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5 hours ago, MacabreEternal said:

I have never really been a fan of the idea of GTA Online - I just don't want to interact with other players as I find gaming a much more personal experience.  Is it possible to just be in online and go about your business like you can in the main game?  I accept that there are a lot more toys to play with as it were in the online option but just am not interested in the co-op option overall.

Seconded. GTA is a solid franchise at this point, but it's better left as it is: a B movie power fantasy simulator. I never understood the desire to play video games with others. It kind of defeats the purpose, plus the sheer volume of almost human beings you meet in these huge interactive worlds can send me into a misanthropic death spiral. If I spend too much time interacting with cretins online I'm liable to go to a monastery, take a vow of silence, and live out my days tending to a garden and singing chants, hidden away from the drooling barbarous philistines who have seemingly proliferated the world over. Single player only for me.

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43 minutes ago, MacabreEternal said:

Thanks for the update, sounds promising and I may invest in online via my Xbox or PS5 in the near future.

I'm on PS5 so if you ever feel like a game or me showing you some things or helping you earn a bit of cash (If you need it) then happy to do so.  Chatting/socialising not required.  

22 minutes ago, Nasty_Cabbage said:

Seconded. GTA is a solid franchise at this point, but it's better left as it is: a B movie power fantasy simulator. I never understood the desire to play video games with others. It kind of defeats the purpose, plus the sheer volume of almost human beings you meet in these huge interactive worlds can send me into a misanthropic death spiral. If I spend too much time interacting with cretins online I'm liable to go to a monastery, take a vow of silence, and live out my days tending to a garden and singing chants, hidden away from the drooling barbarous philistines who have seemingly proliferated the world over. Single player only for me.

I've always been a solo player, probably a hangover from the 80's when I first played on Amstrad, Spectrum and Sega Master System etc., when single player was really all there was.

I had the PS1 and after that (and some Nintendo system before it), I took a LONG break from gaming as I started my chef training and worked long/odd hours and had little money to spend on gaming (what little I had went on music, of course).  

A few months prior to the release of the PS4, I bought a cheap, second hand PS3 and GTA V with some money I got for my birthday.  I completed story mode before I even dared venture into the online mode.  When I did, being a noob and getting shot at etc., I had pretty much the same attitude as you, NC, like why would people find this FUN?  Finally, on a gaming page on social media, I met the dude I mentioned earlier that I now play GTA Online with (we both got booted from the page as I think our humour was a little too out there for the admins of the group, even though it wasn't bad LOL) and now, I either play solo, or with him in closed/friend sessions.  

As I said to ME, earlier, though, if you play solo, even though you are online, it's pretty much like playing single player, no interaction with other players is necessary unless you want to do the multiplayer heists.  There's a hell of a lot to do to keep you occupied, that's for sure.  

Another game I loved the story for is Red Dead Redemption 2, I don't know if you guys have played it.  Forgetting about online, which is now essentially abandoned by Rockstar and pretty dire in terms of players, the storyline was amazing and streets ahead of GTAV in terms of story, characters, writing and feeling invested in the characters.  I'm a huge fan of great storytelling and, for me, RDR2 really hit the spot for me.  It's the only game I have ever pre-ordered, I just had a strong feeling I would fall in love with it when I started reading about it.  Amazing to think that it is already five years old. 

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I must be one of the few people around who as never owned or used a console. I didn't even own an Atari in the 80's. My wife has had just about every PS and DS but the closest I've every had is some of the original Game And Watch (like Donkey Kong) and several of the smaller single screen Game and Watch's from early 80's. Although my dad did make a machine that had 250 versions of Pong which plugged into the black and white tv set in the very early 70's  so I guess that's a console.

I do have a Switch now days but I've always been a single player PC gamer

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at this point, my gaming days are well and truly behind me, which totally sucks when this year has gifted us a remake of my all-time favourite video game, and a new entry in my favourite video game franchise… if Zelda tears of the kingdom doesn’t win game of the year, the judges need their heads re-examined.

 

generally, though growing up, I always had more fun with multiplayer games, Mario kart, Mario party,Smash Bros etc if medical science ever comes up with a cure for my eyesight though, well, let’s just say I’ve been keeping tabs on all the video games I’d want to play in that situation lost count. There’s about 100 of them…

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56 minutes ago, AlSymerz said:

I must be one of the few people around who as never owned or used a console. I didn't even own an Atari in the 80's. My wife has had just about every PS and DS but the closest I've every had is some of the original Game And Watch (like Donkey Kong) and several of the smaller single screen Game and Watch's from early 80's. Although my dad did make a machine that had 250 versions of Pong which plugged into the black and white tv set in the very early 70's  so I guess that's a console.

