Looks good! I plan on downloading the DLC when I get home today

The Indivisible prototype is now free on Steam! No more excuses, now, JRPG fans, check it out and fund this already.

I wrote a short review here: http://steamcommunity.com/id/morriganst ... ed/421830/

I agree with you on some parts here. The Witcher 3 is more of an action/adventure game than a true RPG. You're limited in the kind of character you can build, combat ends up getting repetetive, exploration is limited by a lack of dungeons, it's not perfect. That said, I can't begin to understand problems with the writing and presentation, ESPECIALLY compared to a Bethesda game (come on, the story in Skyrim boils down to "hero slays the dragon"). I might be biased as a long time fan of the Witcher series and Sapkowski's books, but everything about the story, characterization, choices, and even the minor quests was superior in Witcher 3. Not really going to comment on the other games you mentioned, because my comparison was between Witcher, and Fallout, but I do agree, all better RPGs than both games and with fantastic writing. But I just don't understand how a sane person could say that Preston Garvey for example is a better character than even some of the most trivial quest givers in Witcher 3. Or that the quests themselves were in any way more dynamic, because they are almost all about clearing dungeons, finding an item, and occasionally passing a lucky charisma check. If I've missed something, let me know.

I guess my biggest problem with Fallout 4 is that it doesn't feel like Fallout. It's another formulaic Bethesda title, vast as an ocean but deep as a puddle, with a big headline that says "OPEN WORLD WHERE YOU CAN DO ANYTHING!" but the small print promises a very simplistic gameplay experience. I don't feel like I can play a suave con man or a handy survivalist like in the past. The game is geared towards FPS players, maybe the kind that prefer Borderlands or Bioshock over COD, but still not RPG players. Coming from Fallout 1 and 2 and even New Vegas, it just feels lacking in the things I want in a Fallout experience. To me it's almost like FromSoftware saying "You know, Dark Souls is too hard for people, so let's make it really simple so we can reach a bigger demographic."

So Fallout 4 is more like Fallout 3 than New Vegas, then?

It's definitely more like Fallout 3, but even Fallout 3 gave you more options to use your unique build. I have not encountered a single instance to use my high intelligence or luck (some of my go-to stats from previous Fallouts). The perks are basically unlockables (Science lets you unlock 3 levels of craftable energy weapons, Gun Nut lets you unlock various levels of ballistic guns, etc.) I've found very few instances to use speech to complete a quest, and when I do I can just keep reloading until I pass the RNG check. There is no hardcore mode even as an option like New Vegas, so my companions are invincible and I can sleep for an hour to cure two broken legs and a head wound. They've done some really cringeworthy stuff with the lore too, like a giant Brotherhood of Steel airship that looks straight out of Final Fantasy. But hey, at least it's a big world to explore, right?

Overall it isn't even an awful game, just a bad Fallout game. It is Fallout in name only at this point and plays more like Skyrim turned into a Borderlands clone.

Man, I can't wait for the full game. The JRPG field is so barren these days, and not many games utilize a Middle Eastern-esque aesthetic (which more should, 'cause it's cool). I'ma have to find the place to insert my dollars, because I want it.

And the story in TW3 boils down to:

I don't like Skyrim and the last Beth game I truly loved was Morrowind, but the broad strokes of Skyrim were just as idiotic as those in TW3; in fact, in some ways they were even less egregious. Seriously, that final confrontation between Eredin and Geralt belonged in a Saturday morning cartoon, not in a self-proclaimed "intelligent" video game. I don't think there was a single conversation in Skyrim that reached that level of stupid.

Sapkowski disowned the video games. Personally, I'll take Witcher 2's narrative over Sapkowski's (but I've only read the English translations for Blood of Elves and Last Wish), but they're not really even comparable. They're two very different things.

No, I agree. Even Morrowind, which I love dearly, had almost no characters who weren't walking textbooks with the personality of a bar of soap. I think FO4 may actually have their best writing to date, but that's really not saying much. Preston did strike me as being the single worst main character, though. Well, with the exception of that sunglasses-wearing "wisecracker" in the Railroad camp; holy shit was it great when I got to... well... you know. But yeah I agree, TW3 had much better flavor writing, buuuut....

I disagree with this. Quest design and interaction et al is far, far better in FO4. I love that there are four major factions, all with a slew of exclusive quests, items and abilities. Quests don't give you a stupid GPS to your coordinates every step of the way, you actually have to pay attention to your environment, and you have to find alternate solutions all by your lonesome. I love how stealth is actually viable. I love how enemies don't really scale but there's also no damage reduction buffs like there were in TW3. I love how difficulty affects heal rate and also Legendary Enemy chance, who drop the best gear, effectively making that difficulty mode the hardest for the first half of the game, but becoming the most overpowered by the ending. The list goes on and on. Fallout 4 has superior GAMEPLAY to TW3 in almost every way. But if graphics, atmosphere, cutscenes and incidental writing are what you prefer in your games, Witcher 3 generally does that better.

