PantsBandit posted:

Is...is that a turd on her shoulder...

Foul Fowl posted:

i recently finished northern journey and it's a rare treat.

Gay Rat Wedding posted:

I thought you had to write words to submit a rating at all? In the past when I tried to thumbs up a game with no review it wouldn’t let me.

Jelly posted:

This is exactly the kind of game I want (raised on Wizardry) but not like this...

Foul Fowl posted:

i recently finished northern journey and it's a rare treat. absolutely incredible adventure/FPS/walking sim/horror/metroidvania/etc. game. it creates a really evocative and cohesive world centred around scandi mythology, despite being pretty loving out there, or rather it's fully in line with how actually loving out there most scandi myths are, with some very unexpected, funny and memorable events. some janky ugly graphics and some text on the screen is all this game needs to do more to get you invested than a cutscene worked on by 100 people with paid hollywood voice actors. you never have any idea where the story is going next or what you're about to do but it all fits together into this compelling fantasy story that's equal parts about mythology and faith and community as it is about human ingenuity and its daredevil attitude towards the unknown. i'd hate to spoil anything about it, honestly, since that's half the fun of the game. but the dev is one of those people who seems to have realised that you can make your video game do anything so why just stick with boring stuff? the complete lack of information about this game online also definitely helps give the game a sense of mystery. it's one of those you want to keep playing to see what happens.

some of the steam reviews called it skyrim on acid and that's not inaccurate on a surface level but it's got so much more going for it besides just being a richer and better version of a scandi fantasy game.

it's also very pretty. i know i said it's ugly and it kinda is but you spend a lot of your time wandering and ziplining through norwegian mountains and hills and swamps and caves and it's a really pretty game. on some of the maps you'll start on the ground gradually making your way higher and higher, on some you'll delve far into the underground before coming back up. you unlock new means of transportation as you go on and ziplining across the landscape you just struggled through is, as in all games, a lovely feeling.

oh, and the combat. lol, the combat. this is probably where the game's going to lose people. if i was in a kind mood i'd say the combat is charmingly janky, if i wasn't i'd say it was pretty dogshit. other than boss fights you spend all your time fighting these incredibly unpleasant insects, arachnids, whatever ticks are, basically the whole game is crawling with giant bugs and they're really annoying to fight. some of them fly, some of them hide in the grass (and when they attack they attach themselves to your camera and take up like 50% of the screen for a few seconds while they suck your blood). and there are so many of them in the game (there's at least half a dozen kinds of spiders lmao). and they make insanely hideous crawling/flying/skittering bug noises, which is good, because it warns you that something is coming.

and yet. i still pushed through. i mostly have zero tolerance for stuff in games that i don't enjoy but i think northern journey gets away with it in my brain for a few reasons. 1) the game is made by a single dev so i'm much more forgiving of all weird decisions, and because it has such a clear vision throughout it's definitely part of the intended experience 2) because the enemies are so unpleasant to fight, you really appreciate all of the increasingly mechanically complicated weapons you get to fight them, reinforcing the thematic content of human ingenuity and conquering nature 3) going through areas you've cleared is great 4) since most of your weapons are affected by gravity and the insects move in a very insect-like way, becoming better at fighting them takes some amount of skill and it's very satisfying to line up three perfect shots in a row 5) it makes the game feel grounded, which is important when the game goes so out there in so many other ways 6) it leads to some moments of profound terror.

i did play it on the deck which made it a lot harder to aim. and it's possible i am huffing some pure strain copium wrt the combat because i loved the game so much.

anyway it's incredibly good. play if you enjoy video games.

ninjoatse.cx posted:

The combat really is something else. You think you're doing something wrong, the game can't possibly be expecting you to do that, but sure enough, that's exactly what it wants you to do. And after you've shown you can do it, how about doing it while dancing on a tight rope above instant death and stuff is shooting at you. Yeah.

It also has some of the most memorable moments and OST in a video game I've played in the past 10 years. Even linking what they are is kind of ruins it since the music transitions hit you much out of nowhere as much as the gameplay itself.

exquisite tea posted:

I’m gonna be honest, I don’t understand TCGs on a fundamental level. I play video games exactly because I can see my little man beat up stuff instead of some lame picture, that is in fact the entire point!!

