What are you playing at the moment? - October 2017

[alms]

Project Highrise: managed to kickstart my bee-hiveTrump Tower on Hard, finally! Doom and Gloom’s VI, it’s called.

All that it took was:

1. taking every loan in sight as long as I was generating enough profit to stay in the black (the starting funds are ridiculous)
2. consistently under delivering on every service that was requested, and ignoring the complaints
3. cutting every cost-saving corner that made sense
4. cutting every cost-saving corner that didn’t, such as deploying wiring cabinets (that have a recurring upkeep cost) in place of laying down more cabling
5. confining offices in the basement to save on utility connection costs (cabling again)
6. consistently applying the highest rent hikes I could get away with
7. and even those I couldn’t as long as it didn’t result in the office leaving, when I couldn’t afford that
8. but conveniently ignoring those which would lead to them leaving, because that costs less than evicting (that’s how I plan to make room in the basement, if you’re wondering)
9. sign as many contracts as I could, that are feasible, but without actively working towards them (this is something you can get away with at lower difficulties), and letting the money roll in whenever the goal is hit

So for the most part, an accurate simulation of dick-head, penny-pinching, value juice extractorProgressive, Upstanding, Corporatively Socially Responsible Entrepreneur who has the Public Good in mind.

Project Highrise is one of those games I keep trying to like, but there’s just something off about it. Part of it is the mechanical and planning frustrations you mention, but I think part of it is also that I’m not entirely convinced the underlying simulation is really doing much. There all these different stores, all these different kinds of offices etc, but it all feels very samey in a way I find difficult to explain.

Overall I think we’re in agreement, it’s a number of things that are almost there but not quite, starting from the UI itself, which isn’t outright bad, but has a number of niggles.

The mechanical part of the simulation seems taken from an early SimCity game (I have never played SimTower so I can’t say), replace pollution with noise and smells, should be about there.

In my previous mess of a tower, which I started on the default level (Beginner?), I would just compartmentalize things, so I would have noise/smell generators (services for offices, food serving areas) on one side, and the offices on the other.

In that instance, I made the mistake of trying to put apartments inside the same structure, which I’m NOT going to repeat, assuming I keep playing. I picked an Extra Large Lot so I don’t have space problems (thought picking Hard was enough already).

The game also conveys a weird ‘tension’ to me, like, rushed when I’m actively playing (stay on top of everything that needs micromanaging!) but then there’s this downtimes where I’m mostly staring blankly at the screen and waiting for stuff to reach the point where I can interact with it again (though I suppose these may go away later, when the building is more developed)

Lastly, there are some cheap pieces of DLCs that should at least be doing something to dispel that sense of sameness, which, BTW, reminds me of something: I’m not crazy about the art-style either.

One could think it a minor thing, but while building my bee-hive of creatives, and lawyers, and accountants, etc, I cannot really spot at a glance which is which, the designs lack that immediateness.

I don’t doubt budget has something to do with all the annoyances, but still.

It’s frustrating, because in principle it seems right up my alley, and there aren’t enough good economic sim/builder games these days.

Have you tried Kingdoms and Castles? Seems to get very decent user response, looks very appealing.

I also have Lethis sitting in my wishlist for a long time now (what, 2 years already?). And Clockwork Empires, of course.

In my couple hours, Project Highrise felt too paint-by-numbers. Do X to fulfill need Y to build Z, rinse, repeat. This design is essentially the same root problem that SimCity Societies had. It’s not simulation driven, or interesting, or fun.

At the same time you have this puzzle of conflicting needs and wants that needs untangling; I’m not sure you get to appreciate that in two hours, nevertheless, that’s hardly buckets of fun.

[Sarfrin]

Playing Peregrin at the moment. It’s reminding me of a more puzzly, less morbid Inside with a soupcon of Banner Saga thrown into the art style. Lovely looking, relatively straightforward puzzles (it’s no English Country Tune) and a decently voice-acted narration with a narrator who sounds a lot like Colin Firth. Worth the £5.49 I paid for it, I’d say.

I’m not sure why Eurogamer’s reviewer took against the narration so badly, except that he thought it was aiming to be like Bastion. Goodness knows why; it’s not remotely like Bastion (which I loved) in any significant way.

[Spacewalk]

I started on Dragon Slayer IV: Draslay Family (more widely known as Legacy Of the Wizard) with the intention of mapping out the game by hand instead of using a guide. It’s turned out to be a much bigger game than I had planned for so presuming that I don’t go mad in the process I’ll share more of my thoughts on it at the end of the month.

