toxicitizen

Oh, that's where that came from? I've seen it referred to by that name but I had no idea wtf it meant lol.

I knew it would come to PC eventually. Even if it wasn't for all the subsequent leaks, the initial nvidia leak from like 2 years ago that was supposed to be some made up list an intern came up with has proven to be incredibly accurate so far lol. But goddamn it feels like I've been waiting for it for a long time. It's gonna be tough choosing between this and Shadow of the Erdtree on June 21st, though. And at this point I'm honestly kinda dreading S-E shadowdropping FFVII: Rebirth on Steam the very same day because that's the level of stupidity I've come to expect from them.

I see I'm not the only one who felt the urge to buy more Persona from playing P3R.

Don't think I'll be anywhere near done with P3R in two weeks but it's launching at a lower price point so why the hell not. Besides, I've been wanting to play it for years and never got around to buying the second game due to it never being discounted quite enough (and my mild annoyance at the first game not getting a PC release). So I feel like I kinda have to get this one.

Stupid real-time cutscenes and their stupid inability to handle just a little bit more rendering off to the sides of the frame!

Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty - Master Collection Version I decided to play this over the week-end kind of on a whim because I needed something to distract me from impulse buying Tekken 8. I don't need another fighting game in my rotation right now, especially not with Persona 3 Reload coming out in less than a week. Anyway, I actually played the Tanker chapter a couple months back, right after I played MGS1, so I only had the Plant chapter left to play. I may have mentioned it back then but MGS2 is so much easier to slip back into. I never had any issues with the fixed camera angles and it just controls incredibly well overall, so I didn't struggle like I did with MGS1. Almost couldn't tell it was my first playthrough in over a decade. I'm sure some would find it dated by modern standards but for me this was one of those rare cases where the game was actually every bit as great as I remembered it to be. The story, in particular, has aged so well because of how prescient it was. Back then it was speculating about the future but now it's just describing the present lol. I'm kinda glad I held off on playing the meat of the game since that meant there's now a mod out that fixes the internal resolution. I was able to run it at 1440p without any issues. There's even some experimental support for ultrawide, which is a really cool option to have, but I ultimately decided to play the game on my 16:9 monitor because the ulrawide mod broke too much stuff during cutscenes. Seemed to work pretty well during gameplay, though. I'm so glad to finally have a version of these games on Steam. I've wanted to replay MGS2 and 3 in particular for quite a few years at this point, so it's great to finally have a version I can play whenever I want without having to dust off an old system. And thanks to modding, they're already the definitive versions and will only improve with time. I'll probably jump straight into MGS3 tonight. I went through MGS2 fairly quickly, so I should have plenty of time to finish it by friday.

Horizon: Zero Dawn - Complete Edition Since they announced that Forbidden West is coming out for PC this year, I figured it was time I got around to playing this one. I had tried it back when the port first came out and bounced off of it after a few hours, partially because it didn't run great on my old PC. I almost bounced off of it again this time but I pushed through hoping I was just still feeling the Cyberpunk withdrawal. Turns out this game just takes a little while to get interesting. The gameplay is fairly standard/generic open-world stuff and I think that's what turned me off initially. But once I started exploring ruins and uncovering the mystery of Aloy's origin and why the world is the way it is I started really getting into it. The combat being more of a hunting kinda deal rather than just generic shooting/melee combat was also pretty good but, again, it took me a little while to really get into it. My favorite aspect of the game has to be the art direction, though. I've gotten into collecting art books the last few years but this is the first game where I was so impressed with the art direction that it actually made me look up whether there was an art book available. Other than that, my only real complaint is that the climbing/platforming was shockingly janky. I stopped counting the amount of times Aloy fell to her death because she wouldn't snap onto the next foothoold properly. The lack of polish in that area was surprising coming from a first-party PlayStation game. So yeah, it took a little while to click but once it did I really enjoyed it. Definitely going to get Forbidden West once it comes out on PC. I also need to do a new game plus run on ultra hard at some point for the last few achievements. I probably have enough time to rush through it before P3R comes out but I was kind of hoping to squeeze something else in-between. Or maybe I'll just go back to playing nothing but Street Fighter 6 for the next couple weeks. That sounds pretty good, actually...

Let's fucking go! Still feels weird to have an Atlus game (especially Persona) day one on PC.

For once I made it through the Steam sale without buying too much but then I saw some deals on GMG that I couldn't say no to... I've been curious about Powerwash Simulator for a while because it looks super relaxing and I figured since I completed the Divinity set I might as well get the second PoE game as well (especially since the complete edition was super cheap). I should have all the CRPGs I need for the foreseeable future now lol.

