Messages

1

Modern Video Games / Re: Free to play games!

« on: January 26, 2026, 06:28:11 pm »

Highguard is out and it is not Concord 2. It's closer to Apex Legends mixed with Rainbow Six Siege. The developer refers to it as a PvP raid shooter.

I hate that "It's Concord 2" is gonna be a thing now, it really undercuts how big of a disaster Concord was.  It's definitely not an interesting game though, 3v3 is such a terrible idea, makes a reasonably large map size, even if it has ways to corral people, feel empty and boring.  I wasn't gonna be into it even if it was like 5v5, because I just can't get into small scale hero shooter anymore and if I was gonna do anything hero shooter, I'd just go back to Marvel Rivals, that's at least got a dedicated player base and fun characters.

It's a shame, because I like the general gameplay idea, different objectives and phases, could be fun, but just make it like...not a hero shooter.  If this was like crazy fantasy/scifi fps with bigger teams where you trade back and forth base defense, that could be fun. 

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General / Re: 52 Games Challenge 2026!!!

« on: January 24, 2026, 04:52:15 am »

4 - Dead Island 2 (PC 2023) - BEAT - This is my second playthrough of the game as I had played it on Epic when it came out and got it insanely cheap with the DLC, which was the big reason to check it out.  The main game is solid, coming off Dying Light 2 and The Beast, I like the linearity of this abit more, focus on bloody violence and some humor, it's more direct fun, a lot less open world roaming that drags.  Dying Light still does  movement stuff well, which DI2 could certainly use at times as you'd get situations that you wish you could charge through crowds or leap over better lol I don't want to see grappling hooks and all that, but there's definitely a little more room to improve general movement.

Forgot the ending was such a cliffhanger, you have some big bads teased through the game, but you only interact with one, in the DLC, and it's not to take her out, it's a big setup for a third game for sure.

DLC is overall solid, two favorite areas, Haus built around the artistically driven rich creeps creating a dark cult, built around a mysterious person.  And then Sola, which is about a huge festival that's gone horrible wrong, Coachella with zombies.  Both dive deeper into stuff with the Autophage, the thing that turns people into zombies, it's not simply a virus, and the way they expand on it I'm a little mixed, it's trying to make it such much bigger, almost makes me think of Death Stranding and I'm not sure how much I love that.  Not bad, but it would take the next game to really explore it fully.

In the end, I kinda realized some things I disliked, the combat needs to be less stiff.  There's a lot of times where you get locked into animations, heavy strikes usually doing these stationary animation attacks, or if you stun a zombie, you can then get some brutal attacks in, but they take way too long.  The stuns need to be glory kills like in Doom 2016, fast, insta-death, and then I'd kinda get rid of the lock on heavy attacks just to move away from being stuck in place.  The SOLA dlc in particular emphasized another issue where you could quickly get juggled into hits or stunned on the ground while taking environment damage, and really just lose large chunks of health fast.  I died like a dozen times in the final two big SOLA fights because I'd suddenly lose 75% of my health or more and had no chance to recover. 

Frustrations at times with the combat aside, I did have fun, I'm not doing most of the side stuff, this was purely a story run, but there's New Game+ stuff here and I think completion on the game, with DLC is probably 40 to 50 hours, so a good chunk of time for sure.

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General / Re: When will your backlog actually be completed?

« on: January 19, 2026, 06:21:53 pm »

While I have a bazillion games in libraries thanks to freebies, I actually don't have tons of actual, genuine, backlog lol I'd be surprised if I have more than like 20 games at most that I'd want to actually play that I haven't gotten to yet.

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Off Topic / Re: Music thread

« on: January 16, 2026, 11:25:11 am »

I wasn't keeping track of everything I was listening to last year, though my favorite album was Ghost's new album, "Skeleta". It was an album that grew on me, as other than a few particular songs, it didn't really hit me, especially coming off of Impera, but songs like Peacefield, Satanized, Lachryma, are super strong songs for me.  It's still below albums like Impera and Meliora for me, but still a solid album.

