toxicitizen

Yeah but they're all so time consuming! Most feel like you need to sink at least 50 hours (if not more) into them to really get everything out of the experience. And the good ones make it easy to lose twice that amount of time to them. So with more than one you might as well give up on playing anything else for the foreseeable future.

Only reason I think it's too soon for XCOM 2 is I want them to rebuild it from the ground up. Game was great but it seriously lacked the depth and replay value of the original. If a sequel doesn't address that I'm going to be massively disappointed. As for Civ V, I never bothered to look for an official source but I've heard more than once that it's done and that BNW was the last expansion. And with this new announcement, I'm inclined to think it was true. I don't think they'd have two major Civ games out with active development and ongoing support. I still need to buy BNW, though. Might be a good idea to grab it for the summer, now that I think about it. Then again, I was planning on trying Endless Space first. That one's already on the backlog... Shit man, who has time for all these 4X games?!

Kinda glad it's not just Civ VI, seems a bit too soon for that. Likewise XCOM 2. It's a shame they don't have access to the Alpha Centauri name anymore, though. Fall 2014 is also surprisingly early, must've been in development for quite a while.

That's racist, Cowboy!

Comes out May 20 on PC and PS4. $19.99 / €18.99 / £14.99 This is surprisingly earlier than expected, I kinda figured it wasn't coming until late 2014.

The Wolf Among Us: Episode 1. I was gonna wait until I was at least done playing all the available episodes but man, this game is so fucking good I felt like posting anyway. Plays just like Walking Dead but the atmosphere is completely different. And even though the graphics are essentially identical, the more colorful aesthetic makes it look a lot better. So far, I think I actually love it more than TWD. The detective angle, even though it's not really reflected in the gameplay, is also a lot more interesting to me. Looking forward to playing the other two eps so I can join you all in complaining about the wait!

I was kind of hesitant to buy it since I still haven't touched The Walking Dead Season 2 but I'm actually more interested in this one so I'll probably get around to playing it first.

These are the alleged leaked settings. Seems reasonable. Whatever's missing or limited will likely be tweaked by modders, I expect. And judging from a tweet by Brad from GiantBomb, it looks like the embargo on coverage lifts tomorrow. Their Quick Look is going live tomorrow morning.

Despite the atrocious pic, this is the new one and not the classic. Looks like plenty of dumb fun and it was dirt cheap. I've been meaning to give this series a shot for a while now, mostly because I keep hearing great things about it. This one is supposed to not be as good but the reasons why kinda make it sound more appealing to me so we'll see. They also recently removed GFWL and patched in Steamworks so I figured it was gonna go on sale sooner rather than later, was just waiting for it to happen. Now do Dark Souls, Namco Bandai! I was a massive fan of Frozen Synapse (can't wait for the Vita remake) and have been looking forward to this one since its initial announcement despite me not caring about football in the least. Actually, it looks like they might be announcing a title change to Frozen Cortex soon because they're sick of the "frendzone" jokes and want to distance themselves from actual football a bit more. Although the timing of the post makes it possible it was an early April's fool so we'll see, I guess. I like Frozen Cortex better, to be honest. Anyway, I'm usually not that keen to jump on early access games (or even spend that much on indie titles considering the abundance of bundles) but I went a bit crazy in March and ended up buying all the current and upcoming major releases I'm interested in so I'm left with a bunch of money and no big games to spend it on. There's a few more smaller titles I'm looking at but nothing I'm willing to pull the trigger on just yet.

It's starting to look like the improved lighting won't be in the PC version either. Most videos and screenshots showcasing it have been removed from the Steam store page. Sucks but hardly a deal breaker for me. Gameplay is king for the Souls games. But yeah, in the last couple days there's been rumors of people with early copies claiming the PC version has extensive graphical options. Would be nice if true. It's clear that the game suffered visually as a result of the modified lighting so if these options can at least help mask some of those imperfections I'll be satisfied.

Does this count as game-related enough? Diablo III: Book of Tyrael. How the hell did I not know this existed? Looks like it came out last fall but I only just now found out about it. It was pretty much an instabuy. I got the Book of Cain before D3 came out and really enjoyed reading it. It looked fantastic (cover isn't just a pic, if this one is like it then the sword will "stick out" a little, not sure how else to explain it), the artwork inside is amazing and reading the lore from the point of view of the characters was pretty cool.

