I've been into a ton of different things in the past few days:
Firewatch - I finished it. It was alright, overall, but I didn't end up liking it as much as I anticipated. Maybe I was just not in the mindspace for this type of thing. The high points are the style of the game's art and believable characters on display, though I don't quite buy that it is set in the mid '80s when the characters speak the way they do. Something about it just seemed off. Hiking around the nature areas was nice, but got old kind of quickly, and I was soon dashing everywhere, and dashing through to the end of the game.
Torchlight II - I'm not sure why, now, but something made me want to go back to revisit this game, as I felt like we had unfinished business. I feel like I'm finished with it now, though. I realized while playing it for a while that I wasn't particularly in love with either the play or the world in this game, and my time would be better spent elsewhere.
Borderlands 2 - Same story here as above. I haven't been able to get into Borderlands 2 for whatever reason, after a couple of tries. I played all the way through the first and all the DLC for it, and while I do enjoy the combat in these games, the randomly generated guns don't really do all that much for me, and I don't particularly like the world they've built here, unique though it is. I could play any number of other shooters and probably eventually find one that clicks in a way that this one doesn't.
Tomb Raider II - Another game not really on my backlog, since I did play all the way through it back at release on the original PlayStation, but that I did want to revisit. I bought the entire collection of Tomb Raider games on Steam a while back, and I want to try each of them out, for a while at least. I never played past the second when these were contemporary, nor ever played Legend, Anniversary, or Underworld in later years. The next TR game I played after II was actually the 2013 reboot. I still really like these original games in the series. No other game has done quite this sort of 3D world navigation puzzle with a very well defined move set and a collection of levels planned out so exactly. I hypothesize that the advent of the analog stick cut short this evolutionary path in gaming.
Rocket League - It continues to be a great game to dip into for a few minutes at a time as a break here and there during the day, or in the evening as a warm-up for more serious fare.
The Witness - The more serious fare, often. I've made some really good progress lately. I'm up past 250 puzzles solved now, I think, with 5 or 6 laser beams activated. I really like this game.
X-COM Enemy Unknown - My campaign continues. I'm at a stage where I have to infiltrate an alien base, and I'm just trying to build up resources and prepare my squad before doing that. I don't know if it's time sensitive or not, but it probably is, at least in the sense that alien activity is going to keep happening, and I can never address all instances of it. Eventually everyone will just pull out of the whole X-COM project. One nation already has, Russia, if memory serves.
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night - I have a game in progress that I am half-serious about completing, and that I keep going back to when I feel like a quick hit of action play and the PS3 is on, usually because Mia and Juno have been watching something.
Elite Dangerous - I finally made it back to civilized space with my tons of exploration data, and sold it, making about 8 million credits, which was enough to bankroll the best FSD available for my Asp, as well as other improvements, and now I'm off out into the black for another run. I don't know where I'm headed, other than to the bottom of the galaxy, and rimward of the bubble of settled systems. One of the new toys I want to test out is my SRV, the rover that can be deployed to drive around the surfaces of planets (rocky and non-atmospheric, for the time being). I need to do more and longer expeditions if I'm going to make enough money to buy an Anaconda or other large ship, and if I'm going to rank up to Elite in exploration. These are long, long, long term goals. I can play CQC mode in between bouts of jump, scan, jump, scan, jump, scan, and so on.
Showing posts with label Tomb Raider. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tomb Raider. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 17, 2016
Tuesday, October 8, 2013
Shifting Into Autumn
It's hard to recall everything I've played since the last entry, but it mainly comes down to three things: Spelunky, World of Warcraft, and Tomb Raider.
WoW, you say? Indeed. Blizzard offered to comp me a free 7 days, so I took them up on it, toodling around a bit in Outland, bringing my Orcish Arms Warrior into line with all the major talent changes that had taken effect in the three years since I last played, and leveling up to 68, which is the perfect level at which to ditch Outland and head to Northrend. My Orc is waiting there right now for my next free play session.
