RMWeb Gamer's Lounge.

[Corbs]

John can't swim, because in RDR he wasn't able to (presumably to limit movement or avoid having to build in a swimming ability or model underwater areas), and since RDRII is a prequel it makes sense to carry that over. Arthur teases him about it in some cut scenes.

I found that Arthur was able to swim quite far, but as soon as that stamina meter goes you're a goner  

[Classsix T]

Ah, that explains it perfectly, thanx Corbs.

 

C6T.

[Classsix T]

The first game release date to go on the 2019 wall planner has been Days Gone (April 26th), however, whilst looking up which EA Sports personality might be next to have his collar felt by the law, I stumbled across Anthem which looks pretty cool, EA's involvement notwithstanding.

 

Further browsing of linked searches etc revealed that February could be quite a month for gamers, here's a purloined list for the month:

 

Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown (PC) – Feb 1

 

Etrian Odyssey: Nexus (3DS) – Feb 5

 

The Occupation (PS4, Xbox One, PC) – Feb 5

 

The Walking Dead (PS4, Xbox One) – Feb 6

 

Total War: Three Kingdoms (PC) – Feb 7

 

BlazBlue: Central Fiction (Switch) - Feb 7

 

God Eater 3 (PS4, PC) – Feb 8

 

Monster Energy Supercross 2 (PS4, Xbox One, Switch, PC) – Feb 8

 

Trials Rising (PS4, Xbox One, Switch, PC) – Feb 12

 

Civilization VI: Gathering Storm (PC) – Feb 14

 

Crackdown 3 (Xbox One, PC) – Feb 15

 

Far Cry: New Dawn (PS4, Xbox One, PC) – Feb 15

 

Jump Force (PS4, Xbox One, PC) – Feb 15

 

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy (Switch, PS4, Xbox One) - Feb 21

 

Anthem (PS4, Xbox One, PC) – Feb 22

 

Metro Exodus (PS4, Xbox One, PC ) – Feb 22

 

Anno 1800 (PC) – Feb 26

 

Dirt Rally 2.0 (PS4, Xbox One, PC) – Feb 26

 

Lego Movie 2 Videogame (Switch, PS4, Xbox One) - Feb 26

 

The start of the month (1st-3rd) sees a publicly available free download demo of Anthem which I'll be sure to try.

Besides that Metro Exodus looks interesting. I'm led to believe this will be the third installment of the franchise, can anyone recommend (or otherwise) on the basis of having played the previous games?

 

C6T.

[Classsix T]

Ooh, my right thumb tip is still numb after the weekend!

 

Anthem, well it ain't Mass Effect kids...but the ghost of it lives on, kinda.

I'm not completely sold but am sorely tempted. In the main, it was good fun, mostly. On-line the naysayers are prominently in vocal in their dislike (as with all things) and to a degree none of them are incorrect. But then games as an artform, by definition must be experienced before they can be critiqued. And we'll all come away with different perspectives.

 

I'm not a doctor though friends and I strongly suspect my unfeeling thumb didn't come about by Anthem alone, more the fact to play Anthem I needed to sign up to PlayStation Network (combat takes place using EA servers). OK I can't have a 14 day free trial, s'pose I better fling Sony seven quid for the month then (for a three day demo).

 

...well whilst I'm signed up, I wonder what RDR2 online and Grand Turismo Sport online races are like...

 

My poor thumb. Do nerve endings mend..?

 

C6T. 

[Clagsniffer]

I had been following the development of Anthem, but I’ve really gone off EA. They just seem such a scummy company. Never really forgiven them for messing up mass effect to be fair. I actually have less and less faith with the majority of big game companies now that I struggle to get excited for games like I used to. So much so in fact that I’m playing through older games instead. I’ve just started playing L.A. Noire again, absolutely brilliant game. I also play a lot of World Of Tanks, so much fun!

[Classsix T]

I absolutely get where you're coming from Clagsniffer, I've no love for Electronic Arts either. 

I detest what they did to Mass Effect, but, we are where we are. 

 

Square Enix haven't treated the Deus-Ex franchise with much respect to the fanbase either BTW.

 

C6T. 

[beast66606]

14 hours ago, Clagsniffer said:

I had been following the development of Anthem, but I’ve really gone off EA. They just seem such a scummy company. Never really forgiven them for messing up mass effect to be fair. I actually have less and less faith with the majority of big game companies now that I struggle to get excited for games like I used to. So much so in fact that I’m playing through older games instead. I’ve just started playing L.A. Noire again, absolutely brilliant game. I also play a lot of World Of Tanks, so much fun!