If there's anyone here interested on PC strategy games, i just started playing Civilization V and I have to say I'm impressed by the game. It's incredibly complete, it has a good set of difficulty for those who are newbies on strategy games. Graphics aren't that bad, they aren't the main feature though.
I have to say these kinda games aren't for every person, some people may get bored on the pace and the timing in which the game develops the events. But there may be people who enjoy these in games too, for those i assure you and bet my fuckin' ass, you are going to enjoy this game.
There are some requirements your computer needs to accomplish to enjoy properly the whole experience. It runs better with a good Intel processor and there's not much about the hardware besides of it.
If I convinced you and feel like wanna play it, prepare yourself for at least 100 hours of history, great battles, strategy, great choices for your people and great political interactions.
I'm having such great time playing that game, I hope you, whoever is reading, have the same amount of great times when playing it.
If you wanna know more, here they're some reviews with grades on the game from international magazines.
I know the game is an oldie but you can still enjoy it!!!

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/sid-m ... lization-v

http://www.ign.com/games/sid-meiers-civ ... v/pc-62125

And I leave here some images.





Weeeeeel I'm not quite sure how does one post images here, but... weeellll I'm sure you can find them online

You make some good points, and a lot of it will just come down to subjective preferences. I'm not a big fan of FPS gameplay, but then again I also think that Witcher's combat has always been simplistic at best. Witcher 3 combat is easy. Cast quen, attack, roll away, recast quen, repeat. Almost nothing else needs to be used except on certain enemies, My go-to series for good combat mechanics is Dark Souls, and if the Witcher had tapped into that a bit more (I believe it easily could have if they tried), the gameplay would have been more engaging. That said, I find the combat in both games enjoyable. Combat is Fallout 4's biggest strength. In my original post, which was centered mostly on why I feel Fallout 4 is lacking, my main point of bringing up Witcher 3 WAS the presentation. By that I mean exactly what you say, graphics, atmosphere, cutscenes, and incidental writing. Those parts were better. I have some issues with the way that Fallout 4's characters are only a bit less wooden than in the past (some are admittedly great, I like Nick Valentine in particular). It's the little things I suppose, and it detracts from immersion that I had with Witcher 3, which was really the only point of comparison I intended. I didn't mean to imply one was a better overall game than the other. I like both, but for different reasons. (And yes, they really did screw up Eredin compared to his much more nuanced role in the books. Avalla'ch too for that matter. But even though Sapkowski doesn't consider the games canon, I think they are a mostly good and faithful adaptation of his characters in a new story arc).

For example, I like the way Witcher 3 keeps track of your interactions with people. In Fallout 4, I meet people for the first time and my main character addresses them by name when I click on them. In Vault 81, I met the teacher Katy who gives you the "Short Stories" quest. When we first spoke, she introduced herself, we chatted, and she asked me to speak to her students. I agreed, went through the quest, and got my reward. Curious to see if there was any more to this character, I spoke to her again, and just got the generic banter "You must be the outsider everyone has been talking about. You must have a lot of stories." I could never get past the fact that the main character's 200 year nap is pretty much instantly forgotten for most of the game, and that he comes out utterly unimpressed. One "Holy shit" and a short conversation with Cogsworth and ok, I've accepted this new world. When I'm talking about quests, I mean that Witcher 3's quests tend to have more personality. There's a story behind almost every one, often with strange twists and choices involved. Fallout 4 does this too, but not nearly as often. Most of the time it just involves clearing a dungeon or finding an item, maybe with some scripted scenes attached to it. It's not exactly the gameplay itself that is the problem. Dungeons are pretty varied, the gameplay is enjoyable. My issue was that it never lets you forget that you are playing a game, and that is something that I feel like Witcher 3 did, even if it oftentimes came off as more as an interactive movie.

But then again, this is all the kind of stuff I expect in a Bethesda game, and not really my main complaint when it comes to Fallout 4. My problem is the way it was dumbed down and just not giving me the Fallout vibe. My other posts already kind of detail it enough, but it's the oversimplification of RPG elements that pushes you into a mostly combat oriented role, because the shooting mechanics are good enough now that you shouldn't need to use speech or repair or whatever else you might want to use.

Uh... I linked it countless times before but here it is again:
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/indi ... rls#/story
You don't even need an IGG account, just a Paypal will do (it's better to have an account in case you want to change your pledge amount later, of course).

