What games are you playing now?

I've been playing Covid the last few days. I know I'm late to the party, but to be honest, I think it's overrated.

The FX aren't even that good. I'm not impressed with the runny nose or the dry cough, and the body chills were only in that first level. I never even saw the loss of taste or smell. Maybe I encountered a bug?
 
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I've been playing Covid the last few days. I know I'm late to the party, but to be honest, I think it's overrated.

The FX aren't even that good. I'm not impressed with the runny nose or the dry cough, and the body chills were only in that first level. I never even saw the loss of taste or smell. Maybe I encountered a bug?
:biggrin:

I'm playing COVID isolation at the moment. Daughter has it, we're all isolating and waiting to see if we get it too. Got her set-up in her room with a gaming computer loaded up with Mass Effect Legendary Edition and RDR2, so she rarely has to come out of her room. Also, thank fuck for online grocery shopping.

Prey is as good as I remember it. Excellent stuff. Though, after a while I think I'll be hitting randomly placed-looking objects with something in IRL. I'm beginning to jump less, at least.
 
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Prey is as good as I remember it. Excellent stuff. Though, after a while I think I'll be hitting randomly placed-looking objects with something in IRL. I'm beginning to jump less, at least.

Stumbled across this while playing Doom Eternal. :)

0B30C0D40F7FB6753B83AECF2CFE992494610741
 
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Maybe I encountered a bug?

Nah, man, just a shit game. Just goes to show, with the right marketing you don't even need a good game to make billions. ;)

I've been playing the latest version of Jupiter Hell. The high-score to beat is 5798!

EUROPA

Just as "Valhalla" overhauled Callisto, "Chaos" does the same for Europa (guess I won't be able to hide what the next release will be about, eh).

== Branch reworks ==

NEW #1732 - Conamara Chaos branch/special rework!
NEW #1713 - Dig Zone branch/special rework!
NEW #1731 - Asterius branch/special rework!
NEW #1750 - Refueling Base/The Pit reworked
CHANGE #1737 - improved Europa level generators (mostly visual)

Three of the four branches have been given dedicated mechanics and a added reward at the end (Ruins will be overhauled with Io), the level generation has been more or less updated in each branch, although it will mostly be visible in the cave/basalt branches. Improvements have been also made to the mainline and mainline special levels. All special levels have improved rewards. All branches have their own new Manufacturer perk. You might even hear a new tune somewhere!

== Ice Cold Boss ==

NEW #1712 - Europa has a boss too!

An old favorite got a new job! However brand new mechanics are present, and you might consider getting some cold resistance for this particular fight!

== Caves & Cliffs ==

CHANGE #1714 - improved cave/basalt level visuals
CHANGE #1714 - improved cave/basalt level generators

All of the cave and basalt levels got a visual upgrade, and most also got a architectural update for more variety. We'll be revisiting other generators in the next updates too!

== Visuals ==

NEW #1709 - Callisto security visual improvements finished
NEW #1745 - Europa security visual improvements

We started the Callisto security visual upgrade in the Valhalla release, but now it's complete - human enemies should be much better visible in the dark (insert snarky comment about wanting to get shot here), and Europa security got a similar visibility bump. Some of the enemies look really disturbing, but fear not - you'll never see that 'cause the models are so small ;)

== A taste of Io ==

NEW #1721 - Mephitic Mines branch/special rework!
CHANGE #1695 - CRI weapon prefix is a manufacturer now
CHANGE #1695 - CRI manufacturer present on alive CRI soldiers/branch
CHANGE #1695 - CRI sword/CRI blaster always roll with CRI manufacturer

As we left out an Europa branch for the Io update, it was only fair to pick a Io branch to update in this release - Mephitic Mines was chosen as it goes well with our visual basalt generator improvements!

Also take careful note on the CRI Manufacturer perk, as it gives a whopping +25% damage against ALL demons, which is a significant buff to all Io weaponry!

== Redacted! ==

NEW #1551 - [REDACTED]

[REDACTED] (there's a new secret in this release, not as huge and not community driven like the last one, but close and personal ;)

GAMEPLAY

It was time for another larger balance pass. Our main objectives were to make the mid-late game a bit harder, make mid-late game loot a bit stronger and more interesting, especially uniques and exotics, and rebalance a bit the master perks.

