toxicitizen

Shadowrun Returns. This was pretty damn good, even more so than I expected. There were times when I kinda wished it had higher production values but overall it was fine. The art is gorgeous, the lack of voice acting never bothered me and I hear Dragonfall is a little bit more open so I have that to look forward to in the next one. It also seriously scratched that cyberpunk itch, and that's always nice. Cyberpunk is probably my favorite kind of setting/genre for RPGs. I've been vaguely familiar with the Shadowrun setting for years but this was my first actual experience with it. I've never played the tabletop version or past video games based on it. I loved it so much that now I'm really tempted to just jump right into Dragonfall. And Harebrained recently teased a kickstarter for their next campaign, so that's another thing to look forward to. Other than that, it's been too long since it came out for me to remember the main issues people had with it, so I can't really comment on those. All I remember is the lack of manual saves thing and they've since rectified that with a patch. And holy shit, I can't even imagine playing this without the quick save button. It would've been so goddamn frustrating! I only actually died once or twice in the entire game but some areas/fights were pretty long and I can definitely see how having to start over from the autosave would suck. One thing I really appreciated was the ability to rewind a save to a previous state. I kinda hate having to keep a ton of backup saves in RPGs in case I screw something up so this was a very welcome feature. I can't believe I've never seen any other game implement it before.

I guess I'm doing a double entry here. First off, Styx: Master of Shadows. Finished it early yesterday but, since I ended up having to put it on hold for a few weeks, I wanted to let it sink in a little bit before doing my usual write up. This game is pretty rough around the edges but if you love true stealth games and can look past floaty jumping/controls, map re-use and generally low production values (most cutscenes are just drawn art with a voice over) then holy fuck are you in for a treat. Stealth games don't get any more legit than this. Forget all that "stealth-action" bullshit, Styx is the real fucking deal. If you get spotted, you are going to get fucking murdered. It's very possible to survive combat against one guard but any more than that and you might as well just hit that quick reload button. It just felt so good to encounter this kind of unapologetic stealth focus without having to replay the first two Thief games. Like I said, it's a bit lacking in polish and was clearly developed on a tight budget. The way Styx jumps and (sometimes doesn't) grab onto ledges kinda makes you appreciate how Assassin's Creed has the auto-climbing thing. But man did the team behind Styx just get stealth. Environments are wonderfully open and have a ton of verticality to them. It makes most maps incredibly satisfying to explore and sneak around in. You can just sneak around on the ground but there's almost always "air vents" tucked away in corners and other high paths allowing you to sneak above guards, whether it's a series of ledges and catwalks or chandeliers and the likes. The first few missions kept blowing my mind with how much fun it was to discover hidden paths like that. As for the map re-use, it's always disappointing when a game does it but Styx somehow manages to do it intelligently and circumvents most major problems that come with it. For one, it doesn't treat you like a fucking idiot and pretend it's a difference place. When a map shows up again, it's because you're going through the same place again. Usually in a different direction, too. Sometimes I'd only recognize the maps once I spotted a recognizable piece of scenery. Considering that the entire game takes place in one gigantic tower-like structure, it just kinda works. Especially when you end up using a different exit that leads to a completely new area. Obviously, more map variety would've been better but the devs clearly put some thought into how to do this properly so I wasn't too bothered by it. So yeah, if you're a fan of pure stealth then definitely give Styx a shot. You won't be disappointed. Next up, Bioshock Infinite: Burial at Sea - Episode 2. Finally got around to playing it today, mainly so that I could free up the 40+ GBs that Infinite was taking on my hard drive. But goddamn, now I'm kinda kicking myself for waiting this long to play it. This was so fucking good! I really loved the focus on stealth, it actually made me realize that I kinda dislike the combat in Bioshock in general. I guess that's why I was never able to play Infinite for extended periods of time. Sneaking around and picking enemies off stealthily was much more fun for me. There really isn't much more to say beyond that, at least not without getting into spoilers. It's nice to see the series being nicely tied up like this, though, especially considering what happened to Irrational. I'm kinda curious to see where the series will go next but if Levine isn't involved then I can't say I'm all that excited about it. :/

Alright, good to know, thanks. I do tend to favor harder difficulties when normal is considered too easy.

Alright, guess I'll check it out then.

Oh, well that sounds good too. I haven't quite finished Styx yet but I've enjoyed it so much that I'm glad to hear there's any amount of stealth in this one as well, tbh. edit: 20 bucks on GMG and a voucher brings it down to 16$. Not bad at all considering that's almost 50% less than the base discount Steam has on it. Been hearing really good things about it, too.

