Octopus Overlords

This probably doesn't need it's own thread at this point but I'd like to give a shout out to a little one dev indie game I've been playing a lot lately:
Bloodlust Shadowhunter



It's basically a mix of Vampire the Masquerade RPG, dungeon crawling, a random loot system with equipment gem slots, minions to fight for you, factions with reputation, quests, puzzles and more. It really is quite a lot of fun. Now, there are a few issues with the stiff character animations but I'm not as picky as some on that kind of stuff and overall it's an incredible effort from one person. It's built using Unreal Engine and the graphics are very solid for an indie. There are quite a lot of dungeons and areas and they are essentially bottomless/endless. People have explored some those below level 300. The lower you go, the better the loot you find.

The loot system is kind of like Borderlands with common, magic, rare, unique items you can find. There are ways to enhance and change stuff you find in a variety of ways. Overall, I've found it to be a lot of fun and the vibe/atmosphere is very similar to Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines. There's a ton of stuff to do even without the main quest/story. Check it out if you like this kind of game. I picked it up on sale last week and so far it's been more than worth the $9 I spent on it. The best part is the dev is currently working on a sequel with MP Coop.

Interesting. Hadn't heard of it. Thanks for posting it.

Since we're creeping closer to the holidays...I'm not normally into the whole statue/figure thing, but Dark Horse is releasing a series of 8"+ figures from The Witcher for around $30 each. Geralt just arrived and it looks pretty damn amazing. Definitely a nice addition to the gaming area.

Wow, that is really nice.

My internet provider upgraded my speed to a faster level. Now I'm going and uninstalling a lot of my bigger games and reinstalling them.
I uninstalled the mods for Civ 5...........780megs worth.

Devs....if you make a game that I have to go through a door but depend on a NPC to open that door then make them smart enough to actually do it and not simply stand there running against that damn door.

Second...as pertains to the above......also give me save anywhere because if the save is auto and on the other side of that door Im going to be mad.

Rather than create a whole embarrassing thread for the annual Interactive Fiction Competition (IFComp) like I usually do, I'll just make an embarrassing little post here.

I only had the chance to play 10 of the 58 games in IFComp 2016. I gave high ratings to Black Rock City (vignettes of Burning Man), Ash (losing a parent), and Cactus Blue Motel (weird).

Cactus Blue Motel got third place, but the first and second place went to games I hadn't played during the judging period: Detectiveland and Color the Truth. Both are detective games. I've now played them briefly. They seem OK and have some interesting innovations but don't really grab me.

Haven't read this thread but I wanted in. Three and a half years late.

Hipolito wrote:Rather than create a whole embarrassing thread for the annual Interactive Fiction Competition (IFComp) like I usually do, I'll just make an embarrassing little post here.

Ah... was wondering when you would make your annual appearance. Still appreciated, even if little and embarrassing.

When you rearrange your Steam wishlist for 30 min dont look at another page before you save it.

Isn't it ridiculous how it doesn't save as you go? Second only to the fact that the Steam store still does not have a "sort by discount" button.

MonkeyFinger wrote:

Hipolito wrote:Rather than create a whole embarrassing thread for the annual Interactive Fiction Competition (IFComp) like I usually do, I'll just make an embarrassing little post here.

Ah... was wondering when you would make your annual appearance. Still appreciated, even if little and embarrassing.

Thank you, MonkeyFinger.

JetFred wrote:Isn't it ridiculous how it doesn't save as you go? Second only to the fact that the Steam store still does not have a "sort by discount" button.

Would be nice. At least this site has ya covered on that.

https://steamdb.info/sales/

So, as part of the Steam Thanksgiving sale, I got a bunch of DiRT games, including Colin McRae Rally. I've never played any of those games and I thought that the version of Colin McRae Rally was an updated version of the first one first released in 1998. It isn't. Apparently this is a PC port of the mobile game, which is completely different. It's more of a hybrid between the first and second game in terms of content, but only has 4 cars; the four 4WD cars. It's a fun game though for what it is, and I'm glad I didn't pay more for it than I did. Just wanted to forewarn anybody thinking this might be a trip down memory lane.

Has anyone played with steams spectator stuff?