== Enemies ==

CHANGE #1749 - balance - base/exalt reavers have lower melee dmg/acc
CHANGE #1749 - balance - exalted reavers don't get +10% speed
CHANGE #1729 - balance - fiend/kerberi/reaver status higher, lower base
CHANGE #1729 - balance - sentinels proc cold effects
FIX #1746 - fixed rare in-your-face spawns (mostly in mini-levels)

Friendly Neighbourhood Reaver was a meme in the community since Early Access, and I though that I dealt with the most annoying cases of this syndrome, but alas some more nerfing is needed. Especially due to a bug in the enemy safe placement system, that if after several attempts it couldn't place the enemy in a requested safe distance... placed them happily on top of you. Now it reduces the attempted range instead of just giving up. Both reavers and exalted reavers were nerfed in their melee oppressiveness.

Enemy status effects have been increased to make resistances more worthwhile and change up the gameplay depending what resistances you carry. To offset that, base damage has been lowered.

== Masters ==

CHANGE #1729 - Vampyre - melee restore 8%/12%/20%
CHANGE #1729 - Vampyre - grants overhealth
CHANGE #1729 - Sharpshooter - resets skill cooldown on kill
CHANGE #1729 - Gun Kata - only in opt_range, removed dodge penalties
CHANGE #1729 - Gun Kata - single target dual shots from L2
CHANGE #1729 - Gun Kata - critical damage bonus based on proximity
CHANGE #1729 - Survivor - no in-combat regeneration, 5/5/10 crit
CHANGE #1729 - Ghost - L2/L3 swapped, L3 Stealth cost is 12
CHANGE #1729 - Wizard - smoke cooldown up to 25

Let's get the painful info out of the way - Survivor, Ghost and Wizard are OP, and needed a nerf (the alternative was to rebalance the whole game and all the rest of the traits around them, which would have taken the better part of this year). That said, at the moments the nerfs are slight, and hopefully the buffs to the other Masters will bring them closer in line.

Vampyre now grants overhealth (and better melee restore numbers) and Sharpshooter resets cooldowns on kill (for Headshot synergy).

Gun Kata got more significant changes - it somehow totally missed the initial idea of getting in between enemies and shooting like mad, and instead became a "snipe from the edge of vision" trait. Worse, due to often missing from that range it became very ammo inefficient and not a great Master at higher difficulties at all. So the plan was simple - make it more Mid-range focused, while making it much stronger to compensate. All dodge penalties have been remove (you even get a +10% extra dodge per shot), firing both pistols at a single target is at L2, and L3 gets a critical damage bonus depending on range (closer = higher) on top of it!

Take them out for a spin and tell us what you think!

== Weaponry ==

CHANGE #1729 - balance - 40mm drum launcher - 32 damage/6 capacity
CHANGE #1729 - balance - plasma launcher - +10 damage
CHANGE #1740 - unique buffs - level the same way regardless of tier
CHANGE #1740 - unique buffs - Scrapgun and Void get +1 base damage
CHANGE #1740 - unique buffs - Firestorm deals more fire damage
CHANGE #1740 - unique buffs - Carnage - +1 opt, +4 clip
CHANGE #1740 - unique buffs - Monster and Bloodletter - +20 damage
CHANGE #1740 - unique buffs - Overlord works on Guardians/Sentinels
CHANGE #1740 - exotic buffs - AWP and CRI blaster +5 damage
CHANGE #1740 - exotic buffs - nailgun/super nailgun +2 damage
CHANGE #1740 - exotic buffs - micro launcher/power saw +20 damage
CHANGE #1740 - exotic buffs - toxin rifle +2 damage

Bad things out of the way - it took a NetHack speedrunner to show us how ridiculously overpowered the 40mm drum launcher was, so it (and only it) needed a slight nerf in power. Plasma launchers needed some love. All post-Callisto Uniques got a blanket buff - they level up much quicker now. Apart from that a lot of exotics and uniques got straight-up damage buffs. Oh, and Overlord will now work on Guardians/Sentinels. Take that, Alighieri!