Might as well start posting pics too. That's a complete run as Crusader, Acts I through V. Really loving the class, I played Demon Hunter at launch and afterwards none of the other classes seemed as much fun. I tried Barbarian and Wizard and both times I ended up going back to my Demon Hunter before even finishing the game once with them. Wasn't an issue with Crusader although the other improvements might have something to do with that. The game is massively improved. Loot drops are way more satisfying now and it doesn't take anywhere near as long to find worthwhile upgrades. Act V is also the best one by far, there's a lot more variety to the environments and the atmosphere is even better than Act I, which I thought Acts II-IV didn't really match in that regard. I think they also sped up the leveling a bit, I'm pretty sure I finished Act IV higher than I did as Demon Hunter back at launch. Other than that, Adventure Mode seems like the worst kind of time vampire. It unlocked when I finished Act V earlier this afternoon and I figured "I'll just check it out real quick." It's now 3 hours later and I've only just turned off the game. So much fun. And to think I almost got cold feet and was considering cancelling my pre-order. For the first year after the game came out, I really wanted an expansion. But now it had been so long since I'd touched the game that I was kinda worried I'd end up barely playing it. Honestly, I pre-ordered more because it seemed like I should rather than actual excitement for the game. But holy shit am I glad I went for it. In its current state, I could see myself getting back into the game big time. Last night I actually started thinking about my next run on the next difficulty even though I wasn't done with normal yet. I had to head to bed but all I wanted to do was fire up the game and play all night long. Which reminded me of something Ethan said about South Park that I didn't really get at the time. Something about enjoying the game while he was playing it but not feeling the urge to play when he wasn't. It made me realize I felt the exact same way about Thief. I love it but it hasn't gotten its hooks into me, not the way Reaper of Souls has.

All I'm getting from that is that David Bowie is one creepy motherfucker.

First time I played I didn't know for a fact you could do it but I still kept trying for like an hour until I pulled it off. The game was way too good at being Deus Ex up until that point so I just figured it had to be possible. I only found out you could save Paul in the original after I had already beaten the game and didn't want a repeat of that. Planning on doing a new run soonish and going for all the no kills/no alarms/etc. achievements. This bit is going to be a bitch to pull off non-lethally, I think.

Still working my way through Thief and enjoying it a lot but my progress has slowed down the past couple days. Reason for that is my copy of Diablo III: Reaper of Souls got here friday morning. I initially didn't really want to jump into it until I was done with Thief, DX: The Fall and maybe Burial at Sea 2, but I still fired it up just to give the Crusader class a quick try and it just sucked me right back in. I enjoyed the game back at launch and I haven't played in a while but playing it now just feels so much better than I remember. Loot drops are a lot more satisfying, I think I've actually seen more legendaries in this run alone than I have in the 100+ hours I put into the game two years ago. I'm already halfway through the original campaign and will probably do Act III tomorrow. Really looking forward to Act V as I heard it's a massive improvement over the original campaign. The maps being properly generated is a major plus, it's a shame they couldn't retroactively change the first four acts to be that way. The way all areas kept the same map outline and orientation with all the major locations always in the same spots and only the inner landscape and secondary stuff changing was a big part of what made me lose interest back then. Well that and the complete lack of progression for someone like me who wasn't all that into grinding dozens of hours just for a better helmet...

