Video Games and Gaming Technology (In A Positive Light)

I'm partial to the old sidescrollers myself. Two hidden gems that I enjoyed as a lad were Felix The Cat and Tiny Toon Adventures for the NES. I still remember how happy I was when I got the last Tiny Toon cartridge available at the store.
Felix:
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Tiny Toon Adventures
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Which Baldur's Gate 2 girl was your favorite and why?
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I liked Arie, she had the sweetest personality.
 
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I'm wondering if anyone knows how to get Age of Empires 2 to work on computers running the latest version of Windows.
Inb4 "buy the new release." I'd rather not, I still have the old cd-roms and don't want to spend more shekels. Can it be done?
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Huge sale on Steam now. Bunch of games ranging from 50-95% off. I bought The Orange Box, Myst 3 and 4, American Truck Simulator, Fallout 4, ESO, Hogwarts Legacy, Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, Sea of Thieves and Subnautica, for a total under $100.

I may still get a few more. I'm switching from console to PC so I really don't have and games currently except Age of Empires and Heroes of Might and Magic so would rather stock up while they're cheap.
 
I've been a big fan of the Assassin's Creed series. I've learned a bit about architecture and history, particularly the "Ezio" / Florence, Italy one which was probably the best. Also the assassins vs templars was a really engaging idea, parallel to the Dan Brown secret society stuff.

Also if you stay behind the current release, you can often pick up the titles for around $15. Of course, like everything else they have been going downhill. The assassins / templars stuff plays less of a role as they go on.

I was warned here that the latest ones suck. I've played a few hours of Valhalla, and I just don't care about the characters or the plot at all. It's kind of pretty, taking place in Norway and England. But I'm also sort of over the "explore this beautiful world" thing because I've already spent hours doing it on the last couple of games. I don't even really understand what I'm doing, it's something to do with avenging my father? I don't really care.

There was a scene in Valhalla where this obnoxious wife is openly complaining to me (a STRANGER, no less) that her husband no longer fornicates with her on the battlefield. There's a tiny side quest where you can "help" them by smashing some things in their house, to remind him of the excitement of warfare, and that doesn't work, so this trollop asks you to set their house on fire. Then the husband gets excited and gets it on and you have "succeeded." What total garbage!

I'm also playing as a Big Bad Brave Female character. I'm going to hold on a bit more until it switches later to playing as her brother, but so far this thing is total garbage, slightly better than Red Dead Redemption 2 but not much. I already know there is some gayness in Valhalla, so I am prepared for that, but honestly just the lack of engaging storyline and interest in the characters is far more offensive to me. Gayness is in everything these days, so whatever. (It's obviously out of place 2,000 years ago)

As I recall a lot of these Ubisoft games are programmed by Ukrainians and the degeneracy is really showing.
I believe the next one in the series is Japan, and I may still buy that as I'm enthralled with Japanese culture and society but maybe this one will offend me enough to quit completely.

On a positive note, Nintendo produces mostly quality, non-pozzed stuff, and I am looking forward to the Switch 2 console they will be releasing next year. I haven't had a Nintendo in well over a decade and dislike consoles but I like the idea of good family friendly Japanese content, and I think the Zelda games are probably fun for adults.
 
Started up Subnautica today to get a feel for it. Ended up playing for ten hours straight. I can't wait to start building a base, though I'm pretty sure that is gonna take some serious time. It's such a beautiful game. Not nearly as scary as I've heard it claimed (I did encounter my first Leviathan that gave me a slight spook, and there's definitely a general uneasiness exploring the deep).

I'm not sure yet what makes it so compelling and hard to put down. I haven't played anything quite like it, and it was clearly made with love. One of my favorite features is auto-swim. You just press a button and all you have to do is "steer" your character. This takes away from a lot of the potential grind of a game that demands huge amounts of exploration. I will have no issue sinking several hundred hours into the game.
 
cheapchampion said:
Started up Subnautica today to get a feel for it. Ended up playing for ten hours straight. I can't wait to start building a base, though I'm pretty sure that is gonna take some serious time. It's such a beautiful game. Not nearly as scary as I've heard it claimed (I did encounter my first Leviathan that gave me a slight spook, and there's definitely a general uneasiness exploring the deep).

