PWB July: It's The End Of The World As We Know It

Month 73 of lockdown. Outside is a distant memory. No-one over the age of 70 in the UK is left alive. Everyone is living off giant boxes of Frazzles delivered to their door by Amazon workers in hazmat suits. The pigeons have taken over. Somehow the Conservatives are still ten points ahead in the polls.

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Jedi: Fallen Over which I've spoken about at length elsewhere so I won't repeat myself, however I will say that the more I play it, the more generic and less Star Wars-y it seems. You could swap out lead character Jedi Sheeran for any generic dude with a sword and you'd have pretty much the same game. That doesn't mean I'm not enjoying it, it is straightforward fun and there's always something satisfying about getting your head around a Dark Souls-type environment with lots of shortcuts, but it's not a classic.

The Elder Scrolls Online - dipping into this on a nightly basis, it's strange to have an MMO that's ideally suited to short bursts of play but half an hour, a couple of quests and a spot of crafting quite suits this one.

Lego Harry Potter Years 1-4 - the boy and I tried to play Lego Star Wars but it's dated quite badly, it's clunky to play and generally not that interesting any more. I guess it was their first attempt at this sort of thing. We decided to stick in Harry Potter instead which is only a couple of years newer and it's a million times better. Really clever level design, amazing attention to detail and - hurrah! - a split-screen option which makes all the difference when you're playing two-player. It's great fun.

Minecraft Dungeons - completed this, thought "well, that's that then" but for some reason we carried on playing it and it continues to get better second time through. It becomes much more about levelling your character and gaining ridiculous upgrades which is actually the most fun part. The first DLC's out today I believe and we're quite tempted…

Want

More info on the PS5 and Xbox Series X. I want to make a choice dammit!

This year's going to be more about clearing the backlog I think rather than buying new stuff - on the basis anything decent will just get a next-gen version anyway. I'll be holding off on Cyberpunk 2077 for that exact reason and I'm in no hurry to play the PS4 version of The Last of Us 2 either, though I'll definitely get round to both of them eventually.

Hitman 3 though, ooooh.

Bin

When people invented sci-fi dystopias, I think they always assumed the fascist governments would be evil but ruthlessly efficient. Did anyone ever predict that the fascists would also be blithering incompetents? Honestly at this stage I don't think there's any number of avoidable deaths that would prevent the morons in this country voting Tory.

When people invented sci-fi dystopias, I think they always assumed the fascist governments would be evil but ruthlessly efficient. Did anyone ever predict that the fascists would also be blithering incompetents? Honestly at this stage I don't think there's any number of avoidable deaths that would prevent the morons in this country voting Tory.

There's a grim poetry to today's story, about the US buying up the world's supply of a covid treatment drug from a big pharma called Gilead.

Play
Red Dead 2 – I struggled through this when it first came out, loving bits but hating pretty much all of the mechanics. It was slow, repetitive and finicky. But I had a hankering to inhabit the world again – surely one of the best ever – so I reinstalled.

I have to say, taking things slower this time, the game isn't annoying me anywhere near as much. I've realised that first time around I missed an insane amount of content; the most interesting stuff in the game doesn't even track on the map as a quest. There are so many little stories that you have to uncover for yourself, your only reward the joy of the story itself.

I'm going to stop playing before the boat, keep the main quest in permanent limbo as I explore every nook and cranny of the world.

Ratchet and Clank PS4 – the PS5 reveal made me want more Ratchet and Clank, so I'm racing through this again. They're such brilliant, fun, outrageously pretty games.

FF14, still Just got to Rak'tika woods. LA HEEE.

Month 50 of Independence and the sun is shining. I've been called up to do my month of service on Hadrian's Wall. I'm looking forward to seeing the new Tesla towers.

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Animal Crossing. But not much. I think I might be done.

Thumper. This game is fantastic, and every level so far is better than the one before. At some point my reflexes will probably give out but so far I'm doing ok.

Coriolis. Another tabletop RPG by Fria Ligan. This one is Arabian Nights in space. My players have made a small detective agency.