So I did that. 'sgood game, massive, sprawling, something that you need a map handy to get through as well as a tolerance for flip-screen platformers though this isn’t like anything on the Spectrum which was the official home of flip-screen platformers and even then you gotta get used to each screen not being a separate room. So you might wanna go for the NES version over the MSX2 one since it has actual scrolling even though it’s different in a few places which means that you can’t exactly use maps for one version for the other.

I think it still holds up well, the kind of thing that people into ‘retro’ platformers would be well into. It’s a helluva lot easier to digest than La-Mulana say.

[Shadoko]

Medieval II Total War : Teutonic and as my danish kingdom is locked in a bitter war with the Teutonic Order, I start wondering if I should just ask for peace at this point. I’m winning, sure but it’s a slow grind, probably the slowest I’ve ever experienced in a TW game.
The main problem being that the Teutonics are tough. Their heavy infantry and cavalry is probably the best of the game : they simply won’t rout and they cut through anything short of heavy pikemen. Hammer and anvil tactics work of course, but I’m unable to avoid 30-40% casualties in my frontline units. No matter how fast the cavalry is, it’s always the initial shock that hurts the most. And I’m talking about my top of the line, heavy infantry units, the vikings with two-handed axes and plate armor. The rest simply suffers critical existence failure as soon as it makes contact.
Defensive battles somewhat mitigate that, as I can hide in the woods and force the enemy to disperse, but in offensive battles it’s a nightmare.
The result on a strategic scale is that even if I’m victorious in battle, I can’t turn my tactical victories into strategic victories - not with an army that just lost one third of its units.

I don’t really know how to alleviate this issue. As Denmark, I’m a heavy infantry and cavalry faction, but the Teutonics are simply better than I am. Spamming heavy crossbowmen protected by cheap infantry kinda and cavalry to mop up the already weakened Teutonics works but it’s far from being ideal and has the same problem of causing uneeded casualties.

[Jasmin]

Today I play Assetto Corsa on my simulator

[FunnyB]

Still playing Ghost Recon Wildlands for the most part. After finishing 2 entire sectors and taking care of their respective buchons, I can see how the gameplay can feel samey after awhile. I still like it though. It has quite “punchy” combat that just feels good.

When not playing that, I’ve been playing Stardew Valley. Still as lovely as ever, but it took awhile to get back into things since it was awhile since I played it. Currently on Summer year 2. One bundle left to finish the community center. Finished the Mines. Got a good farm set up, but there’s always room for improvements!

[theclockworkrat]

I finally won a hard game of Endless Legend. I had been trying for an expansion victory with the Broken Lords, but because I had turtled for a bit too long I ended up getting an economic victory instead (I actually won via supremacy in the same turn because I started racing round the map once I twigged that I’d screwed up).

However, up until now I’ve always fought battles with autopilot and stacks of doom. I accidentally forgot to hit auto in one of my final battles then panicked because I had no idea how they worked! Now I’m playing a quick “easy” match in order to try to get to grips with it. I’m guessing that if you get reasonably good at manual battles then you can gain a bit more of an advantage.

[BillButNotBen]

I’m not sure why Eurogamer’s reviewer took against the narration so badly, except that he thought it was aiming to be like Bastion. Goodness knows why; it’s not remotely like Bastion (which I loved) in any significant way.

I notice Edwin is writing some stuff for RPS as well:

A reminder that Overwatch should be the friendliest shooter ever

[ToomuchFluffy]

I haven’t had much success with progressing my first run through Mask of the Betrayer. I do like it, but since there is always something to read, spells to rearrange and exact workings of spells to check during or before battle it’s slow going. I think I spent about an hour the day before yesterday simply to take a look at the spell selection of my characters and how to rearrange it. Oh, and trying and failing to craft of course. Still, dialogue and story are certainly enjoyable so far.

Other than that, more Titan Quest. Built a Pet-focused Diviner (Dream & Spirit) and a Trap-focused Brigand (Rogue & Hunting) and got both of them up to around Level 15. The latter used to be a Summoner (Earth & Nature) initially, but once I realized that I had completely overlooked the fact that Briar Ward - which I had wanted to use for defense - has a 120 second-cooldown, I changed the second mastery with the help of TQDefiler before eventually settling on a Brigand.

