What's everybody playing?

[KevinStriker]

Honestly the fact that it’s a detailed strategy game excites me even more. That’s a nice change up after Fireteam. The mental health of your marines is an interesting angle to me.

While I’m not crazy about them ripping a bunch of dialogue from Aliens, the game seems to have its own merits that might make up for that annoyance.

On a side note, was I the only one who found AVP Extinction fun to play?
It was goofy but I loved building my own Alien hive and Predator clan.

AVP Extinction was one of his earlier reviews, and he does give credit where it's due. But there's also a lot wrong like repetitive environments, sound mixing, the Predator campaign's difficulty spikes (and that one music track he calls a Captain Beefheart experiment which always makes me chuckle). But that's his wheelhouse, is ambitious and eccentric but flawed games.

 

[bSTAR_182]

AVP Extinction was one of his earlier reviews, and he does give credit where it's due. But there's also a lot wrong like repetitive environments, sound mixing, the Predator campaign's difficulty spikes (and that one music track he calls a Captain Beefheart experiment which always makes me chuckle). But that's his wheelhouse, is ambitious and eccentric but flawed games.

To think my mom had to listen to this game in the background… LOL

I do like this guy’s reviews so thank you for sharing!

 

[KevinStriker]

To think my mom had to listen to this game in the background… LOL

I do like this guy’s reviews so thank you for sharing!

Happy I could help, I've been watching since his Limbo of the Lost video got sucked up into the YT algorithm and wouldn't stop being recommended to me, lmao

 

[Ikawaru]

Silent Hill 4: The Room

What an interesting game, I'm at the part where you have to unlock all of the apartment doors and get to Eileen's apartment. This game is not for the mentally feeble/cluttered, you have to have a sense of mental clarity and soundness and pay attention to all the notes and all the dialogue to progress in the game. Drug addicts/alcoholics need not apply here. While I am progressing in the game fairly steadily, something tells me I may have to replay the game to see the pattern of this whole "Orphan Walter, son of Rachael and Mike killed a bunch of people" riddle, the pattern of the games plot is certainly unraveling itself but I may need one more playthrough to piece it together completely. Something tells me that I should not take all of this at face value and their may be some kind of bit of a "twist" later on.

Controls and combat are frankly, terrible, and I've managed to hopskip through the game with minimal fighting because it's more of sound strategy to just dodge everything, go back through the "hole", heal up, and then venture forth again. I mean it can be fun to shoot and ****stomp enemies occaisionally, but most of the time it's not even worth it. All-in-all the controls and combat leave something to be desired, even though I've pretty much gotten used to them by now.

Wasn't this game poorly received by "the community" when it was launched? I remember reading something to the effect that the feedback of this game was so abysmal and sales were quite poor that Konami pulled the plug on Team Silent and handed the series to a different studio. At this point that seems kind of strange because while the game is certainly not alpha tier holy grail of gaming, it is certainly not a bad game and has a lot of interesting features and themes. It seems to have aged well because I am enjoying and it seems to be slowly finding an audience with time. It's just unorthodox and requires a certain mindset and perhaps was just a little too ahead of its time.

Will continue playing and see where these trails of bodies lead me and find out what the deal is between Walter and Henry, Silent Hill, the orphanage and this weird religious cult. "011/21" out!

 

[Ikawaru]

Silent Hill 4: The Room (cont.)

Ok, game is definitely getting creepier and more challenging as you progress. Your room is no longer a perfect "safe space" where you auto heal, it's getting darker, creepier and the auto heal function is disabled so you have to be more careful and calculating when engaging enemies because...you can't auto heal! The plot is still unraveling itself and interesting but still nothing really "shocking" has happened yet.

I just got past the subway station (again), this time with Eileen. There was tons of backtracking in this segment and I can imagine a lot of players giving up at this point with no room healing, backtracking through subways, and having to babysit Eileen. It personally didn't bother me too much, slightly annoying perhaps but I can imagine impatient people getting frustrated here and perhaps throwing in the towel. Dogged determination got me through it though. Am now at the part where you're back in the forest putting body parts together and getting closer to The Truth.

