The OG Silent Hill. Dandelions along a path? A bitter tangerine? What the hell are these puzzles, man?
Also, I love the emergency hammer. It’s my new best friend.
-
Shadow Labyrinth: A metroidvania set in a very dark timeline for Pac-Man. As a metroidvania it is solid. The traversal and exploration are on par for the genre. The sections where you transform into Pac-Man are a cool new take as a variation of Metroid’s classic ball. The maze levels which most resemble the Pac-Man we’re all familiar with provide quite a challenge. Overall I would put this on the shelf next to some of my other favorite metroidvanias including, but not limited to, Hollow Knight, Sundered, and the Ori games.
-
Tales from the Shire: A cozy sim of living in a Hobbit village. I’m sorry, not-village, as that is the goal of the game: to make your small town an official village. I find the pathfinding mechanics in this game adorable and liken them to the wind in Ghost of Tsushima which acted as your objective guide. In Tales from the Shire you follow little blue birds that perch on nearby trees, rocks, and signposts. Speaking of which, when they’re on a signpost they actually sit on the board pointing in the direction you need to go.
-
Primal Planet: Another metroidvania, this one is a primitive setting where you’re a caveman living with your village when it is attacked. You then track down your missing villagers and rebuild the village while levelling up, gaining new crafting recipes, etc. Nothing groundbreaking in here, but it is still a good pixelated entry in the genre with a nice art style and animation. This game does do a really good job of letting you know when you’re under-levelled for an area…brutally so.
-
Did a FNV run for the first time in maybe 10ish years? I had never played modded, was feeling like some fpv shooter arpg hybrid with a dose of nonsense, so figured I’d give it a replay.
Holds up remarkably well. Played it with the Viva New Vegas modpack as a base to simplify things a little bit for myself, added on a few extras for cool features, and it did significantly improve the experience. I remember crashes used to be very frequent, but even with a bunch of mods, this was actually more stable than I remember. Multiple companions mod made the difficulty completely trivial, so felt more like a power romp than an immersive game, but still fun as it sped the playthrough up enormously, with this posse I’m running around with just gunning down absolutely everything in the wasteland.
On the whole, good stuff, modded replay is recommended.
Just started Arco and it’s super fun.
mostly dcss & heroes of might and magic 3 lately
Moss: Book II
I adored Moss (mostly for its theme but also for the highly innovative gameplay) but I haven’t had a VR system in some time. This one might be first on my list to buy if I ever get into VR again.
- Magic Arena - phone and laptop
- Tunic - Steam Deck
- Tears of the Kingdom - Switch
- Final Fantasy VII - Desktop
I only play the last two with my kids watching.
Tunic was such a fun adventure.
TL;DR:
- Colin McRae Rally 04
- Project Wingman
Lots of rambling
Still playing Colin McRae Rally 04, mostly on Steam Deck this week.
I think I’m finally used to playing this game with a stick - not that this was particularly difficult but after years of doing so exclusively with keyboard it did happen easier than expected.
I didn’t migrate any of my progress from the desktop so I’m just slowly getting into the groove with 2WD Championship. It’s one of those games where I don’t really mind having to unlock everything again (maybe I’m just unconsciously worried there won’t be enough content otherwise).
Besides that I finally started playing Project Wingman. I got it during GOG’s summer sale but outside of testing it for performance as well as Linux and HOTAS compatibility I didn’t really touch it otherwise.
I’m 40-60% into the game, I think, so things might change but I like it a bit more than either of the Ace Combat titles I played so far (not by much but still). Game feels great to play, looks awesome and I really appreciate how they’re able to use the fantastic soundtrack to make even the early missions into extremely hype affairs.
I enjoy it way more than I expected to, to the point it became my favourite game in a long while.I also decided to try playing it in VR. First reaction: it’s freaking playable on my machine?! Awesome! Second reaction: this is really cool. Feels less intense than anticipated but really cool nonetheless.
Bonus points for finally getting a chance to SEE the designs of enemy aircraft - I was never able to get a good look at them when playing in pancake mode (I’m talking about large support planes you can’t buy for yourself).Unfortunately for me, this will most likely stay as a fun experiment rather than something I’ll continue with. While the game runs well enough, I can already tell the performance during later missions will take a dive to unplayable levels and there’s no point in dealing with that. I’ll most likely try a few more missions and just wait for a proper VR playthrough until after I upgrade my ancient hardware. One day…
While there aren’t any game breaking issues so far I do have a few small nitpicks about the game:
- Excessive missile spam in some missions - it’s not even difficult, just tedious.
- I keep getting tripped over my key binds as they differ slightly from what I’m used to in Star Citizen (my main HOTAS game at the moment).
- I wish there were more key binds for enemy targeting - I miss the ability to select the target I’m aiming at instead of having to cycle in whatever order the game decides to go with.
- Had an issue with enemy helis bugging out and not moving in one of the mission. They just hanged in place with their noses aimed at the sky.
- Navigating menus in VR is seriously borked. Mouse cursor doesn’t show up and when it does its visual position is completely unrelated to where it physically is. Aiming with my had is a complete guesswork as that too has no reticule to use as a reference point. Last but not least, keyboard works for the most part but can’t be used (or just doesn’t work for me) with certain elements of the settings menu (like trying to go through key binds to a specific position). Setting things up was a HUGE pain.
- Dunno if it’s just numbers magic or an actual mechanical difference but combat distances seem to differ between VR and desktop modes. I’m pretty sure distances during the latter are at like a third of what I’ve seen during my VR playthrough. I need to do some more testing.
- I miss the afterburner from AC, it was fun to use.
Finally, I have a question for those more familiar with the game: does the number of enemies change with difficulty? I’m playing on hard and the amount hostiles can be pretty ridiculous at times. It’s (mostly) fun and it’s properly challenging but it can look pretty stupid sometimes.
I’m going to have to check out Project Wingman, it sounds and looks really fun. No idea why but your comment made me want to go back and try to continue my playthrough of Armored Core 6. Not sure where that thought came from reading your comment, but I think that’s how I’ll spend my weekend if I find the time.
It’s not perfect but it is pretty great great - definitely better than what I’d expect from an indie Ace Combat clone made three people. Just watch out for the ridiculous amount of enemies in some missions.
I really want to get into Armored Core someday, starting with the PS1 original. I’ve heard gameplay changes pretty significantly every few games and I’d like to test which type will be the most fun for me. Are you familiar with the series in general or just like AC6?
I haven’t finished any game in the series so I can’t fully comment, but if my memory serves me right the control scheme prior to maybe AC4 was absolutely awful. There’s a really good video on YouTube that pretty accurately describes my feelings on the series from what I’ve played. I don’t remember exactly who made it now but I want to say either VaatiVidya or Iron Pineapple. If I find it I’ll edit my comment and include the link.