I felt more comfortable with the idea for the Diviner initially, but now I’m not so sure anymore. While I still find the idea of combining ranged Pets with things like Mind Control, Fear and so forth interesting, at least the Mind Control-skill doesn’t work as reliably as I had hoped. The good thing about that is that I don’t need to put in more than one point. It should still be useful for removing Champions from battle for some time.

https://www.kirmiziperfect.com/titancalc-anniversary-edition/TitanCalc7070.html?mastery=Diviner&master1=2&master2=9&sa=7&m1=32-6-0-0-1-1-0-0-0-16-0-0-8-1-1-0-8-1-0-0-3-0&m2=16-0-0-0-0-8-0-0-16-0-0-0-0-8-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

[Sarfrin]

I notice Edwin is writing some stuff for RPS as well:

They were advertising for new freelancers not long ago. Samuel Horti writes over at Eurogamer too, but he seems to have stopped here.

[Viral_Frog]

I’ve never met anyone who actively disliked Minecraft but most people I know who used to love it got totally bored of it years ago, so there’s that.

I don’t actively dislike it, but I’ve never enjoyed playing it. The most joy Minecraft has ever brought me has been vicariously through my son.

[theantmeister]

I took a break from Planescape to play some Civ VI - just to see how the religion changes play out. I didn’t really get far enough to judge before crushing boredom sank in. I don’t know if I’m over the whole Civ thing or if it is just Civ VI, but “one more turn” has become “sigh, one more turn”. I could be wrong, but I think I enjoyed Civ V more. Anyway, I had the misfortune of being plonked down right next to China - who coincidentally were going for the same religious victory condition as me. Between them declaring war as soon as I founded my religion and the bloody ridiculous barbarians hordes, my game was basically gimped from the start. I guess I could have fought the war and conquered the Chinese, but then of course there would be warmonger penalties and I’d have to put up with Montezuma shouting at me for the rest of all time.

[Sarfrin]

I finished Peregrin. Short (4h), beautiful-looking puzzle game with a reasonable story to it. I think they could have made more of the puzzle mechanics they had, especially the combat one. Plus there’s a bizarre “scientific” explanation of what’s happened at the end that, if you buy into it, makes the quest you spend the whole game doing pointless as it doesn’t explain how what you’ve done will change anything.

[Sarfrin]

Then I started Aporia: Beyond the Valley. Absolutely gorgeous. Kind of a walking sim with light puzzles so far, which I’m more than happy with as it’s such a beautiful place to explore.

[spoken_starfish]

Giving Alien: Isolation a go. Wasn’t really sold until the first proper alien encounter, now I’m totally sold. Finding I’m not using many items - just avoidance mainly. The motion tracker is a brilliant mechanic.

[Lukasz]

I am witchering through Skellige.

Was playing AC: Black Flag before but it got boring before i even got my own ship. then remembered how much bewitched i was by TW3 and how much i crave to finish the story.

So doing all the quests for which I am overlevelled. Some fun stories though.

[Shadoko]

So it looks like Battle Brothers is on sale, would you recommend it for someone who is average at turn-based combat, loves Darkest Dungeon but is (mostly) shit at it ?

[Tritagonist]

Still playing Rise of the Tomb Raider. I’m a bit disappointed it looks like Lara won’t be going anywhere other than Russia. It’s not necessarily boring, but it is a bit dragged out and the other characters aren’t very interesting.

I’m also not too pleased that they’ve only marginally incorporated more puzzle elements into the main story. The ‘challenge tombs’ are nice and all, but they’re out of the way, generally short, and it’s just not the same as needing to do it to progress the main story. But at least we get to choose from 20 different guns for all those firefights…

There is a negative bias, so mistakes made by others are spotted more easily than one’s own, and a higher (negative) value/stigma is assigned to such mistakes.

And that is, IF they can spot their mistakes: many of the things you don’t know, you don’t know that you don’t, and won’t realize a mistake as such.

An interesting post, thanks!

[aoanla]

I don’t actively dislike it, but I’ve never enjoyed playing it. The most joy Minecraft has ever brought me has been vicariously through my son.

This for me too (minus the son, which I don’t have one of).

[Agrest]

I’m playing Pokemon Uranium (it’s a hack of GBA Pokemon Rugby/Sapphire) i thinks it’s better than the original history.
And I just installed Siberia yesterday. My friend recommended me it, since i like puzzles etc.