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Video Games General

KinKrow said:
Yeah, it's been over ten days, so I have almost no guilt double posting to ask for advice.


I recently beat Skyrim, and while fun I've heard good things about the Morroblivion games.

Which choose, and why? :V

I vaguely remember that gibbousmoons had... opinions about this.

Or are the Skyblivion and Skywind mods far enough along I shouldn't even bother?
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It's been easily five years since I played Morrowind, but I did enjoy it a lot. A lot to do, and a lot of mods to do stuff afterwards. Ugly, ugly graphics though. Never played Oblivion.
 
I just spent the last four hours working on a review of Trails of Cold Steel only to have it cut in half by Steam's character limit. Screw it, I'm posting it here instead:

The Short Version
Persona 5 may be my favorite JRPG of 2017 but Trails of Cold Steel is a very close second. This game combines a richly-detailed setting and excellent characters with a dense and tactical battle system. While the plot can drag in some places it's ultimately a very worthwhile experience that rewards your completion of its story with one of the most insane cliffhangers in modern videogames as the plot continues into the sequel. If you have any love for JRPGs at all then picking this game up should be a no-brainer.

First Impressions
Cold Steel came recommended to me by a friend who is also into JRPGs. I knew of the game and had some familiarity with the first Trails in the Sky on PSP but not enough that I would consider myself a fan of the series (a position I will be rectifying immediately), so I came into this experience with no preconceptions of what to expect beyond a few worldbuilding details. As of this writing I have 103 hours logged in game time, have played the game to completion, and am eagerly awaiting the PC port of the sequel.

Cold Steel opens with a brief prologue in which your characters attempt to stop a terrorist attack on a military base before cutting back several months to the start of a new school year at Thors Military Academy, where main character Rean Schwarzer and the rest of your party members will be attending. Things get off to a rocky start; the newly-minted Class VII is a mix of traditionally-segregated social classes and tempers and personalities immediately begin clashing within the group, setting up the early plot of the game as the characters try to work out their differences and become a more effective fighting force.

This opening showcases several things Cold Steel does right as well as a few places where it stumbles a little. The cold open does a great job of priming the player for the plot to come in the mid to late stages of the game before immediately dumping you into Rean's shoes and presenting you with a much less exciting plot of teenagers learning how to be friends. That's not to say the school plot is bad, far from it: it's very rewarding to see these characters grow and change as the story progresses, but it's also slower-paced and more focused on character development than most JRPGs that aren't Persona games, which makes the game as a whole feel a little sluggish in places if you just want to smack monsters with swords. By opening with one of the emotional high points from later in the story however the game does a good job of having its cake and eating it too by promising that more action-packed content awaits behind the softer stuff.

And on that note…

General Gameplay
The flow of the story follows a pretty consistent pattern. You'll start each chapter of the game playing out a day or two of major events at Thors, during which you'll socialize with party members and certain NPCs (earning bond points and gameplay rewards, much like Persona's social links), answer the occasional question in class, do sidequests for your schoolmates, and run through a short dungeon with a team of your choice of available party members. After this your team will be split up and dispatched to some distant part of the country for a field mission, during which you'll get a lot more fighting, more sidequests, a lot more character and story development and so on before fighting a big boss to close out the chapter and heading home, where you'll start the process all over again.

If this sounds a little repetitive that's because it is, but setting that aside the format works pretty well. Each chapter takes you to a different region of the kingdom of Erebonia, and this is where one of the game's greatest strengths shines through. The Trails series' worldbuilding is some of the very best in all of videogames because Falcom puts the legwork in to make sure their game worlds feel like real places. You don't just run around fighting monsters and saving the day, you're also learning about the culture, politics, and economics of the various places you visit, and the enemies you face will often have something important to do with those things. This makes Erebonia feel fully-tangible, like you've actually been there, and there more you talk to NPCs or read the in-game novels or otherwise ferret out information about the setting the more fleshed out it becomes.