I do have a Switch now days but I've always been a single player PC gamer

I have a PC capable of gaming but other than GTAV and RDR2 (to play online with friends who moaned me to get them and then largely abandoned both games) I have pretty much zero experience of PC gaming since the 90s when I used to play Rise of The Triad and a few others.  

Ah man, Game & Watch!  That takes me back!

7 minutes ago, RelentlessOblivion said:

at this point, my gaming days are well and truly behind me, which totally sucks when this year has gifted us a remake of my all-time favourite video game, and a new entry in my favourite video game franchise… if Zelda tears of the kingdom doesn’t win game of the year, the judges need their heads re-examined.

 

generally, though growing up, I always had more fun with multiplayer games, Mario kart, Mario party,Smash Bros etc if medical science ever comes up with a cure for my eyesight though, well, let’s just say I’ve been keeping tabs on all the video games I’d want to play in that situation lost count. There’s about 100 of them…

That does suck my brother :(  Fuck's sake, hanging out for a medical miracle on your behalf.  Also, I had forgot about Mario Kart.  Me and my friend absolutely hammered the SNES version for YEARS after it came out.  As in, every night after school and weekends we would CONSTANTLY play.  It used to piss him off mightily that I would kick his ass on battle mode, haha.  Fun times!

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I mean it has its benefits, for one I’m never going to be the designated driver… Plus words cannot express the immense satisfaction of being told blind people can’t do that to prove that particular, ignorant fuck, wrong…

 

also, muscle memory is still a thing, so a couple of weeks ago I was still able to absolutely wreck my younger brother in Mortal Kombat

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38 minutes ago, thrashinbiker said:

I have a PC capable of gaming but other than GTAV and RDR2 (to play online with friends who moaned me to get them and then largely abandoned both games) I have pretty much zero experience of PC gaming since the 90s when I used to play Rise of The Triad and a few others.  

Ah man, Game & Watch!  That takes me back!

These days my gaming PC is getting too old to be useful so it's mainly used as a file server. I used to do LAN parties and the like in the late 80's and 90's, then they moved into LAN gaming parties with games like Doom and Duke Nukem. But when Warcraft went mainly online I stopped playing all but the older games. I even went back to old DOS games, the kind with block characters and a massive 16 colours! A decade or so ago I spent a lot of time playing simulators, Flight Sim, X-Plane, Truck Sim, Farming Sim, Racing sim, I played heaps of them and spent way too much time on them so I pretty much gave up.

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1 hour ago, thrashinbiker said:

  Another game I loved the story for is Red Dead Redemption 2, I don't know if you guys have played it.  Forgetting about online, which is now essentially abandoned by Rockstar and pretty dire in terms of players, the storyline was amazing and streets ahead of GTAV in terms of story, characters, writing and feeling invested in the characters.  I'm a huge fan of great storytelling and, for me, RDR2 really hit the spot for me.  It's the only game I have ever pre-ordered, I just had a strong feeling I would fall in love with it when I started reading about it.  Amazing to think that it is already five years old. 

RDR2 is the gold standard for open worldish games in terms of story telling and just pure visual feasts these days. It's kind of a blessing and a curse since I think video games (or at least the big releases) are entering a sort of baroque era where every big game has to be a survival third person shooter melee with stealth elements story focused higher end graphics in a massive open world exploration sandbox lore expanding crafting customization puzzling platform trading settlement building mystery high player agency (*breathes in) game. Smaller studios have always known their scope and limitations which unfortunately many larger studios do not, so we get more misses than hits these days and release window strictures put in place by marketing departments that lead to burn out and long suffering devs and their respective losing their passion.

The current example of a studio falling prey to that kind of trap would be the two Horizon games. The combat and especially the use of the map in-game is excellent, but the plot is really weak until it completely goes off the rails at the end, when it's downright laughable. Then there's the crafting system which is somehow one of the worst I've seen in a big budget game. Basically they're good adventure games trapped in the body of an rpg. You wouldn't think creating a game about hunting robot dinosaurs would get in it's own way so much, but there it is.

