2024 Video Gaming

Somewhere along the line this switched over to being a hobby blog for miniatures games. I do still play video games, also. At least sometimes.

2024 was a pretty light year on that front, but I did have a torrid affair with Fallout: New Vegas, completing two full playthroughs in a row, first siding with Mr House, and then with Caesar. That leaves only the NCR playthrough left, but I was not up for a third consecutive at the time.

I also decided to pick up FFXIV once more, and spent a good month on that before being distracted. I do plan to go back, and I'm keeping my subscription live.

What side-tracked me was wanting to play through Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic again in order to play along the podcast A More Civilized Age. I had a really good time doing so, and completed a full playthrough as a Dark Lord of the Sith. I had no idea I would be forced to kill so many of my own companions in doing so! I'm really looking forward to eventually playing KOTOR II now, as well. That's one that I never got to, previously.

Elsewhere I dabbled a little in Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor, Total War: Warhammer, Diablo IV (didn't grab me), Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear (need to get back to this), Skyrim (as per usual), Fallout 4, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, Dark Souls II, and Warhammer 40,000: Battlesector. I think I basically opened Crusder Kings III and Elite: Dangerous this year and bailed before doing anything. Even less impressively, I bought Shin Megami Tensei V in Japan this year and never booted it up. I did play a little Warhammer 40:000 Mechanicus there, though. Seems OK.

I don't have a GOTY pick for 2024. I'm not sure I even played anything new this year. It's been busy, otherwise. As of this writing early in 2025 I am installing Red Dead Redemption 2 to give that a shot. I've also felt a little bit of a tug back toward Assassin's Creed Origins lately, too. We'll see if anything comes of those. I do still need to play my fair share of FF XIV, after all. They've recently added some FFXI content to it's endgame that I want to experience. I love FFXI, but I'm not ready to go back to it yet. I need to familiarize myself with it's younger sibling that may one day inherit.

Gaming 2023

Final Fantasy XI

Mario Party Superstars

Hyper Light Drifter

Achron

Desynced

Burnout Paradise

Wipeout HD

Starfield

Dirt 5

Castlevania: Lords of Shadow

Blood Bowl III

Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War III

Fall Guys

This was a year dominated by my return to FFXI. Apart from that, most games here only got a single short session or two. I don't feel like I've played enough from 2023 to nominate a GOTY, but of the newer games I've played like Rogue Trader over Starfield so far.

I don't have anything upcoming in 2024 that I'm especially hyped to play. I'll probably just dip into things in the backlog, mainly.

2022 Game Tracking

Halo Infinite
Necromunda: Underhive Wars

The Horus Heresy: Battle of Tallarn

Stephen's Sausage Roll
Assassin's Creed Origins

Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine

The Shrouded Isle

Warhammer 40,000: Armageddon

Elite Dangerous

Total War: Warhammer III

Battle Brothers

Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne

The Horus Heresy: Legions

Forza Horizon 5

Fortnite

Spelunky 2

Horizon Chase Turbo

Yakuza 3 Remastered

Warhammer 40:000 Battlesector

Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen

Diablo Immortal

Warhammer 40,000: Inquisitor - Martyr

The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall Unity

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Special Edition

Animal Crossing: New Horizons

VVVVVV

Unity of Command

Hundred Days

Shootas, Blood, & Teef

Devil Daggers

Gloomhaven

Battlefleet Gothic: Armada

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide

Mass Effect

Final Fantasy XI

So these are the games I played in 2022? A meager lot. How many of these were released in 2022? Maybe three?

Diablo Immortal

Total War: Warhammer III
Shootas, Blood & Teef

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide

On doing the research, these four games were released this year. Err, last year. I'm going to award GOTY to the one I played the most, then. 

GOTY 2022 -- Total War: Warhammer III. 

Second place goes to the one I liked best of the rest.

Runner-up -- Warhammer 40,000: Darktide

Not to cast any shade on the titles above, but I've been sort of  "out of the game" this year--last year. I hope something comes along in 2023 that gets me more excited for digital gaming.

2021 Review and Awards

Games Played In 2021

AVSEQ

Aeronautica Imperialis: Flight Command
Animal Crossing New Horizon
Art of Rally
Assassin's Creed Chronicles: India
Assassin's Creed Chronicles: Russia
Assassin's Creed Origins
Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear
Bastion
Blood Bowl 2
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
Crystalis
Diablo II Resurrected
Elite: Dangerous
Endless Legend
Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout
Final Fantasy XIV
Forza Horizon 3
Grand Theft Auto V
Halo Infinite
Hunt: Showdown
Kingdom Come: Deliverance
Mass Effect: Legendary Edition
Metal Gear Solid
Might & Magic VI
Might & Magic X - Legacy
Project Triangle Strategy
Quake
Receiver
STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl
Shenzhen I/O
Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne
Sid Meier's Civilization VI
Skyrim
Tetris 99
The Elder Srolls III: Morrowind
The Horus Heresy: Legions
The Signal from Tolva
The Ultimate Doom
The Witness
Total War: Shogun 2
Twilight Struggle
Valheim
Warhammer 40,000: Armageddon
Warhammer 40,000: Battlesector
Warhammer 40,000: Deathwatch
Warhammer 40,000: Inquisitor - Martyr
Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine
Warhammer Underworlds Online
Wilmot's Warehouse

