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Trying to finally finish 'Shadow of the Tomb Raider' now that I have my new laptop and can play it properly.

God, I am so spoiled, living in a 1st world country where you can buy anything you want in limited time. I never imagined 'Shadow of the Tomb Raider' could look and play so brilliantly, everything from the foliage, the water, the models and the objects looks so amazing on a 165hz monitor with maxed out settings, Ray Traced shadows, and 100+ consistent frames per second. You really don't know what you're missing here, just wow.

The gameplay also holds up very well past the visuals of course or I wouldn't even play it, combat is very diverse and responsive, with stealth kills, firefights, lure traps and more. Character building feels rewarding and unique, but not overtly, you kinda get the feeling that you can just max out all skills at some point with enough time and energy spent leveling up. Exploration is fun, there's plenty of backtracking and hidden items of interest scattered through out and tombs to raid. I wish the tombs were more fleshed out, but I suppose this is an improvement over the previous two games.

As for the characters and story, well, pretty generic in my opinion, it's standard Lara Croft, as usual trying to stop some villain trying to use ancient relics to gain great power. It's great to see Lara from time to time but honestly she never struck me as a fascinating character, just an interesting one.

Hopefully the sheer spectacle of this game is enough to keep me playing to the end this time, I am truly dazzled by its presentation in a way I've never been before. Really stunning what modern tech can do.
 
I hate to double post but geez it has been over a month and nobody has posted so here goes..

I am playing 'Sword and Fairy 7', which appears to be a story driven RPG based off of Chinese mythology and actually developed by a studio based in Beijing so it is legitimate. I really like it, the art direction is very good and the story is engaging. Gameplay seemed pretty shallow at first but as you progress more options like weapon crafting and upgrading "spirits" become available so we're slowly hitting well established high JRPG standards as far as party based RPG gameplay goes, but the sad part is that the glory days of JRPG's from the 90's and 00's appear to be over and most Japanese games these days are heavily westernized. So, if you want "Asian-ness", it looks like the Middle Kingdom is filling that void because this game is certainly "Asian" or "Eastern" no doubt about that.

I really like the characters in this game because they all seem to have a purpose and good wisdom. There's a ton of cutscenes and focus on narrative, I mean like for real, don't come in expecting a grind fest because you won't get one, grinding is kept to a minimum and emphasis on story, art/graphics, and characters is prioritized. Ray Tracing augments the visuals, lighting, and reflections so I would recommend playing with an RTX compatible video card for maximum visual fidelity, as I'll again stress that the art direction is quite good.

The story laser focuses on Chinese mythology almost to the extreme, as you cannot call the story anything modern or new age, I mean everything even has cliche names like "Tsaoist monk" "Spirit Demon" and "Immortal Realm" so don't come in expecting anything fresh or original as far as names and styles, as it is old Chinese folklore to the bone and even as far as clothing and hairstyles go. I consider that a positive not a negative but some people might be put off by historical/mythological accuracy shenanigans and prefer adaptations over authenticity.

All-in-all I would recommend it but only if the themes and the story I mentioned would interest you in the first place, not if you're just looking something that has addictive and perhaps grindy gameplay because this is certainly focused on other things aside from that. I'm about 8 hours in so far and I only just pried myself away from the experience just now to post this here so I intend to finish this one w/o a doubt, as I am quite glued to it's presentation.
 
I've been playing Dead Space 3 in 4K equivalent DSR. I really don't get why this game got bashed so much, as it packs in a lot of good content, and chapters 4-7 feel very open world. You can't get much more non linear when you're allowed to bounce around between wrecked space ships via a shuttle and fly in zero-G via suit thrusters to scavenge artifacts, weapon parts, ammo, health, weapon circuits, and oxygen to keep you going. Not to mention some optional side missions along the way, which have some intense monster fights.

I've beaten this game several times on Impossible, yet STILL somehow forget where certain artifacts or weapon parts are. The chapters I mentioned are so open world that you can end up collecting certain things that pertain to one chapter, while engaged in another chapter. I mean it must have been quite a task just to develop it in such a way that the save system properly accounts for the percentage of collectibles completion in each chapter. It also has a Chapter Select feature that allows you to easily revisit chapters, even within key points, like the start of the chapter or the start of an optional "dungeon" side missions contained within, then exit at any time to take a route back to your current story mission in game without even going back to the main menu.

