TheMightyEthan

Hades So I'm having a better time with this game than I did the first time around. I started a new game, and beat Megara on my third run (got to her on my second but died), which is way faster than before. I actually made it all the way to the second boss on that run, and managed to beat him and get to the third area by run 8. When I played at launch I had 11 runs on record and never even got to the boss of the second area, and that was with God Mode on (I actually thought I was playing with God Mode this time but only recently realized it actually wasn't activated). I have since made it to the third boss, but forgot to look at my run total. I'm not frustrated with the progression the way I was when I first played it, I think partially just because I'm doing so much better. I got gud, I guess? It has crystalized in my mind what exactly I didn't like about it before though. I said it was that I felt like there wasn't enough progress between runs, and I think that's right in the broad sense, but more specifically I think it's because you have to play through the entire thing on every run, bosses included. In other roguelites, at least the ones I've liked, you only ever have to fight each boss once, but Hades makes you fight them all every single time. Also in other ones you tend to unlock shortcuts that let you jump to later biomes without going through the entirety of all the earlier ones in ever single attempt, but in Hades the only way out is straight through. It makes the runs feel more repetitive, and more padded with busywork at the beginning. All that said, unless I hit a wall I do think I'll manage to finish it this time.

The Game Informer review said it's like the t-shirt section of a Hot Topic collided with the anime section of a Suncoast Video, which frankly sounds awesome.

Assassin's Creed: Valhalla This game is really hard to rate, because I really like a lot of what's there, but it's just so long. Even doing literally nothing but the main quest it took me over 60 hours to finish, because most of the main quest line should have been side quests instead. In fact, the game doesn't really have almost any side quests, because everything's just either part of the main quest or a little one-off world event that only takes a few minutes to finish. The way I traditionally play big games like this is that I play the main story until I feel like I want to explore around, then I run around doing side stuff until I get bored with that, then go back to the main story, and so on. In Odyssey I couldn't do that because the level gating forced me to keep doing side stuff to grind in order to be strong enough for the next main mission. Valhalla did technically solve that problem, but they "solved" it by just making all the side missions part of the main quest, so you have to do them to advance the story. Either way the end result is the same: I have to spend a ton of time running around doing random bullshit I don't care about instead of getting on with the story. It sucks, because in both games I actually did like the story, both the ancient one and the modern-day one, but they just won't let me play it. I like the core of the gameplay (even if it isn't as much the stealthing and assassinating that I really want from a game called Assassin's Creed), and the world is huge and varied and well done. I probably would even have really liked a lot of the missions if they'd been side missions instead of main missions, because then they wouldn't have felt like they were in my way, and they really are intricate and well made. Like Odyssey before it, this is a game that is so close to being great, but it just can't stop stepping on those rakes. Grade: C Assassin's Creed: Valhalla: Dawn of Ragnarok This has a lot of similar problems to the main game, except it's much smaller in scope (I finished it in about 9 hours), it does a better job of separating out side quests from the main quest, and it's set in the realm of the Norse gods which is inherently cooler to me. Nothing fundamentally different though. Grade: C+

That game looks radical.

I can't believe I forgot to post this till now! Such a great game, and one of my proudest hundos, up there with Returnal and Elden Ring.

I tip my hat to you finishing Trek to Yomi, I played like 45 minutes and gave up cause I didn't like how the combat felt. Gorgeous as hell though.

Been a lot of people talking about how good this game is recently, and it's on sale for really cheap on multiple platforms.

