The video game thread.

Jason P

I am vengeance ...

I am the night ...

I am Batman!

only a few more weeks

dudeman

I borrowed a PS5 from a friend. Going to check out the God of War games and decide from there if I'm going to shell out for my own. 

Jason P

dudeman said:

I borrowed a PS5 from a friend. Going to check out the God of War games and decide from there if I'm going to shell out for my own. 

Stellar Blade is another game to check out in that genre.  The Boss battles are epic and it has a decent skill tree and move list.  They paced it well enough that I figured out the mechanics without feeling overwhelmed.

Jason P

I got MS Flight Sim 2024 for PS5.  It is very similar to Flight Sim 2020 that I played on Xbox, although less buggy.  The install size is significantly smaller (under 20 GB) but requires a stable internet to stream in assets.  The maps use actual maps so you can fly over your house or fly thru Yosemite valley and do a nose dive off of Half Dome.  I'm happy that a game like this is available for consoles.

mca47

Jason P said:

I got MS Flight Sim 2024 for PS5.  It is very similar to Flight Sim 2020 that I played on Xbox, although less buggy.  The install size is significantly smaller (under 20 GB) but requires a stable internet to stream in assets.  The maps use actual maps so you can fly over your house or fly thru Yosemite valley and do a nose dive off of Half Dome.  I'm happy that a game like this is available for consoles.

That's really cool.  I got MS Flight Sim 2020 for my PC back in the day.  Have rudder pedals, yoke and throttle quadrant, so a legit sim setup.  I was also doing actual flight training to get my pilot's license back then too.  Didn't want to continue my training during the Covid days so during lockdown I tried to stay current with the sim.  Funny thing is...  I spent very little time using it in a useful way.  Instead I just did all the things I would have never, ever done in a real plane.  hahaha

Jason P

mca47 said:

Jason P said:

I got MS Flight Sim 2024 for PS5.  It is very similar to Flight Sim 2020 that I played on Xbox, although less buggy.  The install size is significantly smaller (under 20 GB) but requires a stable internet to stream in assets.  The maps use actual maps so you can fly over your house or fly thru Yosemite valley and do a nose dive off of Half Dome.  I'm happy that a game like this is available for consoles.

That's really cool.  I got MS Flight Sim 2020 for my PC back in the day.  Have rudder pedals, yoke and throttle quadrant, so a legit sim setup.  I was also doing actual flight training to get my pilot's license back then too.  Didn't want to continue my training during the Covid days so during lockdown I tried to stay current with the sim.  Funny thing is...  I spent very little time using it in a useful way.  Instead I just did all the things I would have never, ever done in a real plane.  hahaha

The game is much cheaper than airplane fuel!  My Dad was training as a pilot (then we kids came along and ended that dream) and I'm using the small airfield he practiced on as my base of operation.  I have his training kit and slide rulers that is kind of neat to poke thru.  I'm approaching this game a little more seriously than I did with 2020.

I spent some time adjusting the sensitivity for the Dual Sense and it made a huge difference in flying.  It is pretty twitchy out of the box.

mca47

Jason P said:

mca47 said:

Jason P said:

I got MS Flight Sim 2024 for PS5.  It is very similar to Flight Sim 2020 that I played on Xbox, although less buggy.  The install size is significantly smaller (under 20 GB) but requires a stable internet to stream in assets.  The maps use actual maps so you can fly over your house or fly thru Yosemite valley and do a nose dive off of Half Dome.  I'm happy that a game like this is available for consoles.

That's really cool.  I got MS Flight Sim 2020 for my PC back in the day.  Have rudder pedals, yoke and throttle quadrant, so a legit sim setup.  I was also doing actual flight training to get my pilot's license back then too.  Didn't want to continue my training during the Covid days so during lockdown I tried to stay current with the sim.  Funny thing is...  I spent very little time using it in a useful way.  Instead I just did all the things I would have never, ever done in a real plane.  hahaha

The game is much cheaper than airplane fuel!  My Dad was training as a pilot (then we kids came along and ended that dream) and I'm using the small airfield he practiced on as my base of operation.  I have his training kit and slide rulers that is kind of neat to poke thru.  I'm approaching this game a little more seriously than I did with 2020.

I spent some time adjusting the sensitivity for the Dual Sense and it made a huge difference in flying.  It is pretty twitchy out of the box.

