Video games and gaming

[HighlyMotivated]

GTA 6 trailer looks very promising... shame about the 2025 release date

[Munter84]

Plan is to play It Takes Two for the first time with the girlfriend. I'm a bit nervous as it took some convincing to get her to play it.

What did you make of it? I started a co-op game of this but our interest just fizzled out after a few sessions despite us both making noises about it being not bad and worth a revisit. Games designed for co-op are a tricky beast I feel, they must be hell from a design standpoint and are pretty niche. The last one I played that I really clicked with was Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, about a decade ago.

I'm going on a bit of a binge of my back catalogue, a combination of nostalgia trip and achievement hunting. Recently finished Sniper Elite V2 with a view to picking up the sequels on the cheap in the near future. An enjoyable game when you get to grips with some of the fiddlier mechanics!

[Billy no mates]

What did you make of it? I started a co-op game of this but our interest just fizzled out after a few sessions despite us both making noises about it being not bad and worth a revisit. Games designed for co-op are a tricky beast I feel, they must be hell from a design standpoint and are pretty niche. The last one I played that I really clicked with was Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, about a decade ago.

I'm going on a bit of a binge of my back catalogue, a combination of nostalgia trip and achievement hunting. Recently finished Sniper Elite V2 with a view to picking up the sequels on the cheap in the near future. An enjoyable game when you get to grips with some of the fiddlier mechanics!

I would recommend Brothers : A tale of two sons for a great co op experience and believe it to be by the same guy that made A way out, but when he was still an indie designer.

[Rick2468]

What did you make of it? I started a co-op game of this but our interest just fizzled out after a few sessions despite us both making noises about it being not bad and worth a revisit. Games designed for co-op are a tricky beast I feel, they must be hell from a design standpoint and are pretty niche. The last one I played that I really clicked with was Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, about a decade ago.

It's a BRILLIANT game we are both enjoying it a lot. I recommend it to everyone it is so much fun to play through. It is not terribly hard but still takes a reasonable level of skill from both players so I highly recommend you play through with someone who is a gamer rather than just playing through with your partner and assume you can carry the both of you through it. We have been able to solve all the puzzles ourselves so far, sometimes I work it out and sometimes she does which is cool, so hopefully we can complete it with no guide. The sections are really varied and you move neatly from one to the other. It's like being in a Pixar film. We have been kicked out of the game due to server issues twice over the course of about 5 hours of gameplay but were able to quickly rejoin with no progress lost so doesn't feel too bad. We are having another session on it this evening.

It's free on PS Plus at the moment but gets removed next month in case anyone has that and wants to give it a try for no extra cost.

[Spunky34]

Well, I just received my 2023 wrap up email from PlayStation.  I knew I had been stuck in a rut this year but my god. 

I have played 1200 hours this year.  425 of those Elden Ring, another 400 Hitman, 120 The Witcher 3 (which I was playing from November last year through to January).  40 hours each for XCom 2 and Crusader Kings 3.  Leaving about 180 hours split across another 26 games.   

I know this will probably go down as a great year for gaming generally but none of those 5 mentioned above was released this year.  And only Elden Ring was one I hadn’t played extensively before. 

I guess I’m becoming much less adventurous as the price of games at release goes up, and I’m becoming more reliant on ‘included with subscription’ games for trying something totally new.  Genuinely not sure whether I’ve actually bought a game outright this year (think I got Elden Ring last Black Friday - -I don’t remember spending money on anything specific).

[Billy no mates]

I’ve seen my Xbox one, but I don’t think it’s correct 927 hours, but it has Forza Motorsport at 230hrs, that sounds too high, I have played it a lot, but not that much in the two months since release. It was very buggy initially, it still is far from perfect, but it would crash randomly to homepage and I wonder if it added the time for the races into that, or kept a counter going in the background on game suspend.

Anyway my highest game by hours is Piczle Lines on the switch, of which I have two more puzzles to complete then I have done everything.