As far as scares go, I don't find this game game particularly unsettling. Maybe because it's a 20 year old game and things become desensitized over time, but thus far the only things that truly creeped me out was some of the ghosts, the room losing its "safe space" appeal, and Eileen's giant head gawking at me in the hospital (by far the scariest part of the game so far). The interesting plot, dialogue, writing, pacing, and how it all ties into progression are the strongest aspects of the game, and I can only imagine that 20 years ago it was probably an even scarier experience. It's definitely gotten creepier though than it was in the 1st half of the game.

Alright, back to the game, I just found a chain that Eileen can equip, may make her more useful in combat hopefully. She does a great job agro-ing monsters so I can outflank them with my axe so if she can have more attack power, that would be great. Still itching to see what this "Truth" is that Joseph keeps writing about in the red diaries.

 

[bSTAR_182]

Silent Hill 4: The Room (cont.)

Ok, game is definitely getting creepier and more challenging as you progress. Your room is no longer a perfect "safe space" where you auto heal, it's getting darker, creepier and the auto heal function is disabled so you have to be more careful and calculating when engaging enemies because...you can't auto heal! The plot is still unraveling itself and interesting but still nothing really "shocking" has happened yet.

I just got past the subway station (again), this time with Eileen. There was tons of backtracking in this segment and I can imagine a lot of players giving up at this point with no room healing, backtracking through subways, and having to babysit Eileen. It personally didn't bother me too much, slightly annoying perhaps but I can imagine impatient people getting frustrated here and perhaps throwing in the towel. Dogged determination got me through it though. Am now at the part where you're back in the forest putting body parts together and getting closer to The Truth.

As far as scares go, I don't find this game game particularly unsettling. Maybe because it's a 20 year old game and things become desensitized over time, but thus far the only things that truly creeped me out was some of the ghosts, the room losing its "safe space" appeal, and Eileen's giant head gawking at me in the hospital (by far the scariest part of the game so far). The interesting plot, dialogue, writing, pacing, and how it all ties into progression are the strongest aspects of the game, and I can only imagine that 20 years ago it was probably an even scarier experience. It's definitely gotten creepier though than it was in the 1st half of the game.

Alright, back to the game, I just found a chain that Eileen can equip, may make her more useful in combat hopefully. She does a great job agro-ing monsters so I can outflank them with my axe so if she can have more attack power, that would be great. Still itching to see what this "Truth" is that Joseph keeps writing about in the red diaries.

I’m curious to hear what you think after you complete your play through. I personally love SH4 and think that it’s such an underrated SH game. While the game does have its flaws, I think it has one of the more interesting and unsettling stories of the series.

 

[Ikawaru]

I’m curious to hear what you think after you complete your play through. I personally love SH4 and think that it’s such an underrated SH game. While the game does have its flaws, I think it has one of the more interesting and unsettling stories of the series.

I beat it, it was quite good! I think I got the bad ending though because I just wanted to get through it xD. Story didn't pan out as interesting as I hoped but it was still solid and "horror movie" grade if you wanna call it. A little too much emphasis on the Christianity/Satanism duality for my liking but all-in-all I enjoyed solving the riddle and reading all the notes. I may try again later and gun for the good ending. I'm glad I finished it though in any case, I only had to cheat and look up what to do next a couple times so that's something!

From what I can gather, it applies the Japanese national problem of young people living in isolation and being afraid to leave their rooms with Western themes of Christian horror, so it's an interesting mixed bag of storytelling (Christianity IS on the decline in the West but nonetheless that was the design philosophy they went for).

I just looked it up. I got the **** ending because I didn't take proper care of Eileen and because I didn't clear all the "hauntings" in room 302. I may just restart and try harder and go for the good ending.

Can't wait to try SH2R!

 

[Jonipoon]

I tried giving Ghost of Tsushima a chance a few weeks ago, but I lost interest very quickly because of how ridiculously linear the game is. After hearing so many good things about this game I was surprised by its childish tendency to "hold your hand" in almost every situation and give little room for self-exploration or divergent paths. I might as well be watching a movie, and that's not what you want from a video game.