WoW, while kind of neat and mindless, just is not that fun. The pleasure derived from WoW, for me, is more about exploring the world and filling XP bars. I can barely stand the redundant combat of your prototypical MMORPG anymore. Maybe it would be better if I gave my life to the game and joined a full-time raiding guild, and really took it seriously. But that is not me anymore. I demand to play on my own scant time, and more often than not, I'm playing solo.
I've dipped into Spelunky for the daily challenge almost every day for the last two or three weeks. That is a truly great game. Truly difficult, and truly addicting. As much as I've played it so far, nearly 150 attempts, the farthest I've gotten is to the third level of the jungle, or 2-3, only the 7th level. And that was from starting at the Tunnel Man's shortcut to level 5. I wonder how good I can get at it, if I continue.
In an effort to wrap up and try a few other 2013 releases, I concentrated the last few days on finishing off Tomb Raider (the current release). I actually really enjoyed that game, far more than I imagined I might, and more even than the two Uncharted games I've played, which I found overrated to some degree. Tomb Raider is just plain fun to play. Lara moves around the world really responsively, and is very well animated. The game is also very attractive, visually, and ran at a rock solid 60 fps the entire time on my mid to low-range PC. The combat was always fun, and never actually wore out its welcome, which is remarkable, thinking about it. I also really, really like the new Lara Croft. She's actually a believable human being, here. She may be a bit of a climbing and shooting wunderkind, but that is hardly the most outlandish thing happening on the island the game is set on. I have very few complaints about Tomb Raider, and those mostly center on how limply the plot wraps up in the end, and the completely over-the-top and uncalled for amount of grisly gore present in the game, a lot of it presented in Lara's various bad death animations. I could have done without those oddly out-of-place bits, if I'm honest.
So, Fall is here, and the season for new major releases is really already in full swing. There's not a lot that I care much about this year, though. There's Assassin's Creed IV, and not a whole lot else. I'll probably end up with GTA V and Watch_Dogs at some point, and maybe a PS4 sometime in 2014, but I'm honestly having a hard time thinking of other big Fall releases that I am excited about, this year. Oh well, I've still got a tremendous backlog, of course. I think I may try to polish off the Half-Life 2 series next.
WoW, you say? Indeed. Blizzard offered to comp me a free 7 days, so I took them up on it, toodling around a bit in Outland, bringing my Orcish Arms Warrior into line with all the major talent changes that had taken effect in the three years since I last played, and leveling up to 68, which is the perfect level at which to ditch Outland and head to Northrend. My Orc is waiting there right now for my next free play session.
WoW, while kind of neat and mindless, just is not that fun. The pleasure derived from WoW, for me, is more about exploring the world and filling XP bars. I can barely stand the redundant combat of your prototypical MMORPG anymore. Maybe it would be better if I gave my life to the game and joined a full-time raiding guild, and really took it seriously. But that is not me anymore. I demand to play on my own scant time, and more often than not, I'm playing solo.
I've dipped into Spelunky for the daily challenge almost every day for the last two or three weeks. That is a truly great game. Truly difficult, and truly addicting. As much as I've played it so far, nearly 150 attempts, the farthest I've gotten is to the third level of the jungle, or 2-3, only the 7th level. And that was from starting at the Tunnel Man's shortcut to level 5. I wonder how good I can get at it, if I continue.
In an effort to wrap up and try a few other 2013 releases, I concentrated the last few days on finishing off Tomb Raider (the current release). I actually really enjoyed that game, far more than I imagined I might, and more even than the two Uncharted games I've played, which I found overrated to some degree. Tomb Raider is just plain fun to play. Lara moves around the world really responsively, and is very well animated. The game is also very attractive, visually, and ran at a rock solid 60 fps the entire time on my mid to low-range PC. The combat was always fun, and never actually wore out its welcome, which is remarkable, thinking about it. I also really, really like the new Lara Croft. She's actually a believable human being, here. She may be a bit of a climbing and shooting wunderkind, but that is hardly the most outlandish thing happening on the island the game is set on. I have very few complaints about Tomb Raider, and those mostly center on how limply the plot wraps up in the end, and the completely over-the-top and uncalled for amount of grisly gore present in the game, a lot of it presented in Lara's various bad death animations. I could have done without those oddly out-of-place bits, if I'm honest.