Was gifted to me by an irl friend a few days ago. Really loved the world in Styx so I'm looking forward to seeing a more expanded view of it in a proper RPG. Should be fun!

Well, looks like I was right about my CPU being the culprit for ACIII being unplayable on my PC. After my upgrade, it runs pretty smoothly. CPU usage reported by MSI Afterburner was actually insanely high, my cousin was with me at the time and he couldn't believe it. What a load of shit, my old one clearly met the recommended specs. Anyway! I already played the game on PS3 a few months ago but since I own the season pass I was wondering, is the King Washington DLC worth playing at all? I'm tempted to just move on to Black Flag but I don't wanna skip it if it's good.

Since no one answered my question, I'll do a bit of a cross between the two and pick one indie and one major release. It always feels kinda weird to me to try and compare the two, anyway. I tend to favor high production values but there's always some great indies that I want to acknowledge and they simply can't compete in that area. Choosing one of each makes it easier for me. Looking at all the games I've beaten this year, there were a lot of games that I really loved but that I wouldn't really consider GOTY material. First off, the ports: Resident Evil 4, Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance and Valkyria Chronicles. All three were mostly solid ports and are some of my favorite games ever. I was really happy to revisit them all on PC but picking a port/remaster as GOTY is just kinda boring. So I decided not to consider them, but they get an honorable mention because if I had then they would've dominated over almost everything else. As far as actual new releases go, I simply didn't play too many of them. Ground Zeroes was great once you really dug into the Side Ops,but the idea of picking a glorified demo as my GOTY is laughable at best. Reaper of Souls was an oustanding expansion to Diablo III but failed to keep me playing as long as the base game did. Thief was great simply by virtue of being Thief, but it was also the worst Thief and kinda buggy. That leaves only South Park and Dark Souls II. South Park was a ton of fun, very true to the show and actually felt like more than just an expanded episode. Its gameplay was simplistic but it was way better than a South Park video game had any right to be. But unfortunately for South Park, it's going up against Dark Souls. As disappointing of a sequel as it was, it's a testament to the series quality that any criticism of Dark Soul II is almost always preceded or followed by "but it's still better than 90% of what's out there". There were only two games this year that kept me hooked for almost 100 hours and Dark Souls II was one of them (the other one was actually Dark Souls I). So, Dark Souls II is my GOTY for major releases (although I reserve the right to potentially change my pick if I manage to beat The Evil Within before the end of the year ). Honorable mention: Styx: Master of Shadows. PC issues got in the way of me finishing it so it got put on hold for a little while there. I only started playing it again tonight, so I haven't finished it yet. But man, I fucking love this game. It's a bit rough around the edges but it's a very legit stealth game, much more so than Thief was. Guards will fuck you up if they spot you, it's absolutely fantastic. As a big fan of the stealth genre, games like Styx are few and far between and are something to be treasured. As for my indie pick, Shovel Knight was a very strong contender but ultimately I simply loved Transistor more. Put any form of turn-based strategy combat into a game and you're basically guaranteed that I will love it. This was more of a real-time with pause and action points hybrid but any amount of turn-based will please me greatly. The beautiful art direction, amazing soundtrack and intriguing story were all just icing on the cake. Honorable mention: Door Kickers. I only bought this one a few days ago but I've already sunk almost 10 hours into it. Again, this one is a real-time with pause kinda deal. Remember the planning phase from old-school Rainbow Six games? Expand that to an entire game and that's Door Kickers. If that sounds interesting to you then go for it, you will not be disappointed.

Trials Fusion. This took me way longer than it should have. I had stopped playing last spring because I got frustrated with how it ran but after I installed my new parts yesterday I figured I'd give it a shot. Oh man, dat 60fps! Plays so much better that way. Anyway, I guess I had already played through most of the base game's content because it only took me like an hour before I made it to and cleared the final track. There's still a bunch of optional stuff to do, though. And I'll probably grab the season pass now, since half the content is already out. I'm just waiting for a daily deal.

The thing is that you're comparing a gen's first year with another entire gen. Those games didn't all come out in the same year, far from it. Look at the PS3's first year and I'm sure you'll find something comparable, probably even worse. 2015 is already looking significantly better. Back on topic, are we supposed to make a list or pick a single game?

Santa CrowKnow decided that Christmas wasn't spooky enough so he got me The Evil Within! Thanks a lot, man! So stoked to finally play it!

