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I haven't played 2, but I played the crap out of 1! Great game, for sure.

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I really liked the first game but think 2 beats it in all round, particularly in the writing.

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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 am perhaps...eight hours in on Odyssey. So far, this game is fantastic. The characterizations are better than I expected, but still not on a level with Witcher 3. As far as story is concerned, Witcher 3 is going to be tough to beat. It's clear these developers liked Witcher 3, as they "adopted" many of the systems wholesale from CD Project Red's masterpiece.

Meanwhile, a game that uses these systems while also injecting all the sneaky stealth elements of the best AC titles is just loads of fun. The game world itself is pretty much ridiculous. From what i can tell, it's absolutely massive. The natural lighting engine is spectacular, and I have already had several moments where I just stop and take it all in. Waves crash on the beach, wildlife wander the forests, and townspeople go about their daily lives doing a variety of tasks. I understand that this game goes on for perhaps a bit too long, and that the tasks eventually become a bit repetitive, but so far, things have been varied and fun. Did I mention the game looks amazing?





The setting is right up my alley, which has me playing along in an all-out war between Athens and Sparta. I am just getting into the conquest stuff, but what I have done so far seems fun. Oh, that reminds me...

Exploration Mode: Why, oh why, haven't games been doing this the whole time? All the people that make RPG's need to steal this mechanic right now. No more quest markers. You actually have to get directions from people, and then go explore areas to find the places and things you are looking for. It's automatically more immersive in that you have to both listen more carefully to NPCs, as well as actually pay attention to your surroundings. Great idea!

Mercenary system. I see you Ubisoft. Not only did you lift a bunch of great ideas from CD Project Red, but here you are grabbing up the Nemesis system from Shadow of Mordor. Since I enjoyed that aspect of Shadow of Mordor, I am also liking it in this game.

In closing, although the developers have clearly borrowed heavily from other games, they have created a genre mish-mash that is epic in scale, broad in scope, beautiful to look at, and so far, extremely fun to play.

Assassin's Creed: Odyssey? I think I just got that for my nephew on xBox. He seems to enjoy it but hasn't said much of it but that it gets difficult with the bosses (or whatever they're called in this game world). He complained of having to start over several steps back every time he failed to defeat whoever. I had no idea the environments were so dense. Those are GREAT screen captures!

I still haven't played a game in pushing 3 weeks now. I need to complete CONTROL, but I kinda don't want to get back into it as I'm getting other things done again lol. Life eh?

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"My Dionne Warwick understanding of your dream indicates that you are ambivalent on how you want life to eventually screw you." - Joel

"Ever try to forcibly pin down a house cat? It's not easy." - Captain Steel

"I just can't get pass sticking a finger up a dog's butt." - John Dumbear

I need an @Tacitus CONTROL update to ease my withdrawals.
(hint hint)

Not played it. Outer Worlds launches tonight so I doubt if I'll be getting back to it any time soon either.

File it under the Bioshocks of this world - Exceptionally well made story driven shooters that I just don't get a lot out of. Sorry!

Blasphemy.
Guess ima hafta pick up the ole gun and reclaim my directorial role of death!

It's time..

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Didn't get a chance to play much of The Outer Worlds when it launched last night but ..... wow.

Imagine a game with Obsidian's writing and world design but with Microsoft's money behind it. I don't think I found a bug, and I played for an entire half hour - This is unparalleled for an Obsidian game on launch day.

Yeah, amazingly this game dropped where I have so much going on that I couldn't even play it on launch night, d'oh, but definitely soon. Maybe a couple of hours today. I've heard the same thing re: bugs, sounds very polished. Also seems like it had to skimp on the raw exploration stuff I like so much, but for a first effort, and in exchange for buffing everything else to a high sheen, that seems fair, especially hoping/assuming they do another that's bigger and open-er.

This was, like, the one panel I made it to in Seattle, as well. It was primarily with the writers, answering questions about the inherent challenges in writing for open worlds. Good stuff.

I'm sitting down with it for a couple of hours before dinner. Didn't get much more done than create my character last night.

It runs amazingly well on a base Xbox too - I'll try the PC version later but have no idea how moddable it's gonna be. Historically Microsoft Store releases (as the Game Pass version I have will be) aren't at all and I've not looked into if the Epic and upcoming Steam releases will be different.

