PWB September

Play
I actually played a game last month: Zoo Keeper DS! I gave my DS and R4 card to Little Miss Bloodaxe to entertain her. She found Zookeeper, which I promptly had a shot of, and then got hooked on. I even finished it, getting the weird story at the end.

I also found the charger for my PS Vita so I've been playing a few things on that. Nothing seriously though. I thought I might give Vagrant Story a try. Or Trails in the Sky.

D&D! Both my Whitehack and 13th Age games are back on, which is mostly awesome.

University! 2nd year starts in a couple weeks. I'm really looking forward to it.

Want
A Switch. I'm hoping that there might be a decent deal around Black Friday and we can get one for the family. Then I can play it.

To run a bunch of other RPGs. I am writing a setting for D&D/OSR and I want to start running it.

Bin
Meteos DS. Jesus God, that's a stressful game to play.

13th Age. I was kind of surprised to find that I wasn't enjoying running this one as much as I expected. It's perfectly balanced and full of fantastic ideas which really smooth out some issues D&D has had since the beginning, but the game is fairly starkly split between combat and everything else and combat is guaranteed to be a dramatic close battle, with the heroes heroing heroically, and everything else is kind of loose and handwavey. My players love it, but I'm finding it too predictable. It's a real shame because I was dead excited about it, and it started off really well.

Brexit. How can it still be getting worse?

Play

So far all I've managed to play this month is Two Point Hospital, which is pretty much exactly what I wanted from an updated Theme Hospital. It's maybe a bit easy - certainly compared to its predecessor, I'm constantly flush with cash and haven't had problems meeting any of the level goals… yet. To be fair, I'm only three levels in, so I'm expecting it to kick my ass without warning any second now.

Want

Nothing, at the moment - playing the (admittedly excellent) demo for Valkyria Chronicles 4 on Switch has basically satisfied my curiosity for that, Destiny has effectively suffocated my interest in its new expansion (at least until reviews start coming in), and counting up the (27) games I've downloaded but not even started on PS4 has shamed me off pretty much everything else.

I really wanna play my Kenku Bard in 5e, especially since I discovered the College of Whispers Unearthed Arcana, which is 100% thematically perfect for the character. Getting people together to finish up this section of Monster of the Week is proving difficult, though, so moving onto anything else is a while out yet.

Bin

Destiny, for now.

Play
Still working my way through Overcooked 2, which is everything I wanted from more Overcooked.
I ventured into Destiny 2's Gambit trial thing for a single match last night, which was… fine? Dunno, think I'm in the same boat as aniki, that being one that's mostly over Destiny 2. Certainly the new expansion isn't much of a temptation, reviews or otherwise. Spoiler - click to showThe whole "killing the only character anyone actually liked/had an opinion of" thing reeks of desperation, to boot.

Want
I still keep hovering the preorder button on Hitman 2, but I'm resisting so far.
More board game time would be great, but everyone I know locally seems determined to be difficult to organise. Doesn't help that everyone seems to be moving house at the moment, on top of the usual nonsense.

Bin
Destiny 2, mostly, probably.

@aniki:

I really wanna play my Kenku Bard in 5e, especially since I discovered the College of Whispers Unearthed Arcana, which is 100% thematically perfect for the character.

There's a published version of College of Whispers in Xanathar's Guide to Everything. I'm not sure what changes there were, if any, but just in case you're playing with the sorts of people who don't like "unofficial" stuff. It's not hard to… find… online.

PLAY
Fire Pro Wrestling World - I cracked and ended up grabbing the US version on PSN, rather than waiting until the end of this month for the EU version. It's Fire Pro Wrestling! It's very, very good if you like that. If you don't, you'd probably look at some screenshots and wonder what the fuck all the fuss is about, because it looks like someone decided to do all the graphics in watercolours and everything looks a bit janky. But it's great, I love it and I'm very happy plugging away at it.

Hollow Knight - Started out a bit apprehensive about this, since I'd already played it on Steam and it didn't click. But I spent a bit of time on Friday playing the Switch version, got to the first boss and won, found the map and quill, and it's all starting to come together. I can see why some people might not like it, because it's very unhelpful and non-hand holdy in how you make progress. But it looks lovely and I think it's starting to get me in the way that Death's Gambit and Owlboy never did (the latter is sooooo dull). So that's nice.