On rare occasions if you choose the wrong path to backtrack, you will be blocked by a now locked door. Case in point, when the explore the CMS Greely side mission is first available, it's wise to finish the main mission on the Terra Nova first where you find and acquire the CMS Crozier shuttle ship to fly to the planet surface. You'll still have to obtain an engine for it, and scavenge parts to build a nav system, while it's docked at the Roanoke, which is a central hub for chapters 4-7. The reason it's wise to do CMS Greely just before leaving the planet is if you go to it right away, you won't have enough Tungsten to build a Torque Bar to open the room in the Greely that contains valuable items, like circuits, weapon parts, weapon blueprints, ammo, health, etc, and they also usually contain a fair bit of tungsten.

The main mistake I made this last playthrough was trying to backtrack to the Greely before finishing the main mission on the Terra Nova, at which point I couldn't actually get all the way back to the Fore Station of the tram, as the last door to it was locked. Nor can you go back to the Greely after finishing the mission to explore it and then leave it. Fortunately all I had to do was use Chapter Select to go back to the CMS Greely mission, and then I had access to it. I could then again via Chapter Select go to the start of Chapter 7 where I left off. This is because your progress in Chapter Select is determined by what actual point you've gone to, not what mission you've completed, so if you see something onscreen verifying CMS Greely or Chapter 7 has started, you now have that as an access point.

This game via New Game+ also has other game modes you can play on, like Classic, where you only have access to blueprint weapons in Dead Space 1, which is also played in Classic POV aiming wise, and Pure Survival, which has no Ammo, Health, or Stasis pickups from enemies or caches. You will only find resources, so you always have to craft those items with them. Completing Pure Survival mode also unlocks MK weapon parts, which have boosted stats. Then there's Hardcore Mode, one I've never played on, where you're on Impossible mode but have to restart the game if you die.

I assume one of the reasons the game got bashed so much besides being more action heavy than the first two, is the weapon crafting system was much more complex, and a lot of players probably didn't get to know how to use it well enough to prepare for the tougher fights. That's a shame, because where the game really gets good is in the optional dungeon missions, which have the toughest, scariest fights. You also need to find all the artifacts in a set to unlock the best weapon circuits, and you will have to do those dungeon missions to find them all. The S.C.A.F. circuits are the best, as they each have a +3 multiplier on two different stats, and it's also the first set that can be collected.

The Awakening DLC is more challenging than the base game. I don't recall if you can play it via New Game +, but I'm currently trying to prepare for that.

BTW, unlike Dead Space 1 and 2, 3 has a pretty good weapon crafting system with monsters you can spawn in, and as long as you are careful how you exit it back to your current game progress, you won't lose any resources experimenting with weapon builds either.

Here's a couple of the more powerful weapons in the game.

This is a Blueprint weapon called the Mjolnir.


This is my preferred weapon I always build anymore, which is a Chaingun with Shotgun, using an Acid Bath attachment.


Looks can be deceiving here, as it can appear the Mjolnir is the better, quicker weapon. While it certainly can be when facing staggered enemies as shown here, it's not as good at handling tough swarms where multiple enemies come at you, especially if any are Twitchers, which move very fast. It's MUCH slower fire rate and need for very precise aiming can often leave you getting overwhelmed.

So while Dead Space 3's Weapon Crafting Arena is nice to have, it can't fully prepare you for the toughest dungeons Necromorph wise.
 
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Frag Maniac said:
On rare occasions if you choose the wrong path to backtrack, you will be blocked by a now locked door.
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This right here is why I never finished Dead Space 3. Was playing in co-op with my brother, we tried clearing up side missions as we went along, and got stuck, didn't really feel like starting all over again and just abandoned it. Didn't help much either that the game felt rather hard to get into as well. Maybe it's better suited as a single player experience, which I'll give them credit for since I've heard co-op and single player offer tailored experiences unlike Resident Evil which forces co-op no mather what.

It's a real shame though because I loved the first 2 games. Just couldn't really get into 3, especially after that bullsh*t that just completely sucked the wind out of everything. Would still like to get back into it one day.
 
The remake of 'Dead Space' is literally right around the corner. If they remove that stupid GPS navigation feature I may look into this one, as I literally could not play the game back when because I found such features to be seriously immersion breaking and seemed childish for such an allegedly "mature" horror game. Yeah, it struck me as that bad, sorry, I only like GPS in my vehicle, not my horror games.

Also that laser cutter weapon thing didn't rub me the right way either so more traditional weapon options to start with also wouldn't be bad. I don't mean to sound ignorant on the franchise, it's just that it immediately hit a lot of wrong personal buttons so I could not get into it.
 
