Weekly “What are you playing” Thread || Week of June 23rd

I've been playing Soulmask and enjoying it, but I need a break as the building in that game leaves a lot to be desired. So I'm returning to Baldur's Gate 3. I can never bring myself to play Durge or evil aligned characters, but I'm going to try a class and character I've never considered and see how it goes.

sleeping dogs. They sure did curse a lot.

Was getting all set up for another playthrough of New Vegas, mods and all (even made my own, though I ditched it last minute), and then I realised, "Wait, why am I doing this? I don't actually feel like playing this at all right now, even with the new mods."

So, now I've downloaded some stuff in my backlog, but don't know if I'll play any of it at the moment because I'm kind of burned out a little.

Terraria. An old friend popped up to ask me if I'd like to play and it's been many updates ago and at least a decade since I last played. We are playing both calamity and Fargo souls mods mashed together and having a hell of a time with the extreme difficulty as we work through the boss fights.

Not to mention our life schedules work out to 2 hours a day.

Investing a bunch of time into Erdtree. I think some of the bosses probably need a bit of tweaking, in particular Rellana seems to be a spot where lots of folks are struggling. I wonder if someone will figure out the Scaudtree fragment mitigation/dmg boost, but there's definitely a lack of pre-Rellana fragments or just a general struggle with this boss based on how quickly you can get summoned and how quickly people seem to just straight up die when fighting this boss lmao. Took a lot of tries to down him the first time myself but I also haven't touched this game since release and I played through it pretty quick.

Tips for Rellana if you're struggling

A lot of his attacks won't drain a ton of stamina, bring a shield and start to learn his move set. In general rolling into him, especially to the right or left is useful for many attacks. Many of Rellana's moves are also parryable, bring a shield with golden parry or carrian retaliation. Be sure you're running a heavy fire and heavy magic reduction talisman.

Two big points to watch for. When he enters second phase, the animation is good for a solid punish. If you punish him he'll almost always do the flame pillar move, so punish and roll back a few times.

When he jumps in the air with two blue orbs, get ready to jump 3 times or have a good shield and full stamina. You might want to run a bit away from him to make timing the jumps easier.

At the end of this week, I will be getting a new game PC. So, I will play:

The last of us part 1 remake
High On Life
Cyberpunk 2077
Alan Wake 2 (half replaying it, already played 4 hours on the PS5)

I wanted to be a bit more productive in my spare time, but I have made a huge mistake:
I started playing Vagrus - The Riven Realms again.

The world building in Vagrus is excellent. It's set in a post-apocalyptic fantasy Roman empire, and there is a massive amount of text that details the world, and the people living in it. There is so much to read, that the devs even thought it necessary (and rightfully so) to display a warning about the sheer amount of text on the game's startup screen, with the suggestion to refund it if one doesn't enjoy a lot of reading. Sooo, of course this is the perfect game for me - or would be if I had more spare time.

The game is a mixture of trading sim and role playing game. You play a vagrus (a caravan leader), and travel the land trading wares, transporting passengers, spreading gossip and doing missions for different factions, you also have a lot of story elements that you can (and should) follow. There is turn-based combat, and during story events there are plenty of skill checks.

The game is relatively difficult, due to its interwoven mechanics. You need to calculate relatively tightly in order to make a profit, but if you loose people in combat, not having reserves might lead into a morale-loss and hunger death spiral... Also, due to the game's grim settings, the choices one faces are more often than not to either do what is right, or to survive.

GregTech: New Horizons

:)

The Talos Principle 2 dropped an expansion out of nowhere. It hasn't even been a year since the game released! The puzzles so far are really creative and cool, and of course it wouldn't be The Talos Principle without a healthy dose of philosophizing about the human condition!

I'm still on the first chapter but it's awesome. But I got stuck on 2 of the bonus puzzles and age of wonders 4 and Elden Ring both dropped dlc as well so I'm currently playing way too much Elden Ring. I have to say that the philosophising in the first chapter didn't land with me but maybe that's because love for me isn't something to thoroughly analyze.