And wrecking the videogame planes is waaaay cheaper too!  hahaha  

Jason P

mca47 said:

Jason P said:

mca47 said:

Jason P said:

I got MS Flight Sim 2024 for PS5.  It is very similar to Flight Sim 2020 that I played on Xbox, although less buggy.  The install size is significantly smaller (under 20 GB) but requires a stable internet to stream in assets.  The maps use actual maps so you can fly over your house or fly thru Yosemite valley and do a nose dive off of Half Dome.  I'm happy that a game like this is available for consoles.

That's really cool.  I got MS Flight Sim 2020 for my PC back in the day.  Have rudder pedals, yoke and throttle quadrant, so a legit sim setup.  I was also doing actual flight training to get my pilot's license back then too.  Didn't want to continue my training during the Covid days so during lockdown I tried to stay current with the sim.  Funny thing is...  I spent very little time using it in a useful way.  Instead I just did all the things I would have never, ever done in a real plane.  hahaha

The game is much cheaper than airplane fuel!  My Dad was training as a pilot (then we kids came along and ended that dream) and I'm using the small airfield he practiced on as my base of operation.  I have his training kit and slide rulers that is kind of neat to poke thru.  I'm approaching this game a little more seriously than I did with 2020.

I spent some time adjusting the sensitivity for the Dual Sense and it made a huge difference in flying.  It is pretty twitchy out of the box.

And wrecking the videogame planes is waaaay cheaper too!  hahaha  

True.  Not having to worry about the grim reaper is nice.  What's not cheap are the marketplace planes.  Thankfully the base game seems to have a decent roster of aircraft, but I was looking at a C160 plane last night and with tax it is $40.  For one plane.  That said, I'm just flying a Cesna right now.

Jason P

I got the new Yoshi game to play with the kids last night ... I tried to do research on if it was a 2-player co-op game a month ago and nothing was clear, but I must have been convinced it was.  Thankfully, before opening the game, I looked at the back and it is only a 1 player game.  I'm not paying $70 for a 1-player Yoshi game, so I returned it and got Tetris, Tennis, and Blades of Steel for my Gameboy.

Another "L" for Big Mario.  One year into the Switch 2 I've bought two major party games, Mario Kart World (included in the bundle) and Donkey Kong.  I have not played either in the last 9 months.  I've played Cast n' Chill, an indie fishing game with co-op, more than official Nintendo games.

mca47

Started another Elden Ring run.  Pretty sure it's my 5th full run.  It's still fun, but for the love of god, I wish some new games would come out!!

Jason P

mca47 said:

Started another Elden Ring run.  Pretty sure it's my 5th full run.  It's still fun, but for the love of god, I wish some new games would come out!!

Do you have any of the strategy books from Future Press?  They just released their 4th book on the game. 

All of the books that Future Press have released are top notch and packed to the brim with knowledge.  Heck, they have one for Animal Crossing that is almost 700 pages long with no filler.

Bitmap Books make great books chronicling the history of video games.  They do the best job at protecting books during shipping that I have ever seen.  I'm thankful that these two publishers are around ... books and guides are a lost art, an industry destroyed by the internet and youtube.

I've dipped my toes into Elden Ring (a toe dip in this series is 50 hours of gameplay).  I had to beat Dark Souls 3 first, which took about a decade.  I started Elden Ring on Series X, but since I primarily play on PS5 now, I have just started the game but got sidetracked by Demon Souls ... hopefully I complete that by the year 2030.

Jason P

The Batman Lego game looks awesome ... I was going to buy it to play co-op with the kids, but when I asked them if I should get it, they wanted to play Stardew Valley ... so I decided not to spend $75 if they would rather play a SNES-like game.  I can wait for a sale when it goes 50% off in the fall.

CarryTheZero

My son got the Batman Lego game. I played it for a couple of hours with him. It is awesome!

Jason P

Steam Deck went up in price by $300 overnight ... That mean the Steam Box is going to be $1000 for base models ... and the controller looks like a giant brick ... and scalpers instantly cleaned the limited inventory out.  Valve must have hired Microsoft strategists ... 

It used to be where I could buy a Nintendo, a Playstation and an Xbox for around $1000.  That time was 5 years ago.  

