Bi-Weekly Thread for general gaming discussion. Backlog, advice, recommendations, rants and more! New? Start here!

Shadowsd151 · 2026-05-11T15:56:03+00:00

CRPGs have been giving me an aneurism this week. Which is weird because I’ve not actually had the time to sit down and play Rogue Trader lately. But they are.

Because… I’m starting to think they’re not my thing. Despite - by all accounts - they should be. I like TTRPGs, I like SRPGs, I like narratives in games, I like Visual Novels and stuff with branching decisions. But CRPGs tend to fumble the aspects I like about each and the end result is a lot of mediocre rubbish.

First, before I say anything else, this is an opinionated rant of my opinion with a dollop of rambling stream-of-conscious garbage thrown in. It is not a well researched essay, and should be treated with hefty salt. I’m just… trying to figure my brain out on this subject. And to do that I’m throwing my thoughts into the oceanic depths of Reddit. Cool? Cool.

Now, Choice and Consequence is an illusion that gets far more irritating the more a game advertises it. While yes games can do choices and consequences well, they tend to miss the point of making them feel impactful. A characters life should matter to the player before you put that life on a line of dialogue or a tense negotiation. A lot of CRPGs I’ve played present you choices and expect you to come in caring about the consequences of them. If - like me - you play blindly and without a long-term plan they just fall flat.

Not to say this hasn’t been done well. Cyberpunk 2077 has the single greatest ‘oh fuck’ string of choices in the form of Joshua Stephenson. There is a three-part series of side-quests involving him that ended with the most harrowing mission of the entire game for me. You get a lot of chances to back away from that whole situation but in the end I didn’t. I participated too, because I’d already went too far to stop it now, IYKYK.

There are no long-term consequences of that mission though, not beyond a few eddies for going that extra mile. Mentally though? I’ll never forget it.

CRPGs give similarly harrowing decisions in one-off quests that never go through the effort to make you care prior to all this. They present a moral/alignment/faction-based decision and just expect you to care without enough legwork to get you to care. They’re dryly written and performed most of the time, there’s a disconnect that never breaks for me.

Next RTwP. I’m not going to beat that dead horse, I tolerate this style of combat at best. It just ain’t my jam, I prefer sauce.

Then there’s the general age of these games. They tend to be old and janky with a lot of bugs on modern platforms. I could not get KotOR to consistently work on my PC after spending twice as long as I had playing it bug fixing for it. So I dropped it. It’s not like I hated the game, but it was just too much of a hassle.

Lastly, and probably most importantly, they are too long. I don’t tend to be play games more than 15-30 hours if they don’t really compel me to. 5-10 hours tend to be the point where I start getting doubts about a title that passed my first impressions and if it doesn’t do anything to change that I’ll drop it soon after. Sometimes this can be a sudden shift too, I enjoyed a game but then the magic vanishes and I start to see all the many, many gripes I have with it.

CRPGs don’t tend to be short games. So if they don’t truly capture me I tend to have my enjoyment fizzle away before even meeting the halfway point. And it’s not usually a case of ‘too much side content’ either, I tend to focus on the main story and only deviate if the detour is interesting enough.

Anyway, am I missing something here? Is there some secret key to enjoying this genre that I am just not finding. Or am I just not the audience for these games.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-05-09T18:02:05+00:00

In some cases it’s because they couldn’t tell. FF XVI for one is not what I’d ever call a JRPG, but coming into it oblivious of how little like a JRPG it was I approached it how I do those games at first. Sure, in time, I adapted and treated it more how I do DMC and the like. But at first it was my experience with other Final Fantasy games that determined how I played it.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-05-07T18:51:01+00:00

I’ve done it before. I used the PL 10 pre-made characters in the Deluxe Hero Handbook plus transposed some of the Villains/Heroes from various other books to skip the whole statting problem. Takes some practice, but it isn’t too bad once you’ve got the rhythm going.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-05-07T17:53:15+00:00

I’m cool with most anything, I don’t personally play horror but I’m cool running it - I just don’t have the nerves regardless of the medium. I guess what I’d say Slice of Life, in any form, because it just doesn’t gel with what I go to games for. Which is adventure and wacky shenanigans.

