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Started Sea of Stars on Friday, really enjoying it so far. Loving how well they have captured that SNES era Square feel to a tee. Also loving that Rainbowdragoneyes and Yasunori Mitsuda do the soundtrack for this one. The latter, one of my favorite composers from the SNES era - Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross are both to 10 soundtracks of all time for me. The former, one of my favorite modern artists, with the Messenger at or near the top of the last decade. He quickly displayed a unique style with The Messenger, and you can instantly tell it's him in Sea of Stars, with the style there but adapted to fit the genre.

I also started Starfield this weekend. Pretty much exactly what I was expecting - Fallout in space. The stealth feels a bit janky, but that may just be because I have a companion with me, they seem to get spotted before I do most times. Some UI tweaks would help the experience. Also the first AAA game I've played on PC that shows I need to upgrade my graphics card. I have a 2060 and it runs fine, but on low settings. Still looks OK to me since I don't have a 4K monitor either. Played about 10 hours or so over the weekend, feels like I haven't done anything yet and I've been to 4 or 5 planets. Last thing I did was head to The Den to sell some contraband. Had to pass through the system New Atlantis is in and instantly got scanned. They tried to hail, and I denied, saying "boring conversation anyways" as I jumped to the Wolf system. So I'm guessing I have a bounty now? Anyways, small criticisms aside I'm enjoying my time and look forward to playing this for hundreds of hours.
 
Started Sea of Stars on Friday, really enjoying it so far. Loving how well they have captured that SNES era Square feel to a tee. Also loving that Rainbowdragoneyes and Yasunori Mitsuda do the soundtrack for this one. The latter, one of my favorite composers from the SNES era - Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross are both to 10 soundtracks of all time for me. The former, one of my favorite modern artists, with the Messenger at or near the top of the last decade. He quickly displayed a unique style with The Messenger, and you can instantly tell it's him in Sea of Stars, with the style there but adapted to fit the genre.

I also started Starfield this weekend. Pretty much exactly what I was expecting - Fallout in space. The stealth feels a bit janky, but that may just be because I have a companion with me, they seem to get spotted before I do most times. Some UI tweaks would help the experience. Also the first AAA game I've played on PC that shows I need to upgrade my graphics card. I have a 2060 and it runs fine, but on low settings. Still looks OK to me since I don't have a 4K monitor either. Played about 10 hours or so over the weekend, feels like I haven't done anything yet and I've been to 4 or 5 planets. Last thing I did was head to The Den to sell some contraband. Had to pass through the system New Atlantis is in and instantly got scanned. They tried to hail, and I denied, saying "boring conversation anyways" as I jumped to the Wolf system. So I'm guessing I have a bounty now? Anyways, small criticisms aside I'm enjoying my time and look forward to playing this for hundreds of hours.
I finished Sea Of Stars and started Starfield over the weekend. I'm only at the beginning, I did all the intro stuff, went to New Atlantis, said I'd help find the artifact, and part of that was talking to a dude that asked me to join the UC Federation (or something like that) so I took and passed the test for that and started the probation assignment which turned out way different and cooler than it was supposed to be.

I have very little experience with Bethesda's games, so a lot of this game feels overwhelming but I'm trying not to overthink things she just follow the missions.
 
they definitely have Game Pass for PC, not sure how it compares to using it on Xbox though
Missed this one, there's a few titles that are console exclusive, but most of the GP catalog is on PC, and has a few extras from the EA side of things, mainly all their old strategy games. Haven't had a ton of issues, biggest ones I had were with the Final Fantasy titles, specifically 10 and 13. That being said, the issues were resolved by looking at the reviews, both review sections had a review by someone that posted the fix for the issue I was having. Everything direct from the MS studios has run pretty flawlessly.
 
I finished Sea Of Stars and started Starfield over the weekend. I'm only at the beginning, I did all the intro stuff, went to New Atlantis, said I'd help find the artifact, and part of that was talking to a dude that asked me to join the UC Federation (or something like that) so I took and passed the test for that and started the probation assignment which turned out way different and cooler than it was supposed to be.

I have very little experience with Bethesda's games, so a lot of this game feels overwhelming but I'm trying not to overthink things she just follow the missions.
Don't worrry about feeling overwhelmed, as a seasoned veteran of Bethesda games I feel that way too. My current quest list has 20+ items in it, and I've only been to a few planets in my 12 or so hours.
 
The A17 Pro chip is the industries first 3mn chip and only available on the iPhone 15 Pro.

Looks like Apple has been investing heavily in the GPU. The GPU on this chip has a total redesign and is the most significant update Apple has made to any GPU to date. Not only does it provide must better performance and frame rates, but also supports native ray tracing for the first time.