Sifu This is a roguelite-lite where you play as a martial artist avenging your dead father/instructor. (I say roguelite-lite because the levels and enemy placement aren't random, they're the same every time, so it's not even a true roguelite.) It's got an interesting hook, where you have a magic talisman that brings you back to life each time you die, but you also age a number of years equal to the number of times you've died. So you start off at 20 and the first time you die you come back to life at 21, then the second time you add 2 more years so you're 23, third time you add 3 years so 26, and so on, though there are opportunities in the game to reduce or reset your death counter (but not your age). If you age past 78 you die altogether and have to restart that level. Your age also carries over from one level to the next, so basically you have to beat the whole game without aging past 78. Luckily there are only 5 levels, and you can go back and play any level any time you want though, to try to get a better age to carry into the next level. There are also skills and that you unlock as you go. With skills if you unlock the same one 5 times in the same run then it's permanently unlocked even if you die or restart from the beginning, whereas upgrades are more like your age and you start each level with the upgrades you had at the end of the previous level. That's all the central mechanic, but the core of the gameplay is the combat, and it feels great. You have the classic light & heavy attacks, along with blocks, parries, and dodges, and you can throw it all together into crazy combos that make you feel like a badass. The timing and execution can feel a bit weird at first, but once you get used to it everything starts to flow and it just feels so good to play. Fundamentally it's the modern interpretation of those old beat-em-up games like the Ninja Turtles games from the 90's. It also has crazy replayability. I beat it in just over 6 hours, and I've already spent another 6 hours doing the optional objectives and trying to beat it with a lower age. I do have a few nitpicks, changes I would make to the progression system, that kind of thing, but none of it detracts from how much fun it is to play. I definitely recommend it for anyone who likes oldschool beat-em-ups or just fast action games in general. Grade: A

Tales from the Borderlands I feel like the Telltale formula kind of limits how good a game can really be, but within that formula this game was really good. I'm not a Borderlands fan by any means, but it was presented in a way where I didn't feel like I needed to be, and the writing had me laughing out loud multiple times per episode. I did feel like the second half of the last episode felt odd, like it didn't really fit with the arc of the story, but other than that I really liked it. Grade: B+

I have to accept I do this every console generation since the OG Xbox. I get the console, say "this is good enough for me, I'm never going back!" and then a few years later build a new PC anyway. But specifically this time the tipping point was basically the advent of VRR (and my experience of how great it is on console). I've been dissatisfied with my GTX 1080 for quite a while because it can't run newer games even close to 60 most of the time, and 30 is less than ideal, and I can't stand the stutteriness of an unlocked framerate with vsync, nor can I stand tearing. Then I got my new TV which supports gsync, which would solve that issue, but it only has HDMI ports, no Displayport, and the 1080 only supports gsync over Displayport, and Displayport to HDMI adapters don't work with gsync. So I've had my eye out for a side-grade to an RTX 3060, which does support gsync over HDMI, but had kind of decided that was a waste of money and wasn't going to do it. Fast forward a couple months, I get a raise at work that's retroactive to the start of the year, so I have a bunch of cash burning a hole in my checking account, and then on Friday I happen to stumble across an RTX 3060 Ti for only 25% over msrp (and by "stumble across" I mean "go to Newegg and run a search"), and ordered it. Then on Saturday I started thinking "the rest of my PC is almost 10 years old at this point, seems silly to just do the graphics card..." and here we are. VRR should pretty much fix my tweaking issues with PC gaming too though, cause now I don't have to worry about optimizing with a locked framerate, one that fluctuates will be fine, so I won't get into that cycle where a frame drops so I go into the settings to try to fix it, I'll just let it run unlocked and as long as it doesn't get like sub 45 it won't bother me. *Edit - it does kind of render my Series X superfluous though, not sure if I should try to sell that or what...

Guys, I may have a problem...

That looks interesting.

Oh, I see, to which I refer you to the aforementioned gun nuts. And our broken system which promotes minority rule.

Well there's the obvious supreme court precedent that it's unconstitutional to ban private ownership. Even if that weren't the case though, there are so many gun nuts that any Republican that supports any kind of gun control will be immediately ousted by their party. So that's why not to try it for them. I saw a study that found that if a mass shooting occurs in a Democratic-controlled state then gun laws remain unchanged (they tend to have pretty restrictive laws already), but if it occurs in a Republican-controlled state then gun laws are likely to be relaxed within 6 months.

lol, okay, that makes sense. That's really cool.

lol, what do you do to your cards that you need that many? You running a casino?

smdh

Also on sale on Playstation, and the PS5 upgrade comes out next month.

I think the initial statement was an honest slip of the tongue (Freudian slip?). It's immediately after when he mutters "Iraq too" and everyone laughs that I find truly horrifying, because that was a joke.

Playstation, it was on sale for $5.