Oh hey, looks like Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon is free for PS+ members in December.
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2015/11/ ... mber-2015/

Not a big fan of this style of game, but if you are, there ya go.

Eww no thanks.

I'm interested in Gauntlet, though. A coop looting hack-and-slash, could be fun. I've had my eye on it on Steam for a while, but it's likely to be even better in couch coop.

Also, people were bitching about the "episode 1" part of King's Quest, but unlike Telltale games and other episodic games, it appears this episode 1 has quite the meaningful amount of content (according to Howlongtobeat.com, it's about 5 hours, vs 1-3 hours for other typical "episodic" games), plus it was critically acclaimed, so it's not as throwaway a freebie as it might appear.

Further progressing into the Bloodborne DLC. Beat 3 bosses so far.

Really tempted to click those videos..... But I'm not gonna. Knowing one of the bosses and some of the new weapons is spoilerish enough for me.

I like Kah's videos but yeah I'm not gonna watch anymore of then less I need some help. The ones from the other day were good but totally spoiled the first boss for me.

Blood Dragon fuckin' ruled. If you like awesome 80's action movies and had fun playing Borderlands I'd say you're really missing out by not playing it.

Yeah, don't let the disgusting racism and sexism and generally dogshit writing of Far Cry 3 put you off Blood Dragon; it's about as far removed from that as possible. The fact it's a Ubisoft game that does nothing but make fun of Ubisoft Game should at least make it worth the asking price of nothing. Great soundtrack too even if it's Power Glove's least-awesome release.

The weird thing about Far Cry 3 was that it had some excellent character writing - the villains were great, the Aldous Huxley style drugged-out scientist guy was great, your German mercenary buddy was great, the supposedly CIA undercover operative burnout guy was great, but then you're some douchebro who gets powerups in the form of tribal tattoos. It's the weirdest combination of genuinely awesome and incredibly stupid. The gameplay was fun and I don't regret getting it, but I can't wholeheartedly recommend the game.

Blood Dragon on the other hand is just plain awesome all around.

Tried the demo a while back, I found it annoying to play and very try-hard in the humour. Pass.

Mechanically, Far Cry 3 is really awesome. The whole execution system was well designed. I absolutely loved pinging one guy with an arrow, then immediately running up to another dude and doing backstab execution chains. And don't forget to pull the grenade pin on the final guy and kick him into a group of other dudes to explode 'em all! Man, that game was so fun to play.

Help? This is my first run through. So I am not very knowledgeable about the DLC yet And yeah definitely avoid if you don't want spoilers.

McIntosh?

What the fuck is racist or sexist about farcry 3?

Dude I watched you spank Ludwig on your second go of it... so yeah if I need help.

Honestly I think fallout 4 is more of an rpg than the witcher 3, Bethesda games are more about giving you a framework to roleplay and create your own stories (maybe they should give up having main stories all together, fo4 would make more ensense if it just left you to go around doing what you want and not telling you that you need to go find your son), whereas witchery 3 is still pretty railroad, the main quest is linear and is the meat of the game, all there really is to do outside of that is side quests, fo4 is a world where you can find somewhere to call home and go out and make your own adventures as opposed to set piece quests like witcher 3

Are you serious? It's the most textbook example of the "mighty whitey" trope I've ever seen in a game.

Oh yeh white people aren't allowed to kill any other skin colour but white in video games, i forgot.

Wouldn't want poor helpless minorities to be offended.

Again, not really comparing gameplay mechanics between the two. As a long time RPG player I consider Fallout 4 a sandbox shooter and Witcher 3 an action adventure game. Personally, I really dislike the perk system, and BOTH games use a kind of version of it. Instead of having direct control over your character's development, you get little bonuses. It's an RPG mechanic sure, but I can give you a ton of games that have similar systems that nobody would ever dream of calling an RPG.

As far as the open world thing goes, Bethesda's biggest issue is believing that "open world" is all that makes an RPG. That makes it a sandbox. You can explore a lot in Farcry 3 and GTA5 as well. As far as story goes, I agree, Witcher 3 tends to keep you more on track, whereas Fallout 4 gives you tons of distractions just like all their other games. However, both are on rails, both give you little choice over who your character is (you get to make choices, and some are compelling ones, but they don't really change your character) without the karma system or any real faction rating. So yeah, you can roam more in Fallout 4, but eventually you have to get back on the train, whereas Witcher 3 tries to keep you on most of the time.

It's not really that, so much as the fact that having a regular white dude show up and beat a bunch of millennial tribal warriors at their own game after just a bit of training is a pretty tired and annoying cliché, and an easily avoided one, at that, what with Far Cry 4 having an Asian protagonist fighting, you know, other Asians.