Can't remember if I listened to much else, I did listen to the new Castle Rat album, which is good, but I didn't listen to it enough compared to something like Skeleta and I had just found the band last year, so it was more just listening to that and their previous one at the same time. 

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General / Re: 52 Games Challenge 2026!!!

« on: January 15, 2026, 11:24:36 pm »

5 - Hytale (PC Early Access 2025) - ENDLESS - Couldn't help myself, but this was one of those situations where it's more about supporting a studio than anything, it's kinda of an interesting story for this game getting to where it is, coming from Minecraft modded days, to being supported by Riot Games to create their own game, to being shutdown, to the team getting the rights back so they can go indie with it.

What's here is really solid, it's years of work from what I understand and you do feel it.  It's basically just base Minecraft, but with more QoL to it.  I've seen some folks be real weird about comparing it to Minecraft, acting like that's unfair to compare it or something, trying to put it with Terraria or Valheim, and some building aspects lean abit that way, but the core of the game is just Minecraft, and that's fine. 

Minecraft, base Minecraft, is boring, it's always been boring to most folks unless you are like a kid for the most part.  Minecraft became great with its mod support.  This feels like they are trying to make base Minecraft into more of a proper adventure game.  It's got a long way to go, a lot of stuff that feels abit outdated, some old feeling textures compared to other stuff person/creature models feeling way more detailed, which will eventually get updated I'm sure.  I'll play for abit though, it's got enough here to spend some time with it and then set it aside for like a year to see what they add lol

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General / Re: What are you playing?

« on: January 14, 2026, 10:17:17 pm »

Picked Dead Island 2 up again, I played it once back when it came out like 2 years ago, but never touched any of the DLC and I just feel like it's a good time to replay it as I did enjoy the game.  It's certainly fun to play after going through Dying Light 2 and The Beast, which were much more serious with its story stuff, and I felt like the open world was kinda overwhelming, and not the most satisfying to always explore, despite being someone that's quite big on open world experiences.  Dead Island 2 scales that all down and I think it's better for it, it's just enjoyable to roam around, explore the nooks and crannies for secrets and such.  It's just more enjoyable to get around in.

Decided I'll do a full replay of the game and then go do the two DLC packs as it worked out that Steam was selling it insanely cheap, so I basically double-dipped on the game (Had it on Epic), and got the ultimate edition for something like 10 bucks or around that, which is a great deal.  It's hit that a few times I've seen now, so if you were ever got a mood for some zombie smashing, I do recommend the game.

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General / Re: 52 Games Challenge 2026!!!

« on: January 05, 2026, 07:54:09 pm »

2 - Cassette Beasts (PC 2023) - BEAT - As someone that's fallen off Pokemon hard with the state of their games from the Switch era, it was nice to have a monster collecting game that calls back to the old sprite era, but doing it with a 3D world, and introducing some cool unique mechanics.  It very much follows what you expect of a Pokemon-like game, but does it in a way that doesn't feel so hand holdy like Pokemon usually is.  I know those are made for kids, but they just don't really take into account at all that a huge audience of the games is adults.  Not that this is super mature or anything, but it feels less like a childrens game while still being family friendly.

Good art, good music, some light voice work to add character, it's all a real nice package, highly recommend it if i you want a more old school feeling Pokemon experience.

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General / Re: 52 Games Challenge 2026!!!

« on: December 31, 2025, 08:14:13 pm »

3 - ENA: Dream BBQ (PC 2025) - BEAT - I don't know if I could explain this, I found it because I had seen the player character, Ena, in different things, but it's from this game which is a mixture of video game and someones insane art project as it was apparently just gonna be animation, before turning into a game.  It's very much a nod to 90's PC games, a nod to low poly 3D platformers, with characters in so many different visual art styles and mediums, from anim-like characters, to crazy 3D models that feel like they are out of Reboot, to just very weird and abstract things.  No character feels like they are done the same way visually, it's kinda crazy.  It's a free game, it'll have chapters added over time, but there are multiple things to accomplish and different endings to find and this is one of the types of games I want to do more of everything, because I want to see new characters or what new animation they'll do next, it's a pretty ridiculous experience in the best way.

