I finished doing all the everything in Hades 2 and moved on to another, much weirder roguelike, BAZR, a mod of Super Mario 64 which makes it a roguelike deckbuilder. Great game and easy recommend, but time bonuses make it hard to suggest to anyone who hasn’t played a lot of the original already
X-COM 2: War of the Chosen:
I’ve played this game off and on for years. Fondly wishing I could get back to it and just not having the time. Then I caught strep throat and literally couldn’t do anything but just play games.
Honestly? Finally. I felt like crap, but I was so happy to have an excuse to just enjoy myself instead of being obsessed with what I “had” to do.
The game changed a lot since I last played so I had to start a new save, and I’m having a blast. I love this game so much even with some of its flaws. Do your squaddies miss a 90% shot sometimes? Yes. Infuriating.
But when they make that hail-Mary hit that saves a teammate, or you sneak through a compound to break out an imprisoned comrade and exfil, it’s ADDICTING.
Also, not gonna lie…the game hits a little different in 2025, seeing as it’s about being resistance fighters waging insurgency and a propaganda war against an alien occupying authoritarian regime that is kidnapping people and hauling them to blacksites. Man, that uh, is a little uncomfortably close. (But it’s only a game…The aliens are actually competent.)
The custom voice packs are incredible too. (My sniper with a Bob Ross voice calmly saying “Let’s do a little painting today.” Or “Let’s get a little crazy.” When setting up a shot from across the map never gets old.
This game’s complete version I’ve seen on Steam for like $5 before. This is one of the best tactical experiences there is, and at first I hated the “pressure” this game puts on you, but I’ve come to enjoy the urgency and being forced to weigh difficult decisions rather than just sending my “A-Team” of snowflake OCs to clear every single mission at a leisurely pace haha.
And the soundtrack. Oh man. Once that “Ready for Battle” track hits where you select everybody’s loadout, you really feel the weight of assembling the right squad when you never know 100% what you’re about to send them into.
Red Dead Redemption 2
…again
I’ve just resurrected my partner’s old(ish) gaming PC. It’s got a reasonable GTX1060 GPU, so I’ve installed Kubuntu and am dipping my toes into the world of Linux gaming. So far it’s been pretty smooth.
Difficult to know how well it’ll handle RDR2 properly until I’m out of that accursed opening section up in the mountains. Not for the first time I wish there was a way to skip straight to the train holdup.
Dead space. Such a simple and fun game. Like literally just follow the white line and shoot the baddies.
I’ve fallen for Cyberpunk 2077. I had nearly forgotten how much fun Cyberpunk as a genre is. Just driving around the city seeing the sights right now.
First person driving at night in Cyberpunk was one of my absolute favourite things. Especially in the rain! Such a vibe.
The game made me love motorcycles.
I bought Detroit become human on the steam sale. Gonna finally give it a go
Mad Max
I’ve played it before and own it on a few platforms but it is £2.99 on Xbox at the moment so thought why not. It looks and plays great with the auto HDR and FPS boost and is kind of the perfect game to jump in/out of using quick resume. Started a new save this afternoon and will probably try and get some of the achievements I missed first time round.
Also been playing some demos on Steam and looking forward to a few of them. Tavern Keeper is my favourite so far.
Decided to give Baldur’s Gate 3 another try, though this time I’ll also be doing some modding. I wish I could remove most of its D&D-ness, but then again, at that point I might as well just replay Original Sin 2 instead. I’ll at least have a mod with 2x or 4x Spell Slots, because that’s one of the most obscene mechanics in a TTRPG with spellcasters, but also other general gaming changes like merchants dropping items or better highlighting.
Still having fun with Deep Rock Galactic, unlock the Hazard 5 difficulty but don’t see myself getting too deep into it. Though I also wish the game had ‘pointless’ Assignements besides the weekly one, I play a lot better when I have a fake objective to pursue, rather than just going through missions at random.
Went back to try Tokyo Xtreme Racer 3 for PS2 after getting into the series from the new game on Steam.
The driving is a lot more unforgiving than the new game but It started to grow on me the more I played it.