Books Read In 2021

Alpharius: Head of the Hydra
Amor Fati
Ashes of Prospero
Auric Gods
Blood of the Emperor
Bloodhowl
By Your Command
Call of the Pack
Codex Adeptus Astartes: Grey Knights
Codex Supplement: Traitor Legions
Codex Supplement: Ultramarines
Codex: Grey Knights (2021)
Codex: Imperial Knights
Dark Imperium: Godblight
Dawn of Fire: The Gate of Bones
Dawn of Fire: The Wolftime
Dominion
Eater of Dreams
Endurance
How to Paint: Silver Templars
Imperator: Wrath of the Omnissiah
Inferno! Presents: The Inquisition
Knights of Macragge
Luther: First of the Fallen
Mortarion's Heart
Mortis
Pariah
Penitent
Psychic Awakening: Engine War
Psychic Awakening: Phoenix Rising
Psychic Awakening: Saga of the Beast
Psychic Awakening: The Collected Fiction
Rites of Passage
Sanctuary and Sacrifice
Serpents of Ardemis
Storm of Iron
The Ghost Halls
The Gildar Rift
The Horus Heresy: Age of Darkness Rulebook
The Labyrinth of Lost Souls
The Lords of Silence
The Tyrant's Champion
Titanicus
Unification
Vaults of Terra: Argent
Vaults of Terra: The Carrion Throne
War of Secrets
War Zone Charadon Act I: The Book of Rust
War Zone Charadon Act II: The Book of Fire
Warhammer 40,000: Titan
Warhawk
White Dwarf 458
White Dwarf 459
White Dwarf 460
White Dwarf 461
White Dwarf 462
White Dwarf 463
White Dwarf 464
White Dwarf 465
White Dwarf 466

I guess I've played some games over the last year, probably mostly on a whim or for the purposes of podcasting. 

GOTY: Warhammer 40,000 Battlesector

Honorable Mention: Valheim

I've continued to do a ton of reading in 2021, which is awesome. I probably should read more non-fiction, though. I may consider that a new year's resolution.

BOTY: Warhawk by Chris Wraight

Honorable Mention: Alpharius: Head of the Hydra by Mike Brooks, Penitent by Dan Abnett

2020 GOTY

 2. XCOM Chimera Squad

1. Animal Crossing New Horizons

2020 has been mostly an off-year for me and video games, and I'm not going to try to remedy that in this post, but I did definitely want to record for posterity my choices for game of the year and an honorable mention, as above. Nothing else released this year came close in terms of time played.

I stopped keeping track of games I finished this year, because I don't really think about games in those terms like I used to. And many games don't fit neatly into the shape of something that you can finish. And also because I find myself less and less interested in the type that still do. Anyway, here's a list of games that I spent a good amount of time playing this year, in lieu of the old pile of skulls:

Hitman 2

Assassin's Creed Origins Carcassone Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin Genshin Impact Super Mario Bros. 35 Spelunky 2 Super Mario 3D All-Stars JYDGE Necromunda: Underhive Wars Tabletop Simulator Cube World DOOM Lord of the Rings Online Fire Emblem Awakening Wasteland Legend of Grimrock II Space Hulk Tetris 99 Legends of Runeterra Animal Crossing: New Horizons Horus Heresy Legions Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor Destiny 2 Assassin's Creed Syndicate - Jack the Ripper Ring Fit Adventure Blood Bowl 2 Assassin's Creed Syndicate Warhammer Underworlds Online Fallout 76 XCOM: Chimera Squad XCOM 2 The Elder Scrolls Online Magic: The Gathering Arena Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night Elite Dangerous Warhammer 40,000: Armageddon Warhammer 40,000: Inquisitor - Martyr Dicey Dungeons Juno's Darkest Hour Slay the Spire

I can pretty safely recommend the majority of these games, for what that's worth.

2019 GOTY

My relationship to video games has changed in 2019. This was presaged by my 2018, where I spent more time reading than gaming. This year, I spent as much time reading, but then just as much time building and painting models and building army lists for Warhammer 40,000 and Kill Team as I did playing video games. You may have even noticed some photographic battle reports I have posted to the blog. It'll be a mix of things, going forward.

As far as 2029 in video games, I played remarkably few new releases. Once again, I found myself beginning December with no real shoe-in for GOTY. Of those 10-15 I did check out, a couple stuck out to me as ones that I kept coming back to and enjoyed unreservedly.

My Game of the Year: Slay the Spire
Honorable Mention: Tetris 99

Slay the Spire is simply genius. Tetris needs no elaboration; I'll just say the added mega-multiplayer is icing on the cake.