[Rick2468]

I'm pretty stoked about the PS Plus games announced for this month. I don't care so much for the headline AAA games but the smaller games further down the list look great for me.
- Salt and Sacrifice - sequel to Salt and Sanctuary which I thought was excellent. Sacrifice got worse reviews but I loved the first one enough to give it a go.
- Shadowrun games - I think these looked really interesting, got decent but not amazing reviews so another game I was unsure about so a perfect game to have on the service so I can try it out.
- Grime - looks up my street, I have played too many platformers recently so may not play this for a few months

There are a few games on the list I don't know much about but will look into them and may end up trying those as well. In a way this month has given me too much to play although there was nothing last month that took my fancy so it levels out.

Right now I'm still playing It Takes Two and enjoying it. Expect to finish it by the weekend.

[Munter84]

I would recommend Brothers : A tale of two sons for a great co op experience and believe it to be by the same guy that made A way out, but when he was still an indie designer.

This is another one I started (believe it was free on Xbox Games With Gold many months ago?) and enjoyed, but for whatever reason put down and left on the back burner. Although, I played through in single-player twin stick mode rather than actual 2-player co-op, which is a bit like patting your head while rubbing your belly. Cheers for the reminder, maybe one to dust off again over Christmas.

In the last few days I played Aliens: Colonial Marines as I remember it being absolutely slated on release. It really is a shoddy game, just about enjoyable enough to persevere with for a campaign playthrough but glitches and half baked design are evident around every turn, not to mention just how generic the concept, story and setting is. It's a game that would have added little to the genre in 2003, let alone 2013 when it reared its head.

[Rick2468]

I have finished It Takes Two and got the platinum. Excellent game I think it deserves the high praise it received. We did not need to use a guide once which was satisfying. There was a point near the end of the snow globe level which we were stuck on for about 10 minutes and I was close to checking a guide but we worked it out. I don't particularly like co-op games as I like to game on my own terms and usually when you find a friend to play a game with you might have one or two sessions then never find another time to finish it off. After finishing It Takes Two I will keep more of a look out for these games. I looked into Human Fall Flat but the reviews are a bit shit. A Way Out is by the same developer as It Takes Two and has got good reviews so I'll check that out at some point. It's on EA Play and they do offers for 1 month sub for £0.79 every 6 months so I'll pick it up then and play through.

I have also been playing Devil May Cry 5. I don't like these action button mash games but I am having a lot of fun with it. The characters are so over the top in typical CAPCOM style you just have to love it. I'm just going to play through once and do the secret missions then move on to something else.

I might give ONMO a go as that leaves PS Plus next month. Kind of thinking of looking into whether I can quickly play through Yazuka Like A Dragon before it also leaves PS Plus but probably won't. I now have two weeks off for Christmas so I'm planning to get stuck into Disco Elysium. Salt and Sacrifice joins PS Plus on Tuesday and I really want to try it so I might split my time between DE and S+S. I normally like to concentrate on one game at a time but I will have a lot of time for gaming over the next couple of weeks so think I'll try and juggle the two.

[Billy no mates]

Always fancied disco Elysium.

I have a few single player games I want to get through so will probably halt my game pass after Starfield for a few months and clear the backlog.

Also fancy another run at Grim Dawn, would be offline only though.

[grouper]

Always fancied disco Elysium.

I have a few single player games I want to get through so will probably halt my game pass after Starfield for a few months and clear the backlog.

Also fancy another run at Grim Dawn, would be offline only though.

Disco Elysium is hilarious, the writing is so good. Give it a go.

[Rick2468]

I finished Devil May Cry 5 and replayed a few chapters to unlock a few challenges and the alternative ending. It's a fun game. I could have happily kept playing this and unlocking more things but I wanted to get stuck into Disco Elysium this Christmas holiday so I think I found a sweet spot of where to end with Devil May Cry.