My advice to the game industry ... you don't need real actors to make games.   You don't need to make $300M interactive movies.  You shouldn't need 5-10 years to make a game.  That way, when your $500M game tanks or you spend almost $4 BILLION dollars on a studio that lays a turd, you don't need to raise prices on your consoles to cover up your mistakes for the investors.

Do we really need games where you can see a hair growing out of mole on or do we just need good games?  

Jason P

Sony had their State of Play yesterday ... my thoughts

* Wolverine game has a release date this year.  Looks cool, but gory

* Stuntman was the only game I didn't have on my radar ... could be cool but no release date, so whatever

* Sony confirmed that the followup to the last two Dad of War games will be a Mom of War game ... it's not coming our for at least a year, so whatever.  

* No updates from Naughty Dog on Intergalactic ... I think the first hype video for this game was 1.5 years ago.  

* Tomb Raider looks good, but it could be year away from release, so whatever.

* The Marvel fighting game looks promising.  Releases this year.

* Ace Combat is coming out this year 

* The rest of the lineup was a bunch of meh (for my tastes)

The biggest new for me came out the day before when Sony announced the Flexstrike fighting stick is actually coming out.

Hopefully there are games that peaked your interests.  To each their own.

Jason P

I think Civilization 7 was finally completed after a 1.5 year full-priced beta test.  A recent update looks like it fixed a lot of the criticisms.  It was 40% off so I will be playing it this weekend.  I was thinking of playing Civ 6 a few days ago and decided to check out the progress of Civ 7 and The Test of Time patch just release a few weeks ago.  

Jason P

This picture for the new GoW pretty much sums up why AAA games take 7 years and hundreds of millions of dollars to produce ...

mca47

CarryTheZero said:

My son got the Batman Lego game. I played it for a couple of hours with him. It is awesome!

Might download that after my current Elden Ring run.  Heard it's fun!

MayDay10

Jason P said:

I think Civilization 7 was finally completed after a 1.5 year full-priced beta test.  A recent update looks like it fixed a lot of the criticisms.  It was 40% off so I will be playing it this weekend.  I was thinking of playing Civ 6 a few days ago and decided to check out the progress of Civ 7 and The Test of Time patch just release a few weeks ago.  

I just cant do Civ any more.  I played thousands of hours on 2, 3, and 4.  Looked forward to V, had the special edition pre-ordered and didn't make it through one game (which I was dominating which never happened on previous versions).  Tried 6, liked it better than 5, but didnt get through a game (did start a 2nd game that went unfinished).  No urge at all to try 7 from what I have heard, just a worse version of 6.  Them releasing a patch to completely change the bad idea of a game they had is funny.

I really wish it would go back to the less arcadey games that were 2, 3, and 4.  I would like to see what Paradox would do with a full Civ game

Jason P

MayDay10 said:

Jason P said:

I think Civilization 7 was finally completed after a 1.5 year full-priced beta test.  A recent update looks like it fixed a lot of the criticisms.  It was 40% off so I will be playing it this weekend.  I was thinking of playing Civ 6 a few days ago and decided to check out the progress of Civ 7 and The Test of Time patch just release a few weeks ago.  

I just cant do Civ any more.  I played thousands of hours on 2, 3, and 4.  Looked forward to V, had the special edition pre-ordered and didn't make it through one game (which I was dominating which never happened on previous versions).  Tried 6, liked it better than 5, but didnt get through a game (did start a 2nd game that went unfinished).  No urge at all to try 7 from what I have heard, just a worse version of 6.  Them releasing a patch to completely change the bad idea of a game they had is funny.

I really wish it would go back to the less arcadey games that were 2, 3, and 4.  I would like to see what Paradox would do with a full Civ game

I didn't have a PC that was powerful to run Civ 5 when it released, but I played the heck out of Civ 4.  For me, the biggest issue with Civ 4 was end-game worker management.  I liked Civ 6 ... workers could improve 3 things and then they were gone.  I've been waiting for Firaxis to fix Civ 7 before starting ... I watched some videos and it is quite different than the game that was released.  

I figure life is too short to wait for Civ 8 so I will let you know my thoughts on Civ 7 after playing it for a while.  At least the studio lead ate crow and admitted Firaxis screwed up instead of blaming the gamers for being too stupid to recognize their genius like some studios do.