Past GOTY choices:

2018: Battletech/Hitman 2
2017: Mass Effect Andromeda/Diablo III: Rise of the Necromancer
2016: World of Warcraft: Legion/Overwatch
2015: Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain/The Witcher III: Wild Hunt
2014: Elite Dangerous/The Banner Saga
2013: Spelunky/Hearthstone
2012: Dota 2/Diablo III
2011: The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings/SpaceChem
2010: Mass Effect 2/Castlevania: Lords of Shadow
2009: Demon's Souls/Red Faction: Guerilla
2008: Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots/Gears of War 2
2007: Bioshock/Halo 3

I spent so little time playing video games in 2019 that I only finished these few:

Assassin's Creed Syndicate
Slay the Spire (two wins as the Silent)
The Yawhg

Pathetic! This may be a new normal, though. We shall see. Past years' totals:

2018:9
2017:23
2016:23
2015:26
2014:32
2013:33
2012:23
2011:21
2010:23
2009:19
2008:26
2007:15

The good news is, I no longer care about my backlog! It has transcended tracking, being dispersed over multiple PC store clients and consoles. Too, the rate at which free games rain down upon us all has made it hard to keep track of what all I have or have access to, and also the rise of subscription services has blurred the lines in that way, too. I don't even own my 2019 GOTY! I just play it on Xbox PC games pass! So who really cares about recouping monetary investment for gaming anymore? If I was that worried about value for money, I wouldn't be playing Warhammer!

To that end, I deleted my game and book backlog lists from the blog. I'll still keep track of ones I finish, because that's fun and interesting, but I no longer feel any sort of guilt for those I have accumulated and laid aside, tsundoita.

For 2020, I think I'll take another run at The Witcher 3, if for no other reason than to keep it fresh in my mind as Cyberpunk 2077 comes out. Other than that, who knows? I still like Assassin's Creed games, and Death Stranding has a PC release coming up. I'll play it by ear.

Light Gaming

It's been a while since I wrote about video games. I have been playing a few things in the intervening time, though. Some quick thoughts:

Cube World - Yes, it finally released after many years of limbo and/or development hell. It's charming, but not all that interesting, after all.

Slay the Spire - This is a very cool deck-building card game crossed with a roguelike dungeon crawler. The only thing I don't love about it (aside from the art) is that your run of an hour or two can come down to sheer mathematics and you can lose for the mere want of a point of mana or damage. If only there was some kind of user tilt ability to call on in such times.

Assassin's Creed Syndicate - It's that year's model of Assassin's Creed games. This will sound like I am giving it short shrift, but I do actually enjoy these games and I am having a lot of fun with Syndicate, too. I do plan to buckle down and complete it, if perhaps not to go and find every single little collectible.

The Outer Worlds - It's like Obsidian wanted to keep making Fallout after New Vegas, but to reign in the scope some and improve some of technical aspects. I was having a pretty good time with the first few hours. I'm not certain I'll go back for more, but I may.

Wargroove - A solid strategy game but with an overly wordy and kitcshy pseudo anime storyline. These are so unwelcome that I'd honestly rather play a different solid strategy game.

I've been less concerned with video games in the last year or two, having discovered the Warhammer hobby. I would expect this to continue.

Last year I did make somewhat of an effort to find a GOTY candidate, but I really don't think I can be bothered for 2019. I might make a cursory nomination, but I've played so few new games it would be more of a de facto GOTY than a recommendation.

Freedom '19

I may one day regret this, but I have done away with the video game and book backlog lists. They both just got too big, and I am no longer interested in consuming every single thing I have accumulated over the years for whatever reason or by whatever means.

I still mean to track the things I finish, and blog about those I enjoy, but I'm done with the odd guilt. Let them be tsundoita, I say.

PC Shakeup and Xbox Game Pass for PC

On a whim, and wanting to be able to try a bunch of games but not necessarily buy them, and a good deal, I subscribed to Microsoft's new Xbox Game Pass for PC, for a dollar for the first month, and then five for every month thereafter. It's not a bad deal at all, considering I've refrained from buying many games over the last year or so (meaning there is a lot to catch up on), and that I do want to check out the first party offerings MS will be putting up, including the Halo and Forza series entries and whatever else.

It was a real ordeal getting Windows 10 updated to the newest version so I could get this new Xbox beta app; one that necessitated uninstalling a good deal of games from my PC. It wouldn't be much materially to go and reinstall them all, but for the time being I'll let the previously installed ones go.

2018 GOTY Wrap-Up

This year, gaming has taken a backseat to reading for me, especially anything Horus Heresy or Warhammer 40,000 related.

I have also been modeling and painting (hobbying, as they call it) quite a bit more this year, having finished up several projects. I don't really care to blog about that, though. Not as such. I post to twitter with pics of those things. Maybe I will do a photo round-up sometime to show those off here.

I am also trying a new approach to my writing here about games; fewer catch-all playlogs, more single-topic posts about individual games. For a long time I have tried to record everything I played here, but so many little sessions are completely inconsequential. There's not really a need to document my 500th run of Spelunky or Diablo III, or that I spent a few minutes in Super Mario Odyssey with my children. I do like to post at least once about every new title, though. I need proof that I played them to remove them from the backlog, of course.

My Game of the Year: Battletech
Honorable Mention: Hitman 2

I came to the end of the year without a real candidate for GOTY, but in December finally made myself check out Battletech and Hitman 2, and you have seen the results. I have yet to actually post about Battletech, but there will be one coming on the game eventually. Just know for now that it is outstanding. Hitman 2 is excellent as well. I am a real fan of what they have done with this release, and as a longtime enjoyer of the series, it makes me glad to see its potential so well realized.