I also played through OMNO which is another game that is leaving PS+ next month and got decent reviews. It's a short game and was decent. It describes itself as a puzzle game but I thought the puzzle elements were very week compared with other games like The Talos Principle, The Witness and It Takes Too. It's mainly a platformer where you have to climb structures in a time limit to collect orbs. The controls are decent though and the setting is cute so worth playing. I considered playing Yazuka 6: Song of Life as that also leaves PS+ next month, I watched a video review and it looks okay but I think there are other things I'd prefer to play and I don't want to constantly chase games that are leaving PS+.

I started Disco Elysium and it's still early days but I think it is going to be something special. It has excellent reviews but I was still worried it might not connect with me. But about 3 hours in and I think it's amazing. I love the main character already. I spent an hour in the first two rooms of the game talking to people and it really goes to show you don't need a huge map to have a content rich game. It's a proper role playing game where, shock / horror you actually see the results of the dice rolls. It has a really 1990s PC game feel with the menus etc but still looks great. Something that is worrying me is that there is an in game clock that progresses so I am worried that if I spend too long in a certain place I might run out of time. My way around that is to reload if I spend ages faffing around in an area. Once I get to the end of Day 1 I hope to have a good idea of how tight the time limits are and hopefully will be able to relax. I deliberately saved this game for my Christmas break as I thought it would be a good game to get stuck into whilst I had lots of time and so far it seems like a good choice.

[Ali Katt]

Always fancied disco Elysium.

I have a few single player games I want to get through so will probably halt my game pass after Starfield for a few months and clear the backlog.

Also fancy another run at Grim Dawn, would be offline only though.

Disco Elysium and We Happy Few are two that are up my alley, but my PC isn't powerful enough to run them well. Next year.

[Rick2468]

I finished my first playthrough of Disco Elysium where I played a good and honourable cop (for the most part) and did lots of exploring. I think this game is amazing and will certainly be in my top 5 from the PS4 era. I will need to let a bit of time pass but I expect it will be my 2nd favourite PS4 game with Hollow Knight being number 1.

I had reservations that Disco Elysium would be too text heavy and it did involve mainly reading but I was hooked. The setting and the characters were so gritty it was like reading an Alan Moore graphic novel. The world is actually quite small but you easily spend hours talking to various people. I actually got a notebook out and was writing out my own notes about the investigation whilst I was playing it as I was so into it. The music was good as well, the soundtrack was by a band called British Sea Power who I have listened to before and I even recognised one of the songs as it was just an instrumental of one of their old songs.

The game has a 1990s feel to it I think. It reminded me a lot of a childhood Christmas when my Dad bought us Sam and Max Hit The Road on the PC and I played it for hours a day over Christmas. I saved Disco Elysium for my Christmas break as it looked like a game I could get properly stuck into whilst I had time off. I think it's a game that some people will hate, but based on the games mentioned in this thread you strike me of people of culture when it comes to gaming so I think there is a great chance you'll like this so I definitely recommend it.

I am going to do another playthrough as a bad cop and try and solve the mystery without checking a key piece of evidence. I looked at the trophy list and I think I can get the platinum trophy with one more playthrough although I might need to do a third. Will see how it goes.

Next on my list is Salt and Sacrifice which is now on PS+.

[Munter84]

Disco Elysium and We Happy Few are two that are up my alley, but my PC isn't powerful enough to run them well. Next year.

We Happy Few made me genuinely angry, due to how badly they fumbled a promising premise. It's a game I desperately wanted to like and I persevered long past the point where I was getting no enjoyment from it whatsoever, waiting for a payoff that never came. Hopefully it'll get a remake, official or spiritual, at some point, as the 1960s dystopian sci-fi setting is fertile ground.

I'm still inexplicably punishing myself with Aliens: Colonial Marines. Whats sad is that there are the bones of a perfectly serviceable (if utterly average) game underneath all the bugs and jankiness.

