What Video Game Are You Currently Playing?

[MoeChaos]

Really enjoying Persona 3 Reload, especially the DLC. I've played FES and Portable multiple times each, so I was pretty skeptical about the prospects of a remake that was (by my measure anyways) completely unnecessary, but it does a pretty great job modernizing the game without completely missing what makes Persona 3 special, IMO. The Answer is always nice to see, especially since I think it plays better here than it did in FES. Pretty positive experience, glad to know that Atlus hasn't completely stopped trying with Persona.

[joepallai]

Currently obsessed with We Love Katamari Damacy Reroll.   

[Aceituns14]

I’m currently playing Total Chaos and Cry of Fear. I really enjoy the atmosphere and sound design, but the monsters look kinda cheesy tho..

[Lippeth]

Playing through the original version of Link's Awakening for the first time, with some pretty legit Game Boy shaders through Retroarch. I'm about halfway through the sixth dungeon and this game is no joke. Everything is so cryptic, from the puzzles to the way the story is unfolding, but what it feels like it's all leading up to is pretty existential and surreal, but also cute and playful.

Spoiler

 

I also just bought a game called Fear & Hunger to get spooked up for this Halloween season and so far it's meeting expectations in that regard. I'm not usually keen on Rogue mechanics in games but this one is a bit of a genre bender in general, and so far it's exactly the atmosphere I'm looking for!

 

Also casually played through a few other Game Boy games like Kirby's Dream Land, Tetris and Puyo Puyo, as well as a bit of Metroid and Golf on the NES for some reason. idk, I just like old video games.

[Daytime Waitress]

44 minutes ago, Lippeth said:

 idk, I just like old video games.

 

Weirdo.

 

It's rad to see someone enjoying OG Link's Awakening for the first time.

I ran through it quite a few times back in the day, but I got softlocked on the wrecking ball puzzle and that kind of soured it to the point where I haven't been back since :c

 

While you're on a GB kick, go check out Kirby's Pinball Land and Revenge of the Gator - I can't recommend either of them highly enough.

The later Pokemon pinball games just felt like they were trying to do too much real pinball shit on such a tiny screen for my liking, but both RotG and KPL got the "digital" part of digital pinball right.

[Lippeth]

7 minutes ago, Daytime Waitress said:

While you're on a GB kick, go check out Kirby's Pinball Land and Revenge of the Gator - I can't recommend either of them highly enough.

The later Pokemon pinball games just felt like they were trying to do too much real pinball shit on such a tiny screen for my liking, but both RotG and KPL got the "digital" part of digital pinball right.

 

I'll check those out, I do like a good video pinball game. Devil's Crush and Alien Crush for TurboGrafx-16 and Genesis are among my favorites, and I often play the newer Demon's Tilt and Xenotilt games. A Kirby pinball game sounds brilliant, and the gator one looks good from the screenshots. You're gonna spin me off onto a whole new thing with suggestions like these, but I do love to chase whatever catches me at any given time.

[vanilla_d00m]

Speed Of DOOM (2010) A DOOM II megawad.  I played this before and I had to delete it because it was too hard, I was playing it on H.M.P.  I'm on Level11 so far on UV.  John Romero's Sigil 2 made me a little better.

 

[Mr Masker]

On 10/5/2024 at 4:06 AM, Lippeth said:

Playing through the original version of Link's Awakening for the first time, with some pretty legit Game Boy shaders through Retroarch. I'm about halfway through the sixth dungeon and this game is no joke. Everything is so cryptic, from the puzzles to the way the story is unfolding, but what it feels like it's all leading up to is pretty existential and surreal, but also cute and playful.

  Reveal hidden contents

 

I tried getting those backgrounds in Retroarch, but I couldn't find one I liked, where did you get yours?

 

(Also what was the shader you used?)

[faceplant641]

Finished Hrot a couple days ago.  Lovely game.

 

Currently chipping away at Avernum 2 and pondering abandoning my current Dwarf Fortress settlement and starting over.  Learned a lot of what not to do on this run.  Also trying to decide which flavor of retro FPS to play next.  

[Lippeth]

8 hours ago, Mr Masker said:

I tried getting those backgrounds in Retroarch, but I couldn't find one I liked, where did you get yours?