It remains to be seen if I decide to pick it up again. So far I've managed to reach the open world part and I've done a few missions, and while the story isn't that bad to be honest, the linear directives and overall generic structure of the game hurts the story - unfortunately.

 

[Frag Maniac]

I've been playing Atomic Heart a lot, and just reinstalled Remnant II after the dust finally settled from a move I made recently, and a vehicle that got stolen.

I enjoyed Atomic Heart thoroughly, and was delighted what I thought to be a bug was just needing to find a couple door keys. You CAN however understandably get mislead at one point if you focus too much on unlocking a certain testing ground, as you can overlook a door key sitting right near the terminal you unlock 3 locks with. Mainly because the objective marker was not staying at the point of the key like it should have.

I ended up beating the main game on Armageddon, and Dewdrop and The Twins only took 1 try for the first, and 3 for the 2nd. I have also beaten Annihilation Instinct, and am on the final slide segment of Trapped in Limbo. I know many have said AI is too repetitive and fetchy, with 2 very similar bosses, but IMO they give you plenty variety anyway. I also never thought I'd like Trapped in Limbo, but the slide sections are rather addicting.

Remnant II I had uninstalled some time ago due to running out of space on my then 500 GB NVMe drive, but with a much larger drive now, it's no problem. I decided instead of using my prior save on Survival, I would start a new game on the next difficulty mode, Veteran. It's definitely tougher, but still doable. I've had some good battles with both creatures and bots, as well as 2 dungeon bosses, 1 of each type. The random realms/enemies are incredible!

 

[1995umk3]

Just finished RE:CV again. I believe it’s the best in the series.

 

[Jonipoon]

The Silent Hill 2 remake is not just good, it’s really damn good. I’m only less than halfway through at the moment, but there’s not been a single big complaint so far. I don’t know how they did it, but Bloober Team proved everyone wrong. They successfully made a modern remake of SH2 that both respects and improves the original. I will have fun with this game for years!

 

[Turo602]

The Silent Hill 2 remake is not just good, it’s really damn good. I’m only less than halfway through at the moment, but there’s not been a single big complaint so far. I don’t know how they did it, but Bloober Team proved everyone wrong. They successfully made a modern remake of SH2 that both respects and improves the original. I will have fun with this game for years!

That's really high praise coming from you. As someone who missed out on a bunch of survival horror games from the late 90s to early 2000s, including the Silent Hill series, I'm just glad there's finally a bunch of great survival horror games to play now that aren't just first-person walking simulators on PC.

 

[Ikawaru]

Walking simulators sure, but you have to hit that "Combine" function with "Hide in locker" simulators as well.

Not sure if that was ever a Freudian slip and whether or not many of these developers were shoved in lockers in High School, haha.

Glad to see the impressions of SH2R are positive, early reports show lukewarm sales at best but even worst case scenario and the game sells poorly, Bloober Team is now on the development radar and perhaps can be trusted to handle larger budgets survival horror games in the future, maybe even SH1!

Am currently playing 'Last Land' on my phone. It's a medieval development/war game that will cripple your wallet if you are not careful, but it is definitely worth the time and effort if you can consistently drop some of your money in per week to gradually get stronger and beat your opponents. Probably not for everyone and I can't recommend it to anyone prone to impatience or impulsive gambling because this game can and will destroy your bank account if you aren't fiscally responsible.

 

[Jonipoon]

That's really high praise coming from you. As someone who missed out on a bunch of survival horror games from the late 90s to early 2000s, including the Silent Hill series, I'm just glad there's finally a bunch of great survival horror games to play now that aren't just first-person walking simulators on PC.

Yes. You know that feeling when you’re not at home, and you just can’t wait until you get home and can play again? That’s how I feel now, and it’s been ages since I felt that way for a video game.

 

[Turo602]

As much as I'd love to be playing Silent Hill 2 right now, I did pre-order the physical version of Alan Wake 2 a few months ago and decided to do a playthrough of the first one via the remaster just to freshen myself up on the story before it releases next week.

