Games you are currently playing - Part 7

[x Tame Impala]

TW3 is phenomenal despite its flaws. I just beat that Wild Hunt general and I think im tracking for the “good” ending as well. Can’t wait to jump into the DLCs, I hear they’re the best in the business.

The combat is kind of lame though. I’m level 34 now and could probably have avoided the crafting system and weapon upgrades all together. I also don’t enjoy the level based caps on XP system they tried to balance the game with.

Still though, the characters and world you’re interacting with are so well done none of it matters. I love playing this game.

 

[Blitzkrug]

Finished the main story of Dragon Quest 3. Really enjoyable game. Was generally easy but the boss fights feel like a pretty significant spike since they can spam some crazy shit that completely cripples your party.

Best advice is be prepared to use your autosave to bail out and gear up depending what the monster likes to do because even casting stuff that cuts down on magic damage in my experience will get absolutely punched through.
In my travels through this game, i have ran into a set of enemies that makes me froth at the mouth at the mere sight of them lmao. There some absolute asswipes in this game;

Armfull and his various recolors; this rattle me bones looking mfer exists only to troll you. High agility and moves twice. Is extremely weak to magic. That's assuming he doesn't a) paralyze you with his breath attack or b) cast an ability that nullifies magic for your party. And yes, he'll use both turns to use the breath. Because of how gear works in this series, you have nothing to outright nullify paralysis, only reduce the chance. fun!

Wrytle only exists to waste your time. High defense, will routinely cast defending champion which grossly boosts defense for a turn (think of it as a kinda crummy version of protect from the pokemon games) and takes approximately 45 turns to kill. If you see this guy in a lineup, just run. it's not worth the MP exerted/EXP to kill the big bastard

Shadow/Silhouette/Umbra: If you see these things in anything other than a number of 1, ****ing run. At the midway point these things know Thwack! Which is essentially a diceroll that either misses or instakills you. Once again, gear doesn't fully prevent (carrying Dieamind however will, but at 800g a piece not exactly ideal to load up on it until late game) it so if you get caught against a 6 pack of these f***ers and can't run, you're likely going to get wiped.

Living statues also suck ass - why are you mfers so strong?!?!?

Going to try and find a way to grind for the endgame. I cheated a bit and turned on dracky quest difficulty mostly just to see how hard the postgame hits to see if grinding is needed. The answer is very hard. tried to fight the postgame final boss and even with the ability to just spam everything with how dracky works, would have taken forever on top of being cheap.

Only problem is grinding in this game is truly a grind. Even the postgame dungeon gives you like 5k a fight at most and levelling up where i'm at takes about 80-85k. Metal Slime hunting isn't reliable since everything i've tried (headman's axe, thief one hit kill chances, metal wing boomerang) plus them running doesn't guarantee a good haul. I may consider leaving somebody behind to get a bigger share of exp and look into other stuff later.

Edit: I may have just stumbled on a solution

 

[Bocephus86]

TW3 is phenomenal despite its flaws. I just beat that Wild Hunt general and I think im tracking for the “good” ending as well. Can’t wait to jump into the DLCs, I hear they’re the best in the business.

The combat is kind of lame though. I’m level 34 now and could probably have avoided the crafting system and weapon upgrades all together. I also don’t enjoy the level based caps on XP system they tried to balance the game with.

Still though, the characters and world you’re interacting with are so well done none of it matters. I love playing this game.

I think I ended up only ever crafting:

1. Witcher gear (really the Cat gear, that fit my playstyle best, but I'd craft other ones I had recipes for just to have them).
2. Upgrading the gems / mutations, any related to increases Quen or damage increases.

Never did the potions, bombs, or regular gear. I've done three full playthroughs over the years and it's always worked out the same.

 

[Voodoo Child]

In DQ3HD2D the best grinding spots are midgame Orochi's Lair, which I detailed a page back, very good when you're in that mushy lv 20-25 range.

