Someone was talking about Civ Beyond Earth recently and Potato Mcwhiskey was playing it so I gave it a shot - however, I pirated it and forgot to download the expansion pack at first, so I think I have had the unusual experience of playing the release version of the game and then the fully updated and expanded game back to back as my first impression. I have to say it’s crazy how much better it is. I may have gotten a particularly boring seed the first time around where I was on my own island - and the second game I’m playing on hard, but the game feels much more alive and interesting and I’ve had to actually think about the AI and what I’m trying to accomplish. I don’t know if it’s got legs and I haven’t hit endgame in the second run (it will still probably be a slog), but it’s been a pretty enjoyable civ-type experience with ayylmao characteristics. Watching my little guys shoot giant bugs in the fungal forests is definitely

What I’ve been hearing about civ 7 has gotten me a lot more optimistic about the big design changes, ages in particular. It sounds like they took a really hard look at civ’s lategame sucking because of snowballing and relative impact of decisions compared to how many you have to make and the ages system is intended to alleviate that. I imagine having fewer cities with like subordinate settlements and no workers/builders will also reduce the micro - oh! and you don’t have to manually do logistics for reinforcements anymore. remains to be seen if planes will be pleasant to use.

After weeks of back and forth procrastination, I’ve finally started Path of Exile 2. I’ve finally got my witch to where I can melt down mobs. Still in Act 1 normal mode, but at least I’m not rage quitting after my 50th death. Now I die only 4 or 5 times in a zone.

I’ve been playing modded Skyrim again to get my mind off of things and after playing three hundred hours of that game (according to steam, actually seems kinda low to me) in many different versions and I have to say: This game is actually just ok. Probably their best post-morrowind, although that really isn’t particularly high praise. When you mod it so that it’s better balanced, there’s more things to find and more things to spend your septims on, the gameplay loop actually starts working pretty well. There are also just many, many parts that I’ve never seen before (might try to finish the main quest this time), and that’s pretty cool for a game I’ve often felt I’ve gotten everything out of already. Like when I originally played it at release, it was like forty hours in that once the sheen wore off, that I realized that way too much of that games quests are just lazy excuses to send you into random dungeons, which still holds true, but as I’ve said, once the mods come in that gameplay loop actually works, although it does always still feel kinda flat in its execution.

The modding scene has also genuinely grown into something better than I would have ever thought: There are so many talented people working on that game, it’s absurd. The way they added unto that engine over the years is incredible (they only very recently added things like support for PBR textures, ships and carriages that actually travel the sea and roads and just checking out the Nexus, someone like last week made a mod that adds an Elden Ring-Style horse to the game) and tools like Wabbajack have made modding so much easier. I’ve been playing the “Nordic Souls” mod list, which isn’t the largest or most advanced engine, keeping it somewhat vanilla plus, with many quest mods and follower mods and the likes (all fully voice acted in more than decent quality). It’s been pretty fun. There’s also a mod for an enhanced and fully revamped main quest in the works, which looks pretty promising (maybe they can make a new mages guild afterwards, that still feels like the weakest part of the game to me).