Fallout 4 with Sim settlement 2 mod, i played F4 years ago but now i want to try with SS2. In a corner i have System Shock remake waiting for me

Yeah elden ring SotA, I finished all the bosses and all the content but 1 optional boss on saturday, and the last boss yesterday. Good dlc but the balancing is kinda whacky and is has the typical complainers about difficulty, the typical defenders that have not finished the dlc, and then people that have done all bosses that know that the last boss is the most overtuned piece of shit to be ever crafted in ER. The other optional hard boss (bottom right) is also kinda stupid but it's optional and it does give you SOME breathing room, but the last one is just completely un enjoyable.

ayyy new thread new game!

well kind of. I'm actually playing Caves of Qud a bit, now that I understand it more (I did end up installing the tutorial mod, thank you for that! and I did watch a small non-spoilery tutorial series as well) and I'm having a really good time. I started out with a character the tutorial recommended and have been fighting fish to level up. planning on taking on the first big quest tho!

sadly I'm stuck on an old gaming laptop that doesn't really like to play games, so I can't jump into all the games I want to. even my gacha game I play is pushing it, although I still login every day and do my required stuff. the laptop just gets extraordinarily hot. it handles Caves of Qud, because ascii, but I was wanting to jump in to Elden Ring at some point (I don't have the DLC, does it make new runs more exciting at the beginning or is it a later thing?) and realized it's not an option I think due to my laptop's specs and general grumpiness.

so I've been wrestling with Borderlands 3 to get it to work, and my partner and I have been playing that for a bit. I love the BL series, although 2 was imho the best for writing. the humor still annoys me sometimes but I started playing the series with the first one when it came out, as a kid, so it has a special place in my heart. my partner hasn't really ever played first person shooter games, so Destiny 2 (when we played) and Borderlands was their introduction.

Wait. There is a tutorial mod ?! Can you give me a link to it please ?
- yep! here it is on the steam workshop and I hope it helps you out! if you want the video series too, I can shoot that your way, it doesn't really spoil anything and I didn't know 95% of the mechanics even existed.
  
  live and drink friend!

Against my better judgement, i decided to look into Genshin Impact.

I've resolved to not spend any money on it, and I'm fairly happy with my experience so far. I'm currently in act 2 in Inazuma, and I've really been enjoying the Archon quests. Despite the fact that I spent 0 dollars on it, this part of the game really does feel like a full retail game experience.

The world quests are alright, though I'm honestly having trouble fitting them into my adventures; too much adventure experience is coming in, which is causing me to hit world level increases, which is causing me to need to grind ascension mats for my roster, which is causing too much adventure xp. It's a lot! Dragonspine was a fun detour, though.

Story quests are probably my favorite feature in this game. Low stakes hang outs with the weirdos in your party is a fun and important part of RPGs. And Genshin really gets that. The only problem is... A lot of these weirdos aren't in my party! If Story quests unlocked the characters at their conclusion, I'd have had no qualms with putting $60 down on this game, but they're pretty much all locked behind the gacha mechanic which suuuucks. Shenhe and Diluc should be in my gang right now, but the funny gacha rocks disagree. Not a fan of that.

The resin and primogem stuff I feel really negatively about. I don't want that stuff getting in the way of the fun parts, but I'm constantly scraping up against both. It's not intrusive enough to dampen my experience while actually playing through the quests or exploring though, so I think I'll put up with it until I'm satisfied with exploring Teyvat.

genshin is surprisingly good (I was also wow'd when I started playing), but ultimately I found the story lacking in a lot of key places for me (justice for Inazuma's story especially!) which ultimately led me to quit for now. I played for two years, and have a pretty well established account. however, I have really bad fatigue issues and wasn't able to keep up as well with the adventuring requirements, such as having to unlock chests for free primogems.

I think playing it until you're tired of the grating parts is a totally valid way to experience it. especially because it's free!

like the other comment, I tried Honkai: Star Rail and honestly I love it so much more. it is turn-based combat, but I feel like the writing is better, and they treat their characters better storywise (in contrast to genshin, which imho the hangouts for four stars are not comparable to the story quests some four stars get.) it's my gacha game of choice, and while I've had my nitpicks, I have those with every game I play pretty much. I also agree it's more f2p friendly.

these are all just my opinion tho! I hope you enjoy your time with the game and that you get the characters you want. may your pulls be blessed!
- "...and that you get the characters you want. may your pulls be blessed!"
  
  Thanks, I could really use the bless. I have yet to get a fire character I like and can use. I'd take the bomb goblin in Jean's basement at this rate.
  
  Amber could not leave my party fast enough, and Xiangling is in the timeout corner from the time her rat refused to light the torches on dragonspine. I did get Thoma from the character event, but he absolutely refuses to be ascended past level 20.
absolutely! Genshin is actually a surprisingly good game as a f2p player! If you're having a lot of fun with it, I'd highly recommend checking Honkai: Star Rail! It's somehow even more f2p friendly, and it's clear they learned a LOT from Genshin when making it. It is a linear turn-based RPG though, so quite a different game from Genshin.

Currently replaying The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD. Also have a save going for Stardew Valley and Baldur's Gate 3 (well, I have a few games going for BG3; I have my solo game, I have a game with my partner, I have a game with my partner and a friend, and then I have a game with my partner and two of his friends). I should also get back into Pathfinder: Kingmaker, but I think at this point I need to restart my save because it's been so long.