Want
A break. We are supposed to be going to France in a couple weeks. As long as England doesn't explode we should be ok to go. I am somewhat worried about the return though.

Bin
Basically everything but can I start with lazy teen-agers?

Thumper. This game is fantastic, and every level so far is better than the one before. At some point my reflexes will probably give out but so far I'm doing ok.

Yep, I love this. It's got a really unique atmosphere too.

Oddly I found I was much better at it in VR, although the game itself doesn't change in any way. Lower input latency perhaps? Or just a greater level of immersion sharpening up my old man reflexes. Either way I'd recommend it as the best way to play it, if you have the opportunity.

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Still chipping away at Animal Crossing, but like Bri I think I might be ready to put this one to bed for a while. 450 hours seems like pretty good value for money, though I'll probably keep ticking along until the swimming update lands, at least.

I'm working my way, gradually, through Skies of Arcadia via a PC emulator, which has a fast-forward option that makes the over-aggressive random battle rate somewhat more palatable. I'm just about to head back to Nasrad after leaving Daccat's Island, so maybe halfway through disc one?

Want

A day off. I can't remember the last time I had nothing to do.

Bin

Always feeling tired. Blockchain APIs, which seem to be universally dreadful.

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Destiny 2 - Still kicking through this. It's a lot of fun and the upcoming Content Vaulting (they're removing Io, Titan, Mercury, Mars, the Leviathan raid, and all PvE activities for those destinations in September) and bringing back a tarted up version of the Cosmodrome, Vault of Glass and a new planet/expansion in Europa and the Deep Stone Crypt.

Hardspace Shipbreaker - It's okay, right up until the moment you realise you can use explosive decompression to your advantage to fracture a spaceship. Then it becomes brilliant.

Monster Train - Deckbuilder Roguelike. It's very good.

Want
A new graphics card. The 970 just ain't cutting the mustartd anymore.

Bin
Where the fuck do you start.

Somehow the Conservatives are still ten points ahead in the polls.

Turns out when you burn your party down, no matter how FoReNsIc the new guy is, he's still king of the ashes.

Lego Harry Potter Years 1-4 - the boy and I tried to play Lego Star Wars but it's dated quite badly, it's clunky to play and generally not that interesting any more. I guess it was their first attempt at this sort of thing. We decided to stick in Harry Potter instead which is only a couple of years newer and it's a million times better. Really clever level design, amazing attention to detail and - hurrah! - a split-screen option which makes all the difference when you're playing two-player. It's great fun.

Careful with this one, its broken, we're stuck on 99%, we think its a Student in Peril in Hagrid garden that did the "dah-daaah" fanfare but didn't tick the counter over so we're stuck in 90-something percent and unable to finish it.

As for me

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FFXIV - of course, looks like MPH has sped past me as I'm still around 20 quests away from the end of the base Stormblood expansion. I've also started a new character, which I only play on Saturday evening as I'm joining in with a couple of streamers I was watching.

FFIX - Got to do a whole bunch of grinding now, about to enter Ipsens Castle but everyone (well, apart from Zidane) has got loads of abilities to learn

Persona 5 Royal - Got this for my birthday, beat the first Palace but not been on it in a week because…

Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin - picked this (and DSIII) up on sale on Steam last week as we're trying to see just what this current PC will run. I have done more than I did on my first attempt of the game back on the 360, the giant has been taken down and I beat The Pursuer today.

Want

I've got a £30 Amazon gift card but not sure what to do with it, got loads of books already, likewise games, and I don't buy movies any more as I barely ever watch anything from my watchlist on Prime and Netflix!

Bin

Where do we start? The kids not sleeping? That our bathroom isn't fit for purpose and the housing association are being dicks about it?

Lego Harry Potter Years 1-4 - the boy and I tried to play Lego Star Wars but it's dated quite badly, it's clunky to play and generally not that interesting any more. I guess it was their first attempt at this sort of thing. We decided to stick in Harry Potter instead which is only a couple of years newer and it's a million times better. Really clever level design, amazing attention to detail and - hurrah! - a split-screen option which makes all the difference when you're playing two-player. It's great fun.