When I discovered it I watched Fretmoot playing Dota2 (but Dota2 has built in spectator options) and tgb playing a hex based wargame. I think it was Warhammer Armageddon.

My impression was like "holly crap, this is totally cool" but then I completely forgot about it.

Just curious if anyone spends their leisure time watching others play video games, live?

My 9 year old spends hours watching Minecraft Dad, so yes.

Just curious if anyone spends their leisure time watching others play video games, live?

I watch a few Twitch streamers.

I watch Twitch routinely.

If I don't feel like watching shows while I play games, a lot of times I'll throw on a Youtuber playing games. It's a great way to see different strategies to play games I own, see what games I'm curious about play like, and to vicariously replay old games I don't have the time to replay myself.

I constantly watch videos of games being played for strategic purposes. My kids watch them for entertainment.

I just thought it was cool to look at my friends list, see what people were playing and then ask them if it is ok if I watch them play.

I like Twitch when I'm working out. It gives something halfway interesting that doesn't require my full attention.

Live? Nope. And the only time I sat through Let's Play for entertainment was I watched about 30 hours of KSP because Scott Manly did such an awesome presentation.

Blackhawk wrote:I like Twitch when I'm working out. It gives something halfway interesting that doesn't require my full attention.

Same, I watch twitch (mostly Hearthstone) when working out or doing something around the house that is boring. I have my standard twitch streamers that I enjoy watching.

Interesting, because I prefer audio when working out (when I used to work out anyway).

I watch let's play videos while doing the dishes.

LordMortis wrote:Live? Nope. And the only time I sat through Let's Play for entertainment was I watched about 30 hours of KSP because Scott Manly did such an awesome presentation.

He did a good KSP video with Miss Spacegirl herself Amy Shira Teitel .

Daehawk wrote:

LordMortis wrote:Live? Nope. And the only time I sat through Let's Play for entertainment was I watched about 30 hours of KSP because Scott Manly did such an awesome presentation.

He did a good KSP video with Miss Spacegirl herself Amy Shira Teitel .

Unfortunately Manly is now doing that thing I hate, where the presenter puts themselves in an inset window on the screen. Do I really need to lose valuable screen real estate to see someone's image for the length of the video?

jztemple2 wrote:

Daehawk wrote:

LordMortis wrote:Live? Nope. And the only time I sat through Let's Play for entertainment was I watched about 30 hours of KSP because Scott Manly did such an awesome presentation.

He did a good KSP video with Miss Spacegirl herself Amy Shira Teitel .

Unfortunately Manly is now doing that thing I hate, where the presenter puts themselves in an inset window on the screen. Do I really need to lose valuable screen real estate to see someone's image for the length of the video?

If he's trying to monetize his videos, then the answer is probably "Yes" since part of succeeding at that involves promoting himself as a personality (i.e. he needs to make himself the product, not just the videos). It's probably a bigger deal with live streaming, where he'd be interacting with the audience via chat, but it probably helps in building his brand with things like youtube videos as well.

I'm actually fine with PiP of the player's head. People who's voice annoy me are a far bigger issue and more likely to get me to stop watching that a two-feed video.

Of course so far I've only come across fairly small windows for the player. If it were obnoxiously large then we'd have a problem.

I watch outside Xbox videos because I like the presenters, and even though the video of them playing the game is obnoxiously large, I don't mind so much because I like them and I'm really just watching to hear what they have to say rather than watch the game itself.

GreenGoo wrote:Just curious if anyone spends their leisure time watching others play video games, live?

Live, not so much. Put I do spend a quite a bit of time watching Let's Plays on YouTube.

All too often though I find myself thinking, "man, this looks like a ton of fun, I should buy this game" only to remember that I don't have any friends to play it with (well, except for one but he almost never has the time to play anything) so why bother?

...But watching other people have fun is almost as good.

GreenGoo wrote:Just curious if anyone spends their leisure time watching others play video games, live?

I watch youtubers that 'teach' and explain game\character builds .. do the math for me .. answer the why's and wherefore's of how something is better than something else in-game. You don't get alot of that in a twitch stream .. and a lot of twitch streamers seem to be there to watch the donations roll in more than even playing or enjoying the game in front of them.

