Bought it to try n Linux. I don’t have the greatest video card but I can play Dune: Awakening, Helldivers 2, Monster Hunter Wikds, Avowed, Black Myth: Wukong…

Borderlands 4 was stuttering on the barely animated character select. I lowered settings all as low as possible and it was still unplayable with delayed/missed input and stuttering.

It would be amazing if they add the enemy AI teamwork from Force Unleashed to Control 2. Enemies would cling to one another and try saving eachother.

They’re not lying. Ash tray maze is one of the best levels in any game.

After I realozed you already have an attack that dives at an angle and bounces off enemoes that first boss and the minions prior became much easier.

First boss only has 3 attacks. Watch for the rumbly floor to see where it is coming from.

It will either jump across or scuttle alomg the bottom.

The jump can be run under and has a distinct sound to cue you in on it, once safely under you can get a couple whaps in.

For the scuttle across the floor you can use the dive attack. I missed a lot with this but you’ll either score a hit and bounce to lamd safely or you’ll overshoot and land safely.

Later in the fight it will go to the center and rumble the floor then pop up and throw two bells in the air which land and then roll off to opposite sides. Stay out of the middle and jump over the bells.

I think that’s it.

Control is also a great game.

Second this. The Ashtray Maze is still one of the coolest levels in a game for me.

Wow. First search result was for Kongregate. That brought back some memories.

In 400+ hours of Helldivers 2 I have only had a handful of groups with people talking shit in voice or type chat. The co-op nature of the game probably helps with that.

Split Fiction from the same team is also good. At least as far as I’ve gotten playing with my daughter.

I haven’t finished it but I hear you should steel yourself for the ending.

Shadow Labyrinth might be a good filler in the meantime.

Bioshock Infinite

Tunic was such a fun adventure.

• Shadow Labyrinth: A metroidvania set in a very dark timeline for Pac-Man. As a metroidvania it is solid. The traversal and exploration are on par for the genre. The sections where you transform into Pac-Man are a cool new take as a variation of Metroid’s classic ball. The maze levels which most resemble the Pac-Man we’re all familiar with provide quite a challenge. Overall I would put this on the shelf next to some of my other favorite metroidvanias including, but not limited to, Hollow Knight, Sundered, and the Ori games.

• Tales from the Shire: A cozy sim of living in a Hobbit village. I’m sorry, not-village, as that is the goal of the game: to make your small town an official village. I find the pathfinding mechanics in this game adorable and liken them to the wind in Ghost of Tsushima which acted as your objective guide. In Tales from the Shire you follow little blue birds that perch on nearby trees, rocks, and signposts. Speaking of which, when they’re on a signpost they actually sit on the board pointing in the direction you need to go.

• Primal Planet: Another metroidvania, this one is a primitive setting where you’re a caveman living with your village when it is attacked. You then track down your missing villagers and rebuild the village while levelling up, gaining new crafting recipes, etc. Nothing groundbreaking in here, but it is still a good pixelated entry in the genre with a nice art style and animation. This game does do a really good job of letting you know when you’re under-levelled for an area…brutally so.

This is either a bad faith argument, trolling, deliberate mischaracterization, or you have seriously misunderstood what you’ve read.

No, but they’ve kept the servers on all this time so while the games was not getting updates it was still playable.

Thanks for giving me inspiration to come back to it this weekend.

Drop Duchy 18.0 hrs last two weeks / 33.5 hrs on record

Deckbuilder, Tetris style-puzzle, and rogue-lite game. Gameplay is like Tetris but you get building cards which translate into tiles. When placed the tiles provide resources, armies, or somehow affect the tiles around them. Between rounds you can upgrade cards to improve or change their functions. There are achievement milestones which reward progression points that can be spent to unlock new cards, new decks, or otherwise provide boosts to make future runs more successful.

How was Magnolia? I loved Lillies.

Drop Duchy - Roguelike Tetris/card/city builder. 13 hours in and it’s solid./L Description from the Steam page does a good job of explaining an unconventional roguelike.

Drop Duchy - Build your duchy piece by piece in this refreshing hybrid rogue-lite game. Use block-dropping mechanics to collect resources, recruit troops to fight against belligerent armies, and let every block shape your realm, leading your path to victory!

Webbed - This deceptively simple metroidvania is based around using spiderwebs as the main mechanic for puzzle solving. You have two web modes: swinging or pulling yourself to a surface or creating persistent webs. The webs stay when you leave the current screen/room so when you spend time making yourself a ramp to get somewhere you don’t need to redo it again when you return to an area.

I also thought it was a cool touch that they made it accurate to nature in that the male spider is a riot of color and the female is grey/browns. I think they’re based on peacock spiders and the protagonist is the female.

I loved the Ori games and No Rest for the Wicked was shaping up to be a great game. Hoping my refund request to Steam wallet goes through; 67 hours played. I included in my refund request that I want to take that money and use it to support a studio that isn’t run by an asshole (but worded gooder).