 

I've been playing Burger Time on an emulator ! (MAME)

[Classsix T]

On a purely personal level, I hope Anthem does OK for BioWare. I doubt it'll sell in huge amounts for a number of reasons:

 

Not dissimilar to Destiny

 

Ticked off Mass Effect fans

 

Fear of EA monetisation (though having been spanked over loot boxes, they've promised they won't)

 

Plus other performance and gameplay fears people have voiced and indeed, I experienced on Sunday

 

But the game's failure won't do anyone any favours, and if EA decided to fold BioWare as a consequence, what chances then a Mass Effect follow up?

I'm cagey about Anthem on the basis the game itself is gonna cost anything up to sixty quid to initially buy, but an additional minimum of fifty notes per annum necessary for PSN subscription to play. Mind you, that's just me showing my age, fiscal rigidity (tightness!) and naivety wrt necessarily on-line gaming.

Having played Anthem's demo, the Mass Effect model of a cpu/ai team at your command just wouldn't work given the play arenas.

Also, as far as I can tell, Anthem may not have the vital ingredient for me of a cracking story to tell. In my favourite games I literally MUST find out what happens next to Shepard/Ellie/Adam/Nathan/Aloy. But maybe that's me being naive again and this isn't a story led journey, it's essentially Space Invaders/Asteroids/Pac-Man. Kill baddies, next level, kill slightly harder baddies. Ad infinitum. But a prettier background.

So more like Sonic or Mario then...well Tails cos he could, like, fly?

 

Anyway, Days Gone! Show me whatyergot! C6T. 

[Reorte]

I've not been following Anthem at all but I got the impression it's really just a big multiplayer thing, which doesn't interest me at all (although rather to my surprise I found Mass Effect 3's multiplayer one of the positives of that game - Andromeda's a bit less so, and I've not even tried Inquisition's). My connection's a bit ropey for current multiplayer anyway.

Edited February 6, 2019 by Reorte

[Classsix T]

Well certainly the combat missions are four player co-op, there is a free roaming option as well to garner crafting elements.

BioWare are also trumpeting the RPG element though which takes place at the games home base Fort Tarsis. If the demo is anything to go by though, the conversation choices are limited and rather binary.

 

C6T. 

[Lancaster622]

just my 2 pence worth, had enormous fun in Andromeda still not worked out what is supposed to be wrong with it 

 

 

[Classsix T]

Ooh, how very Deus-Ex of you Mr. York!

[Reorte]

1 hour ago, Lancaster622 said:

just my 2 pence worth, had enormous fun in Andromeda still not worked out what is supposed to be wrong with it 

 

I don't see why it got quite as much hate as it, and certainly far worse games have had DLC. The main problem with Andromeda is that it was simply a bit mediocre IMO - the environments were a bit copy-paste across themselves and uninteresting to explore (every kett base seemed the same for example) and not many side missions - and there were a lot - were engaging. The plot didn't really hold together much at all either (your title is Pathfinder yet everyone else has got plenty set up by the time you arrive for example - turns out everyone else had already met the two new alien races). Then there are bits of laziness like all asari clones. The music was pretty bland, although the title theme grew on me, whereas it was good in the other games. Multiplayer is a bit janky, that may be my connection though. It doesn't work if I host and when others host headshots are rather unreliable (and that sort of sniping is my favourite approach - did solo Platinum matches in ME3 with the Javelin). Never had any issues with ME3 multiplayer but the 3D of Andromeda presumably puts more strain on it - I think there are more enemies too?

 

But I didn't mind Andromeda and I'll happily play it again, it didn't annoy me in the way 3 did, and if it wasn't for the controversy around ME3 I think it would just be shrugged off and regarded as a reasonable but somewhat forgetable game.

[Classsix T]

1 hour ago, Lancaster622 said:

just my 2 pence worth, had enormous fun in Andromeda still not worked out what is supposed to be wrong with it 

 

 

If you enjoyed it, there's patently nothing at all wrong with it!

For you.

But that's art. I think most of the ire is directed at Electronic Arts' treatment of the franchise as opposed to Andromeda itself. I'd welcome some story DLC in a heartbeat, but it was made apparent early doors that ME:A's production was being rushed to free up staff for other projects at the behest of EA.

It's unfair to criticise EA for making commercial decisions that benefit shareholders and the company as a whole, but it's incredibly naive on their part to disregard a fiercely loyal and emotionally invested fanbase.

 

Like Dylan going electric...

C6T. 

[MJI]

Anthem, well I don't have time for more than one permanent time sink, so since i have put so much time and effort in I am staying with Destiny.

 

I still like other games, recent likes including Uncharted 4 and Horizon Zero Dawn.