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General / Re: 52 Games Challenge 2026!!!

« on: December 28, 2025, 10:09:09 am »

1 - Peak (PC 2025) - PLAYING
2 - Cassette Beasts (PC 2023) - BEAT
3 - ENA: Dream BBQ (PC 2025) - BEAT
4 - Dead Island 2 (PC 2023) - BEAT
5 - Hytale (PC Early Access 2025) - ENDLESS

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General / Re: What are you playing?

« on: December 21, 2025, 03:26:46 am »

Ended up picking up a couple smaller games just as something more casual as I was feeling a little burnt out with multiplayer games like Arc Raider and Battlefield 6 for the moment...

Peak is a part of this big indie, co-op, friend game boom alongside others such as Lethal Company and REPO, but built around surviving the climb up increasingly harder mountain sections.  I think it's procedurally generated, but handled on the devs end, as it only changes every few days or week (I don't know exactly), which I think is done so you have a chance of learning a section to get better at it again, and then if you've completed a climb, it'll change and be refreshed.  It's a cool way to do it.  There's multiple zone types, and these will be randomized as there's a checkpoint after peak of the mountain section, so after Shore, you have a chance to get Tropics or Roots, or after that you get a chance to do Mesa or Alpines, all with unique environmental threats and other unique things.  I still haven't completed a run yet after nearly 5 hours, but got close on my second run, but the Caldera is rough lol  It's fun even as a singleplayer, it has some good humor to it and it's kinda one of the perfect "just a quick run" or "one more run" sorta deal as you can get rewards for achievements that give you new clothing options.

The other game was Cassette Beasts, which is something I've been meaning to check out.  Pokemon games suck, they've sucked for years, I want to like them and I love the actual creatures, but they are very poor games and I also missed that oldschool aesthetic they got rid of after Black/White.  This is basically what I would have loved for them to do is to keep the sprite era, but do the Octopath Traveler method of 2d sprites and 3D backgrounds and it looks great.  Fun retro aesthetic, it's Pokemon while having it's own unique flair (You do collect and fight as the monsters, but you distinctly transform into them rather than being a trainer on the sidelines which is a fun gimmick).  I haven't been huge into turn based games in awhile, but this is fun so far, a lot of charm to it.

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General / Re: Your collection in 5-years from now

« on: December 20, 2025, 10:31:39 pm »

I had a lot more hope for a game collection 9 years ago, as it didn't turn out that way lol

I eventually stopped collecting old games, a thing here and there, I turned abit more into toy collecting, like my Godzilla collection and such, and then you take that and have a regular want for new games, the retro collection sorta never happened.  I do want to one day have a proper collection, particularly boxed N64 games, that's kinda the big one I want, but most I have for display are my Switch/PS5 games, of which I can't play the Switch games since I don't have a Switch right now and my Zelda collection which I ended up clearing out a lot of it and mostly just have my amiibo's (I own them all other than Smash Bros Link and a couple others I'm forgetting) and a handful of games like my original N64 Zelda games, and boxed Japanese versions of Majora's Mask and Link to the Past.

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General / Re: A Year in Review - 2025

« on: December 15, 2025, 05:29:37 pm »

Favorite 2025 Release: Death Stranding 2 - While it isn't perfect, I think it was still pretty fantastic and I was really eager to get back into that worl.d

Least Favorite 2025 Release: Monster Hunter Wilds - This, Death Stranding 2, and Battlefield 6 were my most anticipated games this year, but this turned out to be a disaster.  Poor performance, some not great changes to the game that made it feel really easy, it's definitely a big botch coming from World.

Favorite Game Played in 2025: Abiotic Factor - Hard to choose for this, but I think I'll say Abiotic Factor as it turned out to be kind of a surprise game for me that I put a ton of hours into and want to go back with a decent enough update to replay.  Throwback to oldschool Half-Life era games with a survival aspect, and while it's not perfect, I was pretty absorbed into the game.