I really enjoyed that game. I still need to go back and finish it although now that I was able to grab the season pass on sale I'm thinking I should just start a new playthrough. Don't go in expecting it to be anything like XCOM. It felt more like a puzzle game to me. Like "Okay I've got these cards, what's the best sequence to use them in to take out as many of these chuds as possible so I don't get curb-stomped next turn". As for me, I'm still in Cyberpunk withdrawal and looking for the next big RPG to lose myself into, so I foresee a lot of CRPGs in my future.

Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty/2.0 Update I think the highest compliment I can pay to this expansion is that it got me to sink another 100+ hours into this game that, as it turned out, I mostly remembered pretty well. Which was kinda surprising because if you were to ask me about plot specifics for any given game 6 months after I played it, I feel like I wouldn't really remember it all that well. I guess Cyberpunk was just really memorable for me. Like, I don't just mean the main quest line. Even random small gigs, I'd go to the map marker, enter whatever area it led me to and go "Oh right, this one!". I can seriously count on one hand the amount of quests I didn't remember and I'm pretty sure those were ones that I just didn't encounter in my first playthrough for some reason. Early on in this playthrough I realized that Cyberpunk might be my new favorite game of all time and over 100 hours later at the end of this run I think I still feel that way. I'm actually looking forward to doing another playthrough at some point in the future to try a melee/Sandevistan build. Anyway, people keep saying that Cyberpunk is good now but as far as I'm concerned it was always good. At least on PC. It's just way more polished now. I'm really glad that the big rework I had been expecting for the past 3 years finally came and ended up solving most of the game's big issues. And that it was accompanied by an incredible expansion was just the cherry on top. I do have some complaints about Phantom Liberty but most of them amount to minor nitpicks. Mostly about how isolated it feels from the rest of the game. The main quest in Phantom Liberty is really good. Arguably even better than the base game's. They did a pretty good job of justifying V going on this long, spy-themed tangent but it still felt detached from the rest of the game in a way that kinda bugged me a little. I guess I was hoping for something that would expand the base game's main quest and correct some of its flaws rather than just attach an extra limb to it. That being said, I never would've thought that an expansion to Cyberpunk would be able to top "Oh also Keanu Reeves is in the game!" but having Idris Elba play Solomon Reed was basically as close as you can get to doing exactly that. He was pretty damn great as Solomon Reed. I did the new ending and man, what a bummer lol. I mean, none of the endings for the base game were particularly happy or satisfying but this one just hit differently. Especially since there's no mission or anything, you just make the call and then it's just a bunch of dialogue until the credits roll. So thanks, Cyberpunk, for starting my 2024 on a downer lol. I'm also definitely bummed out that we'll only be getting a single expansion for the game but I imagine it ended up being bigger than either of the two would've been. I'm really curious to know what the original plan was, though... I'm also really looking forward to finding out more about the sequel. Will it still be set in Night City? Is it going to be a completely new thing or will it still involve V and Johnny somehow? I just need to know! I don't expect we'll hear anything for a long while, though, since I think there's like two Witcher games that have to come out first... Oh yeah and I finally got those damn two achievements I missed out on in my first playthrough! The one for maxing out a skill is kind of annoying since they go up to 60 now but I was already most of the way there with Headhunter. So I just had to grind a little bit. So V turned into a complete psychopath in her last few days in Night City and starting murdering every street gang she ran into and leaving nothing but corpses whenever she took a job to retrieve a laptop or some shit because she needed the experience points.

What Jack said, plus on this you can do something that's physically impossible on a stick: input opposing directions at the same time. This can be very useful with charge characters or when you start using input shortcuts. It'll be months before I can see any of the advantages that come from using this, though. I need to rebuild my entire muscle memory first. I can barely land my bread and butter combos right now or like... jump on reaction lol. I'm shocked that I was actually able to win online matches day one, though. Casual matches against lower ranked players but still! I think some of them may have been super confused, though. I must've seemed shockingly bad for a diamond player.

I had been thinking about this for a few months now and this week I found out I'm getting a pretty nice bonus from work, so I decided to treat myself. I would've liked an actual Hitbox but they're currently out of stock so I wouldn't have gotten it until January at best, and I was worried the currency conversion and custom fees would drive the price up too much. This was the only model I could find on short notice that was directly available in Canada and since it was on Amazon I get 1-day shipping. Which means I'm getting it today and can spend the holidays playing with it. I had sworn off Razer years ago after my Deathadder mouse started going to shit after only like two years but the reception of this one (and some of their previous fight sticks) seem pretty good, so hopefully I have nothing to worry about.

Ethan, you shit mod!!!