I'm not sure yet what makes it so compelling and hard to put down. I haven't played anything quite like it, and it was clearly made with love. One of my favorite features is auto-swim. You just press a button and all you have to do is "steer" your character. This takes away from a lot of the potential grind of a game that demands huge amounts of exploration. I will have no issue sinking several hundred hours into the game.
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I would recommend looking into bugfix/optimization mods, because after a certain point you start seeing a lot of very serious game-breaking glitches, like expensive vehicles glitching through the terrain and being lost forever, along with whatever items you had stored in them. The game is great but it's laughable that they claim it's a complete product. It should frankly still be in early access.

Additionally, the game is quite old at this point so if you have a decent mid-range gaming PC, the game doesn't really look anywhere near as good as it could if it took advantage of your hardware. The biggest problems are that there is a lot of really unseemly pop-in, as the game has quite a low render distance by default and it cannot be changed in vanilla (it's only really a problem in certain biomes, but it's still a big deal imo), and that certain textures are extremely low quality. Both of these problems can be fixed with mods.
 
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Unending Powerhouse Match said:
I would recommend looking into bugfix/optimization mods, because after a certain point you start seeing a lot of very serious game-breaking glitches, like expensive vehicles glitching through the terrain and being lost forever, along with whatever items you had stored in them. The game is great but it's laughable that they claim it's a complete product. It should frankly still be in early access.

Additionally, the game is quite old at this point so if you have a decent mid-range gaming PC, the game doesn't really look anywhere near as good as it could if it took advantage of your hardware. The biggest problems are that there is a lot of really unseemly pop-in, as the game has quite a low render distance by default and it cannot be changed in vanilla (it's only really a problem in certain biomes, but it's still a big deal imo), and that certain textures are extremely low quality. Both of these problems can be fixed with mods.
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A midrange gaming PC is exactly what I'm playing on lol. And I've also never really used mods but definitely felt if there ever was a time to start, a game like this would be it. Appreciate you letting me know what to look out for.

Out of curiosity, have you looked into the sequel yet, which I guess is planned for next year? And if so, what are your thoughts on it?
 
cheapchampion said:
A midrange gaming PC is exactly what I'm playing on lol. And I've also never really used mods but definitely felt if there ever was a time to start, a game like this would be it. Appreciate you letting me know what to look out for.

Out of curiosity, have you looked into the sequel yet, which I guess is planned for next year? And if so, what are your thoughts on it?
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Wait, they announced Subnautica 3? Wow. I've played the first game a lot but never bothered to check out Below Zero and I'm not the type to be tuned in to videogame news. I thought we were talking about the first game.

Is Below Zero even finished, though? Feels like it was announced yesterday. Apparently it's been years.
 
A friend recently got me Crusader Kings 3 and we played for much of the day. Wow, I should have tried Grand Strategy games earlier. It's a mix of RPG (lots of decisions to be made which affects your route, sandbox storytelling etc) and strategy (many many different systems can be intertwined to achieve various goals, very replayable etc) that is better at both elements than most games. Would highly recommend it both solo or co-op, and I can see why people get hundreds of hours of playtime out of it. And planning to try Stellaris too when I want to switch it up.

Also have been enjoying Wuthering Waves lately. It's a gacha open-world RPG like Genshin Impact, but with much higher skill ceiling combat. Story is meh so far but it's been both relaxing gathering the many resources in the world and engaging fighting all the different sorts of monsters. Not gotten interested in a gacha game before so I can expect at some point the MTX system is going to limit my fun, but for now it's quite entertaining.
 
Unending Powerhouse Match said:
Wait, they announced Subnautica 3? Wow. I've played the first game a lot but never bothered to check out Below Zero and I'm not the type to be tuned in to videogame news. I thought we were talking about the first game.

Is Below Zero even finished, though? Feels like it was announced yesterday. Apparently it's been years.
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Yes, I'm playing 1. I believe there are 2 that are out including Below Zero with a full sequel coming out next year. I dunno. Loving 1 tho.
 
cheapchampion said:
Huge sale on Steam now. Bunch of games ranging from 50-95% off. I bought The Orange Box, Myst 3 and 4, American Truck Simulator, Fallout 4, ESO, Hogwarts Legacy, Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, Sea of Thieves and Subnautica, for a total under $100.