== UI/UX/Other stuff ==

We're constantly dedicated to improving the UI and ease of gameplay, here are the recent changes in that field.

== UI/UX ==

CHANGE #1744 - UI/UX - mouse path uses icons instead of highlights
CHANGE #1748 - UI/UX - modded items don't display text description
CHANGE #1747 - UI/UX - elevator, term/box/station reveal on clear

Mouse mode now has nice visuals indicating the target path, not ugly highlights. Modded items will no longer display the description to give some real estate for mod descriptions (a full blown item view is coming too). Elevators and other items of interest will reveal on level clear, so you won't have to wonder where that *&^(*@) exit is.

== Hacking ==

NEW #1739 - use SHIFT-move to swap position with friendlies
CHANGE #1738 - improved friendly pathfinding (esp. for Hunt)

It was pretty annoying to move around with an army of bots, now you can quickly swap positions with them using SHIFT! As a bonus, friendly pathfinding got a significant improvement - Hunt commands will be much more reliable now!

== Other stuff ==

CHANGE #1743 - Purgatory - Cathedral hint leads to Inferno unlock
CHANGE #1742 - Callisto Mines - 5 turn warning countdown for summon

The path to finding the Valhalla release secret has been glorious! You can find information on it in the Wiki (https://jupiterhell.fandom.com/wiki/Purgatory) but to ease access to the Inferno difficulty we made it so that the Cathedral secret leads to the unlock bossfight (this all makes sense in context, I promise).

Also those summoned reavers were really annoying in Callisto Mines, so we gave them a countdown warning timer.

== Bugfixes ==

FIX #1729 - stimpacks properly reset Headshot
FIX #1733 - status effect text for Freeze/Chilled fixed

Several bugfixes and typos have been fixed in addition to the two above.
 
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I've been playing Covid the last few days. I know I'm late to the party, but to be honest, I think it's overrated.

The FX aren't even that good. I'm not impressed with the runny nose or the dry cough, and the body chills were only in that first level. I never even saw the loss of taste or smell. Maybe I encountered a bug?
Well, I was intrigued by your description of the gameplay, so I just bought the game.
Damn it.

I'll have to pause Prey for now and play something that will run on my laptop while I isolate.
 
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I've reached Fontaine Futuristics in Bioshock 2, and I've really been enjoying myself. Especially since I've hardly had any crashes (though, yesterday I spoke of the devil, and had the first 2 crashes, in very close proximity, in my whole playthrough). Hard difficulty is still quite a pain in the ass, but I'm mostly managing. I really constantly have to scrounge for every piece of health kit or bullets. I hear there's a two Big Sister fight coming up, so I guess that will really test my mettle.

What's kind of weird is that enemies from Bioshock 1 that were kind of easy to take out, are suddenly hard as nails. Spider and Houdini Splicers in particular. If I don't get headshots quickly, I'm pretty much doomed to consume 2-3 health packs in a fight. And that's just no manageable with how many fights there are, and so little money.

But aside from that, I really enjoy exploring the levels. And the little throwbacks to Bioshock 1 are also nice.
 
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After playing a considerable amount of Bioshock 2's Fontaine Futuristics level, it might be my favorite level out of all Bioshock games (ignoring Infinite of course). I'm either way too familiar with bioshock 1, or I might even go so far to say that Bioshock 2 has better level design than Bioshock 1. I think overall, I might be enjoying it either at the same level, or even better than Bioshock 1.
 
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@Redglyph; Yeah, I found that interesting. Judging from the footage, it's a good thing they scrapped it and started over.

After playing a considerable amount of Bioshock 2's Fontaine Futuristics level, it might be my favorite level out of all Bioshock games (ignoring Infinite of course). I'm either way too familiar with bioshock 1, or I might even go so far to say that Bioshock 2 has better level design than Bioshock 1. I think overall, I might be enjoying it either at the same level, or even better than Bioshock 1.

