What are you playing?

[Althena]

When I am done grinding Horse Stance, One-Inch Punch and chopping wood I will play more, I have been enjoying what I've played.

[The Grimace]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2118420/Stories_from_Sol_The_GunDog/

This is really good. Tonally reminiscent to Snatcher.

[Random Encounter]

Oh man, that looks vaguely reminiscent of those old PC98 text adventures. Throwing that on my wishlist, thanks, Grimace!

[Selbaek]

I picked up Avowed, and I am enjoying it so far! It's like an Elder Scrolls game, but more of a lighter version of it. There's no weight to your inventory items, so no worries about getting weighed down. There isn't a stamina gauge for running around or swimming, so you can continuously just roam around at your leisure. Vendors don't have limited gold, so you can just sell your junk to the same NPC. It caters to a guy like me, who is intrigued by exploration and world-immersing games like this but would rather play an action game that streamlines the combat and story experiences.

EDIT: I forgot to mention the part that relieved me the most: Not everything is interactable. You see highlights or icons on things that are, so I don't feel compelled to home in on each individual thing trying to do something with it. That being said, there are plenty of things that are hidden throughout the environment that you can miss easily, so there's still quite an exploration reward factor involved.

Plus... a revealable map! I'm a sucker for it.

[Sarah Valentine]

I noticed threads on Reddit about Avowed but I didn't feel compelled to look into them so I knew nothing about the game until now. I appreciate the write-up because it sounds like the kind of game I can get into! I plan to look into it between finishing Yakuza Kiwami and starting in on Kiwami 2.

[Selbaek]

I stand corrected on the inventory item weight in Avowed. I found out last night that there is a limit, and ways to enhance that limit. Materials have no weight, only equipment does. That being said, it was quite some time before I ever became encumbered, and the storage at my party camp seems to be endless so I can just dump things in that and go about my merry way.

[Sarah Valentine]

You got me taking a peek at Avowed before I was done with Yakuza Kiwami! >w>
I really dig the character customization and was able to easily make a nice avatar.

I feel like this is to Elder Scrolls as Outer Worlds is to Fallout, and I'm digging that. If you'd said this was made by Obsidian to begin with, I would have run off to try it without hesitation lol.

[Selbaek]

If you'd said this was made by Obsidian to begin with, I would have run off to try it without hesitation lol.

Oh, yeah! It's made by Obsidian!

[Sarah Valentine]

I finished Avowed last night. What a fantastic game. I never let Kai out of my sight once I realized he was voiced by the same guy who did Garrus in Mass Effect. The companion quests had believable feeling behind them. I got an ending that satisfied me.

So thanks for getting me to try it!

[The Grimace]

I've got Avowed on my radar. I'll definitely check it out at some point. It looks a lot more interesting to me than Outer Worlds did.

[Selbaek]

I'm in the second region now, and I have to say.. maybe wait for a sale. Avowed is fine, but really it's juuuust interesting enough to keep me plugging along. I'm not immersed, the revealable map is a bit superficial, and while the dialogue and environments are interesting, none of it really feels captivating. Worth playing, but not worth rushing to play imo.

[The Grimace]

I'm near the end of Assassin's Creed Shadows right now.

It's another AC: "RPG" title. Like the others of this type, it starts out strong and then the bottom falls out the middle when the open world aspect is foisted on the player. I love Assassin's Creed and I'm glad the game is doing well, but I really miss the days of Ezio when the story felt more fully realized. Naoe and Yasuke are cool characters that aren't allowed to shine outside of the disjointed main plot.

It deserves an 8/10 because there's plenty to do and most of it is fun, but the open world is too big again. The seasonal transitions the game offers are beautiful and make the game worth playing alone! Seriously, I cannot downplay how cool they are. But the wide areas have very little of substance to actually do.

I can only invade and sneak through Castles so many times before I begin longing for something else to do. I wasn't a fan of hunting animals in Origins or Odyssey, but it did give more for the player to do outside of taking down targets. Once you've seen what the first two provinces of Shadows has to offer, that's it- the rest of the game plays out the exact same. That can be fine for people like me who like to just vibe with a game's 'feel,' but for most others it'll get boring real fast.

Definitely worth a look when it eventually goes on sale.

[Althena]

The Ezio trilogy were close to perfect games.

[The Grimace]

The biggest issue with the RPG series for Assassin's Creed is that the plot loses all of its momentum in their middle acts due to the Open World aspect.

Each of the games has a mysterious cabal of evil-doers that the player is meant to gradually sus out. Finding out who the real leader is can be a fun mystery, but being able to approach any of the Enemy Organization's Members in any order removes any flow from the overarching plot. Worse yet, Shadows does not provide any hints to the Enemy Leader after killing any of the underlings. And ultimately, I felt like it didn't even matter by the time I found out who it was.

I still stand by saying it's an 8/10 game, but it's still an RPG Assassin's Creed, with all of the troubles these variations face. I prefer the structure of older AC titles. Hopefully they will listen to the fans and adjust their ways in future titles.

Shadows has a lot of really cool aspects to it, and they have been listening to players as to how to make the experience better.

[Althena]

Would folks be interested in watching me play the Ezio tril on stream?