Breath of the wild.

Obviously a stone cold classic.

Possibly had to google a few too many boss second forms, and I'd love to know if there's a way other than waiting for lizard power to refresh to speed up the penultimate battle, but wow, overall, just magnificent.

When's the new one out? This year?

Nah, got bumped into 2023.

Did my second post not go through?

Facewon wrote:

Did my second post not go through?

You posted it while I was drafting my reply if you're wondering why it looks like I'm ignoring you.

Halo 2 Anniversary (Master Chief Collection) Steam

I must have had the patience of a saint back on the original Xbox, because this had me wanting to throw my laptop out of the window on numerous occasions. Enemies seem to have wildly varying amounts of health, headshots are iffy at best, and there are too many instances of hidden enemy locations that require precognition to make the fight fair.

It's beautiful to look at, and tons of fun when it's not being annoying. A true classic, but definitely a victim of difficult second album syndrome. Now I understand why EDGE gave it a 9 back in the day, rather than the 10s reserved for CE and 3.

[8] sticky grenades passing through a rampaging Brute out of [10] headshots that aren't registered as headshots.

Brings back memories of legendary and getting sniped instantly if you didn't know the enemy spawn locations and their order. That and playing from stealth/cover is the only way you'll ever see it through to the credits. Scoped weapons are your friends.

Finished this one back in the Xbox days and it's a flawed classic. It introduced so many things (online mp, dual wielding, a coherent narrative) it's hard not to forgive it it's telepathic legendary AI faults.

On the up-side, your allies are also ridiculously adept at sniping in legendary. To exploit this arm them with as many sniper rifles/rocket launchers as you can, take to the helm of any vehicle and tear through the level killing everything in sight from a mile away.

GurtTractor wrote:

What difficulty were you playing on?

Heroic.

hunk wrote:

Brings back memories of legendary and getting sniped instantly if you didn't know the enemy spawn locations and their order

Yeah. I think, because I played it so much back on OG Xbox, that I forgave the campaign's foibles because I knew when and where everything would be. I'd forgotten so much in the intervening years, all the issues were right at the fore again. The core mechanics are fine (bar hit detection) and the combat versus rank and file is the usual Halo genius.

GurtTractor wrote:

2 has the most consistently enjoyable and memorable campaign for me, with the least amount of shit sections.

I'd rate ODST as the best campaign. CE, 2, and 3 are all excellent, but 2 has too many sections that rely on rote knowledge, and the less said about the "boss" battles the better. (Why is Chief punching the Prophet when I have an energy sword?)

At least the boss sections were mercifully brief in the older Halos, unlike Infinite's interminable bastards.

I always play Halos on normal these days, just so the marine followers survive long enough to provide ample amusement.

I was enjoying infinite until the shitty boss battles. Just make them skippable

Oh, I forgot about Lego Builder's Journey (PS5). Well a crash bug badly soured me on this and I ended up having to restart the level to progress. Basically it's a meditative Lego adventure game where you do some simple manipation of Lego blocks to create pathways across Lego dioramas. This PS5 version also has raytracing at the cost of reducing the framerate to 30Hz which in this case is a reasonable compromise as it is not a frenetic game. Unfortunately, it is not as good as it sounds - I'm not sure the developers fully got what they were trying to do with this and towards the end of the game you end up with variations on the gameplay that feel like the dev team were just aimlessly casting around... making bridges by spamming magical self-replicating Lego blocks, fannying around with machines that spew out tiles... Nice idea but wasn't fully sold on it. I would wait for it to be at least 50% on sale before trying. [6]

Upacking (PC) Gamepass
Started it a while back, got to the last house and couldn't be bothered with the juggling, but was done quite quickly. Overall a pleasant relaxing experience. Not sure I got the emotional beats some here felt, but I guess I'm just a miseable old fart.

[7]

I have moved house.  I do not want to do it again unless I have to.

Plenty have.  If you enjoy having to point, click, drag and place each word in your story then give it a go.

Unlikely wrote:

I have moved house.  I do not want to do it again unless I have to.

So bloody stressful.

Trek to Yomi

Worth a go. Great visuals and style, decent combat that is nearly great but too often a bit clumsy. A few little bugs but nothing game breaking. Not too long either, done it in two sessions.