Well that sucks. I was really liking this game but I’m not supporting trash people with my money. Sucks for the developers working there. Refund requested and review with reasoning posted.

I was unaware that Thomas Mahler was such a goon, bad boss, and puts out misleading press to bolster sales. I have requested a refund and will not be supporting anything he is involved in going forward.

After saying negative reviews ‘might just cause our death’ and ‘we’ve got a few months left in the oven’, No Rest for the Wicked CEO claims he never said they were in ‘immediate financial danger’ - https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/after-saying-negative-reviews-might-just-cause-our-death-and-weve-got-a-few-months-left-in-the-oven-no-rest-for-the-wicked-ceo-claims-he-never-said-they-were-in-immediate-financial-danger-actually/

Ori Studio Head Says Review Bombing Might Force Studio Closure, Then Takes It All Back - https://kotaku.com/ori-moon-studios-no-rest-for-the-wicked-review-mahler-1851780166?rev=1747057357889

Moon Studios Creative Director Thomas Mahler Criticizes Cancel Culture and Media Bias - https://noisypixel.net/thomas-mahler-cancel-culture-woke-narratives/

Despite its beautiful Ori games, Moon Studios is called an ‘oppressive’ place to work - https://venturebeat.com/games/despite-its-beautiful-ori-games-moon-studio-is-called-an-oppressive-place-to-work/ Posted May 15.

Just accidentally memorize it from having to manually pay a bunch of bills online in a short span!

I also pro-rate the value of my games like this. For instance, Helldivers 2: paid $39.99 (€35,76), played 537 hours. That’s $0.001 (€0,0012) or 1/10th of a cent per hour of play. Even if I add $2000 (€1.788,61) for the PC I play on that still only comes to $3.79 (€4.24) an hour.

Hard to beat that price per hour of entertainment.

My Steam spend over the lifetime of my account comes to $25 (€27,97) a month which is a decent monthly entertainment cost. Of course that doesn’t account for additional spending on other entertainment but putting the total spent amount in perspective is definitely good to do, so thanks for pointing that out for those who need it.

Edit: added € costs

I’m still stuck in Horace! Such a great game.

Ori and the Will of the Wisps is an excellent followup to Blind Forest.

Great game! I had a lot of fun with it. Was it early access at some point? I seem to remember it not being complete when I played it. Or maybe I was left wanting more? Guess I’ll reinstall and find out. Thanks for the reminder!

Kingdoms of Amalur Re-Reckoning $9.99

How timely a comment.

I just got pop_os up and running to replace windows 11 on my alienware aurora. Still working on a sound issue in Helldivers 2 but overall has been a smooth transition.

Ori and the Will o’ the Wisps is an amazing sequel, just as beautiful and just as smooth to play.

Moon Studios also has a new project, No Rest for the Wicked. It is very different from the Ori games but just as well crafted.

Oh awesome! Thank you

Using an old spare as a test is a good idea.

And to think, my wife mocks my hoard of old parts, cables, adapters, etc. Who’s laughing now? It matters not that it grows at an inverse rate at which it is depleted…I did say hoard, did I not?

Yeah…ok, so try it with a spare. Sounds good.

That’s the plan no matter what but always glad to hear from the voices of experience.

I use it to vet ganes for my kids at a glance. I still allow them to play some but I want them going in with eyes open to the machinations going on.

I want to swap my alienware aurora to linux but I’m struggling to find a distro that I know will be compatible with my hardware. Is there a list for bazzite driver support? I’m sure all my hardware will work in most linux distros geared toward gaming but it’d be nice to have some assurance beforehand.

Yes, that’s yet another dark pattern.
You can use this site to help with your game choices.

I know from personal experience it broke Star Wars Outlaws. Appears to have broken any Ubisoft games using that same engine.

This is why I returned Star Wars Outlaws on Steam. I couldn’t even get the game to start. Ubisoft has known about this issue for months now and continues to allow their PC games to be sold in an unplayable state. This is exactly the kind of situation class action lawsuits should be used in, too bad consumer protections are nominal at best in the US.

Compare this to, say, Dead By Daylight, where there’s “seasons” with unlockable rewards, you can get them for free, and you can keep unlocking them after the season ends.

Similarly Helldivers 2 battle passes cost in-game earnable currency to unlock and never expire, but if people want to pay cash to unlock them the option is there.

Ale and Tale Tavern is a game about running a tavern.
Star Was Galaxies back in the day was one of the only MMORPGs I have ever played where people actually hung out in the cantina all day. You can still play it with help from the linked site. That was an incredible MMO and a shame what happened to it.

I also like the lack of pressure to finish a round if you have to be drug away by life. I know they’ll likely be able to finish without me or someone will pop in after me to help.