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Yea man. F' those wolves. Wanted to throw that guy to em'. May or may not have presented an issue for the first game.

Played a few hours of The Shapeshifting Detective last night - cowboys can take a hike.

It's a similar style FMV mystery game to the team's last release, Dr Dekker, and like Dekker was on release it's interesting, well acted and a little lacking in the UI department. Dekker got cleaned up by patches pretty quickly and I expect the same will happen here - More of an explanation on how things work would go a long way.

Recommended, if you're into that sort of thing. Launched on PC, PS4, Xbox and Switch.

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"Critics are like eunuchs in a harem; they know how the Tatty 100 is done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves." - Brendan Behan

I try and keep nitrous-level VR chat out of the tab (honest ), but just as a generic tab of what I've been doing:

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Feeling woozy for the first time in ages playing Payday 2's final freebie hurrah: A White House raid (Not sure why performance was so bad, but I was in single digits at points, and that is notttt goooood). Also given it's not fully stealth-able we just went full loud in easy mode to case it, which is never as fun as co-op stealthing. (Could see the early sections being kinda fun in stealth, but I've no idea how you'd survive the final waves). Grand-standing from the press podium while holding off guys gate-crashing through glass doors and that was fun though

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Been messing around in the Elite 3.3 Beta. Tis a'ight. But most interested in their explosive take on mining coming in tonight's patch:

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Virtual Reality chatter on a movie site? Got endless amounts of it here. Reviews over here

I've done a couple of playthroughs of Shapeshifting Detective now - Different killer on each occasion.

I'd say immediately that it's a much better video game than their previous (and first) one, The Infectious Madness of Dr Dekker. Firstly, it doesn't have the often maddening text input system, preferring instead to have a conventional dialogue tree. Secondly, it whips along at a much greater pace - It'll take you a couple of hours to complete the case as opposed to 6 or 7 for Dekker.

As with Dekker, first impressions aren't the greatest - The game could really do with some sort of tutorial. I get that they want to throw you in there immediately but I thought the game was fatally bugged for the first 10 minutes until I figured out one very important part of the UI. The shapeshifting component isn't explained any better and I was already on chapter two before I even figured out when and where I could do it.

Even so, there's not a lot like this on the market and the game's writing, acting and production values (even though I suspect that the vast majority of the budget went on hiring the actors) more than make up for any shonkiness in the UI.

At £7.99 it's confidently recommended.

Man, that snuck up on me, I didn't realize it was out!

Once things settle down here and my mouth recovers a bit Courtney and I will definitely dive into it. We still haven't played Dekker, but meh. There's so much to play I figure we should play the best stuff first and everything else if and when we run out.

I think Dekker's a lot more manageable now than it was at launch. I've had a few chats with the developers and they said that the console launch of the game came along with more funding from their publisher to streamline the experience.

It's still a bit slow, however, and you can't say that about the new game.

Played through first couple of "missions" in RDRdeux this morning. I'm fine with it so far. There are the bits I can do without (stamina stats, riding for exposition, make sure you look at all this stuff) . The voice acting is there, but it always is in R* games. I don't wanna look up the voice actors, but if Dutch isn't Powers Booth... Played with the headphones in and really enjoyed the instrumentals.


I for one love looting the bodies. "Shut the hell up Dutch. We'll leave when I get done pulling these cigars and bathtub gin off these corpses."

The late Powers Booth?

Yeah, I totally got that vibe from him too. RDR2 is probably the most accomplished game I've ever played, but I think the first game is still a lot better.

After many hours I still hate the controls and the somnambulant way Morgan moves. The scripted shootouts take FAR too long and the pacing of the main story is glacial.

Still getting blown away by the detail in the world, though, and I'm collecting horses quicker than I racked up sports cars in GTA games. Coats too.

I reckon I'll still be plugging away with RDR2 in 6 months time, and still have exactly the same likes and dislikes. It's a hell of a game, but not one that's been made for me.

We did lose him, didn't we. Whoever it is...the way his voice cracks and trembles...great stuff.


My b.i.l. was here yesterday and it brings up one of my favorite stories that I may have told before.

As pertaining to RDRuno

"I walk into my brother's room and see that he has held up a train on a bridge. He then proceeds to fire upon the steam and steel carriage, which in turn causes the passengers to jump out of the train, off the bridge and plummet to their demise.

At that point I realized he was a sociopath."

The Long Dark is on sale on Steam - is this game worth buying for $7.50?

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Depends on what you like, but it's my favorite survival game. I've got a handful of posts in this thread about it and the stories I've experienced with it in beta, and got 136 hours total.

My recommendation is simply for open survival mode, though. Not as much a fan of the campaign, though I hear they addressed a lot of people's initial issues with it.

It's very pretty in a minimalist way, and they did a really good job of fleshing out all the survival mechanics. I really admire its simplicity.

I really enjoy Subnautica, and also The Forest, but eventually grew kind of tired of the zombie stuff in the latter game. I like the sort of quiet feel of the vids I have watched in The Long Dark. Bah, it's cheap, I am going to take a stab at it. It's getting chilly, so I will most likely start gaming regularly again soon.

Good stuff, hope you like it. If you decide to stream I'll watch!

Well, it's official, Microsoft has acquired both Obsidian and inXile.

https://www.ign.com/articles/2018/11...-entertainment

"Today at X018, Microsoft announced its intent to acquire Obsidian Entertainment and inXile Entertainment.

Today's announcement further bolsters the company's current stable of development teams to 13, following the announcements earlier this year that Microsoft will acquire Ninja Theory, Undead Labs, Compulsion Games, and Playground Games. Additionally, Microsoft indicated it was interested in acquiring even more new studios."

I had my first Revenant experience with a legendary grizzly that we'll call...hmmm....Scar. The biggest takeaway is to not rely on autosave in this game. I'm gonna start saving after every little event.



Why? I got attacked by a pack of wolves and lost the pelt. During the gunslinger missions, I traversed to the top of the map and killed my horse, by accidente . Enjoy that walk in thigh deep snow and the massive boost in stamina stats.


So yeah. Save and horse revitalizer.

I can't get Jeff Bridges image out of my head when I hear Dutch, I know it isn't him but it won't leave!
This game is awesome, the story is great, and when you think that you're done with the story and you've only got the niggly little missions and challenges to attain total completion you end up finding whole new mission threads!

Little tip that the game doesn't tell you, selecting different ammo for your weapons, on the wheel when selecting your weapon you'll see weapon details in the centre of the wheel, you'll see "< regular >", use the d-pad to select high velocity/express etc

There's a bit too much that the game doesn't tell you, I think.

Another one folks might have missed - Press and hold Options/Whatever thing the Xbox has instead of Start to bring up the map. Press and hold it again to get back to the game.

Definitely have over 20 hours in the game now. Still in chapter 2, but I have a golden Mauser.

Notching ammo is where I draw the line. I can't tell a difference (especially when 4/5 shots miss) and doing 200 rounds 1 bullet at a time

The learning curve on this option menu is steep for me. "How do I take the saddle off? Why do I have to turn autosave off? How do I change an outfit while away from camp? What's the diff between food, tonix , camp? Where do I give the camp food and why money?"
I've salted away a good bit of 2 days and still don't feel confident in the controls.

Gunfight mechanic seems to be artificially difficult in contrast to how ez deadeye makes things.

And it totally has me hooked in the jaw.

This is the thing. I don't know how much actual fun I'm having, but I'm playing the game for hours at a time.