Combat
Of course, it wouldn't be much of a JRPG without combat, and Cold Steel's combat engine is a joy to play with. Like the rest of the Trails series combat is turn-based and deeply strategic. Characters have the JRPG standards of normal attacks, special attacks, spells, and a limit break that unlocks when your special attack meter rises past a certain point. All of these abilities have different ranges, special attributes, and recovery times, making each character unique and valuable in different situations. Swords are more effective against some enemies than spears or bows and vice versa, and the normal attacks of some weapons hit a small area of effect instead of a single target.

As your characters grow and interact with each other both in and out of combat they'll also increase their bond levels, which allows them to form combat links to support each other with actions like auto-casting healing spells or taking damage for each other or teaming up to finish off an enemy at low health. Compounding this are turn bonuses which grant special attributes like a guaranteed critical hit to whichever character's turn happens while that bonus is in effect. These can help or hinder both you and your enemies, so having good control over who goes when is critical to success in battle.

Combat in general isn't terribly difficult; even though I played on hard mode on my first playthrough I only struggled with normal encounters on rare occasions where I got careless and found myself in a bad situation. This is made easier by the first hit system, a mechanic that gives you a bonus for attacking enemies on the field before battle begins and a much bigger one if you can hit them from behind. Once you realize that enemies rarely pursue you past a certain distance it becomes easy to lead them to the edge of that radius and then shoot them in the back with a ranged character once they give up on you and turn around.

Boss battles were another matter entirely however, and I found myself suffering game overs on those right from the first or second chapter. Repeat game overs on normal or easy mode give you the option to weaken the boss after one or two losses, but on hard mode that isn't an option and success depends almost entirely on your mastery of the battle system. I say almost, however, because late-game bosses have a distressing tendency to whip out their own limit breaks. These attacks come with no warning and are almost guaranteed to wipe a full party at full heath unless defense buffs or auto-revive magic is in play, and several times getting these sudden game overs on the final leg of a long boss fight nearly had me throwing my controller at the wall in frustration. The lack of a 'Defend' option on the battle menu is keenly felt during these fights. This, however, might be a consequence of playing on hard mode, which boosts enemy stats by 10%, so I won't be docking points for it.

In general I have only positive things to say about the primary combat system. There is, however, a second combat system introduced near the end of the game which is far more punishing and in need of greater game balance. Without spoiling anything I will say that this system is used for one-on-one battles rather than the standard party-based combat and turns a handful of fights into a complex variation of rock paper scissors. This system is a preview for content in Trails of Cold Steel 2, where I am told it is far more well-balanced, but in its few appearances in this game it causes combat to devolve into a frantic DPS race that seems to depend as much on random chance as actual skill.

Characters
Of course, the most important parts of any JRPG are the characters, and here again Cold Steel delivers in some ways and stumbles (but doesn't fall!) in others. At the beginning of the game your characters are kind of a mixed bag. Rean, for example, is a fairly standard high school anime protagonist; he's likable enough, but he has the black hair, katana, mysterious past, unassuming personality and so on down to a T, and Alicia, the girl set up to be his love interest, comes off as a very stereotypical tsundere for the first few hours of the game, complete with the obligatory anime cliché of the accidental boob grope getting them off to a bad start.

A little later on these characters started to surprise me, but in the early game the first big surprise was Jusis and Machias; one a cool-headed rich boy from a powerful noble family and the other a fiery shotgun-toting social justice warrior, but surprisingly the game averts the pompous asshole noble trope with Jusis in favor of making Machias well-meaning but overbearing in his beliefs, at least at first (pompous asshole boy is still present and accounted for, but isn't one of your party members). Another way that Cold Steel surprised me was by having all of its playable characters (with one or two surprise exceptions) present in the story right from the first chapter, giving you plenty of time to bond with and get to know all of them. Combined with other interesting hooks like Fie's unnatural competence at dungeon-crawling and Emma's general mysteriousness and the whole gang (plus several supporting NPCs such as the amorous Prince Olivier and student council president Towa Herschel) proved to be engaging enough to make me want to learn more about them. The only exceptions were Gaius and Crow, but that owed more to my need to ration my bond points out to the characters I was most interested in more than anything else.