So colourful too!

I get that some people would rather have a larger world but people I've spoken to who've been playing it for a while due to review code say this doesn't impact things at all, and even helps things. It's basically Mass Effect size and design rather than traditional Bethesda.

One other thing I've just noticed - If you leave your character unattended it'll zoom out to third person and rotate the camera around them. Can't think where I've seen that before.

Yeah, mid-sentence there I was going "but they've always done that in...oh."

Yeah, I imagine there's a trade off between the bugs and the quality of the quests and all that, and the sheer size. Maybe in practice it won't feel like a sacrifice, but even if it does, it's a reasonable one. I'm not sure anything beats sheer scope for that intoxicating exploration feeling that, I admit, is a high I'm forever chasing another hit of. But I'm down to see an experiment in a modest, better-made open-world, especially since they presumably had to do a lot of this from the ground-up and any follow-ups could very well be larger with less setup involved.

All in all, really hope this game is as good as it looks, and really hope it does well. I'll definitely be in here with more thoughts over the next week.

Oh, and speaking of thoughts, Disco Elysium. Wow. Friggin' wow. It's not perfect, but geez, what a cool vibe, what an interesting world, what a great style. And it's got like 2-3 really cool gameplay ideas that I really want to see repeated and iterated on a little. I think I played it 25 hours in five days and I've started another playthrough already.

I've said it before, but am doubly sure now - I'm gonna be even more interested in what Obsidian release next. I think EA still has the entire Star Wars license or else I'd be crossing my fingers for KOTOR 3. Outer Worlds has a definite Bioware vibe so far, but the Bioware of ME 1 & 2, not modern Bioware.

I've decided to not even think about buying that one until I've finished with The Outer Worlds.

Fair. I was the other way: better hurry up and play Disco Elysium before The Outer Worlds comes out. Embarrassment of riches lately

But yeah, if what you've seen and heard about it sounds intriguing, it's almost a mortal lock you'll like it. It's really something else. So weird and refreshing, I hope it's a huge success, I want a dozen more games in this style.

Another solid recommendation - Children of Morta

It's a run based dungeon crawler/rpg with a gorgeous art style. Nicely written, too.

Heh, Obsidian sure do know their audience.

There's an alternate control scheme which is basically the Bethesda one - Jump on Y, Inventory on B etc - The standard one has jump on A and inventory on Back.

Minor VR incursion. I tried a GTA mod. And the GTA mod is good



It's really hard to capture footage, and the footage doesn't really communicate the difference. But here's a rambling stream that goes a little way down the road



Stuff like the general wow-ing at 7mins. It doesn't look much different on a screen, but it's the 'fact' that you're in the car. Getting buffeted about. Reading those narrow 3D gaps...

I figured this would just be a quick install and then wipe. But nopeee. Gonna be tooling around with this for a bit

(Plus that vid added some wishlist ideas.... Skydiving . And ingesting peyote to turn into a dolphin )

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

Ok so I figured out how to record footage



It still doesn't really communicate it. Either the 'presence', or the scrubbiness of the view when too much is going on . But you can see some of what the head turning adds at least

AC: Odyssey continues to impress. Having a blast with the Nemesis Mercenary system, especially one particular battle, which had me battling a particularly nasty Merc that had trailed me to some remote town. I had him down about half way, when the "Bounty Hunter Nearby" alarm went off again. Oh no! Of course this guy was an archer, and he quickly began peppering me with poison arrows. What ensued was battle fit for the Gods! I barely pulled it out, but I was victorious, and epic gear was to be had.

Still plenty of stop and stare in wonder moments occurring at a fairly steady pace, as well. I randomly happened upon a Tomb of Pythia, way up on a hillside, which had a serene outdoor statue and gardens, along with a dark tunnel entrance that bored right into the hill. Inside was a fun little diversion of exploration with a few secret passages and a sort of Indiana Jones vibe to the whole thing. I emerged later into the moonlit night, and descended the hill, only to find the Oracle of Dephi, surrounded by some amazing temples and really well-done statues, all populated by peasants, philosophers, and townspeople going about their daily affairs. The game really captures the feel of these historical places in a convincing way.