What are you currently playing?

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

Skyrim.  But mostly for my 2 year old daughter at this point.  Really!

She's often fussy in the morning when she first gets up and it became clear after a while that allowing her to choose what goes on the TV right before school was a good way to satisfy her.

I started playing the Legendary Edition of Skyrim I'd had for PC for a couple of years and not touched and one evening she happened to be downstairs while it was going on.  My wife tried to shoo the kids off to bed, but my daughter refused.  I'd been mostly focusing on the game, but apparently at some point she'd taken a break from exclusively playing with her toys in the floor to look up and start paying attention to everything I was doing in the game.  When bedtime came, it was, "No mommy, (points at TV), DRAGONS!"  The wife got my ok to leave her behind and went to bed, leaving me with a toddler who might have been playing at staying up late.  So, I told her if she was going to stay down here and watch the game, she had to sit on the couch with me to do so (I've got my tower set up to use my 4K TV as a monitor with wireless keyboard/mouse).  Without hesitation, she grabbed her blanket, milk and beloved rabbit, then climbed right up onto the couch next to me.  She lasted about an hour before she slumped over into a laying position and I began to hear steady breathing and baby snores.

So, at this point, whenever my PC is on for any reason and my daughter gloms onto this, I'm bombarded with requests for Skyrim.  In the form of "Dragons!  Dragons, daddy!  (little pointing finger)"  Sometimes she'll go right up to the screen and point out the icon if I'm not speedy enough for her tastes, lol.

Honestly, at this point, I'm starting to run out of things to do.  In typical fashion I've skipped going to talk to the Greybeards entirely, but I've completed nearly every other non-main-plot and side quest that I've come across.  At the moment I'm "stuck" because I figured out how to use the in-game mechanics to make really good gear, but can't find any rhyme or reason to how the alchemy/enchanting systems work to be able to do so reliably.  I either make stuff that's trash or stuff that's basically game breaking, which removes most of the fun.  I'm pretty sure that it's just going to take a full evening of screwing around with the alchemy and enchanting benches to figure out the precise balance to be able to make armor and weapons that give me a very noticeable boost above what I can find in the game on my own versus breaking the game so badly that I can just shoot down a dragon with 1 arrow.

[a3quit4s | 4,097]

Taking it back a little and playing call of duty world at war zombies. Der Riese is my all time favorite zombie map! It's pretty crazy I can still get on Xbox live on my 360 and download the map pack. 

[DoctorEncore | 3,691]

Since I finished Last of Us and Hollow Knight, I've been spending time with Psychonauts (Xbox) and Captain Toad (Switch).

Psychonauts has tons of style and the action is great. I'm bummed I waited so long to play it, but it actually looks awesome with the 4k upgrade on Series X.

Captain Toad starts extremely slow to the point of feeling insulting. Thankfully it really picks up in Episode 2 and becomes more challenging and a lot more fun. Definitely feels short, but it's nice to have a game where you can accomplish something in 5-10 minutes.

Edited June 1, 2021 by DoctorEncore

[Inzoreno | 102]

Playing through the DLC of Horizon: Zero Dawn before finishing the game and getting the Platinum. I plan to spend the summer playing through my collection of indie games to hopefully cut down on my backlog a bit before October horror game marathon. 

[YOURTURN | 1,256]

I'm currently playing Dragon Quest Heroes on my PC.

This will be my second attempt at beating the game, which is an irony since I had beaten the sequel twice. But after I finally realized that Phantasy Star Online 2 was lackluster, and that everything requires both money and friends on GTA Online, I figured that I should finish this game up. Before I tackle Dragon Quest XI S... Which I am playing first because I am going to finally play the Erdrick (Roto) series in chronological order. (Even though Dragon Quest Monsters: Caravan Hearts is a Japan exclusive, and I have no chance to cap off this goal with that game.)

[WhyNotZoidberg | 585]

I started playing Cloud Punk on Switch and it suffers from major performance issues so I stopped caring about it. Draw-in distance like I'm playing Daytona on the Saturn coupled with fog effect like Turok on N64, annoyingly frequent load times when travelling across sectors and an uneven frame rate got the best of me. The game is all about its atmosphere and it does everything it can to make sure you can't enjoy said atmosphere. On Switch at least.

So now I'm playing Hades on Switch. The voice acting is dull, but not annoying and the game is fun enough.

Edited June 1, 2021 by WhyNotZoidberg
forgot some words

[Rocketship Evan | 55]

Currently playing Darkstone and Tail of the Sun for PS1. Dark stone I enjoy when I'm in the right mood, but it's a bit of a mindless slog.Tail of the Sun is a game I've enjoyed a lot more than I thought I would, I'm just picking it back up after a long hiatus. It's easy to play and very relaxing. I've explored much of the lands and found some interesting things but I still can't find this island that's on the map, so I'm still looking for that and drowning my poor cave people. Still building my tusk pyramid.… It's a completely pointless game, I love it ha ha

I decided to get into old 3D platformers and I bought quite a few. Now after finishing the first spyro game, I'm trying to decide which platformer to hop into next.