Why the barricades and windows are there is fairly obvious, there was just one in a weird place (on a semi roof kind of area) and I just went right past it because the game didn't make it immediately clear there was a way to squeeze through. It just happened to be the first one I encountered. Once I realized what it was, I just kinda went "oh, duh". I'm not sure what else to say about the climbing. It all seems pretty clear to me where I can't or can't go. Only thing that comes to mind is once early on I couldn't climb on a crate and quickly realized it was just because it had some junk lying around on it. And arrows aren't that limited, you can just buy some more if you run out, which if you loot things you'll be able to afford easily. Or just don't "waste" them and you won't need to buy more. Why would every single random apartment be filled to the brim with riches? You have to loot a few places before getting any kind of significant haul. Still not seeing the problem. As for Deus Ex, same studio but different teams. Thief is a pure stealth game but, although I personally played it as a stealth game, Deus Ex isn't really one. It just provides that option but it's not as in-depth in its systems and the game isn't entirely designed around the stealth. I expect a little more depth in the systems of a proper stealth game than I do in Deus Ex. And to suggest that Deus Ex has better stealth is borderline laughable. It can basically be boiled down to "are you crouching or in cover: yes/no?". I think there's an element of sound to it but light isn't a factor and visual detection is fairly binary. It's pretty basic stuff. When I said incompetence I didn't mean how good or bad you actually are but rather the understanding of how the various systems of the game work. Your comments on the wire boxes and other things seemed to suggest you didn't have a full grasp on a few things. Hardly the game's fault, it taught me everything I needed to know just fine. To be honest, the more we talk about this the more I think you probably wouldn't like the old ones either. Just kinda sounds like it's not really up your alley.

For the red herring thing, it just doesn't make sense. If it was just meant to look pretty then your interaction with it would be seriously limited. It certainly wouldn't have that wire-cutting animation. I never felt like the game failed to properly explain any of its core mechanics. Literally the only thing I would agree it failed to convey properly was the barricades you squeeze through. I wasted a bit of time at first looking for a way to the next city area only to realize what I thought was a dead end was actually the way through. Pressure plates and buttons, I don't remember any but I'm sure there were. Doesn't mean they all need to be like that. Most of the traps and pressure plates I've deactivated were from wire boxes. Buttons have mostly been for secret passages and hidden rooms. Why can't both be used? What can and can't be climbed is fairly obvious. There's always some kind of visual cue, either scratch marks going up or some white stuff on the edge. Plus, all the claw points are highlighted blue automatically, I believe. I honestly have no idea why you insist on coming back to these so-called dead ends and "empty rooms" if you concede there were some things to loot in there. There's rarely just the one place to go after you fired your rope arrow. Usually you can leap off to other buildings and go to other rooms and such. So I honestly don't see what the problem is here. Break in, steal things, leave the same way you came. It's called Thief, what did you expect? You say there's no reason to be up there but the things to steal ARE the reason to be there. I don't know, it just seems like a really strange thing to get hung up on. It's not like you can't ignore The City and just focus on the story missions... And you really should stop comparing it to Deus Ex. They definitely share a similar pedigree and history but they're two completely different games. Deus Ex is a much deeper and larger game and if you keep comparing your experience with Thief to it then yeah, it's going to seem disappointing by comparison. Finally, when you say things like the game "stole your time" and whatnot, which I get was a joke but still, it does give the impression that you have a very low opinion of it. And that's fine. Problem is a lot of your criticism honestly seems to be born from your own incompetence at the game rather than any of the game's failings (and God knows it has many). And the rest of it just makes it sound like either the game's just not for you or you went in with the wrong expectations. I'm pretty sure I was able to get them all on one mission but yeah, I realize most of the time you can't get them all. It just seems a bit counter-intuitive. Off-topic: Has the forum started being crazy slow again for everyone else? I think it's the worst it's ever been for me.

Yeah, can't really argue with that. I didn't see it as an issue, personally. JC Denton was somewhat similar in that regard. I'd be fine with a blank slate protagonist for a game like Deus Ex to be honest. But the little bit of personality Jensen had was more than enough for me.

What are you going on about? There is a wire going from them, you need to use focus vision to see them. What kind of feedback do you expect? Some loud noise or something? It's a trap and you disabled it, that's it. Normally you'd be aware it was there before you randomly opened up some box on the wall to cut things up in it. Once you've disabled the trap, focus vision no longer highlights it. A red herring? Man, you draw some weird conclusions sometimes... And you keep bringing up these empty rooms but in all my exploring (and I've done a lot) I've yet to encounter a single one. So either you have the absolute worst luck in randomly walking into only quest-related rooms or you're just not looking very hard. There's always been at least one or two things to pick up for me. Usually more.