 

(Also what was the shader you used?)

 

They're included in Retroarch and can be found in:

retroarch\shaders\shaders_slang(or shaders_glsl)\handheld\console-border\

and the presets I used in the screenshots are dmg.slangp for the original Game Boy and gb-pocket.slangp for the Game Boy Pocket. The shader itself provides the overlay, so its one step that doesn't require anything else, though any video filters should be disabled or the shader will look distorted. You can adjust the video scale among other things in Shader Parameters if you want to zoom in a bit.

 

 

[Daytime Waitress]

On 10/5/2024 at 1:41 PM, Lippeth said:

 

I'll check those out, I do like a good video pinball game. Devil's Crush and Alien Crush for TurboGrafx-16 and Genesis are among my favorites, and I often play the newer Demon's Tilt and Xenotilt games. A Kirby pinball game sounds brilliant, and the gator one looks good from the screenshots. You're gonna spin me off onto a whole new thing with suggestions like these, but I do love to chase whatever catches me at any given time.

 

HAL's offerings aren't as feature packed or as adrenaline-soaked as WIZNWAR's modern stuff, but they are perfectly suited to their medium and still a shining example of how to make bonus tables unique and engaging by riffing off of pinball-adjacent themes without changing the core mechanics too much. Similar to Naxat's games, they both adhere to and make use of their theme very well. And despite a fair bit of blurring on the OG GB (probably not an issue via emu), they both have smoother scrolling and less dead air (probably a result of being on such a tiny screen). Every corner of every tier of every table has something to interact with, and just like the Crush series, they're big, chunky interactables that feel gratifying to bash about.
 

13 hours ago, faceplant641 said:

Finished Hrot a couple days ago.  Lovely game.

 

Glad you saw it through and enjoyed it despite, as you said, some underwhelming combat scenarios in the first ep. They never truly got more complex, but in combination with the roster, I felt they were varied enough to keep things interesting for the entire runtime. It feels like some kind of reverse shareware title, the more I think about it: rather than front loading the first chapter with what they felt were the best bits (ala Doom), or just packing as many ideas into the opening episode and then petering out in the latter parts, HROT feels like the dev not only got a better handle on level and combat delivery as he went, but he also realised, "holy hell, I can add this!". It's an endearing kiud of amateur excess, found most prominently in the Build-style interactables: it gave the dev a giggle and so he threw it in. Sure, maybe more time could have been spent fine-tuning level design or making combat more intricate, but I feel like "warts and all" fits into the game's aesthetic a lot better. Plus it's just plain interesting to see the game evolve as the dev gains more experience.

 

[I haven't listened to Amplifier Worship - or at Boris at all, for that matter - for the better part of an eternity: thanks for the reminder!]

[Chopkinsca]

18 hours ago, faceplant641 said:

Currently chipping away at Avernum 2

Oh hey, that is probably my favourite game in the series. I am currently replaying Avernum 6 and it is up there in terms of favourites.

[Astar]

Silent Hill 2 Remake. I really like it so far

[Aceituns14]

shell shocked nam'67 and Vietcong.

[faceplant641]

10 hours ago, Daytime Waitress said:

 

Glad you saw it through and enjoyed it despite, as you said, some underwhelming combat scenarios in the first ep. They never truly got more complex, but in combination with the roster, I felt they were varied enough to keep things interesting for the entire runtime. It feels like some kind of reverse shareware title, the more I think about it: rather than front loading the first chapter with what they felt were the best bits (ala Doom), or just packing as many ideas into the opening episode and then petering out in the latter parts, HROT feels like the dev not only got a better handle on level and combat delivery as he went, but he also realised, "holy hell, I can add this!". It's an endearing kiud of amateur excess, found most prominently in the Build-style interactables: it gave the dev a giggle and so he threw it in. Sure, maybe more time could have been spent fine-tuning level design or making combat more intricate, but I feel like "warts and all" fits into the game's aesthetic a lot better. Plus it's just plain interesting to see the game evolve as the dev gains more experience.

 

Yeah, the combination of the game getting weirder/better and my own expectations adjusting made for an amazingly propulsive finish.  I played practically the entire third episode in one sitting, and I almost never play more than like an hour at a time.