Edited June 1, 2021 by Rocketship Evan

[AstralSoul | 502]

Playing Resident Evil Village on PS4, I've only put an hour into it but it's good so far. 

I also decided to start Monster Hunter Rise on Switch and now I am addicted. I have tried several MH entries in the past but just couldn't get into them and I didn't really know why because the concept was really appealing to me. I kept trying entries in the series because I was waiting for one to hook me, and here it is, finally.

[Webhead123 | 675]

Got sucked back into Sid Meier's Civilization VI again. The game is like crack. You tell yourself, "I'll just play one more turn". Then 3 more hours pass and you realize you should have been asleep 2 hours ago. 

As soon as I wrap up my current Rome campaign, I think I'm about to take a shot at the fabled broken Gaul "Man-at-Arms" strategy. Abusing video game exploits is fun!

[Tanooki | 4,933]

10 hours ago, Webhead123 said:

Got sucked back into Sid Meier's Civilization VI again. The game is like crack. You tell yourself, "I'll just play one more turn". Then 3 more hours pass and you realize you should have been asleep 2 hours ago. 

As soon as I wrap up my current Rome campaign, I think I'm about to take a shot at the fabled broken Gaul "Man-at-Arms" strategy. Abusing video game exploits is fun!

Hey maybe if you're that cracked out on it you can give a fair idea what direction may work best.

I have this but looking to sell it on Switch, just don't see me carrying that around or plopped on a TV for long, but maybe?  I know there's the iOS version (have 8plus) and then you have the PC version too.  Which would you suggest to go with for best usability considering it seemed to have been well designed to function on whatever and not be a reduced cheap port.  Also given the add-on content, is any of it really vital to enjoy the game or more fluff?  If it's worth the bother, would that change your choice on platform to use it?  Price isn't a variable for me exactly, 2K does sales so often you can bank the game cheap on whatever format if you're patient if going for the total package vs base game.

[Webhead123 | 675]

4 hours ago, Tanooki said:

Hey maybe if you're that cracked out on it you can give a fair idea what direction may work best.

I have this but looking to sell it on Switch, just don't see me carrying that around or plopped on a TV for long, but maybe?  I know there's the iOS version (have 8plus) and then you have the PC version too.  Which would you suggest to go with for best usability considering it seemed to have been well designed to function on whatever and not be a reduced cheap port.  Also given the add-on content, is any of it really vital to enjoy the game or more fluff?  If it's worth the bother, would that change your choice on platform to use it?  Price isn't a variable for me exactly, 2K does sales so often you can bank the game cheap on whatever format if you're patient if going for the total package vs base game.

I'll see if I can help.

1) Personally, I think this genre of game is best experienced on PC. It becomes so much faster and easier to navigate all the various commands and menus with a mouse and keyboard. The other HUGE advantage to getting it on PC is the mod support. There are a few really incredible mods that just add quality-of-life improvements. Not at all necessary (I played for a long time without them) but it's the kind of stuff that makes the experience even more streamlined.

2) None of the expansions or DLC packs are "vital". While I think Gathering Storm adds some really cool features (like environmental weather effects and natural disasters), none of it changes the game so fundamentally that it feels like something is "missing" without them. Some of the DLC civilizations are more interesting (and powerful) than other, it's kind of nice that you can both buy the content piece-meal and turn on/off any number of various features. Honestly, the advanced game settings is pretty robust and can customize your game in all kinds of ways.

3) If you like these kinds of slow-building strategy games, then I think Civ 6 is absolutely worth your time, especially since it seems to go on sale on Steam frequently (I just recently bought a bunch of the DLC packs for 50% off). I personally wouldn't play it on console but that's because I have the privilege of a good PC. If I didn't have my PC, I think it would still be worth playing on Switch, although it would feel a fair bit fussier to control.

[Tanooki | 4,933]

Well my PC is 6 1/2 years old with an nvidia 980 8GB chip working with it, and a mid-tier i7 from that era, it's more than capable of maxing out so that's not a problem.  I'm sometimes into these and usually just the CIV ones as I do have 1 and 2 handy.  I could fire up 5 again but it didn't wow me beyond a dozen hours or two as it's in Steam.

DLC good to know, hate to see vital stuff that really is worthy left in the dirt to where the base game suffers.  But as you said, steam, cheap deals often, less so on Switch or Mobile (IOS.)  I do have a bluetooth keyboard I can use though with my phone, possibly trackball too as it has a bluetooth receiver inside it so in theory I could lay it down and jack that into my TV with a lightning/hdmi part I have.