I was worried the game might've aged poorly but luckily, it's just been a reminder of why I gravitated towards the game originally. From Matthew Porretta's brilliant narrations to the Stephen King-esque horrors and David Lynch inspired setting and atmosphere, it all came flooding back the moment Roy Orbison's "In Dreams" started playing at the end of the first episode.

Alan Wake 2 has been a long time coming for me. I was there from the beginning, when they first shelved it, to the story tease in Quantum Break and even Control establishing itself as a shared universe. But having to wait an extra year for a physical release while the game has been out already just feels like a cruel joke.

 

[Jonipoon]

I actually completed Alan Wake II just one day before the release of Silent Hill 2 remake. For me personally, it was a mixed bag, but I think I set the bar too high after watching all those amazing teaser trailers. While the art direction is beautiful and the story is quite compelling, the way it is told is frustrating and lacks focus. Gameplay-wise it comes off as unfinished in many ways which is a shame because you can see a lot of good foundations. I hate to say it but I'd argue it suffers from the unfortunate "style over substance" problem. I don't want to go into too many details since you're still planning to play it, but since you were a huge fan of the first game perhaps you'll enjoy the second one more than I did.

I love David Lynch and I always enjoy a good take on similar genres, but Alan Wake feels like Remedy tries too hard to be weird and artsy.

 

[Frag Maniac]

I've been playing mostly GoW Ragnarok and Silent Hill 2 Remake lately. I also played through Alan Wake 2 on Normal a little while ago, and left off just before the big beach battle on Hard. Really loving Ragnarok, as many have said, it packs more of what 2018 had, but done in a bigger, better way. It also runs flawlessly, save for an occasional CTD, which I've found can be either just a few places in the game, or perhaps minimized by changing the game folder properties to read only after launching it (resets itself). The boss fights in this game can be really epic.

As for Silent Hill 2, I'm a bit annoyed I can't run it at 4K without excessive hitching. It still looks pretty good at 1440p, but I feel my spec should be able to run it at 4K. It's really more atmospheric than I thought it would be, a lot of tense moments. I feel the puzzles could be done a bit better though, they seem to use very difficult to read scribbling on too many of them. In some ways it reminds me of TEW, as it's hard to sneak up on the lower level enemies, especially nurses, in fact much harder than anything in TEW. On Normal though there are quite a few ammo pickups, so as long as you search for it, a few pistol shots will down them, IF you get good headshots.

I too have mixed feelings about Alan Wake 2. I really loved the first game, but this one seems to be more about the visual presentation than gameplay. It's far too easy in so many ways, but even when you reload a save when first experimenting with tactics to try to achieve use of less resources, the game will more often than not have the enemies that appeared not even spawn! There's a few good epic battles, and some creepy moments, but there's FAR too many times when playing as Alan the enemies are just shadowy figures that say "Wake" when you go by.

 

[Ikawaru]

'Alan Wake' 1 did have pretty shallow gameplay and just couldn't really into it, despite the horror tropes. After 'Control' I thought Remedy made great progress on game mechanics and hoped they could apply them to 'Alan Wake' 2 but from what I am hearing that's apparently not the case. I am pretty tough to please in my old age though. I thought 'Jedi Fallen Order' had shallow gameplay and seemed like a cheap 'Tomb Raider' and 'Metroid' knockoff, and seemed like it was coded by an artist and not an engineer.

 

[Turo602]

I actually completed Alan Wake II just one day before the release of Silent Hill 2 remake. For me personally, it was a mixed bag, but I think I set the bar too high after watching all those amazing teaser trailers. While the art direction is beautiful and the story is quite compelling, the way it is told is frustrating and lacks focus. Gameplay-wise it comes off as unfinished in many ways which is a shame because you can see a lot of good foundations. I hate to say it but I'd argue it suffers from the unfortunate "style over substance" problem. I don't want to go into too many details since you're still planning to play it, but since you were a huge fan of the first game perhaps you'll enjoy the second one more than I did.