Gun Powder B said:
The remake of 'Dead Space' is literally right around the corner. If they remove that stupid GPS navigation feature I may look into this one, as I literally could not play the game back when because I found such features to be seriously immersion breaking and seemed childish for such an allegedly "mature" horror game. Yeah, it struck me as that bad, sorry, I only like GPS in my vehicle, not my horror games.

Also that laser cutter weapon thing didn't rub me the right way either so more traditional weapon options to start with also wouldn't be bad. I don't mean to sound ignorant on the franchise, it's just that it immediately hit a lot of wrong personal buttons so I could not get into it.
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So you were too bothered to just unbind the key that brings up the nav route, or just not use it? And you didn't bother to notice Dead Space's story revolves around Necromormph outbreaks on mining ships and colonies that use high tech plasma cutting tools, not military weapons? Or, the fact that one of the main features of the Necromorphs is that severing their limbs is the preferred way to kill them when limited to said plasma cutter mining tools? Not to mention that after doing so, using kinesis to pull spiked limbs off their corpses and toss them back at them offers a clever way to conserve ammo in a survival horror game. What most saw as noteworthy and original game design, you somehow see as nonsense.

You may not have intended to sound ignorant on the franchise, but it can't help but be noticed that you in fact are.

As the outbreaks increase, and S.C.A.F. and Earthgov get involved (mostly in Dead Space 3), you DO see more traditional weaponry, but on the player end, they must be crafted. Using the "military" engine though you can create the equivalent of basic firearms like carbine rifles, shotguns, etc. There are also military style weapons even in Dead Space 1 and 2 (which can be found or crafted from blueprints), they're more modern than what are used today though, like Pulse Rifles.

I think your last sentence sums up why so many are put off by game design that goes beyond the norm and innovates with new ideas. Most players seem to corner themselves into a box of what they're familiar with, and give little to no time to becoming familiar with, getting used to, and accepting new game designs. I admit, at first I found the weapon crafting of Dead Space 3 confusing, which affected my gameplay adversely, and I wondered if I would ever like the game. I stuck with it though, learned a ton about it, and now I feel it's one of the best games in the franchise.
 
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Frag Maniac said:
I admit, at first I found the weapon crafting of Dead Space 3 confusing, which affected my gameplay adversely, and I wondered if I would ever like the game. I stuck with it though, learned a ton about it, and now I feel it's one of the best games in the franchise.
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That's exactly how I felt about the crafting and leveling system in 'Parasite Eve', when it first came out in 1998 I was so confused and it seemed too confusing and "out there" but once I actually took some time to learn the damn thing it actually became one of my favorite systems in gaming hands down, and began to see the game as an adequate blend of my two favorite games at that time ('Resident Evil' and 'Final Fantasy VII'). So yeah, I hear that sometimes you have to get out of your comfort zone and learn to dig and appreciate things from time, it's just unfortunately, like a romantic partner, some things just don't interest certain people, despite everything you rationalize and explain its positives, and even efforts to TRY to like something, you just cannot do it and I'm afraid 'Dead Space' is just one of those games to me.
 
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Just started playing Dying Light 2 last night. My only two nit picks so far are that missions you do with NPCs are heavily restricted to how much scavenging you can do while on them, or you'll get a warning you're leaving the mission area. I had to respawn twice because of that. Other than that, the dialog trees are misleading in that you're presented with false choices. I say false because more often than not, Aiden ends up saying the line I don't choose anyway after saying the one I chose. This also doesn't give me a whole lot of faith in how well they've scripted player choice outcomes as far as what NPCs you side with (read last paragraph).

The movement is rather frustratingly gimped at first, but at least they give a reason for it and work the solution for it into a concoction crafting tutorial right after your struggles climbing, so I'm OK with that. In the first game, I usually didn't venture out at night by choice unless on a mission that required it, but here they thrust you right into forced night chases and combat, which I fumbled with a bit. I sort of went with a what the hell attitude once I found the "old school bus", and turned it into a kill zone. I must say though, this game packs some pretty good tense moments sneaking through zombie infested buildings and courtyards, yet it is also forgiving if you use scaffolding, and roofs of vehicles to access roofs of buildings, as well as being able to hide under many tables, and even in tall grass. On hiding spots, it's funny because the first time I saw one, which was under a grand piano, I thought they meant a place to hide gear. It was because I couldn't tell if the icon was for a spot under the piano, or inside it. LOL

I admittedly have often been bad at reading through tutorials completely, as I've been in this game, and it cost me some health where you're taught how to do the Vault Kick. I was mistakenly using E to kick, not having read that when vaulting it changes to LMB. Man those vault kicks are powerful though, even right off the bat when you hardly have any skills. For the most part the parkour feels smooth, save for a few struggles getting familiar with how the new stamina system works. You just need to keep in mind that you can't take your time plotting a route, as free hanging drains it just as fast as muscling up a wall quickly.