But in the end, despite it being even it's I guess lesser so with lag on lower end and lack of control choices, so PC would be best still.

[Rocketship Evan | 55]

Tail of the Sun. There is a island/continent southwest of Pangaea. On the southside of its mountainous region I found a cave. Deep inside was this set of legs without a torso running around and jumping up and down. I eventually killed and ate it but didnt do anything for me as far as I can tell besides being regular food. There was a large Wooly mammoth tusk cache at the end of the cave complex too. Tusk monolith almost halfway to sun...

 

[WhyNotZoidberg | 585]

My 5yr old picked up the old 3DS and popped Animal Crossing New Leaf in.

 

He asked for some help getting tools and what not soooo....

 

Now I'm playing his Animal Crossing 2 hours a night when he goes to bed to make sure the museum gets the fishes and the bugs and his little game dude has bells to spend when he picks up the game during the day. New Leaf is my crack cocaine.

[ConfusedCollector | 36]

Started bio mutant on the series x today.  Gameplay is ok, I'm not sure on this one but I'm going to play for a bit instead of giving into the negativity around it.

Also,  finished COD cold war campaign last weekend.  It's short with lots of scripted scenes but it was so much fun for a weekend.  The action is on point.

[Californication | 1,477]

Haven't been gaming much this week, but when I do I am playing "Butcher" on the PS4. I don't really hear people talk about this game, but it's alright. It's a 2d twin stick, but instead of playing on a flat surface as most twin sticks, this game has platforms and you need to use the level design for defense and have to plan and make quick decisions on the fly. The game isn't a 10, but it's hard to think of a game that plays like this, definetly deserves a spot in the collection.

[a3quit4s | 4,097]

Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart on PS5. Pretty fun game. Best use of the ps5 graphics that I've seen along with returnal. Never actually played a ratchet and clank title before but I'm digging it. 

[DoctorEncore | 3,691]

8 hours ago, a3quit4s said:

Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart on PS5. Pretty fun game. Best use of the ps5 graphics that I've seen along with returnal. Never actually played a ratchet and clank title before but I'm digging it. 

I'm holding off for a price drop since I have literally thousands of games in my backlog, but I'm glad it plays as well as it looks. I also have never played a Ratchet game so it will be my first when I eventually get to it.

I'm still working on It Takes Two. It's just an absolute delight. Easily one of the best games of the year and among the best co-op games I've ever played. The gameplay is varied and fun and you're always doing something new. Highly recommended.

Also started Mario 64 for the first time. It's definitely fun although it's tough to tolerate the old school camera and floaty movement in 2021. Still, I feel I owe it to myself to play through this classic.

Should be finishing up Psychonauts soon and I've been thoroughly enjoying that one. It has to be one of my favorite 3D platformers. Honestly, I'd take it over any 3D Mario game thanks to the witty writing and fantastic world design. I've heard the final level is a bear, so we'll see how that goes tonight.

Next up, Nier Automata and back to Monkey Island 2 SE.

[DarkTone | 984]

Animal crossing. Mixed reviews, hope its good. 

[DefaultGen | 5,401]

Rolled Out, a sort of successor to Super Monkey Ball. Definitely early access but the controls, physics, and graphics are really good, which is 50% of the way to being Monkey Ball. This was an IndieGoGo a while ago but it's on Steam now. Totally worth it since Sega refuses to make new arcadey SMBs.

[G-type | 2,480]

I just upped the stakes with a little friendly competition with my son@North to see who can beat Super Mario 2 first. Loser has to post a pic on Facebook holding a sign saying the other is a better gamer.

Edited June 26, 2021 by G-type

[Reed Rothchild | 9,523]

1 hour ago, G-type said:

I just upped the stakes with a little friendly competition with my son@North to see who can beat Super Mario 2 first. Loser has to post a pic on Facebook holding a sign saying the other is a better gamer.

That's awesome.  I can't wait until my 3 boys are old enough to start doing that sort of thing.  We're still on the very early phase of playing stuff together.

[Jeevan | 8,910]

2 hours ago, G-type said:

I just upped the stakes with a little friendly competition with my son@North to see who can beat Super Mario 2 first. Loser has to post a pic on Facebook holding a sign saying the other is a better gamer.

I have faith in @North  sorry @G-type but you are prolly better at atari   Anyways, if u all aren't busy later, come play mario party with us in discord!

[G-type | 2,480]

28 minutes ago, Jeevan said:

I have faith in @North  sorry @G-type but you are prolly better at atari   Anyways, if u all aren't busy later, come play mario party with us in discord!

I wouldn't place any bets on me either. I have been playing this game since I was a kid and never made it past world 4

[G-type | 2,480]

12 hours ago, Jeevan said:

I have faith in @North  sorry @G-type but you are prolly better at atari   Anyways, if u all aren't busy later, come play mario party with us in discord!

I would, but I don't have mario party....