Careful with this one, its broken, we're stuck on 99%, we think its a Student in Peril in Hagrid garden that did the "dah-daaah" fanfare but didn't tick the counter over so we're stuck in 90-something percent and unable to finish it.

Thank you for the heads-up: I just got the 1-7 collection for PS4, as my partner and I wanted something to enjoy after not particularly liking the LEGO Ninjago movie game. Between that, my experience with the DC Villains game and now you saying this, TT is basically the Bethesda of kids' game development. Every single game is broken, and they don't seem to be that bothered.

Yep it was the Years 1-7 collection we had this issue with, she had a seperate one back on the PS3 version, it basically locks you out of the doing the very last level of 1-4.

They're not bothered in the slightest, we googled this particular bug and it's there in the PS3 version, they've never fixed any of their games.

What was your experience of DC Supervillains? We finished that one 100% but it was so, so frustrating, lots of niggly things and it seemed to have rolled back from what they'd done on Avengers.

Lego Harry Potter does seem a little buggy. We managed to trigger some bug yesterday whereby we were supposed to take turns in passing a rotating bookcase, but the game thought one of us had gone past when they hadn't and it just broke the whole thing. Had to drop out of the level and restart it, luckily only lost about ten minutes progress.

I'm assuming the 99% bug is inconsistent at least because otherwise no-one would have the Platinum trophy. We'll plug on, as bugs aside, it's a great game. Who knows if we will even get that far.

We were having a similar issue with Lego Incredibles 2.

What was your experience of DC Supervillains? We finished that one 100% but it was so, so frustrating, lots of niggly things and it seemed to have rolled back from what they'd done on Avengers.

This, basically. Avengers was great and super solid, as was Batman 1&2. 3 was quite janky, Marvel Super Heroes 2 was really janky and the DC was all over the shop. So many instances of things not triggering, the camera being all over the place (Ninjago suffers from this terribly), crashes during loading, etc. I swear, they need to pull everything apart with that engine and start over. Instead, it's reuse, recycle, rebreak. Sigh.

Actually I had a progress breaking bug in Lego Dimensions too.

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Half Life Alyx: I'm creeping through this and trying to savour it. It's more… unpleasant (?) than scary so far. Like, a sort of perpetual grimness rather than schlocky jump scares. Visually it's astonishingly pretty (well, gruesomely so) and I've often found myself staring intently at brilliantly rendered peeling wallpaper or drawing penises on dustbins and throwing them around. Which is good, because that's how I spend a majority of my time anyway IRL. It's one of the few VR games where I have genuinely felt transported somewhere else for a moment, partially because the controls are so fluid and the roomscale works so well. I was doing a "puzzle" in it last night (not really a puzzle, more of a thing that required dexterity) and I had a very weird disconnect where I felt I was there, because it was challenging me to move and manipulate objects with both hands (while moving my body) in an incredibly naturalistic way. It's very good with doors too - they are the dooriest doors in videogame history. The only place it perhaps suffers is with the more videogame-like bits. It clearly signposts VIDEOGAME STYLE SECTION APPROACHING, both musically, narratively and in that Valve way that people wanked themselves furiously over in 15 years ago, but which almost seems a little old-fashioned now. It's not really an issue, it's just a little odd as I find myself a lot more engaged with drawing cock buckets than shotgunning headcrabs.

Valorant: I have to accept I'm too old to ever be brilliant at this, but the occasional MVP and good round makes up for the remorseless poor performances. It really is a great game - nuanced, elegant, tactical and brutal in equal measure.

League of Legends: Still. My son is trying to teach me League. I've got quite into watching the LCS (European League as an e-sport) and I do enjoy the game (and wish I could be better at it). But again, I'm not sure I'll ever have the time to sink into it to be any more than deeply average at it.

