Last Game You Played

[Dragon Lord]

Ghost of Tsushima (PS4)

Finished the platinum for this a couple of days ago. Still need to do all of the DLC stuff and get all of the extra trophies. In the end my stance on the game pretty much remained the same -- great story, great world and exploration, very nice character stories, very good bow gameplay, good music... but that god awful combat just really lowers my overall score for the game though. The stealth was wonderful. Probably my favorite stealth gameplay in a game, but the open combat/duels were just... bad. I'd give the game a personal 8/10 for all of the good stuff, but the combat drops it down to a 4/10 or 5/10 for me personally.

I was going to play through the PS5 version entirely fresh, but now I'm considering just transferring my save and auto-popping the trophies to save myself from having to experience that combat again. Though maybe I'll at least try the game on Normal/Hard to see if it makes the combat feel any better, since stat upgrades and Charms will actually make a difference on those difficulties, whereas they don't do squat for you on Lethal due to everything just being a 1-shot or 2-shot at best.

Story though was delicious. Really enjoyed the game for everything else.

[Moonface]

@Dragon Lord: I believe I played the game on Hard because I'd heard Lethal just wasn't very fun when it came to combat. That might be why I don't recall having as many irks with the combat as you seem to have had, but my memory of the game is rather hazy so don't take my word fully on that.

Elden Ring (PS5)
Finally made it into the Altus Plateau, since I think I've more or less done almost all I can in the other areas but don't want to just spend my time wandering them endlessly looking for loose ends and getting bored.

[Kyng]

The Sims 4... didn't get a whole lot done, but did get another screenshot or two. It's very difficult to get four Sims to stand in the places I want them to, without having one of them run off to do something else >_< !

[Dragon Lord]

@Dragon Lord: I believe I played the game on Hard because I'd heard Lethal just wasn't very fun when it came to combat. That might be why I don't recall having as many irks with the combat as you seem to have had, but my memory of the game is rather hazy so don't take my word fully on that.

That very well could be it. The thing that really sucks about Lethal is that none of your upgrades/charms matter at all. Even if you equip the most defensive armor, have max health, and equip all the charms that reduce damage, you'll still be 1-2 shot by everything. It definitely makes the stealth feel more exciting, because getting caught and having an entire camp of enemies come charging at you usually means death. This is also what makes the combat feel so bad though, because when you have two or three enemies attack you at once, you're going to die because you cannot parry/dodge all of them. I had countless deaths happen because I parried or dodged an attack from an enemy, only to have another enemy hit me right after the parry/dodge, when there was nothing I could do about it because I was unable to move.

It really felt like they made Lethal purely with the stealth in mind, but didn't really put much thought into how that was going to translate into the open battles against multiple enemies. I'm hoping if I play NG+ on Hard, that maybe I'll feel better about the combat since I should be able to actually feel a difference with armor and charms. 

Oh, speaking of armor and charms... one thing that really grinded my gears in this game was the lack out LOADOUTS. It was so annoying having to constantly go into the menu and change my armor because I wanted to have certain ones equipped for different situations. Like, I wanted the Traveler's armor equipped while I was exploring to get notice when a collectible item was around, but if I came across a group of Mongols while exploring, I had to stop, go into the menu, change to the Sakai Clan Armor so I could have the +2 to the Standoff count, then go back in and change back to the Traveler's armor to continue my exploration. Then it gets even worse when you get the Ghost Armor because I wanted that one equipped while I was clearing out camps. 

I ended up basically never changing my charms just because it was too much work to go into the menu and change them constantly. If they had loadouts so I could have an exploration loadout, an archery loadout, a stealth loadout and a melee loadout, things would have felt MUCH better.

Ghost of Tsushima (PS4)

Going through the Iki Island DLC now. So far enjoying it. The new Shaman enemy seems like it could potentially be really annoying in certain situations, but thankfully it seems they are super weak and one arrow is usually enough to put them down regardless of where I shoot them. The size of Iki Island seems nice. Big enough to give me a few hours of exploration, but not too big to feel like it's dragging on the game for too much longer. Plan to finish up the DLC and get all of the trophies and then probably do my NG+ for the trophy for that. Then I have to get the trophies for the Legends mode stuff... I just hope there's still people playing the online for this game, otherwise I don't know if I'll be able to get them by myself.

Fire Emblem Fates (3DS)

The localization of this game is so, so bad. Like if I was ever going to use the word "cringe" to describe something, I'd use it to describe this game. Currently malding at myself because I keep screwing up the current chapter I'm in by forgetting one of my characters in the southern part of the map and then she dies, forcing me to reset the chapter and do it all over again. 

Arknights (Android)

Finished up all the stages for the 3rd anniversary event. Man, this event was... something else. It didn't seem so bad at first, but then the boss of the event was just the biggest pile of what the fuck trash. I'm kind of getting tired of them just relying on just piling bullshit mechanics on top of each other and calling it a day. It's been a while since I've actually finished an event in this game where I didn't feel just annoyed by the time I was done with it. And of course the next thing we have going on is Contingency Contract, so that's the exact opposite thing I need to fix my feelings of annoyance and frustration with the content of the game. Oh well, at least I have some really nice operators to look forward to in the next 4-5 months.

[ShiraNoMai]

Yeah Lethal was very clearly an afterthought, especially considering they added that difficulty mode in post-launch. Hoping you enjoy the NG+ Hard mode better.