 

5 hours ago, Chopkinsca said:

Oh hey, that is probably my favourite game in the series. I am currently replaying Avernum 6 and it is up there in terms of favourites.

I've heard great things about it, one of my friends is a longtime Jeff Vogel fan and was very excited to hear I was playing it.  I'm only about 10 hours in, still trying to find a safe place to land after 

Spoiler

going down the waterfalls.

 

Also, I decided to go back to Nightmare Reaper.  I haven't played it since it hit 1.0, and I"m excited to see what's been added and how over-the-top it'll get.

[Daytime Waitress]

12 hours ago, faceplant641 said:

Yeah, the combination of the game getting weirder/better and my own expectations adjusting made for an amazingly propulsive finish.  I played practically the entire third episode in one sitting, and I almost never play more than like an hour at a time.

 

I'm the same way when it comes to most all WADs, and HROT had a similar effect on me - finished the latter two thirds of it during a couple of long sessions over the course of a weekend. I think it's because the combat is less intensive, you can pop the levels like they're PEZ; but it's still compelling enough that you want to keep pushing and see what's next. Propulsive is the perfect description for it.

[vanilla_d00m]

Summer Of Slaughter (2021) (DOOM II Megawad)

 

UV.

 

[Lippeth]

After recently completing Silent Hill 3 on normal I went into Extra New Game mode on hard action and hard puzzle difficulty. I don't know what I was expecting but I was NOT expecting to spend the entire evening familiarizing myself with Shakespearean tragedies to understand vague references in order to solve the first puzzle in the game. On normal difficulty it was as simple as rearranging five book volumes to make a number on the spines legible and inputting that number on the keypad to unlock the door, but on hard mode there are multiple passages referencing themes from different plays in a certain order, and each book has a volume number, and if you examine each book in your inventory it tells you which play that book is.

 

So after an evening of thoroughly reading a summary of every act of each play multiple times, I finally deduced what the correct order is, but then there's still the locked door with a number pad. I must've spent another hour trying all sorts of things, all while reading the riddle passages and still going back to read play summaries. But I finally got it and just...that was a lot, but actually really satisfying to finally hear a click and see onscreen "It's unlocked". Had I actually paid attention in school I would have maybe streamlined a part of the puzzle for myself, but I really wasn't expecting to learn the plots to Shakespeare plays while playing a scary video game, that's for sure.

 

The spoiler shows my process to find the door code after learning the order of the plays, but doesn't explicitly show the code.

Spoiler

 

[faceplant641]

8 hours ago, Lippeth said:

After recently completing Silent Hill 3 on normal I went into Extra New Game mode on hard action and hard puzzle difficulty. I don't know what I was expecting but I was NOT expecting to spend the entire evening familiarizing myself with Shakespearean tragedies to understand vague references in order to solve the first puzzle in the game. On normal difficulty it was as simple as rearranging five book volumes to make a number on the spines legible and inputting that number on the keypad to unlock the door, but on hard mode there are multiple passages referencing themes from different plays in a certain order, and each book has a volume number, and if you examine each book in your inventory it tells you which play that book is.

That's some Lorelei And The Laser Eyes-level puzzle depth, and I had no idea the Silent Hill games had adjustable puzzle difficulty, that's awesome.  Might need to check those out, this is usually the time of year I replay old Resident Evil games but I could broaden my horizons a bit.

[Panzermann11]

So I got around to getting Burnout Crash to run on Xenia (had to use the netplay build, the regular Canary build would crash [no pun intended] the moment I try to start a game).

I had to say, I had plenty of fun with it and laughed like a cocaine-addicted clown because of how ridiculous the game is (in a good way) in terms of random shit, like the "super features".

[Taw Tu'lki]

Worms Blast & Pro Pilkki 2

[Aceituns14]

Postal brain damaged & postal 2.

[Lippeth]

On 10/10/2024 at 6:19 AM, faceplant641 said:

That's some Lorelei And The Laser Eyes-level puzzle depth, and I had no idea the Silent Hill games had adjustable puzzle difficulty, that's awesome.  Might need to check those out, this is usually the time of year I replay old Resident Evil games but I could broaden my horizons a bit.