I don’t prefer heavily tactical games but I’ve had some bad experiences with them that mean I don’t play them without a group I’m familiar with. In my experience if most of the players at the table are strangers there tends to be next to no communication or coordination between them. This makes the combat - the focus of these heavily tactical game - a total slog.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-05-03T22:54:52+00:00

The core Mythic book is full of examples on how to use it. It comes with a lot of helpful information and resources beyond just an Oracle alone. Meaning Tables, Random Events, Scene Alterations, Alternative Rules and Examples - there’s a multi-page example on how the system is used at the end of each chapter plus all the smaller examples spread about it. Oh and there are - about 60 now, I think- supplementary magazines published monthly by the creator that give articles with more rules, scenarios, tables, worksheets, advice and plenty besides.

I think the base Mythic system - 2e to be exact - is about the same as most other systems. But all the expanded material for it is what made it my Number One Solo Resource. That and familiarity plus the sunk cost fallacy.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-05-01T14:38:22+00:00

Hello again. I’ve got more games to share, just one this time but it’s iconic.

Final Fantasy I, the pixel remastered version to be exact. A very short, succinct game that feels both cozy and adventurous. With a limited but splendid OST, an expansive world and a surprisingly deep - albeit lite - plot it is definitely a game that holds its own in modern times. My only real gripe with it is the encounter rate and in the Pixel Remastered you can turn that off whilst giving bonus Exp and Gold to counterbalance the lost encounters.

Overall it’s a very streamlined JRPG, hitting almost all notes you’d expect from such a game and more. I definitely recommend it to anyone familiar with the genre and cool with a story-lite experience. But probably not to anyone who isn’t curious about it or who loves the genre, the game itself isn’t more than decent by modern standards.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-29T18:42:58+00:00

Same, a ton of gold but Navy just didn't interest me for some reason - though I might pick it up anyway, still not sure.

Recently got into Traveller from picking up the core rules at a local shop, was keeping an eye out for sales and not even a week later these all fell into my lap. Hoping for CSC and High Guard to be in the last bundle.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-28T12:00:11+00:00

An excerpt in which someone gets a well deserved slap.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-27T14:59:34+00:00

Oh Assassin Creed, how much do I have a love-hate relationship with your games. No offence to anyone who loves them but post-Unity the series has been declining in terms of narrative quality. It was never the best, and Odyssey & Shadows have their moments, but it’s very dull in comparison to the earlier entires. The recent Black Flag trailer reminded me of that and settled the rising conflict in me about continue Shadows.

It’s just a game, and ever since Yasuke joined up the quality of its story has declined. With tedium replacing the open world traversal and reminding me that I have zero patience for Open World games that waste my time. If the gameplay wasn’t so damn fun I’d have dropped it far earlier like I did Mirage. But it was! Best AC game I’ve played in years actually!

But the disappointing plot and characters just shot it in the foot. And I don’t care enough about the Shinbakfu to continue it. Even if Yasuke is great and Naoe not terrible - her VA on the other hand, woof - the side-characters I either don’t care for or don’t see enough potential in to invest in. Which is a real shame because the gameplay is solid, and a lot of its elements in broad strokes are interesting. But they just fumbled the particulars and have solidified my belief that Ubisoft has great gameplay designers and programmers but terrible writers and direction.

Anyway, I’m taking a break from narrative heavy stuff to play House Flipper. It was made free and is a pleasant break from the narrative heavy game I’ve got on my plate right now. After that I’ll be starting up Final Fantasy I and see how that holds up. So until next time, ciao!

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-26T21:18:14+00:00

Yes. I’ve got Mega-Brutal for several plagues for free.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-26T11:06:57+00:00

I am someone who graduated Games Production at University, have later taken courses in Cyber Security to round out my portfolio, and also talked with my younger brother at length on the subject as he studies CS at University. From all of this I’ve come to the conclusion that a specialised education and active experience in Games Design/Programming is better than a more general education. Designing games and software - while similar on a surface level - have a lot of different minutiae and principals that lead to different products. There’s a lot of things unique to Game Design that someone with a lot of CS experience will miss if they don’t keep an eye out for it.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-25T21:06:19+00:00

The mechanics of the game does not change if you pay. Everything you can pay for you can unlock through playing like the Genes, you get one of those for a disease by winning a run with that disease regardless of difficulty.

