… my mind

Presumably

Yeah it’s funny now that you mention it but I don’t really remember the battle music if XV all that well. But I have stuff like Valse di Fantastica/Sunset Walz/Dewdrops at Dawn and Ardyn’s themes seared into my brain.

What I love about the series is that there are so many varied entries that everyone can find their own favourite, consensus be dammed.

I’ll always consider VI the absolute peak Final Fantasy - beautiful pixel art, Active Time Battles, SNES Mode 7, brilliant score, a fantastic story with a memorable villain and a large and varied ensemble cast of great characters… It has it all for me.

I also have to somewhat ashamedly admit that for whatever reason I actually have some fondness for XV. I’ve posted about it before but I have such a hard time succinctly putting my feelings about it into words, because it is by no means a good game. It’s probably the biggest discrepancy I’ve experienced between the objective quality of a game and how much I enjoyed playing it. Whether it’s the stellar fishing mini game or the random wholesome interactions between the gang and the overall bro trip vibe I don’t know but there is something there. And the score is no Uematsu perhaps but I really enjoyed it and thought they did some wonderful leitmotif work.

Agreed, really looking forward to seeing what he’s cooking up. One of the few people with legitimate claims to being able to make a legit “unofficial sequel”. Really hoping to hear something out of Red Info too soon (Kurvitz’s and Rostov’s new company).

Yeah these are all interesting and I’ll follow their development for sure, as I know there were a lot of talented people that worked on DE. But I would be hard pressed to call anything a true “successor studio” without any of Kurvitz, Rostov, Hindpere and Tuulik - and preferably all four of course.

I’ve literally got a save file prepped where I rushed getting to B&W before doing literally anything else so I can play the whole games’s Gwent with the Skellige deck when I decide to play it again. You don’t get enough time with it and it’s such a fun deck!

I skip reading the article this one time after being so disappointed by Rockstar for the PS4 release of RDR, and I an punished. Serves me right tbh.

Archive link doesn’t work for me, but I could extract the original link and read it.

Don’t really take much joy from anything Paradox is saying about the direction and developer switch. It plays more like Dishonored? That’s not what made the first game so good brother, why’d you throw out Brian Mitsoda when you had him working on the project and the writing is half of what made people love the original? Why did The Chinese Room toss out Rik Schaffer when the soundtrack of the original was so iconic?

It might turn out to be a decent game but I have such a hard time believing it will be a good Bloodlines game.

Presumably still 30 FPS max and no other improvements apart from deigning to let us play it at all on PC?

Can’t believe I had to scroll down this far to find Neon White but I’m glad someone mentioned it! It is pretty much the flow state shooter, should be perfect for OP.

Oooh tough question. Maybe Bioshock Infinite? I only ever played the first one but picked up the full bundle on sale on GOG last year. I have to get through 2 first which has put me off a bit since it’s a big time commitment.

The combat is way too easy on normal difficulty - this is fine if you only want to experience the story but very understimulating otherwise. I honestly suggest trying to play the game on Death March (but turn it up after the first time you fight a pack of Ghouls, they’ll fuck you up). On Death March you’ll be incentivized to interact with the game systems: Alchemy, Signs, specific monster weaknesses in the bestiary. All this really makes you feel more like a witcher, which in my opinion enriches the gameplay.

Experiment with builds - respec potions are fairly plentiful so don’t be scared to put points into stuff. Don’t underestimate Alchemy, but make sure you visit all the herbalists you can find to purchase recipes, the difference between basic alchemy and the upgraded recipes is massive.

Play Gwent, and check every single store you come across for cards and instantly buy them all. W3 Gwent is fantastic and half the fun of the game.

With the story calling back to both the two previous games and the books it’s not a bad idea to try to find some story recaps on YouTube of what has happened earlier in the story.

EDIT: Completely put 100%-ing the game out of your mind. There are a million ?'s on the map and they are almost all completely meaningless filler content. Trying to collect all the sunken treasure in Skellige will completely burn you out and make you hate the game.

While you’re not wrong about the grid, safe spots like the ones discussed in the video are generally more about being not off-grid but also outside the range of the Directional Scanner (14.3 AU). These safe spots can only be found via Combat Scanner Probes.

That being said, closer off-grid bookmarks also have their uses, but wouldn’t generally be labeled “safe spots”. At least that’s how I went about it years ago, I am also on a very extended break.

Let’s hope terraforming Mars is an actual possibility in the near-ish future, because it sure looks like we might need a backup planet.

These kinds of moments are pure Remedy magic. Take Control is similarly amazing but hell, they’ve been doing quirky levels since Max Payne! Maybe even Death Rally? I never played that one.

Like the other poster said, Epic financed and published AW2 and paid good money for exclusivity. I doubt you’ll see it on Steam anytime soon. The only way to play it without Epic Games Launcher and all that is on console.

The game is worth it though. One of my most memorable gaming experiences over the past few years. And if you’re planning on upgrading I’ll tell you it looks absolutely gorgeous. One of the few games where ray tracing actually has a noticeable impact, too, in my opinion.

The ride definitely continues in Alan Wake 2, so you have lots to look forward to! Remedy are such a beacon of hope in today’s AAA landscape.

It still has some kinks that need ironing out, and it could for sure use a bigger roster, but they’re cooking with this one. The MOBA core and superb movement mechanics just complement each other so nicely, and with both powerful easy to use active items and ability-based heroes available it’s possible to perform even if you’re not an aim god.

I know the fan mod project for FF8 is jokingly named Demaster in protest of the official remaster, but I never thought a large company would release an honest to god demake of a game - and charge you for it!

Neat, sounds useful!