If it's a 'let's play' and they are not 'splaining stuff .. they need to have an intelligent (non-annoying) banter ... twitch streamers are often not saying anything except acknowledging new subscribers

There's some truth to that, but other than getting an overview of a new game, the main reason to watch Twitch is for entertainment, not intellectual enrichment. I go to YouTube if I want advice on building my Fallout 4 settlements. I go to Twitch when I need a background activity that consists mostly of the streamer being entertaining.

Come travel back in time with me a little bit to the year 2007 and IGN's list of missing PC games . These are games that should have been made by then but weren't. Games like Diablo 3 and Duke Nukem Forever. I actually went to the story because of Mechwarrior 5 should have been made. And now here we are in 2016. Just 9 years later Its been 16 (2000) years since MW4.

I still dream of an arcade building owning managing sim that lets me recreate both my favorite local arcade and Flynns from Tron.

There's something quite cathartic and relaxing about cruising the wastes in Mad Max. The roar of the engine, blowing dust, and peace - punctuated by intense moments of violence. It's nice. I'm enjoying it enough to dawdle and not just chase the story.

Brian wrote:...But watching other people have fun is almost as good.

I do this with board games all of the time. I think people think I'm odd. I like to go to gaming groups and watch other people play and watch strategies develop watch people have fun. The only problem is that I have to check myself on kibitzing, trying to better understand the game and the people playing it, for which I am getting much better.

It's not the same watching people play on youtube, though.

LordMortis wrote:

Brian wrote:...But watching other people have fun is almost as good.

I do this with board games all of the time. I think people think I'm odd. I like to go to gaming groups and watch other people play and watch strategies develop watch people have fun. The only problem is that I have to check myself on kibitzing, trying to better understand the game and the people playing it, for which I am getting much better.

It's not the same watching people play on youtube, though.

I do that at board game meetups as well. Nobody has harmed me for offering rules corrections yet... but I think I have come close a couple times.

Ahh, Rockstar. I love your games, but your social club is shit. If it takes me a half hour of wrestling with your activation server each time I want to play your games, I think you need to rethink your strategy. It feels like there's a disconnect between their activation server and their login server and half the time it throws up an activation message despite the fact that I've already activated said game. Really needs to be a smoother and more transparent process. Besides which, it keeps forgetting who I am each time I launch the game even though I have the whole login process set to automatically login.

Rockstar possibly has the worst implementation of online DRM that I've seen.

Yeah, bad timing in particular for a friend and I.

I bought a friend of mine a copy of GTA V as an early Christmas gift last month and last night he FINALLY had some free time to play (he and his wife are fostering a handful of troubled/special needs kids so he never has any free time) and we couldn't get logged on.

We did end up playing R6:Siege for a bit so still had some fun but damn I wanted to get some GTA time in with him.

Yeah, taking the issues into account, I'm surprised at how GTA Online is popular and that people put up with the social club constantly. What a pain in the ass that thing is.

I think part of it has something to do with linking accounts, and if that's the case, I don't think the linking of accounts is ready for primetime, in general. I've seen other issues with linking accounts with MS and Skype; they're now forcing the linking of the two accounts, yet can't figure out how to make it work smoothly and as such it keeps forgetting my password and some details even though technically they should be part of the same system. Having my PSN and PC linked to it seems to cause problems, even though they're never used at the same time.

And then the login: It sometimes takes forever to check the activation server, and then if it does, perhaps due to a timeout, throws up an activation message. During the times it does work, there's not enough confirmation of anything happening in the background. Meanwhile, it likes to throw in a login screen, making one think the login isn't working. So the user is presented with a dilemma. Is the login working? Do I enter the username and password? Or do I wait? Waiting is usually the thing to do, but the user doesn't have any indication of that. Eventually though, it kicks in and the game loads. Would help if the activation server talked with the login server, but it doesn't seem to be the case.

Hilariously though, the other night I logged into the social club website to check something and it logged me out of the game, and had to go through the whole rigmarole again. Seriously, Rockstar!

Years ago that thing about drove me crazy. As far as I know Ive had no trouble with it in a long time. GTA V and GTA Online both log me right in.