[WDFORTE]

Star Wars Pinball on the Switch is epic.  Cost £4 or so from Eneba, if you like Star Wars and pinball then this my friend is for you.  Download key only, no physical media for that money. 

[Munter84]

Started playing L.A. Noire for the first time. My God, what a good game this is. Utterly compelling, polished, novel, and a refreshingly un-bawdlerised depiction of the late 1940s. No Netflix-style modern sensibilities here. There are games that have an 18+ certificate, and then there are games for grown-ups, this is one of the latter. Real quality.

[Spunky34]

Started playing L.A. Noire for the first time. My God, what a good game this is. Utterly compelling, polished, novel, and a refreshingly un-bawdlerised depiction of the late 1940s. No Netflix-style modern sensibilities here. There are games that have an 18+ certificate, and then there are games for grown-ups, this is one of the latter. Real quality.

I loved LA Noire when it came out.  By the end I wasn't too keen on the overall narrative but I enjoyed each of the individual cases.   Completely agree about the darkness of the story - genuinely a grown-up kind of game.

I seem to remember a sequel of sorts was mooted a few years back but I think got canned.  It's a real shame. 

[Billy no mates]

Gaming update time

Starfield - finished the main story, it’s mediocre, the side stuff is where it’s at. Fairly major plot spoiler thing happened with a choice to go to the eye or stay at the lodge (those that have done it will know what I mean) and for the way I had played the game neither was a good option, found it harder to get motivated after that. Also discovered that new game plus resets lots of things (again this is explained in story which won’t spoil), but resets al planet survey work, which was something I spent a lot of time on.

Forza motorsport - actually quit this as the ramming and poor driving online has broken any interest and hope I had of serious racing. Needs a radar for wheel, in car users, also needs a ranking and penalty system that works.

Playing now
Assetto Corsa Competizione (sp?) - joined an Xbox racing league and getting excellent races, I’m not very good and only ranked at rookie and still finishing in the last 30%, but enjoying the racing.

Asterigo curse of the gods - Xbox - sort of a bit of a souls like, as if it was made by Ubsiosft, more simplistic and a lot easier, colourful fun and grabbed it for 4.99 in a sale.

Cross Code - Switch - not bad 16-bit action rpg type of game with would recommend when on sale.

Grim Dawn - Xbox - Diablo clone that’s a few years old, but recently received a massive update with a lots of quality of life changes that makes the game great fun, easy to build a class of your own choice, no need to search for perfect builds, dual class system.

[Munter84]

I loved LA Noire when it came out.  By the end I wasn't too keen on the overall narrative but I enjoyed each of the individual cases.   Completely agree about the darkness of the story - genuinely a grown-up kind of game.

I seem to remember a sequel of sorts was mooted a few years back but I think got canned.  It's a real shame.

I'm now on Disc 3 (I've been savouring it, and avoiding playing when I can't give it my undivided attention) and I get what you mean. A lot of the narrative "tightness" has slackened to the point my head is spinning. There are too many names, too many people, they're all too similar with too few distinguishing traits. A good few plot twists have come up by this point and if they don't get resolved in a satisfactory way I'll be personally offended after the amount of time and effort I've invested!

I was reading a bit about the development of the game on Wikipedia, interesting to note that it was in development hell for many years and only limped over the line with the assistance of an industry heavyweight (Rockstar) in a final push that basically destroyed the dev team. In many ways LA Noir reminds me of another studio-killing game close to my heart, Shenmue on the Sega Dreamcast. Both critically acclaimed games, but apparently they're real buggers to produce and don't generate much revenue.

[The0neAnd0nly]

Played the FF7 Rebirth demo a few days ago when it was released.

Generally not a fan of remakes or remasters however this was absolutely brilliant. Feels much better rounded after the already very good FF7 Remake (part 1)

Will be buying Rebirth on day 1 release - February 29th (yes there's a leap day upcoming!)

[Ali Katt]

Played the FF7 Rebirth demo a few days ago when it was released.