Titanfall 2: recently picked this up in a sale on Steam to play through and fucking hell, it really is one of the best FPS'es ever isn't it? The traversal is just…. chef's kiss. It looks beautiful, and I like the subtle lines through to the Apex universe in terms of tech and lore.

Towerfall: is there any multiplayer game better than Towerfall? No. No, I don't think there is.

Stick Fighting: Had a surprising amount of fun with this. It's janky as all fuck, but the community is hilarious and it's a great way to unwind.

NFS Hot Pursuit: We had a phase of playing this and it was fucking brilliant. Remember Criterion doing shit like this? Pepperidge farm remembers… however… we decided it was such a pain with the archaic netcode that we'd try a more modern NFS and…

Bin
… NFS Rivals is shit. Shit handling, terrible performance (even with the 60fps hack) and just…. generally shite. Remember Blur? Remember Split/Second? Remember NFS Hot Pursuit and Burnout Paradise? Apart from Forza Horizon when did driving games get shit? (and I'm aware Rivals is also 10 years old or something)

Nidhogg 2 - got this to play with one of my kids on PC. Jesus. Has to be the worst art in any game, ever. Also, I'm not sure it's very good.

Jackbox Party Packs - we've been having a certain amount of fun with these, but I find it baffling they've cornered the market the way they have. The presentation is grating, the games occasionally slow and badly implemented and the fact you need to load each pack individually to play the games in it is infuriating. But there seems to be no other companies even trying to compete in the space? I mean it's Kahoot with about 20 minutes of basic programming over the top, how hard can it be.

Want
As Gar has said…. an informed electorate? How many more people do the fucking Tories have to kill before they drop in the polls. And sorry, but everyone kicking Corbyn pre-election and saying he posed a clear and present risk to the UK and you were going to abstain or vote for the Lib Dems well fuck them as well. Even if Corbyn had single-handedly killed every Jewish person in the UK and invited the IRA into the cabinet the Tories would still have more blood on their hands. But I'm sure it's fine and Starmer will FORENSIC so hard everything will be OK.

Actually I had a progress breaking bug in Lego Dimensions too.

I lost over 60hrs of Dimensions play because the save corrupted when they patched the game. Sigh.

FF14, still Just got to Rak'tika woods. LA HEEE.

I love that song XD. (As does everyone)

Spoiler - click to showthought on Emett-selch?

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Xenoblade: Definitive Edition - My third time beating this, on as many consoles, what a game. Would be a bin but I have a little more to do, not to mention the Switch exclusive new scenario set after the events of the game. The last few hours of this game are anime as fuck, very fun, and look great. I found my 3DS version of this and gave it a spin, from the 3DS to the Switch version is quite a glow up. :D

There's a massive unique monster, a red furred Gorilla on Bionis' Leg that if it spawns you can see it from the travelpoint guidepost. On the 3DS you can not see it til' you're almost in melee range. And despite it looking jank, it still plays really well. Xenoblade is Xenoblade I guess. Also not to spoil things, but it's easy to forget how sci fi this series is (And I mean stuff like Xenogears too).

Trails in the Sky: Second Chapter - so far, so Trails. Down to the world map and characters which are literally identical, but that's consistency I guess. After THAT ending to the first game how could I not dive straight into this. Anyway, characters are as great as ever. My favourite being the older bracer lady who likes to get pissed and attack people with whips, can we have more people who like to get wankered without disgracing themselves or anyone in our RPG parties please in future? ty.

Valhalla - This is a pretty funny game, and I wanna' point out it's sorta' set in a dystopian setting? Jill is actually pretty upbeat for someone who works in a soon to be closed bar in a somewhat rundown City.

Want

I wanna' know why I can't play Xenogears on my fucking PSP anymore, no matter what PS3 account I use to de/activate the thing (It's a US game). I am extremely in the mood for this now.

I would like them to stop releasing 100hr RPGs for a bit please. (he says, with…6 mega long Trails games ahead of him..)

