Ni No Kuni II on PS4 , very nice jRPG that has a fairytale-like story so it's relaxing 🤣

Currently playing :

Red Dead Redemption 2 - Find this really hard to maintain interest, too much simulation crap. Been trying to keep playing for months and keep falling off of it.
Operencia - Old School Turn based Might and Magic style modern game, good characters and excellent art, enjoying this one much.
Rocket League - As always since release
MTG: Arena - Recently got back into Magic AGAIN.

I just purchased Snow Runners and it is a weird mix of realistic and not realistic. not as real feeling as Beam.NG but good crawling.

Interface is a bit of a mess

I'm playing two games right now. Wing Commander Privateer and a second play through of FF7 Remake. I know there has been a lot of hate for the game, but I've really enjoyed it. I'm probably going to platinum it, and I never do that. =)

I just installed GTR Evolution (along with its companion RACE 07 and RACE 07 Formula RaceRoom) and its working as expected on my Mac, thanks to Wineskin Winery, which allowed me to install the Windows version of Steam (and therefore the Windows games, which does not have a Mac version).

I just couldn't run rFactor 2 - it installs and all, but keeps trying to install DirectX every time I try to run the Launcher and when it gets to the launcher, quits.

Yes, I know we have Steam for Mac, but I wanted the Windows games.

keropi wrote on 2020-05-01, 18:58:

Ni No Kuni II on PS4 , very nice jRPG that has a fairytale-like story so it's relaxing 🤣

This is on sale ATM (AU Steam anyway) and looks pretty cool - I do like an RPG but not sure I'm ready for a JRPG, tempted though for 25 bucks. We love a studio ghibli movie in this household so if I don't play one of the kids might!

Still suffering my way through Divinity: Original Sin but I really hope I start enjoying it more soon...

Also went back to Doom (2016) and hope to finish it soon.

badmojo wrote on 2020-05-02, 06:45:

keropi wrote on 2020-05-01, 18:58:

Ni No Kuni II on PS4 , very nice jRPG that has a fairytale-like story so it's relaxing 🤣

This is on sale ATM (AU Steam anyway) and looks pretty cool - I do like an RPG but not sure I'm ready for a JRPG, tempted though for 25 bucks. We love a studio ghibli movie in this household so if I don't play one of the kids might!

well in the 2nd part studio ghibli was not employed - but the devs did also a great job on it most likely because they gained experience from the 1st title 😁
Wrath of the White Witch is the 1st game , ps-store has the remastered version for 25eur as well and even though it also sounds a great game I am not a fan of turned-based combat systems so I passed on it
Revenant Kingdom the 2nd game not only offers real-time combat but there are also dodge mechanics so it's not just a button masher. It is a great game if you don't mind the cute-style world and the fairytale-like story 🤣

Shagittarius wrote on 2020-05-01, 19:34:

Operencia - Old School Turn based Might and Magic style modern game, good characters and excellent art, enjoying this one much.

Thanks for bringing this to my attention! I can't find enough of these kinds of modern RPGs (I'm running out of retro RPGs as I play through them all). Wishlisted.

2Mourty wrote on 2020-05-01, 23:56:

I'm playing two games right now. Wing Commander Privateer

How are you liking it? I played this when it was released and never got very far. Then a few years ago I played it again and could appreciate the trading aspect much more than when I was 24. I enjoyed it right up to the end when I couldn't win the final battle. In general, I remember the combat missions being much harder than any of the other Wing Commanders. It frustrated me to no end, tried the endgame battle again and again over several days, the finally gave up and accepted the "loser" ending.

I'm 4 hours into Wizardry 8 and 19 years later, it still lives up to my assessment of my favorite RPG of all-time. They took all the best parts of Wizardry 6 and 7 and streamlined it, making it a joy to interact with. All the interface quirks and limitations are gone, leaving only the creamy goodness. The graphics are just good enough to feel modernish (somewhere between the original Half-Life and Deus Ex). The level design is brilliant. The opening scene on the beach and the design of the Lower Monastery are brilliant. It feels like a real place with nothing seeming contrived or over-the-top. The sound effects are as good, if not better than anything in a modern RPG. The musical score is perfect--orchestral, catchy, and perfectly composed for the various moods of exploration, mystery and combat. The voice acting is incredible. You have dozens of voice actors to choose from for your characters, with options like aggressive, intellectual, burly, chaotic, cunning, eccentric, kindly, laidback, and loner. Each style has two male options and two female options, for a total of 36 choices. They throw out various comments as you explore and find things and it's quite entertaining. It helps bring the personalities of your character creations to life. And of course the turn-based combat is very satisfying. I can go on and on, but I won't.

FarCry 4

Remember starting this before when it came out and getting bored and nothing has changed. Will push myself to complete it though.

Bruninho wrote on 2020-05-02, 01:42:

I just installed GTR Evolution (along with its companion RACE 07 and RACE 07 Formula RaceRoom) and its working as expected on my Mac, thanks to Wineskin Winery, which allowed me to install the Windows version of Steam (and therefore the Windows games, which does not have a Mac version).