In addition, this GPU will allow games once only possible to play on consoles or PC's to come to the iPhone. Games like Assassin's Creed and Resident Evil Village for the first time ever will be able to run natively on a smartphone, at 4k resolutions and up to 60 fps. 30 frames per second with ray tracing. Both games I mentioned will be available on the iPhone 15 Pro at launch.

It makes me wonder why apple is investing so much in the GPU. Does this go beyond mobile gaming? Could they have a handheld in the works, or a gaming version of the VisionPro headset? Perhaps gaming macs.
 
I recently finished Kirby and the Forgotten Land on Switch a few days ago and it's a solid game. At first, it felt way, way too easy. Then it slowly but also suddenly got much more difficult. The later game boss battles were extremely tough and if you didn't have the right ability it would be impossible. Kind of reminded me Souls or Hollow Knight type bosses where you can't just relentlessly attack and need to plan/avoid contact. Mini levels that showcased each ability and subsequent upgrade were almost impossible to beat at the goal time other than just passing the level. You basically had to be perfect to beat each one every time. Overall it was way harder than it needed to be however because I was playing on the harder difficulty since there was only two difficulty levels. One was very casual and the other was called "Wild Mode" which is harder. If there was a "normal mode" in between I think it'd have been better, although it was a fun challenge in the WIld Mode. Another great thing about it was a bonus area at the end of the game. When you defeat the final boss there was another area left to be cleared which added about 3-4 hours of play onto the end of the game. All-in-all I spent about 25 hours playing it which is much more than expected.
 
Rarely dip my toes in this thread but I need some recommendations.

I'm taking a trip with a bunch of my old high school friends for a get-away slash bachelor party at a lakehouse and I volunteered to bring a PS4. Only issue is I really don't know of that many local 4-player split screen games we could play. Other than the typical COD style co-op which may only be 2-player in most cases.

Any recommendations?
 
Rarely dip my toes in this thread but I need some recommendations.

I'm taking a trip with a bunch of my old high school friends for a get-away slash bachelor party at a lakehouse and I volunteered to bring a PS4. Only issue is I really don't know of that many local 4-player split screen games we could play. Other than the typical COD style co-op which may only be 2-player in most cases.

Any recommendations?
The Jackbox Party Packs are terrific if you have internet access.

There are a number of good arcade beat-‘em-ups that would also fit the bill.
 
I recently finished Kirby and the Forgotten Land on Switch a few days ago and it's a solid game. At first, it felt way, way too easy. Then it slowly but also suddenly got much more difficult. The later game boss battles were extremely tough and if you didn't have the right ability it would be impossible. Kind of reminded me Souls or Hollow Knight type bosses where you can't just relentlessly attack and need to plan/avoid contact. Mini levels that showcased each ability and subsequent upgrade were almost impossible to beat at the goal time other than just passing the level. You basically had to be perfect to beat each one every time. Overall it was way harder than it needed to be however because I was playing on the harder difficulty since there was only two difficulty levels. One was very casual and the other was called "Wild Mode" which is harder. If there was a "normal mode" in between I think it'd have been better, although it was a fun challenge in the WIld Mode. Another great thing about it was a bonus area at the end of the game. When you defeat the final boss there was another area left to be cleared which added about 3-4 hours of play onto the end of the game. All-in-all I spent about 25 hours playing it which is much more than expected.
I need to put more time into both this and Zelda! I’ve been sidetracked by quick session junk food games.
 
The Jackbox Party Packs are terrific if you have internet access.
I agree with this recommendation. I play a lot virtually over Zoom with my fiance's family every few months since we all live in different states and they're a lot of fun. They're pretty casual and you answer the questions/prompts on your phone.
quick session junk food games.
what is this? 🤨
 
kind of weird that the thing that got me the most excited from this direct was the new amiibo announcements lol
 
this definitely felt like an end-of-generation Direct.
Yea just getting the last few things out of the way. Really curious to see what the Switch's successor looks like (probably) late next year. Hopefully it doesn't follow the trend of a major success followed by major fuckup Nintendo has been on for 25 years.
 
Yea just getting the last few things out of the way. Really curious to see what the Switch's successor looks like (probably) late next year. Hopefully it doesn't follow the trend of a major success followed by major fuckup Nintendo has been on for 25 years.
I've been tracking the rumor mill for a while, it's looking like it's going to be a pretty serious piece of kit (at least, for the money).
 
Direct was pretty solid. There was nothing amazing about it but I had no expectations given the end of the life for the switch. FZero 99 is a nice surprise, tomb raider collection is an instant pickup when its 50% off , my girls will LOVE the new Kirby Peach game, the good paper Mario getting a port is nice.

they don’t have to / need to, but if the new system is backwards compatible they can keep pumping these end of the lifecyle games with launch of new system.
 
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