I love David Lynch and I always enjoy a good take on similar genres, but Alan Wake feels like Remedy tries too hard to be weird and artsy.

I hope I do. I know it's very different from the previous game. Almost seems like a complete reinvention given the gap between the two and I still don't know how I'm gonna feel about the dual protagonists. The technical leap alone almost makes me wish they'd remake the first one for a more uniform experience. I'll definitely share my thoughts here once I play it and see what you have to say.

I've enjoyed Remedy's works since Max Payne and I don't think any has spoken to me quite like Alan Wake, which has become the center of this shared universe of games, greatly heightening my enjoyment of Control which I also found to be immensely inspired and distinctive from their other works.

Personally, I've always liked how weird their stuff can be. It gives their games personality unlike most of the generic focus grouped stuff that comes out today. As much as I enjoyed Max Payne 3 and its incredible movement and gunplay, it just didn't feel right without Remedy's signature style. People often recognize Kojima as being this incredible video game auteur, and while Neil Druckmann certainly wishes he was in that discussion, I think Sam Lake deserves more recognition.

'Alan Wake' 1 did have pretty shallow gameplay and just couldn't really into it, despite the horror tropes. After 'Control' I thought Remedy made great progress on game mechanics and hoped they could apply them to 'Alan Wake' 2 but from what I am hearing that's apparently not the case. I am pretty tough to please in my old age though. I thought 'Jedi Fallen Order' had shallow gameplay and seemed like a cheap 'Tomb Raider' and 'Metroid' knockoff, and seemed like it was coded by an artist and not an engineer.

I don't know if I'd call its gameplay shallow. I think its light based focus is a very unique and welcomed take on combat. It could certainly be refined, but I think the issue stems more from the lack of enemy variety and rather bland encounters for what most people confuse to be a survival horror game.

It's certainly not as combat oriented as something like Resident Evil 4, but I think its influence can be felt for better and for worse. It's definitely no coincidence Alan Wake 2 went full survival horror after the success of the Resident Evil 2 remake which set right the wrongs Resident Evil 4 carried forward for over a decade.

But Alan Wake is a much more narrative focused game anyway, moreso than combat or horror, so I don't really hold that against it too much. It also shares a lot of DNA with open-world games of the time as it was originally developed as one, giving the game an entirely different look and feel from other survival horror/third-person action games. So I'm definitely looking forward to Alan Wake 2's much more detailed and cinematic presentation and hopefully tighter gameplay.

I too have mixed feelings about Alan Wake 2. I really loved the first game, but this one seems to be more about the visual presentation than gameplay. It's far too easy in so many ways, but even when you reload a save when first experimenting with tactics to try to achieve use of less resources, the game will more often than not have the enemies that appeared not even spawn! There's a few good epic battles, and some creepy moments, but there's FAR too many times when playing as Alan the enemies are just shadowy figures that say "Wake" when you go by.

Sounds like the game either has random spawns like the original Resident Evil 3 or an adaptive difficulty like Resident Evil 4. Considering you're reloading checkpoints to practice and save on resources, the game is likely reading the restarts as you having a hard time with encounters and therefore scaling its difficulty to your performance by removing certain obstacles.

 

[Frag Maniac]

Sounds like the game either has random spawns like the original Resident Evil 3 or an adaptive difficulty like Resident Evil 4. Considering you're reloading checkpoints to practice and save on resources, the game is likely reading the restarts as you having a hard time with encounters and therefore scaling its difficulty to your performance by removing certain obstacles.

The problem with adaptive difficulty features in games is they have no idea why the player is reloading a checkpoint. It also negged the spawns with just ONE checkpoint reload. It had zero to do with me having difficulty getting through sections, I was really just unsure how many resources I needed, so as mentioned above, was wanting to experiment with different tactics. It's especially confusing when on the first playthrough on Normal, it would let me try different tactics on the heavy that spawns inside the barn-like building the biker gang uses, but of course that is a hard spawn due to being a mini boss. So I'm not sure whether it's an adaptive feature or not, but I feel such features should have a toggle to disable or enable them due to trying to "help" whether you need it or not.