WANT
BAFTA Season - Spider-Man, Red Dead 2, God of War, Hitman 2, all sorts of other things that are bound to be nominated… I'm already champing at the bit to get going with this year's Games Awards, so I can download all the things I've refused to buy.

A new job - Got various applications in the fire for some places, unlikely they'll come to anything but it'd be nice to have a fresh start. Fingers crossed something happens.

No more robots - I need to stop looking at third-party Transformers. Every time I do, I discover more I'd quite like. It's like a bottomless rabbit hole. Mustn't look. MUSTN'T LOOK.

BIN
Nothing much - Life's actually okay now. Yes, not seeing the kids all the time is a bit crap, but I'm much happier than I was and feel like I'm becoming my old pre-marriage self again. Whether that's good or not, I dunno. But it's nice to have freedom to think, to do, to be and not worry that I'm going to be told I'm rubbish or given the silent treatment.

Play

Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate - I played the demo more than I played some full on games, so I dread to think how long I'll play this. It's jam packed with content and the Monster Hunter formula is just so good that I don't think going back from World to this is an issue. The bigger issue is how it's basically a lot harder than World, people act like the QoL was too great and I'm telling you, lack of Slinger in MHGU isn't the reason why Rathalos is a lot harder than he is in World. (Given that's he's a colossal prick in World, this is saying something).

Persona 4 - Still taking my time, tbh it's starting to fall into the cycle of where I enjoy a game on my commutes and then think I don't wanna' only play this on my commutes, it kinda sucks. I think Monster Hunter 4 was the closest to a perfect 'commute' game but then I was like 'I wanna do more'.

Want

Octopath - seems like a solid RPG that I willenjoy, won't get it yet though.

Valkyria Chronicles 4 - barely different to the 1st game, but I hear the maps are way better and VC1 was a damn good game.

Bin

Nothing

Play

Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate - fantastically obtuse and inaccessible for new players but laser-targeted at me, basically, with all the stuff I loved about the older Monster Hunter games but with everything ramped up massively and an obscene amount of stuff packed in.

Overcooked 2 - it really is more of the same, very good but I think once it's done the gimmick will be thoroughly exhausted. It tries a few new things (the level where you're cooking salad on a hot air balloon, which then crashes into a sushi restaurant and you need to switch recipes seamlessly is fantastic) but doesn't really have the courage to commit to such grand ideas and ultimately falls back on fiddly kitchens with lots of moving platforms, much like the first game. The easier levels are probably the most fun, and it badly needs an Endless mode or some sort of way to improvise what you serve in order to mix things up a bit.

Had a bit of a PSVR resurgence lately. Thumper is ridiculously intense in VR but oddly I find I'm much better at it than I am in 2D - reduced input lag maybe or just greater focus? And Ultrawings is basically VR Pilotwings, and every bit as good as that sounds.

Want

Spider-Man looks really, really good and I'm very tempted, but I know Sony first-party games tend to drop quite rapidly in price (not to mention ultimately ending up on PS+). So I'll wait for a while.

aniki's sold me on Two Point Hospital. And I bought Hollow Knight in the recent sale so I'll be diving into that soon enough. But really there are just way, way too many good games coming out. Even on a single platform I'd be drowning in backlog.

Bin

Teetering on the edge of the bin is Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age which is a game I've come to respect rather than love; it's very impressive for its age but also often quite dull to actually play. I've started to think of it as a bit of a chore, something to get through rather than something to play, and with more engaging games on the go (hello Monster Hunter!) I'm wondering if I'll actually get any further in it.

Also Bin: my contracting agency, who went into administration last week leaving a string of unpaid invoices and losing me at least a month's worth of income. Incompetent bastards. I'm so angry.

Christ! That's awful!

That's so shit. Have you had word from the administrators, any chance they'll recoup any of it for you?

Bloody hell, Gar… and I thought things were bad round this way. Hope it all works out for you. :(

In 'not related, but kind of related but not really' news, I might be relocating to Sweden. Only if the maths add up though, since the tax rate there is scandalous and I have responsibilities that won't go away financially. But if it works, I'm off.