I just couldn't run rFactor 2 - it installs and all, but keeps trying to install DirectX every time I try to run the Launcher and when it gets to the launcher, quits.

Yes, I know we have Steam for Mac, but I wanted the Windows games.

About that... anyone know where is the exact forum section for questions related to Wine/Wineskin Winery? I have a few doubts about rFactor 2 on WINE and DX11. If I can't play with DX11 or can't play online, I'd rather revert to an old build with DX9 and play offline.

I've just finished Cloudpunk. This is easily one of the best games of the year for me. Intriguing story, beautiful graphics, amazing voice acting.
I absolutely love games with that Cyberpunk feeling.

After recently burning out a bit on Transport Tycoon Deluxe, I just discovered and fell in love with Sid Meier's Railroads which is much more like a boardgame if anything. I've not found a Firaxis game yet that isn't great.

WildW wrote on 2020-05-03, 06:33:

After recently burning out a bit on Transport Tycoon Deluxe, I just discovered and fell in love with Sid Meier's Railroads which is much more like a boardgame if anything. I've not found a Firaxis game yet that isn't great.

Civ: Beyond Earth for beginners, is pretty poor.

Restoring the rightful Anglo-Saxon rule and driving out the Viking invaders in Total War: Thrones or Britannia

Hey guys, big CRPG fan here. I've become quite addicted over the past year or so, having completed Wizardry 1-3+5, The Bard's Tale 1-4, Wasteland 1, and Ultima 1.

Right now I'm working on a few at the same time...

Dragon Wars (PC)
I just started this up a few days ago, but am really having a blast with it! The best way to describe it is Wasteland (use of skills, multiple solutions to problems) combined with The Bard's Tale (interface and perspective). The game has an automap, but it's really simple with no ability to add notes, etc.), so I've been mapping along on graph paper; if you have a better memory than I, the automap would probably be sufficient.

Ultima: Quest of the Avatar (Famicom)
I've also played (but not finished) the PC version. Now I know this is heresy, but I think I prefer the NES version of this one. You lose out on the keyword conversation system sadly, and there are some other major changes such as a reduced party size to four members and the fact that you have to tackle the Abyss solo. However, the combat is way less of a headache in the NES version as you can target any enemy in combat with ranged weapons, and the combat was the one thing that really turned me off from the PC version. Not having to manage food is nice, too, though food consumption (other than gremlins...) was not much of a big deal in the PC version.
I'm playing the Japanese Famicom version because the English US version has a significant bug, where INT and DEX are swapped, making the DEX-based classes very weak to start.
I've reached Avatarhood and have nearly all the items I'll need to complete the game, so now I'm going through the dungeons one by one.

Might and Magic Book One: The Secret of the Inner Sanctum (PC)
This is a game I have been playing on and off between other games over the last two years. It's just unbelievable massive, especially considering it was released in 1986! For such an old game, the interface is actually very friendly; this is helpful because the game is just enormous, with an overworld map of 20 16x16 square maps, many of which have their own separate towns, castles, and dungeons, each of which are themselves 16x16 square maps (some with multiple levels even). On top of that, the maps are all expertly designed with interesting layouts that are a joy to explore. There is simply no game that does exploration as well as M&M1 in my opinion!
Based on the amount of the overworld I've explored, I'd reckon I'm roughly halfway through the game.

Demon's Winter (C64)
A childhood favorite, though I never got anywhere in it as a kid. This time around I've made some excellent progress, though I'm still early on in the game. Fantastic atmosphere, especially in the C64/Apple II versions. I'm actually playing this on my actual C64 with disk images loaded on my Ultimate ii+.

newtmonkey wrote on 2020-05-06, 04:47:

Hey guys, big CRPG fan here. I've become quite addicted over the past year or so, having completed Wizardry 1-3+5, The Bard's T […]
Show full quote

Hey guys, big CRPG fan here. I've become quite addicted over the past year or so, having completed Wizardry 1-3+5, The Bard's Tale 1-4, Wasteland 1, and Ultima 1.

Right now I'm working on a few at the same time...

Dragon Wars (PC)
I just started this up a few days ago, but am really having a blast with it! The best way to describe it is Wasteland (use of skills, multiple solutions to problems) combined with The Bard's Tale (interface and perspective). The game has an automap, but it's really simple with no ability to add notes, etc.), so I've been mapping along on graph paper; if you have a better memory than I, the automap would probably be sufficient.

Ultima: Quest of the Avatar (Famicom)
I've also played (but not finished) the PC version. Now I know this is heresy, but I think I prefer the NES version of this one. You lose out on the keyword conversation system sadly, and there are some other major changes such as a reduced party size to four members and the fact that you have to tackle the Abyss solo. However, the combat is way less of a headache in the NES version as you can target any enemy in combat with ranged weapons, and the combat was the one thing that really turned me off from the PC version. Not having to manage food is nice, too, though food consumption (other than gremlins...) was not much of a big deal in the PC version.
I'm playing the Japanese Famicom version because the English US version has a significant bug, where INT and DEX are swapped, making the DEX-based classes very weak to start.
I've reached Avatarhood and have nearly all the items I'll need to complete the game, so now I'm going through the dungeons one by one.