Ring Fit Adventure because if I can't go gym, the gym can come to me, also I wanna' try out Arms on Switch because Smash Ultimate just got a character from it.

Bin

The large portion of our lives we've all lost to this Covid shit, all of 2020, most likely most of 2021. It's really sad seeing what it's done to the FGC on my Twitter timeline in particular (Fighting Game Community). A genre that doesn't lend well to online play, even so we are trying to keep this alive with online tournmanets with cash prizes but it's such a fucking shitshow, so far we've had people calling lagtests on people to get them DQ'ed and all sorts of scumbaggery. But what's the alternative? Let the spirit die?

People can't even meet their friends and play some good sets, I can't even think of looking to join a Granblue Versus community in my area until this is over.

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Towerfall: is there any multiplayer game better than Towerfall? No. No, I don't think there is.

There is not. The Ouya's one good game.

Towerfall genuinely is an absolute all-time classic. I can't think of any better multiplayer game. It's a regular fixture in our house.

wow the disrespect for mashed on ps2

Play: Just bloody CoD all the time. I'm at the place finally where I've bought a battle pass, will grind that out and then stop playing the multiplayer portion of the game (I hope) and just drop in for the odd round of Warzone. I've far exceeded my money's worth on this game which is usually the benchmark for me to stop these never ending service games. However, they added something called Intel to Warzone which has given a new focus for our group. The weekly session now revolves around this scavenger hunt and anything else (kills, wins) is just a hilarious bonus. Essentially you get some info before starting the match from a menu, find the location, press square on it (assuming you're in the circle) and then next match you've got another of these to do somewhere else, other players are also going for them so… Ru-roh etc. Dumb but fun

Also Control was/is on sale so bought that. It'd sort of been on my radar but in that way where I go 'I'll probably look at that when it's on sale' and here we are, I kind of wish I'd read more about it at the time but it's nice to come to it fairly fresh. I'd genuinely forgotten how much I loved Alan Wake and I'm sort of bowled over by this game. I thought I was going to get through a lot of stuff I'd been meaning to play during lockdown and then… CoD happened but this feels like it's taking me out the other side of the Warzone obsession. I love pretty much everything about it – looks great, sounds scary, combat feels fun. The story may well turn out to be bobbins but it has the right level of style and intrigue at the moment to keep me going.

Want At this point probably a PC because I've enjoyed hanging out with my PC pals via Warzone and the associated discord chat/messaging. If there was a larger well of cross platform games I'd be happy.

Bin Star Wars Battlefront 2. What even is it? I played a few games but I couldn't really get into whatever was supposed to be happening. I played the first one quite a bit and, as far as I remember, it was a pretty sleight package but also relatively straightforward for anyone familiar with online shooters. I just bounced straight off this. Maybe… Maybe I should have gone through the single player portion but didn't fancy it.

Mashed on Xbox is where it's at.

Also Chu Chu Rocket on the Dreamcast.

Are you all forgetting Power Stone 2? How Capcom have ignored that despite the popularity of Smash Bros I don't know!

Bomberman on the SNES says hi.

Are you all forgetting Power Stone 2?

I'm trying my best.

Bomberman Saturn is the only one which comes close to Towerfall.

You say that as though anyone bought a Saturn.

I bought a Saturn!

Second hand, at least 10 years after Sega discontinued the thing, but still! I even enjoyed (one of) the games I played on it! (It wasn't Bomberman.)

I definitely had one, it was a modded one we had while I worked for Gamesmaster (the TV show). I honestly don't remember a single game I owned for it, bar Guardian Heroes.

There you go, there's a great multiplayer game.

My brother had one at the time, I used to play Sega Rally on it all the time, until he got rid and bought a PlayStation, I bought myself one around the same time I bought my Dreamcast, I was using my Education Maintenence Allowance to buy games rather than art materials

I appear the be the only person who remembers Kung Fu Chaos

I appear the be the only person who remembers Kung Fu Chaos

I had it. One of the few xbox games I ever owned. Always seemed to flatshare with an xbox owner and none of them had ever heard of it. Got turned onto it via a demo disk that I think came with the first xbox I encountered. It came into our flat because I shared with the uni paper editor and, as a competition prize, he got 2 consoles; one as a prize, one for the office. Needless to say the 2nd box was in the office for all of 10 minutes and we spent a lot of time playing Halo and Timesplitters 2.
Tended to only play the kung fu chaos jumping game though… I know there were other games but that one with the spinning pole you had to jump over is the only thing I remember.