I’m not likely to see any of the money, I’m resigned to that now: any administration process is likely to rumble on for months or years and the agency won’t have had any actual assets anyway. All they did was push money from one place to another, skimming off the top: how can you fail to make money with a business model like that? I hope the directors are enjoying their new yachts, anyway.

More pressing is the fact I’m still working but technically have no contract at present, so no guarantee I’ll actually get paid for the work I’m doing now either! Trying to get this sorted out urgently as I’m sure you can imagine.

Sweden??

That sucks Gar. I hope it gets sorted out before long.

We were thinking of moving to Sweden. We decided not to after both our kids settled into good schools but I still sometimes wish we had taken that jump.

Thunderful, who owns RSG, is based in Gothenburg. I've been asked to consider relocation, as I'll be handling both RSG and Thunderful projects going forward. It's only the numbers (which I haven't worked out yet) that stop me from jumping on a plane tomorrow.

Going to start doing a few days over there every few weeks to get a feel for the place, see how I get on. At least, that's the plan.

Thunderful own Image & Form, don’t they? They’re awesome.

That sounds like a pretty awesome opportunity for you mart.

Thunderful own Image & Form, don’t they? They’re awesome.

Thunderful IS Image & Form, essentially. The head of I&F is also the joint head of Thunderful, along with the head of Zoink Games (Stick It To The Man, Flipping Death). Thunderful now technically 'owns' I&F, Zoink and RSG.

It could be an awesome opportunity, yes. I just hope the maths works out. Between loans and a credit card that won't just vanish if I leave, plus the loss of disability benefit if I leave the country, plus the child maintenance I've got to start paying my ex once she sorts herself out, there's a lot of financial baggage I'll be bringing with me. If the tax rate is as killer as it sounds, then it could all be a massive disaster waiting to happen.

Some benefits will transfer to Sweden. I don't know your situation but definitely check.

Mrs Bloodaxe says that DLA or PIP will transfer, but not the mobility part.

I'll have to look into that then. I think I'm on PIP now… most of that's mobility. I'll find out. Ta!

Additional Want: Spider-Man. It looks great, reviews are great, I love me some open-world superhero shenanigans, and I've already platinum'd all the inFamous games.

GIVE SPIDER-MAN, PLZ

Just playing: Dead Cells.
Have made quite a lot of progress over the last couple of nights after, what felt like, a long dry spell in terms of getting through the game. Think I now have most of the Metroid-style upgrade runes so can get to most places (I think). Runs now tend to last for the best part of an hour and usually see me fall in the castle level after fully exploring everything preceding it. I've beaten all three bosses at least once at this point.
Being able to get to all the places previously off limits has been good and the same goes for the confidence to take on enemies that were previously terrorising my headless corpse.
I've a sense that I'm heading towards the end of the game and also that I'll play much less once I've finished it but wouldn't be surprised if there's more to do once the game is complete.

I've a sense that I'm heading towards the end of the game and also that I'll play much less once I've finished it but wouldn't be surprised if there's more to do once the game is complete.

Narrator: There was. :D

Still playing loads of Overcooked 2, and really enjoying it, but the order in which you unlock additional chefs strikes me as odd; half the time, it's just some normal human person. Why didn't they have the humans all available from the start, and the weirder ones as unlocks?

Additional PLAY:

LocoRoco Remastered - I've owned LocoRoco multiple times. But playing the PS4 one, since my friend is also playing and we're talking over chat as we go, I realised last night that I've never actually gone beyond the second world. God knows why. I think it may be because the first yellow LocoRoco has a great song, then every other one after that is nowhere near as good. But it's a lovely game! So I'm glad I'm putting the effort in now.

I need to go back to Dead Cells. This one's fallen off the radar quite drastically. But I'd really like to get into Yakuza Zero… hmm.

Additional PLAY:

Scott Pilgrim Versus The World - I'm stupid and bought a second-hand PS3 today just so I could play this again. It's still great. That is all.