I may still get a few more. I'm switching from console to PC so I really don't have and games currently except Age of Empires and Heroes of Might and Magic so would rather stock up while they're cheap.
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Sold all my Team Fortress items recently. Looking back, counting all your kills isn't as cool as I thought it'd be. Got 110 Lula coins from it. So this is my cart.
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I also bought Recettear and STALKER before this. Recettear was all the rage on /v/ a few years back, and it's pretty sweet from what I've played. Very laid back. Don't recommend if you don't like animay.
 
Got my first shiny : D
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Second best pokémon game of them all, I remember playing on my dad's Windows phone 10 years ago, when the store for it had roms without any care put into it. Such a soulful game. The remaster was also terrific, very fond of the Deoxys questline, that was a great time.
 
Uncle Cr33pin said:
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I find safe milquetoast boomercon-level talking points like the ones in this video very obnoxious at this point. This stuff would have maybe been kind of based 10 years ago, but I think we've moved past "Emegerd guys, game devs hate gamers! Games are kinda gay now! The girls are ugly and the dudes aren't manly! Token minorities!". Yes, we know. Everyone knows at this point. Even your average normie gamer knows, actually. All of this is completely obvious to anyone with eyes. This is completely useless content, and it's arguably actually harmful.

It does not present the problem in a funny lighthearted way or anything. I mean, the guy clearly tries to make it funny but he just really sucks. Instead, it's just demoralizing to watch. "Here's a reminder that your favorite hobby sucks now, here's me whining about all the same things you whine about in your head and online". Wow, thanks, I really needed that.

I think people basically watch this type of stuff just to hear someone else state similar opinions to theirs. It's perfectly understandable to want that, actually, but it's really just going to make you feel worse.
 
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Unending Powerhouse Match said:
I find safe milquetoast boomercon-level talking points like the ones in this video very obnoxious at this point. This stuff would have maybe been kind of based 10 years ago, but I think we've moved past "Emegerd guys, game devs hate gamers! Games are kinda gay now! The girls are ugly and the dudes aren't manly! Token minorities!". Yes, we know. Everyone knows at this point. Even your average normie gamer knows, actually. All of this is completely obvious to anyone with eyes. This is completely useless content, and it's arguably actually harmful.

It does not present the problem in a funny lighthearted way or anything. I mean, the guy clearly tries to make it funny but he just really sucks. Instead, it's just demoralizing to watch. "Here's a reminder that your favorite hobby sucks now, here's me whining about all the same things you whine about in your head and online". Wow, thanks, I really needed that.

I think people basically watch this type of stuff just to hear someone else state similar opinions to theirs. It's perfectly understandable to want that, actually, but it's really just going to make you feel worse.
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I kinda agree. YT is full of adult male personages in rooms full of toys and Star Wars posters crying and whining "they're making everything gay"

I'm not disparaging people who enjoy video games. I do too. But if you are super invested in them and want to see "masculine" video games, then start a development company and make some games. Crying about it is just as gay.
 
Unending Powerhouse Match said:
I find safe milquetoast boomercon-level talking points like the ones in this video very obnoxious at this point. This stuff would have maybe been kind of based 10 years ago, but I think we've moved past "Emegerd guys, game devs hate gamers! Games are kinda gay now! The girls are ugly and the dudes aren't manly! Token minorities!". Yes, we know. Everyone knows at this point. Even your average normie gamer knows, actually. All of this is completely obvious to anyone with eyes. This is completely useless content, and it's arguably actually harmful.

It does not present the problem in a funny lighthearted way or anything. I mean, the guy clearly tries to make it funny but he just really sucks. Instead, it's just demoralizing to watch. "Here's a reminder that your favorite hobby sucks now, here's me whining about all the same things you whine about in your head and online". Wow, thanks, I really needed that.

I think people basically watch this type of stuff just to hear someone else state similar opinions to theirs. It's perfectly understandable to want that, actually, but it's really just going to make you feel worse.
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I don't think the YouTube video I posted equals "crying about it" and is "pointless because it's things we thinkin our heads." If that were the case there would be no reason for this forum we could just go on "thinking in our heads" with no need for discussion. I think the video does a good job of showing where we've been and where we are now, while also showing a bit of how we got there. If you think that's whining and crying I don't know what to tell you. You whined and cried for 3 paragraphs about the video and that's gayer'n anything in that video.

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