Past choices, for record:

2017: Mass Effect Andromeda/Diablo III: Rise of the Necromancer
2016: World of Warcraft: Legion/Overwatch
2015: Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain/The Witcher III: Wild Hunt
2014: Elite Dangerous/The Banner Saga
2013: Spelunky/Hearthstone
2012: Dota 2/Diablo III
2011: The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings/SpaceChem
2010: Mass Effect 2/Castlevania: Lords of Shadow
2009: Demon's Souls/Red Faction: Guerilla
2008: Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots/Gears of War 2
2007: Bioshock/Halo 3

I have only a very meager offering to Khorne this year, for the pile of skulls:

Red Dead Redemption
Witch Doctor 70 (Diablo III Switch)
Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn
Final Fantasy Tactics (all generics)
Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together
Deus Ex: Human Revolution - Director's Cut
XCOM: Enemy Within (Normal)
XCOM: Enemy Unknown (Normal)
Endless Legend (Drakken, diplomacy)

Just those 9, where past years totals were:

2017:23
2016:23
2015:26
2014:32
2013:33
2012:23
2011:21
2010:23
2009:19
2008:26
2007:15

The game backlog has continued to balloon, mostly due to freebies picked up from various places. I'm not stressed about it. I couldn't even tell you how many titles were added or removed in 2018, but it does look big as ever.

As for 2019, I'm not sure what it has in store in terms of releases, or my plans for games to play. Right now I want to continue with Battletech and Hitman. I would like to catch up with Assassin's Creed and The Witcher, as well. Beyond that, I suppose just knocking more games off the backlog will do.

2017 Wrap-up with GOTY!

This has been a good year in games. The Switch was released with a killer couple of entries in the Zelda and Mario series, as well as a number of other good to great Nintendo first party releases, and the other platforms saw a bunch of other huge AAA releases as per usual. My picks for honors this year will probably seem contrarian or unconventional, but of course this is one man's point of view, and intensely personally focused.

My 2017 Game of the Year: Mass Effect Andromeda
Honorable Mention: Diablo III: Rise of the Necromancer

There you have them. I was more into the newest Mass Effect for its duration than any other game released this year. I know the wider response to the game has been negative, and I count myself lucky that I was able to look over whatever the collective complaints were to the entertainment beyond. I wish Bioware was able to follow through on whatever the DLC plans had been and with the logical subsequent series entries, but sadly it looks like Mass Effect my be being mothballed instead. My message for anyone thinking of playing the game is to go for it, and enjoy. It's got the best combat and world of the series, a good cast of supporting characters and villains, and a very cool speculative sci-fi premise.

Rise of the Necromancer brought a whole new game to Diablo III, just like every new class is a new way to play. This was basically more of one of my all-time favorite games, and if I take into account how it brought me back to the game for a good month and a half this year, there's no denying it deserves this runner-up spot in my game of the year consideration.

There was a real wealth of other things I played this year that were very good, like the aforementioned Zelda and Mario games, as well as Mario Kart, Opus Magnum, Destiny 2, Wonder Boy: The Dragon's Trap, Dawn of War III, and many others I think I'll love but have yet to get around to, like Prey, Torment: Tides of Numenera, Dishonored: Death of the Outsider, Nier: Automata, Hollow Knight, Battle Brothers, and more.

As for game achievements and backlog progress this year, here's the Pile of Skulls:

Assassin's Creed Unity
Assassin's Creed Unity: Dead Kings
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Crimson Shroud
Democracy 3
Destiny 2
Diablo III Anniversary Event
Diablo III: Necromancer 70
Diablo III: Reaper of Souls (Necromancer)
Dishonored 2 (Emily, Low Chaos)
Dungeon of the Endless
FFXI: Samurai Artifact
Hexcells
Hexcells Infinite
Hexcells Infinite (60 Down)
Hexcells Plus
Mass Effect: Andromeda
Spec Ops: The Line
Super Mario Odyssey
The Horus Heresy: Battle of Tallarn Apocalypse Campaign (Loyalists)
The Horus Heresy: Battle of Tallarn Apocalypse Campaign (Traitors)
The Horus Heresy: Battle of Tallarn Resurrection Campaign (Loyalists)
Titanfall 2

I count 23 this year, the same as last year, coincidentally:

2017:23
2017:23
2015:26
2014:32
2013:33
2012:23
2011:21
2010:23
2009:19
2008:26
2007:15

I also tally a total of 21 additions to the backlog this year, though I don't really keep track of how many it was reduced by in the same time. Suffice it to say it doesn't look much smaller, though I know I knocked a few things off. Maybe I'll manage more in 2018.

I don't have much in the way of new year's resolutions other than my usual desire to play more strategy games and RPGs. I'll also add character action games this year--Devil May Cry, Bayonetta, et al. Even if I have to play them on easy. If there's one thing I want done and dusted this year, it's The Witcher 3. I don't know why I deprive myself of it like I do, honestly. It's very good.

2018 releases I'm looking forward to include Bayonetta 3, and maybe more on Cyberpunk 2077. I can't think of anything else at the moment.

