Strangestories

Something I didn't mention in my first post: the exploration and traversal!

A huge part of the game is trying to figure out the best way to get from point A to B. Flying through space to get to airlocks is fantastic, but you also intuitively figure out how to get to those places through the station's interior as well. Want to get to the cargo bay? You could run through the entire station (I think) or you could go through GUTS, OR you could fly in through the cargo bay door you use to get in originally. Want to get to the Talos lobby? There are like three or four different ways to get in there. While the easiest way is probably via the elevator you unlock about a third of the way through the game, you can also go through the Hardware Labs, Neuromods Division, or Psychotronics. It feels like you're exploring an actual space station, learning its layout so you can more efficiently run around it.

Gosh, what a great game.

I adored the combat, atmosphere, expansive playstyles, mystery surrounding the story, etc. It has a weird mixture of System Shock 2 and Dishonored that I really feel works well.

The beginning of the game is absolutely brutal up until you start getting Typhon abilities. You go from having to stealth around, setting up every encounter with Phantoms just to survive, to sprinting extremely fast, slinging out explosive blasts, psychic shocks, flame pillars, and so on. It really excels at giving you this daunting enemy which has a huge advantage, to you having the enemy's same abilities that have been killing you over the course of the game, putting you on even footing. My only complaint here is that there aren't really that many weapons. A pistol, shotgun, and laser are really your main means of killing a Typhon outside of the abilities. One or two more weapons would have been a great addition.

The story is pretty good aside from what feels like a rushed, and very sudden, ending. It doesn't rely on some huge boss encounter to top things off which I can appreciate because it's not that type of game. There are some genuinely difficult choices to make that transcend "good" or "bad," oftentimes resulting in you having to choose whether someone should die or not. My favorite example was when I went onto Talos's bridge and saw a computer screen displaying a shuttle only 6 minutes from entering Earth's atmosphere launched from Talos right as shit started going sideways. An audio log nearby shows an officer's deliberation over destroying the shuttle potentially contaminated with Typhon remotely but being cut off by something before she can make a decision. I opted to blow up the shuttle myself but I had to think about it for a while.

I'm really glad I played the game a bit after release. Aside from a few bugs and one or two slightly framey areas, the game ran flawlessly at max settings on my 1080 machine. The arboretum and power plant had the most frame drops but after fully updating the computer's drivers, most of those issues disappeared. I know the game had a lot of issues on release, but it seems like they've been smoothed out for the most part.

If you're looking for a good System Shock 2 esque game and have a pretty good PC, I'd highly recommend this game.

Had Dragon Age: Inquisition since I first got my PS4. Never played the DLC so picked it all up for $6.

Idk about kids that young but I help teach college students and they can go to the bathroom whenever they want. But they’re adults, sooooo.

@coryukin: I’m sure the giant bomb folks want to know that scam ads are appearing on their website. Reporting them doesn’t hurt anyone.

Just got a really powerful new gaming pc with a 1080 in it but I didn’t have any games that would take advantage of it. Got Skyrim for my partner so they could finally fulfill their dreams of playing it modded. I haven’t decided what I want to get yet.

Limiting myself to two games this sale because the winter sale is so close.

@sammo21: Like I said, it’s not exactly gambling. What I said is that it is *like* gambling in that it uses very similar practices. That was the main point of my post.

@sammo21: While this isn’t 1:1 to gambling, loot boxes still prey on people in the same way that gambling does. Gambling is an analogy for what is happening and analogies are not 100% equal to what they are referring to. Either way you are putting money on the line hoping to gain something worthwhile at the whim of random chance.

You claimed in another thread that gullible people are the problem, not loot boxes. While gullible people are part of the problem, there are also those who have a serious gambling problem and thrive off of getting what they want after spending huge amounts of money. These are the ‘whales’ so many people talk about.

Yes, it’s a bit more complicated than saying “It’s gambling!” But the biggest takeaway is that massive game companies are using psychologically predatory and manipulative tactics to get money from people through a random reward system.

But really, I just want to point out that not everyone is or can be like you or me. We aren’t interested in the loot box model for whatever reason but that’s just us.

@kittentactics: So people are paying for perks, something that required progression alone in most (all?) CoD games. That doesn't detract from how scummy it is, it exemplifies it.

And what about the person who is pretty good at the game *and* pays for those perks?

It's still an advantage people can get much faster than everyone else if they pay for it. In any single player game that would be iffy, but in a competitive shooter? That's downright filthy.

@kittentactics: Weird, one of the reviews of the game said you can get a Star card which increases the number of battle points (or whatever they are called) by like 20%. That absolutely seems like a huge advantage.

I also find it baffling that people are just sitting back and saying, "Well...it's really not that bad." We said it wasn't that bad when it was *just* cosmetic items as well. Like at least they're not selling game-affecting gear/buffs! Now they're rolling out paying to gain an in-game advantages and people are saying, "Well....it's only a 10% damage increase." It might not seem like a lot but that can still affect games.

It's just so blatantly obvious that companies like EA, Activision, and Blizzard are gaining ground on this issue by incrementally pushing out larger "micro"transactions, upping the bar of what is acceptable. And a lot of people are eating it up.

I know this sounds like a slippery slope argument and it kinda is. But considering the track records of these companies? This micro transaction culture will probably get worse until people stop accepting these things as *just* a small advantage.