 

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I actually realised my Game Pass that I already have for Xbox covers me for online - I just didn't know.  Went on last night for about an hour.  Kind of agree on the ability to avoid others (enabling passive mode is a gift that keeps on giving) but there's still far too much going on for me with all the notifications and invites to gangs and stuff (need to look at how those can be disabled) and in the end I just got naffed off and logged off as it was sending my anxiety levels way up.

Will revisit once I have finished work for the holidays and I don't then go from a day of answering phone calls and emails to a virtual world of the same that evening.

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10 hours ago, Nasty_Cabbage said:

RDR2 is the gold standard for open worldish games in terms of story telling and just pure visual feasts these days. It's kind of a blessing and a curse since I think video games (or at least the big releases) are entering a sort of baroque era where every big game has to be a survival third person shooter melee with stealth elements story focused higher end graphics in a massive open world exploration sandbox lore expanding crafting customization puzzling platform trading settlement building mystery high player agency (*breathes in) game. Smaller studios have always known their scope and limitations which unfortunately many larger studios do not, so we get more misses than hits these days and release window strictures put in place by marketing departments that lead to burn out and long suffering devs and their respective losing their passion.

The current example of a studio falling prey to that kind of trap would be the two Horizon games. The combat and especially the use of the map in-game is excellent, but the plot is really weak until it completely goes off the rails at the end, when it's downright laughable. Then there's the crafting system which is somehow one of the worst I've seen in a big budget game. Basically they're good adventure games trapped in the body of an rpg. You wouldn't think creating a game about hunting robot dinosaurs would get in it's own way so much, but there it is.

 

Glad you took a breath there, NC, cos I nearly ran out reading it hehe.  Seriously, though, you are on the money with your assessment of RDR2.  The visuals are amazing, but combined with the fantastic story-telling and characterisation - this was, for me, what elevated the game to classic status.  

The depth of story and the fleshed-out characters made it a real treat for me and compared to GTAV which, at the time, was only five years older, truly made RDR2 stand out from what I felt was a lacklustre at best story in GTA.  Don't get me wrong, I have spent countless hours in GTA and had a LOT of fun, but when it came to story mode, I found I just didn't really care about the characters.  Trevor was funny, at times, but one-dimensional, and Franklin and Michael were just a wannabe thug and a has-been, respectively.  

To me, the whole story in GTA revolved around Michael's deception in letting Trevor think Brad was still alive and that was pretty much it.  The whole game then splintered into silliness like yoga, rescuing Michael's (frankly annoying) kids from their various scrapes so that by the time the story was starting to knit together and draw to a conclusion, I didn't really care how it played out.  It was almost a relief to finish it and it would be a long time before I found the energy and enthusiasm to play through the GTA story once more, which contrasted heavily with RDR2, whereby, upon finishing, I immediately wanted to experience the whole thing again.

Finally (sorry for waffling) I absolutely loved the way the game turned from, through Arthur's eyes, being a close-knit gang of friends and gunslingers, to a much darker and sinister entity by the time Chapter VI begins and progresses.  As Arthur becomes more introspective, and the scales fall from his eyes, he realises that loyalty, friendship and everything he thought made him a man was nothing more than a sham, and that he only realises, all too late, what is important in life.

57 minutes ago, MacabreEternal said:

I actually realised my Game Pass that I already have for Xbox covers me for online - I just didn't know.  Went on last night for about an hour.  Kind of agree on the ability to avoid others (enabling passive mode is a gift that keeps on giving) but there's still far too much going on for me with all the notifications and invites to gangs and stuff (need to look at how those can be disabled) and in the end I just got naffed off and logged off as it was sending my anxiety levels way up.

Will revisit once I have finished work for the holidays and I don't then go from a day of answering phone calls and emails to a virtual world of the same that evening.

Understood ME, it can be an overload when you have messages/invites pinging up all over the place.  You can definitely turn posse invites off and I think you can also disable invites to free-roam events, which will help your experience be more immersive and relaxed.  

Gaming is, of course, a wholly personal experience and trust me man, I would never, ever tell someone what I think they should do, but if I may make a suggestion, perhaps try playing the online in small, bite-sized chunks at first.  Familiarise yourself with what the game has to offer and just focus on one or two things at a time.  Personally, I find hunting good fun (and you can sell hides/meat to make some in game dollar) and if you really just want to chill, fishing is a great way to pass the time - I often put some music on and just chill out fishing at Flat Iron Lake or O'Creaghs Run, which is a great source of sockeye salmon :) 

Happy gaming!