Oxxidation posted:

northern journey is a horrid little goblin of a videogame and one of the best I played that year

Croccers posted:

I still barely understand why Syndicate 2012 was banned in Australia.
The offical reason was
"combatants can take locational damage an can be explicitly dismembered, decapitated, or bisected by the force of the gunfire. The depictions are accompanied by copious bloodspray and injuries are shown realistically and with detail. Flesh and bone are often exposed while arterial sprays of blood continue to spurt from wounds at regular intervals."
But this was the same year as Borderlands 2, The Darkness 2 and the Doom 3 remaster so like always it was just the board huffing their own farts.

Jack Trades posted:

Go on...I'm taking notes.

Feels Villeneuve posted:

japanese developers simply understand the truth: people who like old school dungeon crawlers are sex perverts

Mordja posted:

That said, since I've never been a secret hunter*, I'm not a huge fan of the way missable character upgrades are hidden behind some of them, although I think the biggest ones are in clearly marked side areas at least. I haven't played them yet, but I think Cultic and Prodeus are like this too? I definitely prefer it when secrets just hold ammo, health and powerups, or early access to something you'll get later on anyways.

anilEhilated posted:

Prodeus sometimes hides upgrade currency in secrets, but there's way more than you'll need to buy every weapon and upgrade. Cultic has a collectible that gives you 5 extra max health, but there's only one per level. In neither of them, the secrets are necessary to hunt down.

Cultic is the way better game, though.

PantsBandit posted:

Is...is that a turd on her shoulder...

Mordja posted:

Welp, I picked up Dread Templar, only a couple levels in, but yeah, I'm digging it. I get the feeling it won't have the clarity of vision to rank as one of the best (eg DUSK, AE, I think Wrath has that potential) but that's not damning it. It's just good, old fashioned fun! That said, since I've never been a secret hunter*, I'm not a huge fan of the way missable character upgrades are hidden behind some of them, although I think the biggest ones are in clearly marked side areas at least. I haven't played them yet, but I think Cultic and Prodeus are like this too? I definitely prefer it when secrets just hold ammo, health and powerups, or early access to something you'll get later on anyways.


*Unless the games have very obvious tells that one's in the area, eg Overload and nu-Doom.

The 7th Guest posted:

try undernauts

Feels Villeneuve posted:

japanese developers simply understand the truth: people who like old school dungeon crawlers are sex perverts

Gay Rat Wedding posted:

PSA not to update/restart the steam client if you have it running, an update has made the friends list/chat appear as a black box which was previously a rare thing you used to be able to fix but this old thread on the steam forums just blew up with mentions of it starting here so it seems to be broken for everyone.

Jelly posted:

Undisputed came out today and immediately shot to #2 on the Steam sales chart, falling short of only TERFwarts.

This is pretty surprising to me. I don't think I've seen this much hullabaloo over a boxing game since Fight Night.

If I'm being honest, I don't know of any boxing games that existed since Fight Night.

Jelly posted:

Thanks, I've wishlisted this. Few games will I spend $60 on.

The 7th Guest posted:

try undernauts

Rinkles posted:

Much needed change



From the beta client

FutureCop posted:

And here I thought you were just thinking of Momodora, which I feel spawned a lot of similar boob-based bosses:



I also thought you might've meant the Hakoniwa Explorer Plus, which has a lot of bosses that crush you with their, uh, assets.

Rinkles posted:

Much needed change



From the beta client

FuzzySlippers posted:

How interesting are builds in Troubleshooter? It doesn't seem to have any character creation but if the build space is wide enough that can be sufficient for me.

Bloody Hedgehog posted:

Foul Fowl posted:

i recently finished northern journey and it's a rare treat. absolutely incredible adventure/FPS/walking sim/horror/metroidvania/etc. game.

OzFactor posted:

Extremely wide and unfathomably deep. Troubleshooter is very good, only suffering from a general problem of too many things. It could cut like twenty gameplay systems and be a bit more streamlined... but also it's whole everything, all of the things is kind of part of the charm so who cares. But yes, the build crafting is second to none, it's FFT on mega-steroids.