Late game there are the slime hills near Reeve and the Transcendence Tower, and the island in the Dark World, but I found LMS most frequently in Baramos' Castle. Added benefit when you don't fight them, regular enemies still drop you 1500-2000 exp so it's not a total waste.

I'm still not finished, slow playing it and levelling up. I have Hero at 45 so I just got Gigaslash, my Sage at 42, my Monster Wrangler-turned Warrior at 41 and my Mage-turned Martial Artist at 33. The last one especially hits like a tank because I didn't change his job until level 40, stronger offensive magic than the Sage with cat-like speed. Takes huge chunks out of the enemy right off the hop with Kaboom or Kafrizzle.

Once I add 4-5 levels and up my gear I'll go for the post-game boss.

==

Witcher 3 is and remains the champ. Some games have better music, some have better stories and many have better gameplay but nothing comes close to combining everything into a package. It's also the only 'long game' that doesn't run into pacing issues and outright repetitiveness, it'll be a long time until something like it comes around again.

I usually ran Geralt with either Cat or Wolf gear and a maxed Alchemy setup and Euphoria, absolutely nasty setup that trivializes everyone but Detlaff.

 

[Jovavic]

I go back every few years to try to get past the 20 hour mark in Witcher 3 and the gameplay is always what makes me stop, it's just conplete ass and not fun at all which is obviously too bad because I enjoy everything else. Has the PS5 patch that came out in the last year helped it any?

 

[pistolpete11]

I go back every few years to try to get past the 20 hour mark in Witcher 3 and the gameplay is always what makes me stop, it's just conplete ass and not fun at all which is obviously too bad because I enjoy everything else. Has the PS5 patch that came out in the last year helped it any?

I couldn't make it past like 4hrs even with the patch. I never played it before the patch, so I don't know if it improved, but I can tell you it still sucks.

I had it on one of the harder difficulties. I've thought about trying it again on the easiest difficulty just to breeze through the combat as much as possible. That's what I did with Alan Wake 1, but it still only made AW1 tolerable, not enjoyable. I dunno. I'm more of a gameplay kinda guy, so it might just not be for me.

 

[Mikeaveli]

I had the same experience with both The Witcher 2 and 3, and normally I have a decent tolerance for jank combat in RPGs. Gwent in Witcher 3 was more fun to me than the actual game

 

[x Tame Impala]

The combat isn’t awful, I think that’s an exaggeration. It just doesn’t feel as fun as the rest of the game and is lacking in a big way.

I’m basically a Jedi as a level 34 and with Qwen literally nothing can hurt me

 

[PeteWorrell]

I powered through the first Witcher game and it's awfully dated combat just to experience the story. The combat in the two other games felt like something made by PlatinumGames after experiencing that.

 

[Turin]

Finally giving Divinity Original Sin 2 a shot

Also the Witcher 3s combat is not awful at all imo. It’s just mid, not terrible but not great. If you know what to do when it comes to signs and potions it’s pretty easy. Not powering through to the point you’re used to it is a big mistake imo, it’s a great game and one I play through like once a year since 2016.

 

[Unholy Diver]

jumping back into Astro bot, might finish that up before starting something else, found about a quarter of the robots so far

 

[Jovavic]

Almost done with P3R (in January) and it's reenforced my opinion that 3 is the best Persona game

 

[Turin]

Almost done with P3R (in January) and it's reenforced my opinion that 3 is the best Persona game

Yes

 

[pistolpete11]

Finally started Shadow of the Erdtree.

So far, it's more Elden Ring. Maybe a little bit more linear and a little more empty.

There were too many dragons in the base game and I think I've already fought 3 or 4 in the DLC.

I have only found 2 main bosses. The first one was solid. Challenging, but not too bad. The second one kicked it up a notch. Haven't beat it yet, but I can feel myself getting closer each time which is the best kind of FromSoft boss.

 

[PeteWorrell]

Finally started Shadow of the Erdtree.