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On 12/14/2023 at 10:12 AM, thrashinbiker said:

Understood ME, it can be an overload when you have messages/invites pinging up all over the place.  You can definitely turn posse invites off and I think you can also disable invites to free-roam events, which will help your experience be more immersive and relaxed.  

Gaming is, of course, a wholly personal experience and trust me man, I would never, ever tell someone what I think they should do, but if I may make a suggestion, perhaps try playing the online in small, bite-sized chunks at first.  Familiarise yourself with what the game has to offer and just focus on one or two things at a time.  Personally, I find hunting good fun (and you can sell hides/meat to make some in game dollar) and if you really just want to chill, fishing is a great way to pass the time - I often put some music on and just chill out fishing at Flat Iron Lake or O'Creaghs Run, which is a great source of sockeye salmon :) 

Happy gaming!

While I remember, the Closed Friends Session on GTA5 online works a treat I have found - it is just like the story mode with new things to do.  Annoying that some of the missions still require more than 1 person but I simply don't do them.  Had a couple of sessions on there over the holidays already that have allowed a couple of hours to pass each time (get bored after more than a couple of hours).

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Finally got my hands on a PS5, and a game I feel like I've wanted to play for ages: Steelrising. I know it's another entry into the rapidly crowding field of Souls-likes out there, but I don't mind some Souls type of combat and customization if it's well executed and it builds it's own lore and doesn't try to make it like Dark Souls borrowing piecemeal bits from history, mythology, and high fantasy to make something distinct that I have yet to see capably duplicated. Also I have had a long standing love affair with Spiders as a studio. Greedfall is still one of the coolest rpg from it's generation, and they're very careful to balance the crafting and upgrades in a way that makes a ton of sense for a mid size, but ambitious, game.

Steelrising is entirely dependent on how much you take to it's story and art direction. I'm certain there are gamers out there that just don't really like the alternate history French revolution, but with creepy robots (Think Robocop, but with a frenchified marionette instead of a robot). There's also probably people who put far too much stock in pixel hard count graphics and anti-aliasing, since it is a little dated even today. For me it looks good enough and invested most of it's time and energy in the right way: Make sure it runs at a reasonable processing power and keep the stylization in line with the tone. I'm having a ton of fun so far. I get the feeling we're probably going to see some interesting developments in the double A market space given the amount of people who've been fired this year as luxury entertainments go tits up. A few will probably put together their own studios, and will no doubt go headhunting to build a smaller, but capable staff to make the games they actually want to make.

One can only hope.

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  • 1 month later...

Whoo. Finished Steelrising a few weeks back. I enjoyed it, but I think they made the correct decision to keep it fairly abbreviated for their first entry into the souls-like genre. The game does feel like it might be moving at almost too brisk of pace, and you can tell it's a French studio since their are a number of actual historical figures in the game, and when they get a scene or two to forward the plot the writers pretty much indulged in a full on academic lesson on the french revolution. Still, it remains interesting. Most US residents these days don't really know much about that particular topic other than A Tale of Two Cities. Diving into that stuff can be a little daunting to some I suppose. Combat was a lot of fun since you can pretty much carve out a viable strategy from any starting class and stat range. This does have the effect of making the game a little too easy for the souls crowd though. One thing I particularly appreciate is that you don't need to have razor sharp parry and block timings. I almost never start a build with parries being a key component. I know that's sacrilege to some for whom the entire souls genre is the parry mechanics, but I'm just not about that sort of play style so it's really nice to not be funneled straight toward that strategy like Sekiro did (and for what it's worth I actually really liked Sekiro, but man that can be brutal to first timers.) I also played through Disco Elysium again when I needed a break.

Now it's onto the next game: Lost Eidolons. Don't know why, but I've had a hankering for a Fire Emblem style combat system, and since I'm not on that Nintendo crush that sometimes happens,  think I found a good alternative for PS5. I probably won't go back to Nintendo. Lots of fond childhood memories until I actually start to play on somebodies Switch. Zelda games don't feel like Zelda games to me anymore, and I don't really have much fun with what they replaced it with, but I've always enjoyed Fire Emblem style combat. Should be fun.

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