 

I'll have to check out that game as well sometime. I would say the Silent Hill games are much lighter on the survival than Resident Evil, but the puzzles and riddles are memorable. Not all puzzles, but some of them have different clues, riddles or are different puzzles entirely using the same objects, and can even have randomized solutions on different difficulties.

 

I keep starting a new game of the GOG version of the first Resident Evil, as it's the only one of the first three I haven't ever completed and I have a friend bugging me to try and get through the remake, but I want to finish Resident Evil before playing Resident Evil. I either run out of healing and ammo items and die repeatedly shortly thereafter, or run out of herbs and die early trying to save ammo. I was able to get far enough to return to the mansion where the reptile things stalk the halls, but that was while emulating the psx version with a heavy reliance on save states, and being able to skip door transitions on the pc version is just too irresistible.

 

Right now I'm in the process of trying to get a feel for which zombies I can run past every time and which ones to kill, and how to kill them without taking several hits. So far if it's just one I'll either shoot or knife them until they fall, then I'll position myself behind them, stab them on the ground and then slice their back when they get up. Since it's usually a group of two or three zombies, I end up taking too many hits while figuring out any combination of shooting, stabbing and running. Update: got the rhythm for it and learned which routes to prioritize, and got a feel for who to kill and who I can run around every time. This game is no joke!

Edited October 11 by Lippeth

[faceplant641]

17 hours ago, Lippeth said:

 

 

I keep starting a new game of the GOG version of the first Resident Evil, as it's the only one of the first three I haven't ever completed and I have a friend bugging me to try and get through the remake, but I want to finish Resident Evil before playing Resident Evil. I either run out of healing and ammo items and die repeatedly shortly thereafter, or run out of herbs and die early trying to save ammo. I was able to get far enough to return to the mansion where the reptile things stalk the halls, but that was while emulating the psx version with a heavy reliance on save states, and being able to skip door transitions on the pc version is just too irresistible.

 

Right now I'm in the process of trying to get a feel for which zombies I can run past every time and which ones to kill, and how to kill them without taking several hits. So far if it's just one I'll either shoot or knife them until they fall, then I'll position myself behind them, stab them on the ground and then slice their back when they get up. Since it's usually a group of two or three zombies, I end up taking too many hits while figuring out any combination of shooting, stabbing and running. Update: got the rhythm for it and learned which routes to prioritize, and got a feel for who to kill and who I can run around every time. This game is no joke!

At the risk of my gamer cred, I've never actually played the OG OG Resident Evil, just the REMake.  I don't know what changed between versions, besides for one very famous addition, but I seem to recall there being a few stashes of herbs on the balconies.  You're combining herbs, right?

 

And yeah, the game is really a routing puzzle at heart, and a very satisfying one at that.  

 

The GOG rereleases are a really cool thing, I'll get to them one of these days.  Especially excited to finally play 2, I want to see what the PC version does with the PS1 dual-timeline format.

[yakfak]

nothing

 

Spoiler

 

i beat smt vengeance and then immediately restarted it with the map turned off, feels better when yr looking at the game world instead of a bunch of icons

the scenario is great, the maps are great, the music is great

it lacks a lot of the stuff that defined previous games - dungeons, consequences, the feeling of menace - and is more like SMT Sandbox but that's cool

 

what'd make it even better would beeee

- a mode where you only earn about 0.1x as much exp but yr demons level up like normal

if yr playing in a way where you want to get all your demons to unlock their basic skills and then save them back to the compendium you end up overlevelled and eventually you just skip over dozens of demons altogether, never really getting to enjoy them in yr party

(having said that, in my first playthrough i skipped a lot of end game demons in favour of using mu shuwuu, adramalech and dormarth. i was just used to what they could do and having more efficient versions of the same archetypes didn't feel necessary. they did feel underpowered to the point that i couldn't take the superbosses on but that's a thing to try later)

 

- if most of the gameplay is going to be side quests then there should be more quests which lead you to the next quest? the first thing where the preta tracking thing leads you to apsaras's base is great. but a lot of the quests just feel pasted in, could've been in any game and don't particularly factor vengeance's scenario into their goals. the smt franchise by itself has enough meat to make an infinite number of games around, with all its iconic demons and its turn based battle system which blows away every other turn based battle system, but they should be taking pains to make every game's scenario feel unique and... it doesn't have to be "coherent" cos the dealings of gods and demons can be ineffable, but some of the quests don't at all belong to the game thematically. some of the worsts quests in it feel almost contractually obligated

 

- this is bigger but it needs some sort of update that adds a separate mini-scenario where you get to play as atsuta and hayataro. ideally through an actual dungeon lol

 

 

[Naarok0fkor]

Its called UDB for some reason...