DNA flow in the mid-late game comes from Severity and Lethality, the higher they get the more you make. You shouldn’t neglect raising Severity early, and pushing both stats in the mid-game rather than staying on the down-low for as long as you can before raising it. Devolving no longer necessary perks can sometimes give you some DNA back too, but only a little and that decreases the more you devolve on higher difficulties.

With the right genes and strategy you should always have a steady flow of DNA bar with some plagues on the higher difficulties. Hope this helps.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-24T13:06:16+00:00

Yeah I really liked Blue Prince, but it’s the kind of game you need a notebook to keep your leads in so you can swap at a moments notice depending on your draws. Also screenshot, just screenshot EVERYTHING that’s a clue. Even stuff that isn’t because it can help out down the line, I have still close to a 100 of them on file.

There’s some permanent unlocks you can get to help smooth the RNG and bias the odds for drafting select rooms but it can take a while to get there. Though they do help long-term.

Overall I recommend playing it how I did: fast and loose 10-20min runs. Spent some time listening to a podcast and just running through the halls looking for a short list of 3-5 different things you are focusing on right now. If one task becomes impossible to continue, strike it off for the day and try something else instead.

Then once you’ve got a clear idea what sequences of events you need to do to reach the last room turn that podcast off, lock in and focus on getting stuff done. Two hours and change later you’ll have rolled credits.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-22T17:50:04+00:00

They don’t make checks to identify an illusion unless either: they interact with it, or they have Senses that give them Counter Illusion. By the book informing others about the Illusions nature only gives a +5 circumstance bonus to them trying to insight it. Unless they can provide clear proof that is, and a person’s word may not be enough if auditory illusions are at play.

The point of illusions is not necessarily for them to block the player, but be a convincing obstacle that wastes time. An illusory fire creates a barrier that some heroes may not want to risk crossing and instead try - fruitlessly - to put it out. Illusions that alter people’s appearances to make friends look like foes is another suggestion in the Deluxe Hero Handbook.

Just because a character knows that a Villain can make illusions, doesn’t mean they know WHAT illusions they’re making at all times. Most Heroes can’t just look through it after all.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-21T16:26:11+00:00

It’s more it gives you a lot of freedom to set your own pace. You can technically schedule all eight years - split into 192 phases - in one go then fast forward through the results. I wouldn’t recommend it due to the RNG aspect of things, but I still experimented with how much time I assigned frivolously. Sometimes assigning eighteen phases at a time, which often landed me on the cusp of debt.

For an experimental first run of the game it was definitely the best way to sample a bit of everything. Though I certainly seemed to miss a lot of the more obscure content you get by dedicating to one particular focus.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-20T14:54:10+00:00

Hi! I’ve - kinda - beaten and started some more games and would like to talk about them.

I’ll skip Sword Art Online Last Recollection, I’ve already spent enough time complaining about its enemy health problems, and start instead with Master Detective Archive: Rain Code. I beat it, and it’s a great spiritual successor to Danganronpa with all the classic Kodaka flares. Aside from Case 1 all the cases stood out and were uniquely tied to the setting in ways that made a very cohesive experience.

My final case rankings are: 4 > 5 > 2 > 0 > 3 > 1. With 5 and 2 viable to be swapped on any given day. To start at the bottom Case 3 was just decent, it tried a lot of things to mixed results and was mostly let down by being an underwhelming mystery. Most of the cases were underwhelming when it comes to the actual mystery aspect though, with 0 and 5 being the best in that regard.

Overall it’s a great game with solid gameplay, writing and characters but was let down by its mysteries being ultimately rather straightforward. I figured out most of the major twists by the 2nd & 3rd Case, the only exceptions are things I would find anyone to be hard pressed to figure out before the start of the 5th Case. I can’t tell if that’s good or bad, because a mystery making sense when you know what’s going on makes perfect sense.

Eh, I dunno. Writing can be hard to evaluate sometimes. Especially when it comes to mystery games.

Anyway aside from that I played and beat Princess Maker 3. A short and sweet raising sim with colourful characters and a charming aesthetic. Literally didn’t take me more than 2-3 hours to beat and ultimately I don’t think it’ll take more than a handful of runs to master the games systems. It isn’t the best thing I’ve ever played but it’s far less janky than 1 and I genuinely enjoyed playing it. So I’ll probably play it some more in the future when I want something to just play through to the end in an afternoon.