Tallarn and Temeria

Progress continues little by little in both Opus Magnum and Super Mario Odyssey.

The real meat masticated in my gaming jaws lately has been with The Horus Heresy: Battle of Tallarn and The Witcher 3.

Tallarn takes the largest military engagement of the fictional galactic civil war that kicked off the Warhammer 40,000 setting and envisions it as a hex-based tactical war game. On one side is the traitorous Space Marine legion the Iron Warriors, and on the other is the ragtag planetary defense made up mostly of idle Imperial Guard on the world when it was killed from orbit by the opposition. Battles play out on small hex grids covered in a virus bomb miasma that doubles as fog of war, with small squadrons of tanks and other armored vehicles of various types including flying transports and the gigantic bipedal war machines known as Titans, and their cousins, the slightly smaller Knights.

Tallarn is very clearly a pretty quick port from iOS, but with a few key rebindings, I was able to make it feel pretty good on PC despite the big dopey UI. Scenarios can be played relatively quickly and simply, which is a plus for a player with my level of sophistication and dedication to games like this. I have completed the Apocalypse campaign from both sides so far, one of four or five in the game. As a very fervent fan of setting and especially the novel series that to a large part defines it, I have been enjoying this relatively simple war game. I'm actually reading the collected stories around this particular theater alongside playing the game, and it's harmonizing nicely. I might even recommend the game to non-setting fans, but the developer HexWar has about 20 other games that I'm guessing are similar enough that are set in other, real-world historical, settings that are probably worth looking at as well.

In The Witcher 3, I've gone back to flip flopping between control devices and settings for play. Last night I put in a good hour or two on the TV with the pad again. I think the sweet spot may actually end up being at the PC with the pad. There's no doubt the game looks better on my PC monitor, and the 360 pad control scheme, for all its own oddness, may just edge out the mouse and keyboard scheme due to some iffy menu design choices. It seems like they tried to come up with something that worked both ways, when they probably would have been better off coming up with two separate menu systems dedicated each way. I'm sure there are a lot of reasons why doing that would suck for the development of the game, but it would have been nice. There are too many little rough edges on either scheme for me to be completely comfortable just yet, but with some refinement I may be able to get to that point, and it might as well be with the pad, for the same reason I play Bethesda's RPGs that way; it gets really tiresome holding down W for hours at a time with my middle finger, and that's just not a problem using an analog stick for movement.

Progression-wise, I have now made it to Noveria and met up with Triss Merigold. Apparently she and Geralt fell out about six months previous to this, which does a bit to explain how he could begin the game once again apparently an item with Yennifer of Vengerberg. I don't know if there will be more to explore to that story, or whether the player is meant to respect their privacy on the matter and decide for Geralt who he is more interested in romantically going forward. As a player of the previous games, I feel like I know who Triss is. I'm interested in learning more about Yen before committing to anyone, if I do. I've read the first couple of books in the Witcher series, but I don't remember if there was enough in them to know much of anything about Yen from those. It's been a good long time since I read those. It was before The Witcher 2 came out. Now most or all of the rest of the series has been released, and I own some of them, so at some point I'll actually delve deeper in.

Apart from meeting up with Triss, I'm still following leads toward Ciri. I helped to awake the dream-scryer Corinne Tully in a "haunted" house, last. I want to follow the main thread to the next large piece or event, but I also don't want the rest of the game to get away from me. I don't want to outlevel any quests or contracts or potentially great witcher gear out there. I'm still settling in to how this game flows, nearly 50 hours in, now. Granted, I was away from it for two and a half years between hours 35 and 36, but the point still stands.

Today is my last day of work for 2017. I'm hoping to get in some real solid game time over the break, along with a good bit of reading, as well. I'll have my GOTY/BOTY posts in the next week or so, as well. I have already declared a GOTY and two runner ups on the GameBytes Show podcast, but I do reserve the right to change these up through the 31st!

A Link to the Path

I'm still on track back to the Witcher 3. I'm drawing nearer to completion of this run of Symphony of the Night, with only about 4 sections of the inverted castle remaining to conquer before taking on Shaft and Dracula.

Something I've noticed this time around is that for as well as the castle inversion works for the game, there are some rough edges that prevent the second leg of the game from being quite so effortless as the first. It's easy to go the wrong way and find yourself under-leveled or under-geared for a section of the inverted castle, since there can be no mobility-based progression gating once you have acquired all of the motive skills and abilities from the first castle. Instead there is old-fashioned enemy toughness gating. This can still be gotten around, though, with some creative play and knowing when to mist by rougher sections on the way to gear upgrades or more beatable enemies to farm XP and upgrades on.

Elsewhere, I've done some podcast listening to Titan Quest and Spelunky while going for progression in those titles. I've also added some hardware to my setup, both a terabyte hard disk to the PC, and a Steam Link to the TV. The former allowed me to go and re-download some games that I plan to revisit, and the latter was cheap enough ($1) that I couldn't resist.

I toyed around with Skyrim and XCOM: Enemy Unknown a bit while trying out the Link. I decided to start a new non-Ironman campaign in XCOM just to see if I can't eventually actually win a campaign of that game. I'll need to focus on it at some point to make that a possibility.