@feltmonkey

The bit with the torch. I don't know if I can go on felt.

Finally beat 'Future Connected', the new Switch exclusive chapter of Xenoblade. People estimated it takes about 10 hours and I did indeed enter the last fight at 9:30 so I'd say it's a solid length for what it is.

Besides the ending which I'll get to in a sec, I thought this was annoyingly well done to the point that I couldn't bring myself to disrespect the content and not do it and so I was pulled back in to Xenoblade yet again. But ultimately, besides the closure on Melia's story it's nothing Wii/3DS (>_>) owners are sorely missing out on. I wouldn't have bought it as DLC on the Wii (or 3DS :^) but I don't think it's cheaply done, it's actually mostly original content, the landmass, story and even two of the party are all completely new characters.

It actually ends on a bit of whimper, so much so that I barely realised it had actually ended somehow. I know it's a little extra, but I was expecting a bit more, just felt empty tbh. Still, maybe it's just me but if you got this far on this massive game (and still not as long as Persona 5 lol) then you might as well do this right…………….?

Also, is Persona 5 The Royal eligible for my personal nomination for GOTY so far? Or are you all going to say 'well, you played the new content you tell us'?

Anyway, final word is I am finally done with Xenoblade Chronicles as a whole. I really enjoyed it, but I'm never going to play it again. :)

Anyway, final word is I am finally done with Xenoblade Chronicles as a whole. I really enjoyed it, but I'm never going to play it again. :)

Don't lie to yourself.

I wanna' replay Xenoblade 2 to compare it :( . (and finally try the apparently good dlc)

Also trying to get to grips with Xenogears on a phone…

@feltmonkey

The bit with the torch. I don't know if I can go on felt.

Oh god. I haven't even got there yet. I keep finding excuses to play Shenmue 3 instead.

How mad is it that I have a new Half Life game and Shenmue 3 to choose between? I need to go back and finish The Last Guardian too.

Another play for me at the moment is, somehow, Arknights, a Chinese-made, anime-styled, post-apocalyptic-themed, free-to-play gachapon tower defence game.

It is barely on the understandable side of overwhelming in the amount of crap it throws at you without explanation. There are dozens of characters with various rarities (two- to six-star) across eight classes (which are further subdivided by whether they can attack at range or do AoE damage), each with different upgrade paths and special abilities; seven currencies (plus real money) obtained in different ways just for buying items, and an additional two in-universe currencies (that's a total of ten) used to pay for character and skill upgrades and recruiting new characters (almost all of whom are some kind of catgirl in tactical gear).

There are dozens of items and consumables with names like "Ester", "Tactical Battle Record" and "RMA70-12" which can be combined, broken down and spent on yet more upgrades. There's an entire Fallout Shelter-style base-building subgame which requires staff management, supply chains, and a furniture crafting system. There are eleven types of combat quest, depending whether you want to follow the (impenetrable) story, farm raw materials or earn currencies.

The actual gameplay itself is pretty straightforward; melee units go on the ground, ranged units have to be stood on platforms; each unit has a certain deploy cost, and you regenerate deployment points over time and when you defeat enemies. If you complete a level with three stars you unlock an "auto-deploy" option which saves and replays your winning layout, letting you repeat levels for farming much faster.

I cannot remember what put me onto this thing, but I've been playing it pretty continuously for about a week. So far I've not needed to put any real money into it, as it's quite generous in what it gives you for the core "get new units, upgrade 'em" loop, but I feel like if I get much further into the basebuilding (or start promoting my units) I'll start running into difficulties getting my hands on the rarer items.