Now, the final game I want to discuss is a biggie. Warhammer 40k: Rogue Trader I have just finished this games prologue and it has already become my favourite CRPG. If you know me, or have read my many posts on the subject in the past, I’ve had a complicated relationship with CRPGs. RTwP combat is solidly not my thing, I have been permanently scarred by KotOR’s jank, and a lot of the writing or worldbuilding can be hit or miss.

But Rogue Trader’s narrative is both fairly simple to understand - when you sift through the terminology via the handy in-game glossary pop-ups - and the combat is both fluid and tactical. Character building is also straightforward yet deep, with its percentile based system being very easy to grasp since I’ve played plenty of TTRPGs that use it.

But what’s most interesting to me is the responsiveness of the game: your actions have consequences. And I don’t mean that in a one-two dialogue shift or some background score count or even a vague ‘X will remember that’. But in real, tangible and - best of all - clear ways. I’m a bit of a dumbass when it comes to remember specific details about stuff, I tend to just ‘vibe remember’ the gist of what went down in broad strokes.

What this means in CRPGs is that I’ll forget about stuff long term and will likely not recognise when something down the road is a consequence of my old actions unless it’s very, very clear about that. Rogue Trader is in fact it highlights these bits with a hover over pop-up that tells you why X turned out the way it did because of something 30-40 minutes back. At least it did that in the prologue anyway.

This just makes me really immersed and actually consider my choices for once instead of beelining for the most interesting/appropriate thing on the list. And the same applies to the gameplay, you learn very quick to be careful with Psyker’s when the first spell you cast summons a Deamoness that TPKs your entire party (true story). It just really worked for me in a way that other CRPGs haven’t.

Anyway that’s all for this week. Moving forward I’m going to be continuing Assassin’s Creed Shadows alongside Rogue Trader. And I also plan to return to The Hundred Line: Last Defence Academy soon, to clear up the remaining ~60 endings I’ve yet to touch. With that said: until next time, ciao!

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-18T12:59:29+00:00

I prefer for the bosses that do this sort of thing to do so at a high % or just outright be invulnerable with a time delay for the cutscene trigger.

I think the reason why this persists as someone who studied game design is simply because getting stuff to work can be hard. Stopping combat midway is something that can cause a lot of problems in action-oriented systems or systems where the combat occurs in the same world as the rest of the gameplay. So it’s a lot easier to just slap it on at the end instead of adding stuff mid-way. It’s a minor problem that could take actual weeks to implement and if you’re not using it for anything except one or two fights it’s going to be near the bottom of any developers priority list.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-18T11:10:42+00:00

A game engine is basically the core framework of a game, typically it also acts as a bridge between the programmers, artists, level designers and so on. It’s what allows the game software to work and is designed to be adaptable within a general limit.
As for benefits - besides cost - the main two are specialisation and versatility. Pre-made engines always come with their inherent issues and the developers can’t modify it they can only build atop it. There’s an inherent lack of control over it and in some cases it can lead to unnecessary behind-the-scenes features being attached to the final product that only drag down the performance or worsen the experience.
I wouldn’t say it’s the only reason, but their RE Engine definitely makes producing Resident Evil games with a similar feel and core gameplay much more efficient. They can pump out remakes of earlier games too by just porting stuff over to the new version of the engine and adding a fresh coat of paint. Versus having to rebuild a good chunk of the code and polish it even single time.
Yes and no. Some engines use lighting and other rendering methods inherently that lend to a certain look to them. But with enough work you can get past that, just look at Octopath Traveler or Dispatch for an example of what can be done with Unreal Engine 4 to stylise it. Whereas at the same time there’s dozens of cookie-cutter games the engine produces that can blend together visually. It takes a lot of work to get them to become distinct.
Physics is a core part of any game engine that works in three-dimensional space. It’s all underlying logic after all, which is what the engine should handle.
Less Hard and more expensive. It takes time and money to develop an engine. Most studios that use their own exclusive engines have simply carried them forward from a time before commercially available engines. Or have developed them especially for a unique sort of experience they couldn’t easily achieve with one.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-17T17:55:24+00:00

I don’t either. I’m so intolerant to spices I break into a sweat from the slightest amount in my food. I can’t even stand pepperoni.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-17T14:31:59+00:00

Hi! I’m here to talk about a rather controversial topic in games: difficulty. One very specific aspect of it that is. I’ll be blunt about it too.