The biggest addition to the rotation lately has been Opus Magnum, the new puzzle game from Zachtronics. I have long been a big fan of one of their previous games, SpaceChem. Opus Magnum is in some ways a lot like that one, though I haven't yet encountered its kind of insane difficulty here. Opus Magnum is a real looker, as well. It's got a great posh steampunk style and the alchemy machine works animate really well in a believably mechanical fashion. You play a newly graduated alchemist brought into a great house and tasked with combining base alchemical elements to do things like transmute mundane metals into gold or manufacture talcum power analogues, propulsion fuel, or even just hair product for your noble masters.

You're given a set of inputs and told what the required outputs are, and you have a selection of tools to use to assemble a machine to take care of the process that you have to envision and execute by programming grabber arms that can rotate or extend or move along tracks to deliver elements to various stations where they are transmuted or bonded or split in various ways so that you eventually end up with the finished product and deliver it to the output receptacle. It's a pretty basic concept, elaborated on in a huge variety of ways to create a very interesting and challenging and expressive puzzle game. Your creations only need to get the job done, but once finished they are evaluated against those of other players, so if you like you can chase efficiency on a few axes to enjoy refining your base creations, as well. I'm really enjoying the game so far.  

One Does Not Simply Play Through Mordor

I've given up on Shadow of Mordor. The game has never managed to click with me. I did feel like I finally got a good grip on it this last session, but in the end I still felt like it was an overall pretty mediocre game made up of component parts done better elsewhere. Assassin's Creed, the Batman Arkham series, Hitman, and others, cover all these bases sufficiently. I'm considering this one done.

Which, along with my completion of the Destiny 2 campaign and beginning of the upside-down castle in Symphony of the Night, puts me well on my way back toward playing The Witcher 3 again.

I'm still making my way through Super Mario Odyssey, too. I'm just past New Donk City and in the Seaside Kingdom, now. I like how this game lets you bypass a lot of things if you like, and come back to them later if you wish.

I'm also continuing to practice running Spelunky, hoping for an eventual victory. I still don't reliably make it to the Jungle stages, though.

I did manage to finally finish off Hexcells Infinite, getting that achievement for doing 60 procedurally generated puzzles. That is definitely a low-stress way to play that game, though less interesting accordingly.

Finally, Titan Quest has received an unexpected expansion some 11 years after release. Its called Ragnarok and adds a fifth act as well as some other improvements. I've never made it much past the first act, but curiosity and wanting to encourage such rashness from THQ Nordic overtook me, and I bought in. Maybe this will do the trick, finally.

On the Road Back

I'm sticking to the plan I laid out last week.

I've polished off the Destiny 2 campaign. Overall verdict: better than the first game, not as good as any of Bungie's Halo games. I question the need for a campaign at all. Perhaps Destiny should cut straight to the gear chase. I've set the game aside for the time being.

In it's place I've been concentrating on my Symphony of the Night save. As of this writing just prior to a trip out of town, I have 100% of the initial upright castle completed, and I'm ready to tackle the inverted castle. So, pretty decent progress, so far.

I'm unsure of whether I'll end up clicking with Shadow of Mordor and finishing it. I've struggled to, but then I don't think I've actually focused my efforts to do so on it to this point. Every fight I get into, it still seems like I'm being overwhelmed by too many orcs, and too many of them want to get in my face and start a Nemesis system action. I don't know if this is just how the game will always be, or if at some point I am supposed to be able to slay them 10 at a time and be able to fight 50 of them off without breaking a sweat. Something just feels off about the balance to me. I think I may need to just really start trying to grind out some ability and skill points on lower level nemeses in order to be able to tackle tougher orcs and larger groups of them.

I'm at I think 52/60 Hexcells proc gen puzzles done, and I've been brushing up on my Spelunky skills, trying to get back in the swing of things. These may be what I play tonight, if I have any free time.

This will all be put on hold, though, since we're headed out of town for 5 days. I'll take the Switch, but I'm not sure what else. Perhaps the DSs or SNES Classic? I'm leaning away from the Vita, though, and the PS3 and PC are obviously not coming along. I'll probably do more reading than gaming, but we'll see.

Roadmap to Rivian Redemption

I haven't done one of these in a while. These roadmap projects don't tend to work out, but this time I have a particular destination in mind, and I don't think it's that far away.

I want to get through the Witcher 3. It's a farce that I haven't yet, since I was into The Witcher back in 2009, before the second game was even announced. Yes, I was into it long before most anyone else in the west knew what it even was, let alone that it was cool. Credit to the old GFW Radio for turning me on to it. I never said I discovered it.

For whatever reason, I set the game aside after about 35 hours and got distracted by something else. Spring/Summer of 2015... I'm not sure what it might have been then, but definitely by the time MGSV came out I forgot about it entirely, and have yet to return. This then, is me plotting a route back.

To account for what stands between me and going home today to reinstall the game: I've recently dabbled in both Skyrim and Shadow of Mordor, two games in different ways adjacent to the Witcher 3. Skyrim is different enough and long enough that it needs to stand alone. It's also got a kind of timeless quality that keeps me circling back to it. I won't be finishing it off, but I can veer around it. Shadow of Mordor, that one definitely has a finite well of enjoyment that I could exhaust, and probably should, before turning back to Geralt's adventures. So there's one thing to tackle.