 

Got Fallout 4 cheap and also Dishonoured 2 cheap.

 

Put > 100 hours into HZD and Fallout 4, I put 10 to 15 a week into Destiny 2.

 

Longest play times Destiny 1 or 2, then the other, then Killzone 3 MP, then Uncharted 2 MP, then the roaming games like FO4 and HZD.

 

Oh and I have some of the most used PS Move controllers, around 400 hours on my pair, on 5 games, (most on KZ3 MP).

[Corbs]

2 hours ago, MJI said:

 

I still like other games, recent likes including Uncharted 4 

 

 

Much like Christopher Lee, who would read The Lord of the Rings once a year, my destiny is to play all the Uncharted games in order every year.

[Classsix T]

Rapidly approaching Old Gifferdom as I am, I'm regularly surprised at what you can do these days with a console, a smartphone and t'interweb.

The addition of complimentary mobile phone applications for games means all sorts of options for the modern gamer that would've been unthinkable decades ago.

 

My previous pictures from RDR2 are a case in point, using the Social Club - on console and 'phone.

 

Here's an image of what I are mostly wearing in Grand Turismo Sport, purloined from that game's mobile app'.

I've also been able to ascertain (after one race in the entered competition) I'm the second best driver in Suffolk, the 218th best Jaguar pilot and 11233rd in region. IN YOUR FACE 11234th PLACE LOSER!

 

I came last, by the way, in that race. Having missed the first two rounds and with an afternoon Kronenbourg handicap and being less than familiar with the reverse version of the circuit. And a Kronenbourg handicap.

 

C6T. 

[MJI]

I think my best ever in a game was top 1500 woldwide in Killzone3.

 

Destiny has a good app, I can swap gear around without having to go to the tower to shove it in the vault. Only issue it those effing captas for PSN login

[Reorte]

Well if we're bragging on positions - despite my grumblings about ME3 I was 8 in the UK on the multiplayer challenge points score (don't think I quite made the top 100 world wide though). And the top one was a clear cheat.

[Classsix T]

Hmm, I hardly think an 11233rd placing in Europe, Middle East and Africa can be used as a bragging right. Even second in Suffolk isn't that much of a big deal, in a county where typing 58008 on a calculator and turning it upside-down is seen as a zenith of electronic entertainment. Still rather more sophisticated than our neighbours to the north mind you, where Etch-A-Sketch is deemed witchcraft.

 

A more skillful performance on Saturday saw me shooting up the ratings where I now command a lofty 9193rd in region, 189th best Jag peddler but still silver placed in Suffolk.

 

C6T.

Edited February 12, 2019 by Classsix T
(Edited 24hrs later to include derogatory Norfolk bashing comment, and though I say it myself, it was worth the wait, buh!)

[Classsix T]

And of course, we all have "off" days.

C6T. 

[Classsix T]

I've subsequently found out that second in Suffolk is probably the best I'm likely to achieve. As it's me and one other fella, and their driver rating is considerably higher than my own. Confusingly they're a Jaguar driver too so I suspect GT Sport's ranking system (in this particular competition) is possibly based more on the manufacturer you drive for. But then I'm in the top 200 Jag drivers but 9193 in region...I dunno. Just enjoying it for what it is.

 

Here's the fleet.

The black & turquoise motor was created as a "really quick Chris Froome support vehicle"! And no, I don't use it cos it has 'Sky' necessarily but begrudgingly emblazoned upon it.

C6T. 

[Classsix T]

What better way to spend the day after Valentine's than shooting mutants and bad people in post-apocalyptic Russia, right?

Contrary to the list earlier, Metro Exodus is out today. Reviews here:

 

https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/metro-exodus-review-a-train-of-thought/1900-6417087/

 

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2019-02-13-metro-exodus-review

 

C6T.

[Clagsniffer]

I’ve got mixed feelings about the new metro game. I’m a big fan of the series but didn’t agree with what they did by switching from steam to the epic game store. Not that this decision will affect game play, and certainly won’t bother me as a console gamer, but thought it was a bit of a scummy move, especially as a lot of people had it on pre order on steam.

[Classsix T]

I've give up on GTSport's points/ratings, having had a Google it's probably just as well.

 

A third place finish garnered 95pts in one race but seventh in last weekends tarmac pounding accrued some 180pts!

Apparently there's some strange algorithm at work that determines points to who you race against, so I may have finished 3rd against a bunch of idiots, but I came seventh (from the back of the grid) amongst racing gods.

 

Go figure. Start at the back and wait for petulant teens to punt each other off the track seems to be the way..!

 

C6T.