We announced the game I've been working on for the last few months. Hooray! Axiom Soccer! It's football but with quadcopters and projectiles.

Want - Nothing. Trying to go all September and October with no games purchases.

Play - been crazy now I am back at work. Maybe played an hour total all games. Need to get going on Monster Hunter Switch.

Bin - trying to raise £600 selling my games collection or some of it anyway. Hit 200 just by selling some Switch and sealed Vita games I'd never got round to. Some Saturn and Japanese Saturn stuff next then Dreamcast.

No reason for that figure. The loft room is too full of stuff and it has actually started to depress me.

What Saturn/Dreamcast stuff have you got..?

Loads. I will message you when on my laptop as will be easier. You in the facebook groups for dreamcast or saturn junkyards or on twitter? Might be eaiser via that.

I have a vita that I have never used. What's the options there?

I have a vita that I have never used. What's the options there?

Missing out on an awesome line-up of portable gaming, that's the main option. :)

You in the facebook groups for dreamcast or saturn junkyards or on twitter? Might be eaiser via that.

I've not been on Facebook for nearly ten years, and I'm not on Twitter much these days either, but fire me a link and I'll see how visible it is.

I have a vita that I have never used. What's the options there?

Are you looking for suggestions of things play?

Persona 3&4
Wipeout 2048 (IMO the best Wipeout)
TxK
Gravity Rush
Tearaway
Guacamele
Hotline Miami
Trails in the Sky
Rogue Legacy
The Binding of Issac

And portable replays of:
EDF 2017
Borderlands 2
Ratchet/Jak/Sly
Telltale games

The Borderlands game was terrible though. Performed awful and was just too ill fitted to the screen.

Unit 13 is my unhearlded gem of the Vita, Splelunky if you are into it too is a perfect fit for a handheld.

I played loads of Borderlands on Vita. Sure it was a graphical downgrade but it meant I could play more Borderlands so I was happy.

Additional Play: Cook! Serve! Delicious!! 2. Picked this up on a whim (it's half price on Steam this week) and it's excellent, an absolutely manic cookery simulator which makes Overcooked look quite sedate. It's the kind of game where you realise you haven't blinked for about ten minutes because you've been completely absorbed in serving complicated burgers and premium coffees to an endless stream of customers (while also cleaning the toilets, chucking out the rubbish, setting rat traps, filling the drinks machine and beating up robbers). It's apparently getting a console release but I'd really recommend the PC version simply because I couldn't get on with the joypad controls at all and quickly reverted to mouse and keyboard. A great little time-filler.

Play
Nintendo Switch!
So far I'm loving it. Zelda is wonderful, exactly what I wanted. Mario Kart is fun, more fun than I remember MK Wii being. Little Miss Bloodaxe thinks it's the best thing ever. I've barely started Mario Odyssey, seems like it could be fantastic too though.

Want
We have Splatoon 2 and Mario Vs Rabbids in our wishlists. It'll be a while before I need anything else though I feel.

Bin
All my other consoles. All my spare time. Probably the degree that I started on Monday.

Play
Have had rather a lull on playing anything for the past few months but then I took the boy to the Play Expo thing at the start of the holidays and his enthusiasm for all the old games has gotten me back into the swing of things & to that end I’ve fallen down the rabbit hole of modding my Wii and SNES mini to make that easier (both of which are trivially easy, if time consuming) the only problem now being that I’m rather paralysed for choice so have mostly stuck to Smash Bros as something everyone can play

Bin
probably about a stone in weight; middle age spread is starting to hit and having put my back out quite severely the other week need to work on things to make that of a less likely occurrence again given I have to up on my feet most of the day

I went to the physio for my back a few years ago and they taught me how to look after it. I recommend you do the same.

Play
Yakuza 0 - The funniest game since Tales From the Borderlands.

Lego Marvel Superheroes 2 - I'm playing this with my son. It's great, to be honest. It's possibly my favorite Lego game, up there with the Ninjago game, which is an absolute visual feast. There's just so much content!

Skyrim - I bought Skyrim again, on PS4 this time.

Want
The Kill Team: Rogue Trader box from Games Workshop. The miniatures look incredible. Not that I have any shortage of incredible miniatures to paint.