Least Favorite Game Played in 2025: Five Nights at Freddy's 3 - I was trying to get through all the FNAF original games, but I dropped this one after like 10 minutes, because it's such an ugly, clunky, experience.  Obnoxious camera visuals and audio and coming off how snappy FNAF 2 and FNAF4 can feel, the sluggishness of the controls is so terrible.  Genuinely could not play it.

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Off Topic / Re: What TV/Netflix show are you currently watching? (Megathread)

« on: December 14, 2025, 04:54:44 am »

Binged through the final season of My Hero Academia and had a great time with it, they went all out with it.  The series had some ups and down, some soft spots in the middle, but I always enjoyed it.  It's just a good overall show I think.  I'm gonna get to Vigilantes, the prequel spinoff they did eventually.

Got back to Chainsaw Man, I for some reason stopped towards the last couple episodes when it was first out, but re-watched the first season and finished it up and it's definitely a good watch.  I know the movie is doing crazy right now and looking forward to that once it gets to rental.

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Modern Video Games / Re: The Game Awards (TGA) 2025 predictions, hype, and general discussion thread

« on: December 12, 2025, 12:05:38 am »

The biggest, best surprise was Star Wars Galactic Racer, especially knowing the NFS/Burnout people are making it. I wasn't terribly excited about the new KOTOR game, but it's a game I may find myself getting more excited about when it gets closer to release.

I didn't know it has those sort of people working on the game, that has me much more excited, more than I was before.  I use to love Episode 1 Racer and to get something that looks to combine multiple vehicles type is super fun.  I'm also just excited for this and possibly the new Old Republic game because it's outside the big companies now, no EA, no Ubisoft, to me, I feel like that's often a contributor to the Star Wars games we have gotten for awhile not really nailing it like they should.  We'll have to see, I want both of these to be good.

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Modern Video Games / Re: The Game Awards (TGA) 2025 predictions, hype, and general discussion thread

« on: December 11, 2025, 07:57:58 pm »

Bradley the Badger sorta seems like it could be fun, all the references remind me of it being Conker's Bad Fur Day, just not super crude lol I don't know, I want to be hyped but the gameplay they were showing I don't think was real gameplay, maybe I'm wrong, but could be fun.

Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic, a brand new action rpg, I'm definitely curious, I use to like the original KOTOR, I honestly don't remember if I played KOTOR2, but a good new Star Wars games after some sloppy releases lately could be interesting.  We'll just have to see, didn't catch who was the studio for it. It's actually a new studio making it with Casey Hudson, the original KOTOR director.  That actually has me more interested in the game as it's not something attached to any major studio like EA or Ubisoft.

Very excited for Resident Evil 9, it seems like they are gonna mix the playable characters better than they did before, where it seems like they'll have Grace being more like RE7 and then Leon will be like RE4.  Can't wait.

Control Resonant, looks crazy, not the direction I expected them to take it for a sequel. 

The Street Fighter movie looks pretty ridiculous in kind of the best way, like it's gonna be goofy, but I'm fine with them embracing that.

Hell yeah, Star Wars Galactic Racer, I'm very on board with a brand new Star Wars racing game, I thought they were just gonna do Pod Racing again, but it looks like they are doing multiple types of vehicles from speeders, to swoop bikes, to pod racing, I'm kinda hyped and it's another Star Wars game that isn't being made by one of the big studios.

While I can't say I love classic Mega Man as much as I do something like X, a brand new classic Mega Man is cool to have.

Wait, we are at the end, is there no Sega announcement? I know Total War is by a Sega owned company, but that wasn't the reveal was it? Kind of a bummer.  Like it is Sega, but I don't know, I feel like most people don't equate Sega with stuff like that most of the time lol

Crazy sweep for Clair Obscur lol I think they won for every category.  Never played it myself, maybe one day I'll check it out, I don't know, my interest in turn based rpgs is really low these days.