I’ve started Cave Story for the first time and it seems really cute. I recently modded my old DSi, so I’m playing that version.
I have been waiting for Cave Story+ to go on a sale for so long, I don’t think it’s every going to happen. Will just have to buy it at full price some day.
I’m just pirating, but from I saw a lot of people have the opinion that the original is a better experience. If I remember correctly it’s an option to just go with original graphics and audio in +, but I figured I’d test out to see if how well the modded DSi works for me.
Trying to give BG3 another try. Also want to finally beat Undertale. And still continuing Chrono trigger.
Why did you drop BG3 before?
I dunno, I just sometimes get “lost” in big open world games, too many possibilities, and it starts to feel like a big responsibility and a chance to mess up something important. Basically I easily get overwhelmed.
I can understand. Sometimes this causes me to play the starting area of the game multiple times, just to make sure I chose the right starting class etc.
Exactly! I replay a lot, even entire games if I liked them, it’s always less stressful than start something new and big.
Another issue is that I often have less energy to continue something that to start, so I often know the beginning of a game or a tv series or anything but don’t know the rest because I dropped :')
Well, it’s good to know I am not the only weird one 😀
I’m finally playing Alan Wake 2 again this week, playing through the Final Draft before doing the DLCs for the first time. Sadly something seems to have gotten borked when I moved PCs and transferred my save manually - only some of the stuff that’s supposed to carry over to NG+ actually carried over. Very strange. I had looked forward to having Saga’s whole arsenal from the start but oh well.
Game is great. Having waited for so long to return to it has only made the experience better, absence makes the heart grow fonder and all that. Having a significantly better PC than last time also only makes the visual splendour more impressive, although I still can’t even come close to playing it maxed out. It’s a gorgeous game, beautiful HDR implementation and just perfect art direction.
I don’t have much to say as I’ve not only already played it, but also just love it. I guess the collectibles are a little unnecessary, grindy and annoying if you want to 100% it. Also the case board stuff is a little tedious on subsequent playthroughs as a lot of it is unskippable. That’s it for notes. Play it if you haven’t already, it’s wonderful. Try playing some previous Remedy games first if you can, the Remedyverse is cool.
Tangle Tower. Amazing point and click murder mystery game, with beautiful hand drawn animations and environments.
I saw the sequel was coming out soon so I decided to check it out and it’s become one of my favourite short games of all time, highly recommended.
Oh that’s a lovely game! We really enjoyed that one too! The voice acting was sublime and the characters were so loveable. It was so endearingly quirky without going way over the top.
Exciting to hear that there’s a sequel coming!!
After seeing comments here on patientgamers I was reminded that I wanted to play Yoku’s Island Express. So I did. 97% complete. Not sure what’s left to do but I’ll figure it out.
Also around half-way through Pepper Grinder so I’ll be working on that for a couple evenings.
Cyberpunk 2077
It’s time for V’s depression arc. After botching the gig of her life, nearly dying and losing her apartment due to unpaid rent during her recovery she’s back to minor jobs and turning tricks just to survive. Things are looking bleak but that’s the Night City way, isn’t it?
I enjoy this role-play heavy playthrough more than I though I would. There’s a lot more downtime and conflict avoidance, making me feel more like part of the world than a normal playthrough. I also get to familiarise myself with the city better thanks to the lack of car and disabled fast-travel forcing me to walk more.
I still need to force myself to not slip back to my usual way of playing (unlimited hacking works) but I’m getting used to it. I’m sure it’ll lead to some painful encounters while I’m still figuring out what to focus on but it should be worth it - if only for variety’s sake.
Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary
Last time I mentioned the secret videos being kinda meh - well, the one on level 9 (Keyes) was pretty interesting. I missed 2 videos so there might’ve been something else but that’s where I’m at with them for now.
As for the game itself… I appreciate it from a historical perspective but I don’t think I’ll be coming back to it any time soon (unlike Reach). As game progressed, both level design and many of the encounters turned from “it’s neat” to “there’s more?! just let me progress, please”, turning a fun return to a classic into an exhausting experience.