Very disappointed that none of you voted for Street Fighter 6, which can only mean that none of you have played it because It's the objective game of the year! Not just the best fighting game of the year, not just arguably the best vanilla version of any fighting game ever, but also one of the most content-packed fighting game ever! Seriously though, here's how much Street Fighter V I played over a period of about 3 and a half year versus how much Street Fighter 6 I played in the ~6 months since it came out. It's so good, you guys! Also, these were my picks: 1. Street Fighter 6 2. Alan Wake II 3. Resident Evil 4 4. The Legend of Heroes: Trails to Azure 5. System Shock

Haven't played as much of the original as I would've liked, but this one has rollback and crossplay so I'm less hesitant to jump in. I played the free version a little bit the last couple nights and thought it was fun enough to warrant getting the full version.

Just sent in my list. I thought I'd have a hard time coming up with even just five but turns out I played more new releases than I thought. The reason I asked if there were any criterias was because I thought I'd have to give a spot to The Last of Us Part I PC port but I had enough 2023 releases to fill all my spots. Shout out to Talos Principle II. It's very good but it didn't quite make the list. It might have if I had finished it but I haven't touched it in a few weeks because of my number one pick.

Holy shit, you're alive! Is the game Uncharted 3?

So we just send a list of 5 to you? I guess if we wanna write some thoughts we'll do it once you reveal the results? Also, no restrictions other than having come out in 2023?

Yeah, and pretty regularly from the looks of it. According to Google, chapter 364/volume 41 is the last one Miura worked on. They made enough chapters for volume 42, which just came out in Japan, and there's 2 more chapters beyond that according to the wiki.

I just received Berserk Deluxe Vol. 14. It's significantly thinner than the other volumes and like half of it is bonus materials. I wonder if they'll keep making these or if that's as complete as that set is going to get. Either way, it'll be a while before there's enough new chapters out to release another one, I guess...

Yeah, I understand the publisher situation. That's why I opted to pirate the game rather than hold off until the Steam release like I did with Control and every other EGS exclusive. I'm expecting it to never come to Steam but, like Ethan said, I'm hoping that the deal Remedy has with Epic lets them eventually release it on other stores, even if it's years down the line.

Alan Wake II I took my time with it but I finally rolled credits on it last night and I have some thoughts. First off, I loved the game and I'm really happy that we finally got it. A sequel to Alan Wake has been up there as one of my most-wanted games for like a decade, so it was about time. I loved the pivot to full-on horror and the more serious tone but I feel like the survival-horror mechanics were kinda lacking. Inventory management felt tacked on and unnecessary. It felt like they added it because "that's what survival-horror games have" without really considering if their game actually needed it. Like halfway through the game, both characters' shoeboxes were filling up with healing items and various junk because my inventory was constantly so full that I couldn't pick up anything else. I love me some inventory tetris as much as anyone else but that wasn't exactly the fun kind of resource management. It also made it way more cumbersome to switch to an item in the middle of combat if I forgot to setup a quickslot for it whereas something like a weapon wheel would've worked just fine. Also, sometimes my quickslots just didn't work. Now that I think about it, it was mostly when trying to throw one of those propane tanks. I'd switch over to it but the character just wouldn't take it out, so I couldn't throw it. That was fun... I think the switch to a more serious tone resulted in a better game overall but it made for a less compelling narrative. The original Alan Wake is just a fun time and a story that I still genuinely love whereas, other than one particular chapter that's one of my favorite things in any game ever, the story in Alan Wake II never quite reached the same heights as the first game due to not being the same genre. Also, I can't help but feel a little frustrated with the ending. Anyway, this is already long enough so I'll just leave it at that. I loved the game overall but it's not without issues. Oh and I loved all the tie-ins with Control. Especially seeing Ahti pop up all over the place. That was fun. I'm really curious to see how they'll handle the Max Payne remakes now. Also, man I want this game on Steam. I pirated it because I'm not giving money to the EGS but I'd love nothing more than to give Remedy money for this. I'd gladly pay a hundred bucks tomorrow for a copy in my Steam library. I really hope it's gonna come over eventually. Hopefully there's some contractual lookhole that allows Remedy to release a "Complete Edition" or whatever down the line.

Playing a lot of Cyberpunk last month already had me thinking about this one a lot but playing Alan Wake II immediately after is only reinforcing how much I love this trope: having music composed for a fictional band within the game world. This music may or may not be done by an actual real-world band. Cyberpunk has Refused standing in for Samurai and Remedy obviously has Poets of the fall for Old Gods of Asgard. And in both cases, I love the fictional band way more than the real one lol. I love that Remedy's connected universe thing is keeping Old Gods going throughout their various games. It's been almost a week since I've played the Herald of Darkness chapter in Alan Wake II and I still can't stop thinking about it lol. And I'm going to be genuinely bummed out if the Cyberpunk sequel doesn't come with new Samurai music. So, I've been wondering if there are other examples of this. I know there's a (pretty good) full album for Star-Lord from the recent Eidos Guardians of the Galaxy game, although I don't think that one has a real-world counterpart. Can't really think of anything else, though.