[Lippeth]

19 hours ago, faceplant641 said:

At the risk of my gamer cred, I've never actually played the OG OG Resident Evil, just the REMake.  I don't know what changed between versions, besides for one very famous addition, but I seem to recall there being a few stashes of herbs on the balconies.  You're combining herbs, right?

 

And yeah, the game is really a routing puzzle at heart, and a very satisfying one at that.  

 

The GOG rereleases are a really cool thing, I'll get to them one of these days.  Especially excited to finally play 2, I want to see what the PC version does with the PS1 dual-timeline format.

 

I went from getting actually frustrated toward the beginning trying to find the best route to conserve both ammo and health, to really admiring the layout of the mansion. I haven't finished it yet, and I currently don't know where to go(it was actually kind of stupid, I had been to the pool near the welded door but didn't engage it at the right angle apparently, until a hail mary attempt after leaving and returning so many times), but in the process I finally acquired the magnum which one-shots those reptile things, and decided to more thoroughly inspect key items in my inventory which definitely gives me things to try. I've also used the last ink ribbon I had which makes for 18 saves, but I'm sure the next time I play I'll save more strategically.

 

My appreciation really came together after realizing the whole point of raising and lowering the dam after finding the battery to the second lift, and the minigame of mixing chemicals to make v-jolt was a fun extra thing. I don't know if it was necessary to complete but it played out in a satisfying way during my play through.

 

My ultimate goal is to become very familiar with this version so that the remake will be as effective as it set out to be, taking advantage of my knowledge of the first Resident Evil. I will say that being able to skip door transitions is something that would not be easy to get away from with this pc version, and if playing as Jill you wouldn't even need to use ink ribbons to save progress. I grew up playing Resident Evil 1 2 and 3, but only ever completed 2 and 3, with this first one just being a little hardcore for me to ever get very far in, but it's been really rewarding this go around, and I've always loved the atmosphere; certain hallways and rooms remind me of the funeral home my family used to own when I was young and spent a lot of time in, so it's great to finally crack the code on it, so to speak.

Edited October 13 by Lippeth

[Consistent-Money-990]

14 hours ago, yakfak said:

nothing

Same man. Dealing with bs stuff in my life and saving up for a PC hoping that it will re interest my desire in gaming. All the while I am patiently waiting for doom the dark ages. Times are hard, but DOOM is ETERNAL!! 

[Canjul]

Silent Hill 2 remake. Enjoying it so far!

[faceplant641]

17 hours ago, Lippeth said:

 

I went from getting actually frustrated toward the beginning trying to find the best route to conserve both ammo and health, to really admiring the layout of the mansion. I haven't finished it yet, and I currently don't know where to go(it was actually kind of stupid, I had been to the pool near the welded door but didn't engage it at the right angle apparently, until a hail mary attempt after leaving and returning so many times), but in the process I finally acquired the magnum which one-shots those reptile things, and decided to more thoroughly inspect key items in my inventory which definitely gives me things to try. I've also used the last ink ribbon I had which makes for 18 saves, but I'm sure the next time I play I'll save more strategically.

 

 

One strategy I've used, especially when things get tight, is to set out from a save room with the goal of just getting familiar with the next section, seeing what I can access, and plotting a route to the next save room, but fully intending to reload that save several times in order to make the route as efficient as possible.  Granted, it's kinda grindy and probably the closest thing RE has to save scumming, but when ribbons are running low, you gotta do what you gotta do.

 

I made it through the sewers in Nightmare Reaper, and found the "Sorry Civvie" message along the way.  There's been a ton added to this one since early access, including two more GBA games and an arena mode that I haven't found a weapon good enough for me to survive yet.  Overall the game feels a bit better balanced than I remember, which is quite nice.  

 

I did get slaughtered by an incredibly pissed off Doomguy who appeared when I killed a random bunny who was hopping around, spitting out treasure every time I shot it.