Though historically I've tended to delete a game when it gets to that point rather than breaking out the debit card.

PLAY
Sea of Thieves - Becoming increasingly obsessed with this, since I've started sailing with my partner as well. Either I'm on the Xbox with my three work crewmates sailing a galleon, or I'm in a sloop with Debs where she's on the Xbox and I'm playing on PC. I hate PCs to play on but, man, that game is smooth as butter and twice as pretty on it. I'm currently rattling through commendations and working my way to Pirate Legend, but sailing as a Reaper's Bones makes me laugh purely because all the other ships avoid us. Flag be scary, yo (mainly because everyone can see us on the map).
Pokémon Cafe Mix - Over halfway through this. It gets tricky with all the different mechanics. Might not be playing much longer.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons - Still ruralising my housing area. Loving the underwater stuff. But hey, I can see why folks might get bored.

WANT
Tony Hawk - Yeah, I want the new Tony Hawk rehash. Looks ace. We'll see.
Xbox? - I don't want or need a new console for a very long time. But when the time comes, I think I've settled on Xbox over PlayStation. Mentally, anyway. That's more because of Sea of Thieves over anything else though. I'm still not getting one for a long, long time.

BIN
Spending money on stupid stuff - Finally got all the Dropmix cards, so I'm giving up on spending money on things I don't neHAHAHAHAHAHAH okay, maybe not.

I like the art for Arknights but I dunno' if I'd play the game itself. Also, Granblue Fantasy is busy enough at it is, not even bothering to try the new FOTM Yoko Taro Gacha 'SINoALICE' either

What kind of game is that one? I'm tempted to try, although I'll probably hate it.

No idea, from what I saw looked like a side on RPG with co-op and all that jazz

@feltmonkey

The bit with the torch. I don't know if I can go on felt.

Oh god. I haven't even got there yet. I keep finding excuses to play Shenmue 3 instead.

How mad is it that I have a new Half Life game and Shenmue 3 to choose between? I need to go back and finish The Last Guardian too.

I went on. I don't like it. I DON'T LIKE IT.

Just run through it. Either you'll get through and it will be fine or you will die horrendously and you can change your trousers and know that the next time won't be so bad.

They are wise to that. There is a bit of running through bits, but if you go headlong quite often even worse things happen :(

Just run through it. Either you'll get through and it will be fine or you will die horrendously and you can change your trousers and know that the next time won't be so bad.

Videogame tactics don't seem to work here, unfortunately. It's not the fear of dying in the game that gets you, it's the fact that all your senses are telling you that you are right there, in that terrifying place, and that horrifying situation. It's genuinely quite difficult to make yourself run through.

You know how scary a normal scary game on a screen is? In VR it's exponentially worse. I find Superhot frightening in VR because it feels like those huge red men are trying to kill me. I think we will eventually have situations where people are having heart attacks or fainting because of stuff that happens to them in a VR game.

Of course, it might just be that I'm a complete wuss.

I remember a similar thing when moving from 3rd person horror games to first person.

VR definitely activates some long-buried caveman response. Even though you know you're watching some harmless pixels through your sweaty helmet, you feel NPCs when they're stood next to you. It's like catching a particularly lifelike mannequin out of the corner of your eye. Even though you know it's fake, your brain goes through the motions.

This, exactly this, in the Indiana Jones level of Astro Bot. A game designed for kids. And yet I was convinced that giant saw blade coming straight for my head was going to kill me. Terrifying.

VR definitely activates some long-buried caveman response. Even though you know you're watching some harmless pixels through your sweaty helmet, you feel NPCs when they're stood next to you. It's like catching a particularly lifelike mannequin out of the corner of your eye. Even though you know it's fake, your brain goes through the motions.

Exactly. I was playing a Rally driving game, speeding along the tracks with the co-driver reading out how sharp all the corners were, and I happened to glance over to the passenger seat and the fucking guy was SITTING RIGHT THERE. I let out a little yelp and drove off a cliff.