Like Ethan said, it's for disabling traps. Did you not read the description when you bought it? And yeah, fire arrows are more of an offensive kind of item, not meant for stealth. Never really used them here or in the originals. I really miss the moss arrows, now that I think about it. I haven't bothered buying the moss quiver because it's for broadheads and such and I'm going non-lethal but moss arrows were really cool. Definitely up there with rope and water arrows as the most useful ones. One complaint that I'm starting to have is the thieving challenges. They are retarded. Remain undetected, sure. 6 knockouts or kills, uh... okay? 5 combat takedowns? Go fuck yourself, game. I'm not breaking stealth for your stupid bullshit. Then there was a client job where there was one about using an environmental thing. But it drops this huge fucking crate which makes a bunch of noise and automatically invalidates remain undetected. So you can't get them all? What's the point then? it's not like they pay all that much individually.

Pretty sure it was very successful. Also I think The Fall was somewhat outsourced. It was overseen by DX:HR's director but it wasn't developed internally at Eidos Montreal. And I think it being an iOS game somewhat limited what they could do, yeah. So I don't see it as a sign to worry. As for Jensen not having much of a personality, well, that's kind of the point. You're making the occasional convo choice and all that and kinda defining your own Jensen. Not to the extent of Shepard or anything like that but the idea is essentially the same. Honestly, there were a few times where HR bugged me a little bit because Jensen would say stuff that would make me go "No, that's not right." Yeah, I realized the timing as I was writing my post. Hence the bit at the end. They wouldn't do that twice, would they? They can't possibly hate us that much.

Cool, that's what I was hoping for. What's annoying is when I bought the game I grabbed the Master Thief edition thinking it was included in it. Guess I got confused with the pre-order bonus because all I got was some shitty opportunist pack that had extra starting cash and gear. Was only a couple extra bucks but I still feel like I wasted money. :/ Seriously, that kind of shitty "boost" DLC has got to stop being a thing.

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided trademarked by Square Enix Shitty title but hopefully this one turns out to be the real deal. Considering it's already been confirmed that a new Deus Ex title is in development at Eidos Montreal for PC and next-gen consoles, it seems pretty likely to be the case. Perhaps to be revealed at E3? Then again, now that I've played and enjoyed The Fall, I guess I wouldn't be too pissed if it was the follow-up to that. But I swear to God, if this is another---oh Goddamnit, the timing would be just right for another April's fools bullshit fucking thing, wouldn't it...

Bank Heist DLC. How do you sell DLC to a Thief fan? You recreate the series' most iconic mission, of course. No idea how similar it's supposed to be but I just had to check it out. I don't realistically expect something comparable to the campaign missions considering it was only five bucks, but I hope it's a bit more substantial than the client jobs. Those are cool but usually pretty small. I just love me some Trials. Was a tad worried performance- and specs-wise because it's next-gen and physics heavy but I looked into the requirements a bit and I should be fine, especially considering there's a 360 version that I was unaware of. People already in the beta are also reporting better performance than Trials Evolution Gold. Was kinda tempted to get the Deluxe editon that includes the season pass but fuck that, I'm getting sick of pre-ordering DLC that's even further off than the actual game. It doesn't even offer a further discount anyway so I'll just get it once DLC starts coming out.

I don't think I've ever stumbled into a completely empty room. There's always been at least one or two things to grab. And for the weapon wheel, I'm playing with mouse and keyboard so that must be a controller-only thing because the game never mentioned it, it just told me which numbers to press during the tutorial. As for the alternate paths, well, this isn't Deus Ex. Thief has always been about exploration but in a more environmental awareness sense. You're not necessarily going to get some explicit reward for finding the alternate path, it's just going to provide you with a stealthier way in that won't cost you as many resources. And resource management is kind of a big part of Thief. In the old games, the motivation to get as much loot as possible was you'd need it to restock your inventory at the start of the next mission. It really emphasized that Garret lives from job-to-job. Thief 1 and 2 didn't have city hubs for you to roam around and stock up on cash or gear. One thing I hate about the context-sensitive/permanent rope arrows is it prevents one of the most fun thing of the old games: shooting your rope arrows strategically so that you can climb up and be able to recover them.