I also have a number of other non-fantasy, non-roleplaying engagements at the moment, including Destiny 2, Super Mario Odyssey, Castlevania: Symphony of the night, Hexcells, Diablo III, Breath of the Wild, and others. Mario is new and will last forever. That will get some more play here and there, but not be a priority. Zelda gets avoided like Skyrim. Destiny 2 gets polished off, at least the campaign portion. After that, it can simmer, much like Diablo III will. I want to finish this run of SotN, as well. That won't take too long. Hexcells can run in parallel, as can my quest to finally complete a run of Spelunky, whether through Olmec or Yama. Perhaps both. I also have suspended games of Metal Gear Rising, Metroid: Samus Returns, and AM2R to consider. Or not, maybe. For now I'll try to clean my plate of these three, in no particular order:

1. Shadow of Mordor
2. Destiny 2 campaign
3. CV SotN

Mid-2017

Here in early June, already, it's been a pretty good year for gaming so far. I'm coming off two extended stays--Mass Effect Andromeda and a FFXI revisit, as well as having knocked out a few shorter games earlier in the year and knocked a bunch more off the backlog, if not completing them.


I'm in a weird spot for the next week or so, not sure what to play before heading to Japan for four weeks. I know that while there I plan to play more Switch. I'm not sure what else. Maybe just that. I should probably pick up Mario Kart, thinking on that. It does have the kid-friendly mode. My girls like it on the 3DS, and I'm not certain I want to take the 3DS.


I suppose I probably should, since I myself have a bunch of DS/3DS stuff I need to play. I am unsure, though, how much time I'll have to play games there, and think I might want to focus on Zelda. But then, it might be good to have systems to pass off to them during travel or while killing time at home.


And what about the Vita? I'd like to have it along as well, but does it make sense to have a Switch, 3DS, 2DS, and Vita? In addition to a MacBook and two iPads? And my kindle, of course.


Back to the topic at hand, though: what to play leading up to the trip. I just buckled down and finished Andromeda. Maybe I could do the same with AC: Unity? Or make more progress into Shadow of Mordor? Surely it makes sense to finish The Witcher 3 before Mordor, and I plan to do that upon returning from Japan. I could play more of Dawn of War III, or Warcraft III, or Starcraft II, or Stellaris, or Endless Legend or... but I don't think I'm in a strategy mindset right now. I'm leaning toward AC Unity or a backlog blitz, I suppose.

2016 Wrap Up with G and B OTY

2016 has been a kind of off year. I've felt my enthusiasm for a lot of games seem to wane a bit, and so even with my top picks, I feel less than completely rapt. Without further ado, though:

My Game of the Year: World of Warcraft: Legion
Honorable Mention: Overwatch

Two Blizzard games, as it turns out. I went into the year unenthused by either, but it turns out I probably had the most unreserved fun with them throughout the year. There were a series of others games in 2016 I was more looking forward to, but for one reason or another just didn't stick, things like The Witness and Firewatch. Even stalwart series I enjoy like HITMAN and Dishonored didn't hook me the way I look for in a GOTY candidate. At least not in time for the end of the year. I still have hope for some of these.

In terms of backlog maintenance, it seems 2016 was another draw, if not a net add to the pile. I didn't exactly go crazy buying games, but at the same time I only knocked relatively few off the list, and most of those were just dabblings and dismissals. Here are the skulls I took this year, those achievements and milestones I felt notable. It's not as easy as rolling the credits on a game anymore; these days games try to be perennial, perpetual, and otherwise endless, so you have to be able to define your own goals more than ever:

Super Mario Run (Tour)
World of Warcraft (Death Knight 110)
World of Warcraft (Death Knight 100)
World of Warcraft (Death Knight 90)
No Man's Sky (Atlas)
Eisenhorn: Xenos
World of Warcraft (Death Knight 85)
World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King (Dungeons)
World of Warcraft (Death Knight 80)
World of Warcraft: Burning Crusade (Dungeons)
World of Warcraft (Death Knight 70)
Warcraft III (Undead)
World of Warcraft (Death Knight intro)
Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II - Retribution (Space Marines)
Dark Souls
Dark Souls: Artorias of the Abyss
Mass Effect 3
Mass Effect 3: Citadel
Mass Effect 3: Omega
Mass Effect 3: Leviathan
Talisman: The Horus Heresy
Firewatch
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

That's 23 recorded milestones this year, however charitable I am about the definition. About average with past years' totals:

2015:26
2014:32
2013:33
2012:23
2011:21
2010:23
2009:19
2008:26
2007:15

At this point I'm not going to try to put together a 2017 syllabus of any sort. I made some progress through the one for this year, but those always end up falling apart. It seems like a bit of a fool's errand. A few things I'd like to do, though, are finally crack Paradox strategy games, probably with Stellaris, which I am now familiarizing myself with, to get around to really playing The Witcher 3, and to play more real-time strategy.

2017 releases I'm looking forward to? Mass Effect Andromeda, Dawn of War III, and Nintendo's Switch and all that comes with that.