So, Fall is here, and the season for new major releases is really already in full swing. There's not a lot that I care much about this year, though. There's Assassin's Creed IV, and not a whole lot else. I'll probably end up with GTA V and Watch_Dogs at some point, and maybe a PS4 sometime in 2014, but I'm honestly having a hard time thinking of other big Fall releases that I am excited about, this year. Oh well, I've still got a tremendous backlog, of course. I think I may try to polish off the Half-Life 2 series next.
Tuesday, September 3, 2013
DLCOTY, More Like
Because I spend way too much time placing importance on things utterly and compltely without it, I am a little bit alarmed that it is already September 2013, and I only have one half-hearted contender for my Game of the Year in mind. I'm not sure that that is even a reflection on the quality of the 2013 release slate; indeed several factors have come together to prevent me from digging into this year's crop of games. First, I have been, more than ever, playing games of yesteryear. Yesteryear always has the advantage, of course, by dint of the fact that it encompasses every year that is not the current one. Second, my game time has been pretty drastically reduced since taking a new job mid-July--and it was suffering anyway, due to being busy with a two-year-old. Finally, I seem to have found a voracious appetite for DLC in 2013. DLC modules for Fallout 3 and New Vegas, for Dishonored, and now for Mass Effect 2 have all been keeping me pretty busy. Even Bioshock Infinite will probably have some good stuff out this year--oh, and I have been meaning to play the GTA IV DLC, as well. Strange how these things happen, isn't it?
I mentioned Mass Effect 2 DLC--I finally broke down and picked up ME3 for $5 on Origin, and so I also figured it was time to bite the bullet and use the busted-ass POS Bioware site/DLC distribution system to download all of the ME2 stuff. I hadn't touched the game since it was released in 2010, continuing to hold out for some uber edition that would not require me to jump through EA's ridiculous hoops to finish preparations for Shepard's third outing. Alas, that never happened. EA's (lack of) support for this otherwise great game is extremely disappointing. I guess it is the nature of a stupid profit-hungry beast, though, to forget its past and always focus on the short-term. ME3 and it's DLC are available on Origin, incidentally.
Ranting done, I plowed through several ME2 DLC packs this past weekend--Kasumi, Firewalker, Overlord, and Lair of the Shadow Broker, leaving only the final piece, Arrival, left to finish off. They were all pretty fair quality, with Shadow Broker being the best, and Firewalker the least best. I would say its fair to consider them all as read in a complete playthrough of ME2, for future reference. Long time readers may recall Mass Effect 2 being my GOTY 2010. Maybe it's just DLC being DLC, but I can't help but feel that some of the shine has worn off in the intervening 3.5 years since I played it the first time. It is still a lot of good fun, though.
Otherwise, I have spent most of the last several weeks flitting from game to game with little attachment. I am sort of trying to clear a few things off my backlog, but mainly it has just been a case of not feeling like committing to any one thing. The closest I have come to doing so is playing several battles of Tactics Ogre all in a row. I may get back to that after finishing of ME2 for good.
Here is a short and briefly annotated list of things I've touched lately:
Tomb Raider - Still pretty fun, still not exactly hooked, but want to be.
The Binding of Isaac - The stuff of nightmares, really. Fun briefly.
Fate of the World - Nice idea, but too much data-diving. I do that at work.
Sir, You Are Being Hunted - Not sure it holds up for 30-ish fetch quests.
Halo 4 - Yup, it's Halo. Sold with 360.
Red Orchestra 2 - Played a bit, fun multiplayer times.
Civ V - Getting my Hun on. Still in progress.
Final Fantasy XIV beta - Surprisingly nice time for a couple of hours. Sub no thx.
AC3 Tyrrany of King Washington - Looney tunes. No real interest in finishing it.
I mentioned Mass Effect 2 DLC--I finally broke down and picked up ME3 for $5 on Origin, and so I also figured it was time to bite the bullet and use the busted-ass POS Bioware site/DLC distribution system to download all of the ME2 stuff. I hadn't touched the game since it was released in 2010, continuing to hold out for some uber edition that would not require me to jump through EA's ridiculous hoops to finish preparations for Shepard's third outing. Alas, that never happened. EA's (lack of) support for this otherwise great game is extremely disappointing. I guess it is the nature of a stupid profit-hungry beast, though, to forget its past and always focus on the short-term. ME3 and it's DLC are available on Origin, incidentally.