Also that ending. I loved the game but that was a seriously WTF place to end it. Pretty much makes everyone go "Oh! Shit's about to really get interesting!" and then credits. But yeah, Rage is criminally under-appreciated. The way the mutants ran and jumped all over the place while coming at you made for some of the most fun and satisfying gunplay of the entire gen, imho.

I really need to play Burial Ep 2. Meant to do it over the summer but never got around to it. I think I even uninstalled Infinite.

Grabbed this pretty much the second it went on a flash sale last night. It's been on my radar ever since Super Bunnyhop did a video on it a couple months back. I'd never even heard about it prior to that so I guess it came out to very little fanfare. Which is a fucking crime because after only about an hour or so of beer-fueled play before I went to bed last night, hooooly shit I love it! Basically, it's the planning phase of the old-school Rainbow Six games but expanded into an entire game. It plays like a top-down real-time strategy game but you can pause the action to think about/input your actions. It's amazing. edit: Grabbed it while it's still 33% off. Mostly in anticipation of my new CPU but fuck me, it actually runs. At a solid 30+ FPS, too, and I barely had to lower anything. Very impressive, Kojima. I'm really tempted to also get AC: Black Flag while it's only 10 bucks but it being Ubisoft I have zero faith that the game will run properly, even on my new CPU. :/ By all means it should, but I'd feel much safer if I could test it on ACIII first. edit2: Oh well, let's hope I won't regret this...

Hahahahaha holy shit, I need to pay closer attention to people's usernames. I think the avatar threw me off, for some reason. Sorry, Mal! Yeah, I'll definitely give it a shot. But my GPU is pretty dated and not being upgraded so I think that's going to severely limit my ability to push the game. I'd expect that, at best, I'll be able to match PS4's visuals. I'd be willing to turn them down a bit in favor of a solid 60 FPS, though.

I'm 100% sure it's not capped at 30FPS. I think it might be capped at 60 but not 30. Check in your settings, Mister Jack Malicious. If it's capped at 30 for you then there's probably an option somewhere to change that. But yeah, sounds like it's a really well-optimized port. Bodes well for my ability to run it on my shitty GPU. Can't wait for my new parts to get here!

Oh, I misread your comment. I thought you meant an underpowered PSU. Yeah, I really hope it's not a PSU issue but it seems like a very real possibility at this point.

Nah, the PSU is more than sufficient (it's a 1000W, I kinda went overkill when I picked my parts lol) and I constantly monitor temps. Nothing's overheating.

Not recently, no. But I'm sure I have at some point.

You and me both, man. You have no idea how many hours I've wasted trying to troubleshoot this thing on and off over the years. All I can say for sure is I've ruled out the GPU and the RAM. The worst part is how seemingly random it is. It goes away and comes back and I can't fucking figure out why. Like, for the past month or so I've been playing Styx: Master of Shadows without any issues. But last week-end it decided it felt like acting up again so now I can't play for more than 20mins without having my system lock up completely. It's gotten so bad that I can't even finish the damn game. :/ And I feel like it's getting worse because it actually started happening even when I'm not playing graphically-demanding games.

Man, what is it with me and not sticking with my purchase plans? First, I ended up not getting a 3DS. Then I opted not to get a 2DS either. And now it looks like I'm not getting a PS4 after all... The parts I had initially picked out added up to about the same price as a PS4 but I ended up going for a little extra, i.e. something I can look into overclocking down the line. It's still a build in progress, though. I'd like to replace my case as well since my current one is pretty banged up. And I'll definitely have to upgrade my GPU at some point. But for now, those core essentials will do nicely. It'll be nice going back to having 8GBs of RAM. And now I should be able to run the PC version of Ground Zeroes and, hopefully, The Phantom Pain as well! At first, I was just looking to replace my PSU in hopes of fixing a freezing issue that's been plaguing me for years. But I have no way to be sure whether it's really the PSU, could easily be the motherboard. So, I really didn't want to spend 100 bucks and end up with a spare PSU I didn't actually need. So I figured this way, if the issue persists, I'll at least have a nice upgrade and I can just buy a new PSU without any hesitation. Hopefully that won't be necessary, though. My current PSU is pretty strong and I kinda thought that was the one component I'd be able to carry over through a complete upgrade... It's gonna suck not being able to play Bloodborne but I think this is a much better investment.

Oh God, I'm so glad to hear they didn't go under after Remember Me bombed. That game was so fucking close to being truly great. Will be keeping a close eye on this one.