Yep, shadow of the erdtree :) I've been big on invading since Dark Souls 1 and I found that the fog catacombs are a delight to invade in.

Long zone with few checkpoints
Lots of traps
Elevators :D
Imps that do bleed so moghs great rune is decent
Marika's stakes so I don't feel toooooo bad murdering people right before they reach the boss lol.

Love those cannon imps. Such a goofy enemy, and such a good enemy for invaders. Anything that does aoe and knockback is my bff in invasions.

Fun!

I'll probably pick it up in a few weeks. I'm having a lot of fun with BG3 right now.
- Oh nice! I gotta go back and play that again, they added a bunch of epilogue stuff since I ran through the first time :)

Still playing Dark Souls 2 - almost 100 hours in and there's just Darklurker and Aldia left. This game just keeps going and going, really well worth the cost. Since I'm almost through, I can see why it seems to be the black sheep of the series. But, despite some problems (like needing to refer to a guide constantly) I like it a lot, and will definitely do a NG+ eventually.

Also started Yooka-Laylee and I love it already. It's very true to the Banjo Kazooie style.

I've been mainlining Esports Godfather, which is the surprise hit of the year for me so far. The title is nonsensical and on the surface it looks like it can't be good, but it's been so much fun.

It's a MOBA-themed sort of deckbuilder/autobattler/management game - which sounds like a hot mess but plays so much better than you'd think. At least after you get over the initial information overload.

I wish the AI was a little smarter, but even with the game being a touch too easy it's incredible how much fun it is. Loads of cards and heroes to build synergies with and rotating version rulesets keeping things fresh even within a single run.

At just €16 on Steam I'd easily recommend it to anyone with an interest in the genre, and there is even a free demo that covers the first couple hours of a run.

Definitely Shadow of the Erdtree! I’ve already beaten the Dancing Lion boss. Just started playing WoW Classic again too and found a guild filled with super nice people. So that’s been fun.

I played Daniel Linssen's Leap Year, and I highly recommend it! $5 for a delightful single sitting. Goofy mechanics whose depth you slowly discover by exploring and experimenting. Some of the most brilliant level design I've seen.

I picked Baldur's Gate 3 back up two weeks ago.

Last summer I played Act 1 of the game and found myself thoroughly satisfied, and decided to wait to play the rest.

Act 2, like Act 1, is just as awesome. We'll see if I decide to take another break before the third act, haha! This game is nothing short of a masterpiece.

Other than that I've been taking a lot of 10-15 minute breaks while working from home and enjoying the minigames on Meta Horizons.

Once again, I played far too much World of Warcraft Remix this week. I do have three more maxed characters now though and all achievements for the mode. I found Frost Mage to be surprisingly fun, after I totally hated it (my old main) and completely abandoned magic DPS altogether at the beginning of Shadowlands. This time I'll definitely take it slower and will try to only play my Druid. It went so well the last two weeks.

Depending on how much I get into the new expansion, The War Within, Balance Druid and Frost Mage are definitely some I'll consider taking a look, although my Windwalker Monk will most likely stay my main.

Then, more Diablo 4. I'm almost level 90 with my Necromancer, Minion build is still boring, but I'll keep it at least until level 100, and I've checked out more endgame stuff.

Still working on Diablo 4: Season 4 and Mad Max

I've been enjoying Pacific Drive this week. It's a great survival crafting game in the vein of Subnautica, which is to say there is a linear progression path for upgrades and improvement, and a well-defined objective and end goal.

I just wish it was less stressful. Even just the normal act of activating a gateway to end a run requires a race through your current zone where one misstep can cause you to get stuck long enough to fail. And sometimes conditions just really stack up against you in a way that can be unexpected and frustrating.

Overall though it really hits the spot with its loop. I love returning to the garage and going through the ritual of healing, fueling up, recharging, transferring supplies, and checking on upgrades.

Oh...I also finished and platinumed 13 sentinels earlier this week. I enjoyed that one a lot more than I expected. It's as compelling as it is eye-rollingly funny how many sci-fi tropes the main story burns through, but I i was frequently and pleasantly taken by surprise. And the battle system, which through the first area I thought was so easy it was basically a formality, really did become more challenging and tactical, especially when trying to get S ranks.

Slowly grinding my way through a Pokemon Red Professor Oaks Challenge(Yay, switch-training Magikarp...), and when my brains to the point of melting from that, Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous. Kitsune Bladebound Magus, happily traipsing her fluffy way down wherever Desna may guide her.

May the Gods have mercy on the crusade she's going to lead.

The Elder Scrolls Online has been my go to for the weekend so far, it's something I enjoy dropping in and out of sometimes.

Catching up on Final Fantasy XIV Post-Endwalker content and preparing for Dawntrail.