Generally not a fan of remakes or remasters however this was absolutely brilliant. Feels much better rounded after the already very good FF7 Remake (part 1)

Will be buying Rebirth on day 1 release - February 29th (yes there's a leap day upcoming!)

I've heard good things about this. I know the PSP reboot of FFVII was popular in the day, but I've said this before I'm a bit cynical about the triple-A games coming out as most are reboots or sequels of stuff that came out 25 years ago: Resident Evil, Tomb Raider, Tekken, Silent Hill, Pokemon, MGS. That's not to say they're not great games, but there's been very little in the way of new franchises.

[The0neAnd0nly]

I've heard good things about this. I know the PSP reboot of FFVII was popular in the day, but I've said this before I'm a bit cynical about the triple-A games coming out as most are reboots or sequels of stuff that came out 25 years ago: Resident Evil, Tomb Raider, Tekken, Silent Hill, Pokemon, MGS. That's not to say they're not great games, but there's been very little in the way of new franchises.

Yeah getting good reviews but paying £70 for a new game is a bitter pill to swallow! Might wait untill it comes down in price same as FF16!

[Munter84]

Finished LA Noire, although technically all the plot threads were resolved by the end, there was just far too much convenient coincidence for my liking. By the final act, the two protagonists and final boss were revealed to all have been from the same military unit - if it was supposed to be a comment on how the twisted threads of fate lead people on diverging paths, it could have been handled a lot better.

Not a bad game, 8/10, but it ran out of steam around the halfway point and limped home.

I'm currently playing Dead Island 2. About 10 years ago I inexplicably tortured myself with multiple playthroughs of Dead Island and the standalone should-have-been-DLC sequel Riptide, and the long awaited sequel hits all the same beats and misses all the same tricks. It's almost impressive how closely it's cut from the same cloth despite changing studios about three times during development. It's grindy, sometimes-cathartic but mostly unsatisfying hack-and-slash through a series of hackneyed urban, beachside, military and sewer backdrops, with wooden B-movie dialogue which is never half as funny as it thinks it is. I hate it but it's hooked the completionist in me. Aaargh!

[HighlyMotivated]

Looking at Dragon's Dogma 2 to fill the Elden Ring-shaped hole in my life when it releases soon. At least until the Elden Ring DLC arrives in June.

[Munter84]

Finished Dead Island 2, including the base game achievements which are mercifully easy to get.

An awkward game that I like for the same reasons I persevered with the prequel(s) and dislike for the same reasons: everything is subordinate to the grindy loot-based mechanics and it hinges on playing with ideally a full party of friends. It makes the single-player game a slow-paced, lonely experience with very infrequent genuine stand-out set pieces or memorable moments. Graphically it's gorgeous but at times it verges on being a walking simulator.

The second of two DLC expansions has just dropped so I'm sure I'll return to it at some point.

[Billy no mates]

Cleared the decks of everything, so watched a few beginners guides to Elden Ring on YouTube.

The game does a poor job of explaining some basic mechanics, and I tried to play it before got up to the wolf boss (Radhahan?) and killed him, but became frustrated with the game. Some of it was my poor skill level, but some was a misunderstanding of some of the game basics.

So for the first time in years I have gone back to a game and now fully loving it, I still die quite easily, but I now understand what killed me and how to overcome.

[The0neAnd0nly]

Cleared the decks of everything, so watched a few beginners guides to Elden Ring on YouTube.

The game does a poor job of explaining some basic mechanics, and I tried to play it before got up to the wolf boss (Radhahan?) and killed him, but became frustrated with the game. Some of it was my poor skill level, but some was a misunderstanding of some of the game basics.

So for the first time in years I have gone back to a game and now fully loving it, I still die quite easily, but I now understand what killed me and how to overcome.

Brilliant game. I do think about going back to play it again bit I'm not a sadist.

Have fun with Malenia. I genuinely must have died about 100 times before finally defeating her. Absolute slut 👩🏻‍🦰