That said, there are a few points where the game should lose points with me but doesn't due to extenuating circumstances which might be sticking points for others. Trails of Cold Steel was clearly produced with the intention of being the first game in a series, and for that reason many of the characters pass on developing or completing their personal story arcs in this game. For example I learned very little about Emma outside of a few bonding events; even at the very end of the game she remained a mysterious and reclusive character who avoided talking about herself whenever possible within the main story. This might also be to the game's benefit however, because I now have that much more to look forward to in the sequel.

Final Verdict:
9/10, a must play for any JRPG fan.
 
Weighing whether to get this month's Humble Bundle. Haven't heard a single good thing about Dawn of War III, but I'm curious about The Long Dark and Quantum Break. Worth getting? And a follow-up question, worth getting for a laptop or five year old computer?
 
CptTagon said:
Weighing whether to get this month's Humble Bundle. Haven't heard a single good thing about Dawn of War III, but I'm curious about The Long Dark and Quantum Break. Worth getting? And a follow-up question, worth getting for a laptop or five year old computer?
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DoW III is a bad DOW game and a mediocre RTS with MOBA elements.

Quantum Break seems to have flown under the radar, having gone up against Nier: Automata, Horizon Zero Dawn, and other massive successes this year. I've heard it's about an 8/10, problem is there were a ton of 9s and 10s this year.

The Long Dark...

Looks to have good reviews. I'd say it's worth it for those two alone. DoW is just a freebie. I mean, not a great one, but a freebie.
 
Check out Ancient Amuletor.

Chinese VR game... with breast physics.

Gentlemen, grope your anime waifu tiddies for the first time!
 
I am syked for the next HO4 DLC ! Finally, they add stuff for China!
 
Got Destiny 2 for free on pc.

Dad got a video card, and didn't care for the game code that came with it.

Wooooooooo?

tbf it feels better than console Destiny.
 
So, has anybody tried out Elex?
I'm thinking of maybe buying a pc game again since it's been a while since I really played anything.
The trailers look quite nice and PB has made some pretty good games for how small they are, so I'm thinking Elex might be the one. Although I'll probably wait a little until the price goes down some.
Anybody here got any experience with it?
 
My father is handicapped and has trouble bringing his arms together for game controllers.

Anybody know split controllers like VR has, without the motion sensing?
 
KinKrow said:
My father is handicapped and has trouble bringing his arms together for game controllers.

Anybody know split controllers like VR has, without the motion sensing?
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I know there's the Switch, which has a dock for regular gaming on a TV.

As far as PC goes? I'm not sure. Give me a bit.
 
I just got Wolfenstein 2 and the new Marvel va Capcom. Haven't played them yet due to being busy.
 
KinKrow said:
My father is handicapped and has trouble bringing his arms together for game controllers.

Anybody know split controllers like VR has, without the motion sensing?
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Okay. So, I found this:


http://lpaccessibletechnologies.com/products/game-controllers/lp-pad

But I don't know if that's what he wants/needs. It's for Xbox 360 it looks like and is like 400 bucks. Worst comes to worst I'll try and find someone I can put you in contact with to kitbash something nice.
 
BigBoom550 said:
What platform, BTW?
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PC.
BigBoom550 said:
Okay. So, I found this:

http://lpaccessibletechnologies.com/products/game-controllers/lp-pad

But I don't know if that's what he wants/needs. It's for Xbox 360 it looks like and is like 400 bucks. Worst comes to worst I'll try and find someone I can put you in contact with to kitbash something nice.
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Nah, aside from his legs he's mostly accessible (despite being a hundred percent disabled, I don't fully understand it), it's just he can't hold his arms close enough for an xbox controller and such.