My only real concern, and an expected possible 3rd nit pick based on what I've read, is that some missions will end up feeling pointless depending on choices I make with certain NPCs. As far as I know this is Techland's first foray into making a game where player choices affect outcomes of missions, so I'm expecting some poorly designed missions in that regard. I can already see why most seem to say the gameplay makes up for any such nit picks though. I just hope I won't get tired of it, because I've never been the type that is satisfied spending hours horsing around in games like GTA, like many seem to be these days. And no, I'm not comparing DL2 to GTA, just making a point on gameplay that entices players to horse around experimenting with kills. I mean you have to admit, they even have special coins in this game that are meant to be tossed for distraction, which is right out of Hitman.
 
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'Echoes of the Living' demo on Steam. It's definitely a throwback to the RE1-CV age of 'Resident Evil', complete with fixed camera angles and tank controls. Whist it does feel a bit linear at first, as in, run to an area, grab a key of some sort, open object with key, find another key, run back and open another door, find another key, rinse and repeat, it does feel like it's branching out a little bit. I can't help but feel that it could have been a tad bit more open-ended though and to have plenty of areas free to explore and to weave your own path of progression. All-in-all though it's a solid effort of trying to pump life into a antiquated formula and as someone who has played the series from the get-go I do feel obliged to enjoy it for what it is and to give Moonglint credit where it's due. Note to Moonglint: More freedom of exploration and progression would not hurt the game! I hope the final game feels a bit less linear because there's great potential here.

The animations are a bit awkward, and I feel the game throws too many shotgun shells at you at the beginning (Once you get the shotgun you could have over 40 shells in your inventory saved up!), and the controls do feel very awkward at times, even by Tank RE standards, but it certainly looks great and the female protagonist in the game is certainly eye candy, so there's that at least.
 
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I'm playing Back 4 Blood (love it), ESO (they're bringing my favorite Daedric deity/Lore into the next expansion and a new class to make another healer), The Last of Us, Evil Dead and Ocarina of Time. Haha.
 
I just started playing The Last of Us Part I a few days ago. Now before anyone assumes I'm an idiot for buying it so early with all the talk of horrible performance, read further. I've done about a playthrough and a half, am playing on an 8700K, GTX 1080, and 16GB RAM, with stock clocks, at 1080p on ALL High settings, including all Textures, with AF bumped up to 16x, and FSR 2 on Quality mode. I'm talking about gameplay experiences with update 1.0.6.0 btw, as I've not had a chance yet to play with the latest 1.0.7.0 patch.

The Graphics menu auto set me to 4x AF, Default Scaling, most everything at High, with all Textures on Med. It also had Motion Blur and Depth of Field On, both of which I turned Off. I also play with in game Vsync and Frame Limiter disabled, using NCP to set Vsync to On, with a 60 FPS frame rate limiter. This is because if I use the in game VS/FL settings, I get a bit of screen tear. Through most of the game I am now getting at or near 60 FPS. I've had only TWO instances so far where my FPS dropped to 38 for a second, which caused a very slight hitch.

Neither of those very slight hitches affected gameplay at all, as it runs quite well when engaged with enemies. They both occurred during casual exploration, one at the dam when walking near the turbine they'd just turned on, the other at the university when seeing the monkeys outdoors for the first time. Some claim dense forest scenes can have quite an impact, but while in them I stayed at pretty much 60 FPS mostly, whether on foot or horseback, regardless of speed.

I am currently uploading a 28 min video to verify this, and word is, Valve have given an unlimited refund time on this game, due to all the complaints, which I feel is an unnecessary freebie. You MUST however let shaders compile completely in the main menu before playing, or you WILL get stutters in game. On update 1.0.6.0, the shaders compiled in roughly 15 min or so on my CPU. The shaders need be compiled just once, though updating your GPU driver will require it be done again. Game updates however do not affect compile status.