Bin
The media gleefully reporting that the company I work for is going under.

Bin
The media gleefully reporting that the company I work for is going under.

Who?

Debenhams.

Oh, wow. That's a British institution. Says a lot about the attitude to department stores, I guess, given the likes of BHS and Littlewoods aren't on the high street any more. Gutted for you. :(

John Lewis are in trouble too and they’re pretty much the last bastion of treating retail staff (and customers) as actual human beings. Retail is fucked.

I, for one, welcome our new Bezos overlord.

I can't say I'm not part of the problem. I only go into GAME/HMV/most shops to look at stuff and/or just get myself out of the house, then I go online and buy those things cheaper. :(

I'm trying to make an effort not to buy from Amazon at the very least - tax-dodging slavedrivers - but I'm basically just buying from smaller online outlets rather than brick-and-mortar stores, or cutting back on spending generally. About the only thing I buy from a physical shop with any regularity (other than food, which comes from a monolithic out-of-town retail park Tesco anyway) is a new pair of jeans every six months, but that's hardly going to help Next pay the rent.

I'm currently in the situation where I don't actually have to buy anything, because bumming around at my parents until I get this whole job/divorce situation sorted means I get fed and washed like a teenager (which is embarrassing as a 41-year-old grown-up, but it is what it is).

Games, I get digitally direct from the platform storefronts (PSN / eShop) which isn't cheaper, but I'm an idiot. Movies, I only appear to buy Marvel stuff physically and only get those from a supermarket if I happen to be in there… I don't buy digital movies, I have Show Box for that. Clothes, I already have plenty (though I am having to create a Rocky Horror outfit for when I go see it in March… I'll be the one dressed as Christopher Biggins). Transformers nonsense, I get from eBay or Chinese outlets. And then there's buying myself something nice to eat at Nando's or Five Guys every now and then.

Amazon can get to fuck, really.

Amazon are awful. They are pretty much single-handedly responsible for the state of the retail high street. Online shopping would have always taken a lot of market share away from high street shops, because they didn't have to pay the costs associated with having a physical store, but the way Amazon went about business, dodging tax in particular, gave them an unassailable advantage. Even if they start paying taxes now, and the government close the loopholes, the damage is done. The days of brick and mortar retail are numbered. On top of this, they treat their staff terribly. I struggle to think of another company who dehumanise their staff with such sadistic glee.

Debenhams doesn't actually seem to be going out of business quite yet, though. The latest reports were of them turning to some retail advisors/auditors, but they're a company who Debanhams have worked with for years, and frankly getting advice and new ideas doesn't seem like a terrible thing to do anyway. There is a mad austerity drive going on, which doesn't inspire huge confidence, but almost every store is individually profitable. I would expect that rather than actually going out of business, we'll just end up working for Mike Ashley, which is arguably worse. He already owns 30% of the company, and House of Fraser of course, and he's eyeing a merger. If he does buy us up and ever visits the store, I'd love to shout something Newcastle United related at him. "Buy a decent striker or you'll lose Rafa Benitez and get relegated, thus halving the value of those flipping Sports Direct banners all over St James' Park, you idiot!" or something along those lines.

A problem with Amazon is, their evil cackling to one side, they're actually really really good at what they do. It's just so easy. I've made a conscious effort not to buy books from them, because book shops are the best places on Earth. But for everything else, their search is fantastic, they sell anything you could ever need, and it's all available with next-day delivery. It's very annoying.

Play
Ni No Kuni 2 – this is bloody wonderful. It has all of the JRPG homeliness with none of the annoyances (so far). The battles are actually fun (if I'm putting the difficulty on hard, you know they're frustration-free). The plot zips along quickly. It doesn't have a hand-holdy intro. There are no improbably boobed giggly women. And it's beautiful. 60fps, pitch-perfect cartoon visuals.

But the best bit is how completely free of cynicism the whole thing is. Your mission is literally to eradicate war, and to create a peaceful world in which everyone lives happily ever after. And despite all the requisite JRPG tragedy in the first hour, the little boy main character never loses his drive to make this happen.

It's a lovely antidote to all the crap happening in real life.