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Now on to the page-turning side of things. I read a decent amount this year:

Deathfire
Legacies of Betrayal
The Keeler Image
The Unburdened
The Honoured
Altered Carbon
Saga of the Swamp Thing Vol. 1
Origin (Wolverine)
Warcraft III and WoW Manuals (Lore)
Remember
The Damnation of Pythos
Vengeful Spirit
Scars
The Unremembered Empire
Vulkan Lives
Mark of Calth
Paradise Lost
Betrayer
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions
Angel Exterminatus

That's 20-some odd works, by my hackneyed accounting. Figure a few additional, based on all the single issue comics I've read (several large volumes' worth, easily). A pretty good sum from the few years I've been keeping track. Definitely better than 2015:

2016:20-some odd
2015:4ish
2014:18
2013:9

Book of the Year: The Unremembered Empire
Honorable Mention: Betrayer

Two Horus Heresy novels, which is patently unfair to other quality work, such as Altered Carbon, or mind-benders like Flatland or Paradise Lost, because of how much they draw from the surrounding Heresy universe, but there you have it. Both books were incredible, and you are missing out if you aren't reading The Horus Heresy.

I have a lot more reading queued up for 2017, including a lot more Heresy, among other things, so I'm pretty psyched about that.

Say It Now, Before The Cleansing Begins

The title is one of my favorite barks uttered by a unit in Dawn of War II.


I did follow through on my endeavor of finishing Retribution, with 8.7 hours played over the last week, per Steam tracking. I raced through the Space Marines campaign, which it seems is the canonical one for how the story plays out. I also played the first mission of the Chaos campaign, which features you killing a major character from the Blood Ravens, so I'm guessing that one is not canon. Not that it matters.


I had a grand old time with Dawn of War II, all the way back to the base game, through Chaos Rising, and finally with Retribution, both the campaign and the Last Stand mode, which is very cool despite being sort of bolted on. Hopefully it gets a fully-fleshed realization in Dawn of War III, which was recently announced. That should be a good time. I wonder if it'll continue on the campaigning of the Blood Ravens. Probably.


I want to go back and play the original Dawn of War at some point, but my next RTS is roughly 70 missions of Warcraft III. This brings me to my 2016 play prospectus:


Mass Effect 3
The Witcher 3
Skyrim
The Walking Dead Season 2
Dawn of War II: Retribution
Deus Ex: Human Revolution
X-Com: Enemy Unknown
Warcraft III
StarCraft II
Dragon Age II
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
Wasteland 2
Baldur's Gate II


I don't think I'm doing too bad. Figure in victory over Dark Souls finally, and some of the other stuff I've been playing, and I'm pretty proud of the progress I've made so far. X-Com getting the strikethrough here is debatable, but I did give it another run up, even if the jump wasn't long enough to make it to the other side. I'm not sure I intend to play it again, at least not anytime soon. Skyrim had some decent time put into it, but I still intend to circle back to that one. Same with Dragon Age II. I don't know that I'll get to Wasteland 2 or Baldur's Gate II this year; they're not high on my list at the moment. KOTOR II would probably come before either, but after the RPGs already on the list. StarCraft II is going to be a post-Warcraft III thing, so also not likely in 2016. I do need to get on with the Walking Dead's second season, though.


Otherwise, I've just been playing more Overwatch. Nothing more to add on that game, really, other than I am still having fun rotating through the roster and playing every character.


Right now, I need to continue further into my Castlevania: Lords of Shadow replay. I also want to play more Overwatch, and possibly jump right back into Warcraft III while the RTS mood lingers. I know I have plenty of that game ahead of me.

Synthesis

Well, I finally did it. I finally put the cap on the Mass Effect trilogy. Overall, I was pretty satisfied with how things wrapped up for me. If I have any real regrets, it's that rushing through ME3 to some extent locked me out of a few quests, and caused the death of Miranda when I would really have liked to see her live. The other, from earlier in the saga, might choosing Morinth over Samara in ME2, though that certainly made for an interesting decision.

I had a pretty simple play style, as an Infiltrator with a single-shot, high-powered sniper rifle. Stealth up, headshot an enemy, duck back into cover, reload, and repeat. It was really satisfying, though. Most things died in a single hit, and I usually took Liara (biotic) and either Javik, James, or Ashley (assault) with me to round out the squad. I almost never used Garrus in ME3, just because he and I seemed to overlap too much in skillsets.

Here's looking forward to Andromeda.

That makes two titles off my prospectus altogether, and I'm making progress in a few others, as well. After finishing ME3, I immediately reinstalled Dragon Age II, and hopped back into that for a little bit to see if I could pick up where I left off. I don't think it'll be a problem to see that game through to the end, as well, sometime this year.

Mass Effect 3
The Witcher 3
Skyrim
The Walking Dead Season 2
Dawn of War II: Retribution
Deus Ex: Human Revolution
X-Com: Enemy Unknown
Warcraft III
StarCraft II
Dragon Age II
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
Wasteland 2
Baldur's Gate II

I'm also maintaining the Spelunky daily challenge, as I mentioned before. I'm not back to the level of skill and proficiency with the game I used to have, but hopefully I'll get there.