As soon as I can I will post the aforementioned gameplay video that shows onscreen FPS, Frame Time, RAM/VRAM usage, and CPU and GPU usage and temps. It's got a little over an hour to finish uploading according to YT, but processing to 1440p could take a fair bit of time. Hopefully I can get it posted by today sometime.

[EDITED]
And here's that video I was referring to. I should first say this game uses a lot of RAM and CPU. I've always used a tool to disable all telemetry in W10, which frees up at least 1GB RAM, and I highly recommend that for this game. I use O&O ShutUp10, and it can be done with one click. If you prefer to have some apps accessible vs all of them off, it's just as easily reversed as well. I'm sure the same can be done in W11 if you happen to be using it instead.

The frame drop I referred to happens at 8:33. There is also a hitch at 14:13, but that one is a ShadowPlay capture glitch, it didn't occur in game. You can either choose to believe me or not on that one, but you can clearly see the FPS does not drop.

 
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Replaying Village. RE4R gave me the itch to go back to it. I think the gameplay feels pretty basic, but the atmosphere is fantastic and I could play it for that alone.
 
Finally purchased 'Final Fantasy VII Remake: Intergrade' on a sale from Green Man Gaming.

I really liked FF7 especially the characters and the mechanics when I was a teenager but thought the story was a bit too drawn out and took too long to complete, this one appears to be remedying (no pun intended) this so that is good. My only concern is I'm afraid the mechanics will be too simplified but we shall find out soon enough. Downloading now at a whopping almost 100 GB..
 
....And my fears were unfounded, the mechanics are fine, slightly different than the original but they work, and that is good enough for me. The characters are very well portrayed and illustrated, the dialogue is solid, and overall the game is paced better. My only real gripe so far is that the environments do feel quite bland and that's too bad because the rest is great. I can only recommend it for people who played it and enjoyed it "back in the day" because newcomers wouldn't feel as connected to the characters and it would just feel like a standard JRPG with Western characteristics.

Good job square, and daily reminder that there's still an audience for that 'Parasite Eve' remake. ;)
 
I don't have a console atm so just the Lara Croft Temple run on phone, or chess on the phone. Which the CPU gets really cheap in the later difficulties. I was playing RE7 but didn't finish it. Same with RE3R.
 
My buddy's been getting me into Fortnite the past couple months, been playing the hell out of that. I won BR matches with my Batman and Tron Legacy skins that I bought from the Item Shop (I don't usually buy skins, but I couldn't pass those up). Now I just gotta win one with my Optimus Prime Battle Pass skin to complete the trifecta, which I very nearly did one time. I finished second, got the last guy down to 36 health with no shields.

And the two matches I did win with my two Item Shop skins, I got Double Crowns both times and literally stole a vault keycard off a guy I eliminated in one match and a Mythic Drum Shottie off the ground in the other after also going to the vault in that, it was crazy (the former was w/my Batman skin in case you were wondering):

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'Remnant: From the Ashes'

I received this game for free on "Epic Games" a long time ago but never got around to really playing it until now because it's sequel is getting a lot of buzz. I really like it, a lot, where it lacks in rigid "polishness", story, and characters it definitely makes up for in charming gameplay and character development. I am playing as a "Hunter" who specializes in ranged combat and am making pretty ok use of shooting with a crossbow at long ranges.

I'm discovering that I really like games where numbers pop up when you attack enemies. Starting with 'Parasite Eve' in 1998 and 'Remnant' in current times it's becoming clear to me that my brand of action needs to have good numerical values and diverse set of gameplay and character stats or I will get bored and this game does accommodate that itch, even though it is very much, for the most part, an action game and not horror or a full blown RPG. I have criticized multiplayer co-op games in the past but playing on a public server where strangers can pop in randomly and help with tough boss battles isn't very offensive and is actually fun sometimes. One time I was the only player left when two teammates died during a boss battles and I was crouching behind a pillar and wittling down the boss's health with my crossbow until I finally took him down by myself, was a good feeling.

This game does have lots of potential and it is certainly closer to my brand of shooter "crack" than the likes of RE4-RE6, which feel kind of shallow to me and leveling up certain stats and ascertaining which ones will help you most in difficult situations as well as upgrading weapons, armor, and buying supplies that grant buffs and resistances just works much better for me and I am having quite a bit of fun. I cannot wait to try the sequel after this and everything from what I hear it has improved in all aspects so hats off to "Gunfire Games" for developing a certain type of game that probably not every player will fully appreciate but enough to where's a good number of people CAN actually appreciate, flaws with the story, characters and all.
 
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