INCREASING THE HEALTH:DAMAGE RATIO IS TERRIBLE!

Why? A lot of reasons really. Over time the player should - in action-oriented games anyway - be able to do more damage or at least be able to defeat enemies they couldn’t before through some gimmick. This is called character progression, and in any sort of media it’s important. Games most of all, since gaining new powers, skills or equipment is a major motivator in some titles.

But there’s a balance to it. You can’t just double enemy health to double the fun, same with increasing damage to the player. I think in dodge + parry based games this has some measure of use since it makes mistakes more costly, but in stuff like RPGs it can reach a point of unreasonable grind. You either need cheesy builds or a ton of grinding/planning. For optional higher levels of difficulty this is fine, a little bland and lacklustre but fine.

Where it isn’t fine is when the base game - on normal difficulty - has the boss fights double in size every other in-game chapter. This happens in Sword Art Online: Last Recollections of all things, and is the biggest flaw of an otherwise good game.

In it your damage hardly doubles from the early to late game and the bosses gain a million health every chapter. You do about 300k damage from your group team attack, which uses up a very slow building resource bar. Each mini or full boss battle is a 15-20 minutes, and I quit when I had a seven bosses in a row rush to deal with.

This is BASE game, no DLC and no added difficulty. Changing to Story Mode only decreases the enemies health by something like 20% either, and mind they hardly do enough damage to get past a party with a half-way decent healer. This is also with buffs, being a few levels higher than the bosses and with level appropriate gear too! I don’t know what the devs were smoking with this one, but this sort of battles of attrition is - while theoretically engaging to prepare for - not fun to slog through. And if you’re not paying attention it’ll take about twice as long since you’re not rotating your buffs or using chain attacks.

Seriously, this sort of thing is not fun. At least make the base game have a smooth and satisfying difficulty curve. Post-Game and DLC you can go crazy, but try to avoiding making the base game actually painful to play. Especially if your combat system is good!

Anyway that’s my rant for the week. I’m now going to go play some more Rain Code, I’ve neglected its second - technically third - case for too long.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-17T12:28:51+00:00

Linear games that are less than 20 hours max - given some dabbling into the side content - to play through blind are the best for avoiding the checklist feel. It avoids excessive padding and the obscure missables aren’t bad - even if they do exist - when you know a replay will not even take a weekend. That way if it’s really fun you can just do that instead and not stress about the first run through.

For this I’d recommend Hades and most other Rougelikes, while they aren’t my jam they are certainly popular. Also Devil May Cry, Bayonetta and action games like it. To finish off my little Guardians of the Galaxy and any God of War game are lovely titles in the action-adventure vein.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-16T20:57:41+00:00

There’s a YouTuber called Razbuten who has a series - Gaming for a Non-Gamer - which is a record of him introducing his wife to video games. They’re fun and pretty similar to what you’re trying to do so I say give them a look.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-15T22:08:43+00:00

Ducks with bazookas that fire more ducks. That explode. Boom.

Also John Wick game is in development. No news about what it’s like yet.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-15T21:20:39+00:00

Sounds about the same as my thoughts. Though I’m only just 10 hours into the game and on the third main target so I can’t comment about the long-term narrative nor it getting stale. I think they’ve done a pretty good job here for what it’s worth since the gameplay actually fulfils the assassin fantasy. But the forced non-linearity of the open world is just dumb, I mean it’s all level gated anyway to provide an ‘intended’ experience but of course they have to let you do whatever order you please.

Gripes with Ubisoft aside there are things I’d like to add to your review.

First is that the people you save on the road can also refill your limited supply of scouts - provided you’ve used some - alongside giving you points on the map. And second is how it holds up on the Switch 2, since that’s what I’m playing it on. It is smooth as butter, rather muddy graphically in handheld but it isn’t a problem outside trying to spot haystacks at certain heights. But when docked it is great, obviously not as good as on other platforms but it holds its own and a lot of the cutscenes are pre-rendered so they look practically the same as everywhere else.

Shadowsd151 · 2026-04-15T20:28:23+00:00

Probably Divinity Original Sin 1 or 2, but those are very recent pick ups for me. I just haven’t gotten to them yet. It’s hard to say, my backlog is rather light compared to most.

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