He can manage the keyboard though.

We're looking for something like the wiimote or vr controllers (which we have both of) that can be used for pc without vr goggles.

Is there software/methods to use the vr controllers without the headset?
 
KinKrow said:
Nah, aside from his legs he's mostly accessible (despite being a hundred percent disabled, I don't fully understand it), it's just he can't hold his arms close enough for an xbox controller and such.
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Switch to an original Xbox controller? :V

The kitbash solution I was speaking of was to just use two controllers and make the computer see it as one through software. Might be worth checking if you can't find a split controller under the price of two xbox ones.
 
BigBoom550 said:
It's PC, so more than likely. What sort of games does he play?
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Generally just WoW, but I'm trying to get him back into DOOM.

He's fallen far out of love with the Modern FPSs, but I explained the difference between Moderns and Arenas, and it clicked so now he kinda wants to play DOOM 2016.

The problem is that he has trouble moving his arms to close together for long periods, and the controller seems to get 'heavy' after too long.

It's a double whammy of, "Well, I enjoy WoW anyway, soooooooo..."
aabbcc said:
Switch to an original Xbox controller? :V

The kitbash solution I was speaking of was to just use two controllers and make the computer see it as one through software. Might be worth checking if you can't find a split controller under the price of two xbox ones.
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Too heavy :V
 
Odyssey Bundle - 3 point n clicks for 1$, or 14 games for $2.50
https://www.fanatical.com/en/bundle/odyssey-bundle-reloaded

RPG Heroes Bundle - 6 RPGs for $2.99
https://www.fanatical.com/en/bundle/rpg-heroes-2-bundle
(if you're interested in even just Sudeki, then this is six games for nearly half of Sudeki's Steam price)

No Escape Bundle - 4 Old(ish) School games for $1
https://www.fanatical.com/en/bundle/no-escape-bundle
(reviews for Castle of No Escape 2, Pixel Gladiator, and Void Source are all high-ish --- Caste of No Escape 1 is... mixed. It's only a buck though, if you like even one then it's a solid win)
EDIT
Fantasy Heroes Bundle - $112 value, for $3
https://www.fanatical.com/en/bundle/fantasy-heroes-bundle
 
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The previous bundle were just neat game bundles.

However, apparently you can build a bundle for varying prices.

Most of the options are meh, but three of them are multiplayer.

https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/discovery-pick-mix-bundle

Z9nxNMU.png


The first three games are multiplayers.

Hyperdrive Massacre is apparently a dumb/awesome party game, Foreign Legion is a 'meh' shooter, and Azulgar is a 15 buck Steam Early access.

The next two games don't look bad, but I'm mostly interested in being able to have a couple of cheapo multiplayer games I could play with you guys.

Anyone interested?
 
Intel(R) Core i7-7500 CPU @ 2.70 GHz 2.90 GHz
16.0 GB RAM
Intel® HD Graphics 620

I think thats the stuff that matters.
 
BrokenAscendent said:
Intel(R) Core i7-7500 CPU @ 2.70 GHz 2.90 GHz
16.0 GB RAM
Intel® HD Graphics 620
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Shit, your RAM isn't bad considering I'm pretty sure I used to use 8.

Your CPU isn't too bad.

Graphics card... isn't bad, but it isn't fantastic.

The test I saw ran GTA V at 40-50 fps, and Fallout 4 at 20-40, so if you keep it plugged in you should be able to handle the lighter and older games.

That said, I'm pretty sure you can artificially cut a bit of graphics processing into RAM.

Unsure.
 
BrokenAscendent said:
to be fair, it is a laptop
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I'm saying it isn't bad for a laptop.

I can play a few select games on my Surface, and the damn thing doesn't even have a graphics card.

You can tank a couple of older games easy.

Borderlands 2, just don't turn on physx, it crashes your game no matter how high your graphics card.

It is the fucking worst.
 
Well, nice to know some old games are available to me. I can finally play morrowind I hope.
 
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