I’m gonna be honest, from what I’ve played, it honestly seems like the people complaining about the party members hitting on them too much have just been clicking options without fully reading them. It kinda sounds like the writer here inadvertently started romances with every single party member.

Yes, if you get their opinion of you up high enough, they will open up the possibility of romance- but you can tell them that you’re not interested in them in that way, and the topic will never be brought up again. And yeah, the game is considerably more sexual than a lot of other RPGs. I don’t think there’s any denying that. But the author does make a good point in that it disrupts the usual structure of sex in video games. To me at least, in a way, sex in BG3 feels like it’s part of the world; rather than something that just exists for some late-game cutscenes.

Stellaris and Fallout 4.

Stellaris was the game that got me into gaming. I remember talking to one of my friends back in high school, and he recommended it to me. I picked it up on sale, and I’ve played it regularly ever since. Not only is a good sci-fi grand strategy game, but the sheer amount of mods available means you can make it into whatever you want. Want to play in the Star Wars galaxy? There’s mods for that. Star Trek? Same deal. Want to add weaponized moons, death-rays that monopolize the power of a star, and a bunch of robot cats that are hellbent on consuming all matter in the galaxy? There’s a mod for that as well.

Fallout 4 was the first game I brought after I got my own dedicated gaming setup. I decided that since I had a proper setup now, I might as well buy something that’d take advantage of the new resources I had. Fallout 4 had been a game that had caught my eye since the first ads way back in 2015, so I figured I’d pick it up on sale. And what really made me fall in love with it was the settlement system. A bit strange, I know, but I just really love building things in games. Most of my mods for the game are related to the settlement system in some way or another, and I’ll often find myself booting up the game and building a new shack in Sanctuary or expanding Vault 88 a bit more.

Rockstar’s brought them just to shut them down, I’m calling it now. Probably cheaper and more reliable than pursuing legal action for the same result.

Same here. I’m gonna be more than a bit annoyed if it turns out to be a total mess after two delays and with a $70 price tag. But I’m hoping it comes out good.

It’s been delayed twice at this point, so hopefully it’s gonna come out better than other Bethesda titles have in the past. It’s still a Bethesda title at the end of the day, so don’t expect miracles. But hopefully the launch will be acceptable. Or at the very least, not completely awful.

And I bet most of it has gone towards getting Chris Roberts a comfy nest egg for when he eventually decides he’s got enough cash, cans the game, and runs away to some country without an extradition treaty to the US.

Those are my thoughts as well. Like it or not, licenses are the way software has been sold since the very beginning of the industry. The problem is that most licenses can be revoked at any time for any reason; and the solution for that is passing a law that prohibits that.

If firms want to be able to revoke a license, they should have to clearly and prominently outline the conditions for that to happen- preferably before you even press the “buy” button.

Baldur’s Gate 3 Early Access. I’m honestly enjoying it a lot. If there’s one thing that really stands out to me, it’s the sheer amount of choice the game gives you. I’m genuinely looking forward to the full release in slightly over a week.

I’ve not been buying Ubisoft games since the sexual harassment scandal back in 2020, and this only reaffirms my choice not to buy anything from them. It’s not just scummy, it’s pointlessly scummy.

Admittedly, physical copies of games don’t resolve this issue either: legally speaking when you own a physical disk, all you own is the disk itself- not the contents. The only way to actually fix this issue is better consumer protection laws.

A few games have gotten me to do that over the years.

Mass Effect: Legendary Edition was what finally convinced me to fit a 1TB SSD, and Control was what convinced me it was finally time to get a ray-tracing card.

From what I’ve read, while there’ll be a few nods and references you might only get if you’ve played the original games; the game can be played with no need to have played the originals.

Also, if you do decide to pick up the original two games, keep in mind they were made back in the THAC0 days.

I’m pleased to hear that they’re moving. Fandom’s had a monopoly on the community-created wiki space for far too long, and it’s had a dire effect on the usability of so many wikis. It’s like they’re trying to make their site everything but a easily usable resource for community wikis.

On a related note, I highly recommend the “Indie Wiki Buddy” extension for Chrome and Firefox. When non-Fandom/Fextralife wikis are available, it’ll direct you to those instead; and when they’re not, it’ll allow you to view the Fandom wiki through a much more usable mirror.