Unpacking:
Started this up last night. Got it on Game Pass, which I got a month of for free thanks to a Trihex homie (I had won the contest but wasn't there to redeem in chat, so a chat member donated the month pass to me anyway)
Very chill game. I enjoy the satisfaction of rearranging and figuring out the puzzle of "how do I fit all these things in this small space". There's a cute branching story attached to it that's neat too. Nearly done with it, I think. I would've played it all last night but it was getting quite late.

[queenzelda]

[PS5] FF7: Crisis Core. Zack is upgraded to Soilder FIRST CLASS. I had to quit before the rest of the cut scene cause we were leaving to get grooceries and my husband was getting a list together. lol

[Switch] Pokemon Violet: I was heading into raids for candies to raise up some of my shiny Pokemon to higher lvls. lol I beat the game and completed my dex months ago.

[Henrywrites]

I play Elden Ring yesterday. It has been more than 3 weeks since I played it and playing it now is one thing that I truly enjoyed so much.

[queenzelda]

[Switch] Wylde Flowers: I helped out Wesley and found and fixed a gem finder in the mine cause of a quest I was sent on. Finished by gathering some flowers for the spring festival but I need way more witchweed then I can collect in a day. So I'm going to try but I doubt I can make 5. So far I've bearly made 3. Getting 4 witchweed in under 7 days would leave me with 3 days before everything starts. I might need to make it rain or something in game. Idk, but Imma try.

[Kyng]

Transport Fever

Started a new game set in Norway, in Bergen and the surrounding area. The map has 22 towns and plenty of industry - so, while I don't have much of a transport empire just yet, there's plenty of scope for me to build one!

[Heatman]

I played Gran Turismo 7 few hours ago. It's one my favourite car racing games on Playstation 4. My favourite racing game on my Xbox Series X is Forza Horizon 5. I played it last night.

[ShiraNoMai]

Octopath Traveler (PC):

Started playing this since I got Game Pass and I really wanted to see all the character endings. I've recruited Alfyn, Therion and H'annit, in that order, so far, so Ophelia is next in line. Ophelia's is the only true ending I've seen, so I'll be doing her full quest last. Trying to approach it as a "if I come across the mission during my trek to get characters, I'll do those next". It's been fun so far. I forgot how ridiculous H'annit's first chapter boss is. That bitch is tank-y, sheesh. And it hits hard as hell. Had one attack literally OHKO Therion (who was level 8).

[Nomad]

A couple of hours ago, I was playing Asphalt 9 Legends on my Android phone. This is one of the games I am playing too much these days. If you love car racing game, you will certainly enjoy the game. It is free game with microtransactions.

[Dragon Lord]

Been mostly playing the Honkai Star Rail beta. Got in thanks to the Twitch Drops event, and I was lucky enough to be one of the first 20,000 people to claim the drop and got beta access. Having a lot of fun with it so far. It's turn-based combat, so it's right in my sweet spot. Been looking forward to this game for a long while now and it's awesome to get into the beta so I can get a taste of it a little early. Hoyoverse definitely going to get me hooked on another game, and probably third once Zenless Zone Zero also releases, haha.

[Moonface]

Been mostly playing the Honkai Star Rail beta. Got in thanks to the Twitch Drops event, and I was lucky enough to be one of the first 20,000 people to claim the drop and got beta access. Having a lot of fun with it so far. It's turn-based combat, so it's right in my sweet spot. Been looking forward to this game for a long while now and it's awesome to get into the beta so I can get a taste of it a little early. Hoyoverse definitely going to get me hooked on another game, and probably third once Zenless Zone Zero also releases, haha.

Judging by your post, I get the impression you're not really a fan of Honkai Impact? I assume Star Rail and Impact are both within the same line of games, so I'm curious what Impact lacked compared to Star Rail for you.


Horizon Forbidden West (PS5)
Made it to the real meat of the game now since the game basically splits the world into three sections for the sake of how the story is told. Still really loving the game so far, although there was a Hunting Ground that was not remotely suited to being done on Very Hard because it was focused around one-hit kills with Silent Strike, but in Very Hard that move isn't strong enough to one-hit kill the enemies in those trials. It's still doable but it requires using smoke bombs to re-stun enemies so you can land a second Silent Strike (all the trials are focused on killing with Silent Strike without alerting enemies, which is hard when it takes two hits to kill them because obviously the first will alert them, unless you use smoke to re-stun them). Hopefully that Hunting Ground is the only one I have to deal with being busted by the difficulty increase, and I wish the devs had just patched that one set of trials up to just always be a one-hit kill no matter the difficulty.
Oh, I also came across an invisible areas of rocks today that I only discovered because Aloy ran into them and started climbing, despite nothing visually being there. Doesn't seem to be a case of a texture failing to load, so I have no idea how it hasn't been patched up because I'm sure it must be known about.

[Mr EliteL]

Genshin Impact (all accounts)

After finishing up the Onikabuto beetle fighting event last Sunday which I last did on my NA, just daily stuff really and getting the Overflowing Mastery everyday done, but nothing much else. I skipped the other short event on my NA though, did the rest of the events during 3.4.

Octopath Traveler

Finally started this last night. Begun on Temenos and made my way and started Throné's Chapter 1. In a way I should've started as Osvald as he's furthest on the east side, but nah. I'll get Ochette after and explore some more up to Osvald, then back to get the rest of Chapter 1's done.