On a different note, for those getting the Old Hunters DLC for Bloodborne..... Remember how I said a few posts earlier that I knew one of the bosses? Yeah..... That was only halfway true. There's a really cool surprise mid-way through a certain fight. People familiar with the Souls games are sure to crack a smile

That simply isn't true; the bullshit binary moral choice system was removed in favor of the companion influence system (which not only makes way more sense but also gives you a compelling reason to adhere to it beyond a niggling sense of ill-at-ease) and not only are there FOUR major factions (vs. New Vegas's three), each one makes the entire final act of the game play out differently, with loads of exclusive quests, abilities and gear specific to the faction you side with. And you can only side with one, although each faction gives you a few "non-committal" quests to get a feel for each.

I have loads of problems with Fallout 4 but those are two areas that were unequivocal improvements, imho.

I'm actually replaying New Vegas right now and I'm impressed by how much Bethesda took from Obsidian to make Fallout 4. Pretty much everything is there except ammo crafting. Oh, and quality writing with characters you actually care about. Maybe they're saving that for DLC.


Fun fact: Vaas, the villain so loved by the game and fanbase he's basically the entire face of Far Cry 3, was both played by the actor and made to look like Vic, the creepy ex-boyfiend of Sarah in Orphan Black. Great actor, great character, great villain.

I may not have got far enough to see how the factions intertwine, but I think the companion rep is a joke. You can make Cait fall in love with you just by picking locks! That is enough for me to not take it seriously.

That said, moral ambiguity is definitely more interesting than good and evil, and Fallout 3's moral choices were even more laughable than anything I've encountered in 4. Still can't help but feel like my character is being directed to generally fit a certain mold instead of "complete freedom to do whatever you want."

Yeah, the faction interaction is definitely the best thing Fallout 4 has going for it outside of the combat. It's actually quite a bit more intricate than Fallout: New Vegas's faction system once you really dig into it.

I prefer companion rep to an all-knowing binary karma god who deigns that shooting a sweet old grandmother in the face carries the exact same weight as giving a homeless person a bottle of water. You could probably get Cait to wanna bang you by successfully picking about 10,000 locks... or you could just make certain choices in conversation and activity that she'd approve of based on her personality, just like any other RPG that uses an Influence stat.

You can tell that Obsidian fucking hated the Karma system and they probably wanted to remove it altogether but I bet Bethesda said no.

The dialog wheel is by far the worst part, but if you're on PC you can download a mod that fixes it. Sure, you're still stuck to four options but at least you know exactly what you're gonna say and you can use the number keys. So. That's nice at least.

There's nothing wrong with using a dialogue wheel. Somebody says some shit to you, you're given four different kinds of responses in return. What the hell else do you need?

Yeah well the last boss spanked me a bunch of times. And I died quite a bit on the way there. You can probably hear how annoyed I am in my voice at times. Hah hah.




I'm kind of glad I spoiled myself a little bit by checking out preview pics because I know I'm missing some stuff based on the things that I haven't found yet. So I think I'm done with the linear path for the DLC but there's a lot more to discover it seems.

agreed. Feels like you barely have a choice in a lot of the games with dialogue wheels. This is the way to do it. I don't think dialogue wheels are inherently a problem, but they tend to go along with the whole dumbing down/console-itis.

To be fair though, Obsidian's other games (mainly New Vegas and KOTOR 2) were heavily console-oriented games but had almost as elaborate skill checks in dialog as Pillars. And in fact, Alpha Protocol had one of the best dialog systems I've seen in gaming regardless of generation and that was not only heavily consolized but also was conveyed through a dialog wheel.

But I can't deny you're not likely to see something like Pillars of Eternity show up on consoles anytime... ever. But look, Divinity: Original Sin and Wasteland 2 made the jump to consoles, so...

Yeah, consoles are incapable of rendering a list of text choices. Moreover, the previous dialogue systems of Fallout 3 and Fallout NV disappeared on the PS3 versions somehow.

Finished Deus Ex: Human Revolution today. Really awesome gameplay and I also like the detailed story even though it was predictable. The boss battles were fucking ridiculous though. One cool thing was hacking computers and reading people's emails. Overall, a great game but had the potential to be even better

I'd rather have four distinct (or six), different responses than fucking twelve responses that are kind of different. Different strokes for different folks.

I'm not going to lie and say four responses account for every kind of response what could possibly have, but often I find anymore than that to be completely fucking unnecessary to the problem I'm dealing with at hand. It works for Fallout 4 mostly because conversations are where you either try to persuade or get additional information.

Not to mention the games that have 10+ dialogue options for each decision may be neat in that regard, but they almost always have slow, unintuitive, clunky, goofy, stupid, micromanage-y bullshit, equip boots mid-fight TOTES REALZ YO combat systems. Fuck. That.