You're making me really want to start another run of that series. :)

I've only played Bioshock 2 once and don't remember it well enough to recall individual levels. I found the story of the first game more memorable, but I definitely liked the combat more in 2.
 
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I've been playing Covid the last few days. I know I'm late to the party, but to be honest, I think it's overrated.

The FX aren't even that good. I'm not impressed with the runny nose or the dry cough, and the body chills were only in that first level. I never even saw the loss of taste or smell. Maybe I encountered a bug?

I wish you a fast health recovery, JDR13 :)

Don't think it's overrated, at least I don't think so. Only that vaccines plus a relatively weak virus variant (Omicron) made the symptoms not so severe this time. When I got infected earlier this year, I also didn't lose the smell or the taste.

Unfortunately I knew people close to me who haven't had the same luck with the previous COVID variants. :(
 
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I'm playing a blobber called Aeon of Sands, which looks like it will run on even a potato.
It's in a post-apocalyptic setting and promises a non-linear story, and has a nice gritty aesthetic.

So far I've been killing rats and vagabonds in some sort of undercity slum with a single character, but it looks like you can get up to three party members. There are some interesting features, e.g. apparently not all party member combos are viable, as some characters will have animosity toward certain others and won't want to party up with them.
Also, there's an interesting magic system:
In the world of Aeon of Sands, there are two magic systems: the most common one is the manipulation of the elemental energy that permeates the land, through the consumption of reagent items.

This elemental magic is available to almost everyone in the world.

It allows, for instance, to attune a character to magic energy, through the consumption of reagents, like a bag of saltpeter, and the manipulation nuggets of of mana in crystallised form, called activators.
With that, you can cast firebolts or to rain stones from above, at the cost of getting your body saturated with poisonous mana! Be careful not to abuse of the elements!

Then, there is the infamous Auran magic, which is about the enforcement of one’s will on reality.

It is extremely dangerous to whom he uses it as much as to its victims, it is very rare and shunned by almost everybody: it’s to be expected from an upstanding citizen like Setrani, to denounce its users to the authorities right away.
 
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@Shagnak; @henriquejr; @JDR13;

You start at the base game. You get the Season Pass DLC. But to prove you have the Season Pass you need an account. Once you have an account you can buy their store currency.

This is the logical direction of any successful modern AAA game.

Soon the base game will be as irrelevant as the original Half-life is to Steam.
 
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I wish you a fast health recovery, JDR13 :)

Don't think it's overrated, at least I don't think so. Only that vaccines plus a relatively weak virus variant (Omicron) made the symptoms not so severe this time. When I got infected earlier this year, I also didn't lose the smell or the taste.

Unfortunately I knew people close to me who haven't had the same luck with the previous COVID variants. :(

Thanks. I feel fine now, though I'm still doing the self-quarantine for a few more days.
I only felt sick for around 48 hours, and it wasn't that bad. Now I've just got that annoying cough that wants to hang around.

It's surprising that I didn't have it before now because I was never very diligent about taking precautions. Overconfidence from having a strong immune system.
 
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EU4, as Brandenburg. It's becoming very difficult to get anything done. Either Austria/the HRE gets dragged into anything I attempt, or somebody like France does. To form Prussia, I need a few provinces that Poland currently has. They're massive and have no real enemies.
 
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EU4, as Brandenburg. It's becoming very difficult to get anything done. Either Austria/the HRE gets dragged into anything I attempt, or somebody like France does. To form Prussia, I need a few provinces that Poland currently has. They're massive and have no real enemies.
Are you able to beat any smaller enemies nearby even if not adjacent to you?
 
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Are you able to beat any smaller enemies nearby even if not adjacent to you?

I don't know if you've played as a Holy Roman Empire country, but the thing is, it doesn't matter how small your target is if attacking them brings in Austria. I've expanded quite a bit and have 100,000 troops.. but Austria has 300,000.
 
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I played a bit of The Ancient Gods – Part One, the first expansion for Doom Eternal. I just wanted to see how it started out and if it's as difficult as I've heard.

Yeah… it's brutal. They certainly don't ease you into it. Even the first level feels like it's a continuation of the end of the base game. I'll come back to this later. I've had enough of Doom for now.
 
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