Might and Magic Book One: The Secret of the Inner Sanctum (PC)
This is a game I have been playing on and off between other games over the last two years. It's just unbelievable massive, especially considering it was released in 1986! For such an old game, the interface is actually very friendly; this is helpful because the game is just enormous, with an overworld map of 20 16x16 square maps, many of which have their own separate towns, castles, and dungeons, each of which are themselves 16x16 square maps (some with multiple levels even). On top of that, the maps are all expertly designed with interesting layouts that are a joy to explore. There is simply no game that does exploration as well as M&M1 in my opinion!
Based on the amount of the overworld I've explored, I'd reckon I'm roughly halfway through the game.

Demon's Winter (C64)
A childhood favorite, though I never got anywhere in it as a kid. This time around I've made some excellent progress, though I'm still early on in the game. Fantastic atmosphere, especially in the C64/Apple II versions. I'm actually playing this on my actual C64 with disk images loaded on my Ultimate ii+.

Nice! Welcome, fellow RPG fan! I'm going through Wiz 6-8 at the moment. Finished 6 and 7, and just started 8 a couple of weeks ago. I too started my love for RPGs as a kid on the Apple II (mainly Ultima I-IV and Wiz 1-3), while my middle school friend had a C64 I'd go over and play at times. We loved comparing the same game on both systems. Of course the C64 was superior in all ways but load times (he had a cassette drive). And once I got the Mockingboard, music was roughly equal between the two. I'll look forward to reading your gaming posts in this thread!

Cheers!

clueless1 wrote on 2020-05-06, 10:34:

... I'll look forward to reading your gaming posts in this thread!

Cheers!

Thank you for the kind post, clueless1! Actually, it was your posts in this very thread that got me to join VOGONS and post here!
I'm looking forward to reading more of your Wizardry thoughts. I plan on playing Wizardry 6 once I complete Dragon Wars and Might & Magic Book One. 😀

DOOM.

A couple of things I've been playing...

Duke Nukem 1 -- Episode 1
What a fun little romp. I never got into this one much when I was a kid but the other day I was looking through some scrolling EGA games to test a new screen and got stuck on it. The graphics are colorful and I really like the slightly ham-fisted style in which all the sprites and objects are drawn. There's not all that many animation phases to everything, really just enough to get the idea of what is happening across, which gives the action a lean, pared-down kind of vibe. On the other hand there is really nice attention to detail like Duke kicking up dust when he lands a jump. The same goes for the enemies, even those pesky little helicopter drones. The mechanics are very tight for a PC platformer, with gratuitous air control, and you always have a very good feel for the timing and length of your jumps (which can't be said for many Apogee games) which makes for overall satisfying movement. I really admire the effectiveness of the PC speaker sound in Duke 1. It sounds light it's on the edge of clipping out, which ends up giving the effects a much fuller sound than is usually the case with the piezo.

I could write a lot more but I'm sure it's all been said before. Enemies and power-ups are reasonably are varied, the levels offer a nice progression and play with the available mechanics, including a lot of verticality ; only the end-boss is pretty lame.

I played Episode 2 as well, which is a lot less convincing, mainly because the levels are lame with no difficulty curve until the very last one which is pretty tough.

Bio Menace -- Episode 1
I remember really liking this one as a kid. It's equally colorful as Duke but offers slightly more advanced graphics and more interesting guns with the addition of grenades and mines. However, the gameplay is a lot less tight. The controls are floaty and the jumps feel awkward, which is a problem because the game becomes pretty unforgiving just a couple of levels in. I liked the variantion in enemies and levels, but the overall quality is a mixed-bag. I finished it but by the end I was pretty annoyed with the game...

Legend of the Sword
An adventure game from 1988, developed for Atari ST, Amiga and MS DOS. A group of heroes is dropped off on an island to find a mythical sword and shield combo which the king needs to fight the evil wizard threatening the land etc. etc. etc. so far so standard, but what a neat little game. I've only completed 10% according to the games' status info but there is a lot to like. It's really a text adventure with graphics, mouse interface and some convenience features like a map and "find" and "goto" commands (you can even change the colour values of the text and background!). The graphics are nice chunky, naive EGA goodness and, in my book, if the game interface doesn't piss you off 32 years after the fact then it has to be at least decent. So far there's been forests, beaches, crumbling hilltop keeps and a shack with a secret tunnel to explore and I've been defrauded by a talking bird. The descriptions are on-point and don't take themselves too seriously but there also haven't been any cringy self-conscious jokes so far. The game even comes with a pretty inoffensive novellette that has the heroes swap stories while laid up at a tavern, Decamerone-style.