So far, it's more Elden Ring. Maybe a little bit more linear and a little more empty.

There were too many dragons in the base game and I think I've already fought 3 or 4 in the DLC.

I have only found 2 main bosses. The first one was solid. Challenging, but not too bad. The second one kicked it up a notch. Haven't beat it yet, but I can feel myself getting closer each time which is the best kind of FromSoft boss.

Copy and pasting content is one of the downsides of open world games. Bosses kind of lose their impact when it's the 5th time you have encountered them in the wild.

 

[pistolpete11]

Copy and pasting content is one of the downsides of open world games. Bosses kind of lose their impact when it's the 5th time you have encountered them in the wild.

To be honest, it's a valid criticism of FromSoft even in their more linear games, too. They've always reused bosses, early game bosses become late game regular enemies, or even some enemies copied and pasted from previous games.

 

[McGarnagle]

Started Tears of the Kingdom on Black Friday. It took a minute to get into it but I'm enjoying it now. I like the puzzle-solving nature of Zelda games, and this seems to have a lot of it. I haven't quite gotten a hang on weapons yet (finding myself often with no one-handed weapons in my inventory making shields useless) not fusing shit to weapons, but I figure it'll come along.

I'm not very far yet, heading into the temple of time after doing the first three shrines on the sky Islands. Intrigued to see where it goes from here.

 

[x Tame Impala]

Started Tears of the Kingdom on Black Friday. It took a minute to get into it but I'm enjoying it now. I like the puzzle-solving nature of Zelda games, and this seems to have a lot of it. I haven't quite gotten a hang on weapons yet (finding myself often with no one-handed weapons in my inventory making shields useless) not fusing shit to weapons, but I figure it'll come along.

I'm not very far yet, heading into the temple of time after doing the first three shrines on the sky Islands. Intrigued to see where it goes from here.

The tutorial is a long drag but now that you’re done the game opens up a lot more. I enjoyed BOTW more but the engineering and skydiving aspects are pretty cool

 

[McGarnagle]

The tutorial is a long drag but now that you’re done the game opens up a lot more. I enjoyed BOTW more but the engineering and skydiving aspects are pretty cool

I wanted to play BOTW first but BOTW was full price at $70 and TOTK was $30 for Black Friday so I took the deal. I'll go back for BOTW later, hoping it goes on sale or I can find a used copy cheaper.

 

[x Tame Impala]

I wanted to play BOTW first but BOTW was full price at $70 and TOTK was $30 for Black Friday so I took the deal. I'll go back for BOTW later, hoping it goes on sale or I can find a used copy cheaper.

You honestly may be better off anyway because a lot of the map and game in general is very similar to BOTW, if not too similar.

I recommend NOT building the glitchy hover bike. It’s super cheap resource wise and you can traverse the map effortlessly. It seems convenient but it robs you of the map exploration.

 

[syz]

Has anyone played 1000xResist? Seeing it high on a lot of lists all of a sudden.

 

[Sad People]

Been playing Metro Exodus and man is a big step up from Last Light. Really enjoyed 2033, didnt like Last Light much at all and had to force myself to finish it and i already mentioned how i feel about Exodus. Dunno which one in the franchise is my favorite though.

Huge sucker for good animations in video games and this game has a few.

 

[No Fun Shogun]

Carto on the Switch. Downloaded it and a couple other indies on Black Friday.

Pretty charming and a nice, non-stressful experience, albeit some of the puzzles have been kind of dumb with the gameplay logic behind them to me (or I've been dumb, probably the latter).

 

[The Merchant]

Alan Wake II really is as good as everyone said it was when it released. Just a few hours in and I'm already really impressed with the unique nature of the game's storytelling. I absolutely love the approach of framing it around a noir-style murder mystery, with you playing a detective that has to put the pieces together. The Deluxe Edition is on sale on the PS Store for $40 and at that price it's a no-brainer.