I feel like this is one of the few games were age really affects my enjoyment of the whole thing, which is funny because I didn’t have similar issues with ONI (and that one is even rougher as a product).I don’t regret it but I’m glad it’s done.
Halo 2: Anniversary
This game feels very different right off the bat. Even disregarding the Anniversary version improvements, the bombastic opening and light-hearted dialogue make the whole thing feel more like an action movie than an unnerving wannabe horror experience of the first game. I’m not saying that the original didn’t have cheese or that this game won’t have more serious moments but going through the start suggests a very different experience. Also, that Miranda Keys voice acting… it’s not great. Everyone in the game sounds fine except for her, no idea what happened there.
I really like Halo’s take on future earth, especially with the updated Anniversary art style - it looks great! One nitpick here is that the moment you look outside the designated arena (even places you can easily walk to) things start getting real empty pretty much right away. It’s not a huge issue and doesn’t really take away from the atmosphere but it did catch my attention.
Just like with the first game, I think they did really good job with the remaster. Refreshed art style, updated music and sound effects, new cutscenes - it all combines into a great package that feels awesome even today. I was a bit sceptical in terms of what to expect from these updated versions so I’m glad I was wrong.
Secret videos are another improvement - they are way more interesting than the ones in the first game. Maybe it’s because I don’t really care about the Forerunners storyline or perhaps because these ones are more directly relevant to the games I played. Either way I liked them more than Guilty Spark’s monologues.
One technical issue that’s bothering me (also happened in ODST) is that game mostly works fine but sometimes it registers my mouse input as if I clicked on the second monitor, losing focus until I click back on the game. Doesn’t happen often but it can be a huge pain in the middle of combat. I could understand if this happened all the time due to window mode setting but nope, it’s completely random.
Halo 3: ODST
Last week I said I won’t be pausing my Halo 2 playthrough to play ODST… well, I ended up doing just that.
I liked it quite a bit and found the hub based progression + multiple perspectives to be an interesting departure from the usual formula. I was expecting to feel a bit more vulnerable as a “normal dude” but considering how quickly you can die on Heroic in other games the difference is pretty much non-existent. What is noticeable is the gun feel - none of the weapons sound or feel as good as those in other games. I do like the pistol at least, not because it’s an exception or anything but it’s a perfect tool to thinning out the enemies from a sniping distance. It’s pretty crazy.
Despite great presentation, both voice acting and some of the cut scenes make the game feel just as light-hearted as the beginning of Halo 2 - it doesn’t prevent me from liking the characters and their interactions but it’s not really a grunt experience I was expecting it to be. I don’t have a problem with Holywood Halo but I do prefer the atmosphere and tone of Reach and the few books I read. There are still some beautiful, melancholic moments however they feel like a bonus rather than a main goal.
Unlike the anniversary versions of CE and 2, this game has secret audio logs instead of videos which I like quite a lot. They’re actually my favourite of the secret logs so far. They have great voice acting, simple but engaging story and good pacing (no weirdly placed sudden cut offs like in Halo 2 videos for example). I missed about half of them so I’ll have to go back and fix that - something I didn’t really feel compelled to do with Halo 1 & 2.
One thing I’ve noticed while playing the Master Chief Collection is that each game I play sounds quieter than the last. Reach > CE > 2 > ODST - every change of game required me to pump up the volume to get thing were I want them to be. Not a huge issue but certainly a weird one.
Also, and this might sound like a hot take, so far Halo 1, 2 and ODST all had certain segments that felt way too long for what they had to offer. As fun as these games are, these segments did little to help keep me engaged and slowly strengthen the feeling of exhaustion whenever they happen. I’m still planning to go through the rest of the MCC but I hope they’ll won’t become too common going forward.
I dunno - is this because I’m playing on Heroic? Does it extend combat encounters or cause any similar changes to the levels? Am I “reaping the fruit of my hubris” or are the games just like that?
This probably sounds more negative than I’m feeling about it so don’t take this criticism too seriously. It’s annoying, sure, but not in an experience ruining way so far.