Ranting done, I plowed through several ME2 DLC packs this past weekend--Kasumi, Firewalker, Overlord, and Lair of the Shadow Broker, leaving only the final piece, Arrival, left to finish off. They were all pretty fair quality, with Shadow Broker being the best, and Firewalker the least best. I would say its fair to consider them all as read in a complete playthrough of ME2, for future reference. Long time readers may recall Mass Effect 2 being my GOTY 2010. Maybe it's just DLC being DLC, but I can't help but feel that some of the shine has worn off in the intervening 3.5 years since I played it the first time. It is still a lot of good fun, though.
Otherwise, I have spent most of the last several weeks flitting from game to game with little attachment. I am sort of trying to clear a few things off my backlog, but mainly it has just been a case of not feeling like committing to any one thing. The closest I have come to doing so is playing several battles of Tactics Ogre all in a row. I may get back to that after finishing of ME2 for good.
Here is a short and briefly annotated list of things I've touched lately:
Tomb Raider - Still pretty fun, still not exactly hooked, but want to be.
The Binding of Isaac - The stuff of nightmares, really. Fun briefly.
Fate of the World - Nice idea, but too much data-diving. I do that at work.
Sir, You Are Being Hunted - Not sure it holds up for 30-ish fetch quests.
Halo 4 - Yup, it's Halo. Sold with 360.
Red Orchestra 2 - Played a bit, fun multiplayer times.
Civ V - Getting my Hun on. Still in progress.
Final Fantasy XIV beta - Surprisingly nice time for a couple of hours. Sub no thx.
AC3 Tyrrany of King Washington - Looney tunes. No real interest in finishing it.
Sunday, July 21, 2013
Steam Sale Time Again
Yes, it's that time again, and despite my best intentions, I did come away from the sale with a bundle of new games. A couple were ancillary things like the GTA IV episodes and a Steam copy of System Shock 2 (already had it on GOG, but it was $2.50...) and almost the entirety of the Tomb Raider series (I was mainly in it for the new game for $12.50, but the rest of the series was only another $5 on top of that).
Regrettably, I don't have a ton of time to write up the journal entry I'd like to, here, so here's a list of the games I've been playing over the last couple of weeks:
Saints Row The Third
Planetside 2
Cube World
Tomb Raider (OG!)
Tomb Raider 2013
Shin Megami Tensei IV
Civ V
Chivalry: Medieval Warfare
The highlights mean I've put a decent amount of time into each of those, and was planning to go into a little more depth on in the next Call Of Podcast, which, again regrettably, has slipped out another week as my co-host has just returned home from abroad and has to get busy makin' them games.
Yes, one of those is a 3DS game, and yes, I did buy a 3DS at some point--I'm holding out for a good deal on the Vita, as a matter of fact, to pick up one of those, as well. I do still like the occasional Japanese game, and those look like the platforms to find them on, for the time being. When they don't make it to the PC, which is pretty often, unfortunately.
Regrettably, I don't have a ton of time to write up the journal entry I'd like to, here, so here's a list of the games I've been playing over the last couple of weeks:
Saints Row The Third
Planetside 2
Cube World
Tomb Raider (OG!)
Tomb Raider 2013
Shin Megami Tensei IV
Civ V
Chivalry: Medieval Warfare
The highlights mean I've put a decent amount of time into each of those, and was planning to go into a little more depth on in the next Call Of Podcast, which, again regrettably, has slipped out another week as my co-host has just returned home from abroad and has to get busy makin' them games.
Yes, one of those is a 3DS game, and yes, I did buy a 3DS at some point--I'm holding out for a good deal on the Vita, as a matter of fact, to pick up one of those, as well. I do still like the occasional Japanese game, and those look like the platforms to find them on, for the time being. When they don't make it to the PC, which is pretty often, unfortunately.
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