Coming down from the chaotic buzz of Gamescom is always a little bit strange, but it’s stranger still when having to juggle writing up a flood of previews with reviewing a major upcoming game… and packing things in boxes so you can move house! Needless to say, I’ve had a rather busy week!
As highlights, check out mine and Dom’s previews of Tchia, Evil West, Planet of Lana, and everything else.
Gamoc was so eager to tell us what he’d been playing, he was chatting about it before we even sent out the call to ask! “I’ve been playing a game called Little Big Workshop where you manage a factory,” he said. “Every time I play it I time travel forward four hours in time so I had to stop until I’m done reviewing Steelrising.” He also played the two hour trial of Biomutant, and now wants to play more Biomutant.
Nic B chimed in to share that he “played Bear and Breakfast, a delightful twist on the hotel management sim genre that sadly is a little too rough around the edges to have any real longevity — much like the bear-built bedrooms in the game. Beyond that, nobody will be surprised to hear I played the Pokémon Go event last weekend, or that I will play the event this weekend.”
It’s been more of Horizon Forbidden West for Aran: “The progression % has just ticked over the 50% mark after around 49 hours in. I’m really enjoying the game and just wandering around. I think I’ve got Aloy to level 40 so when I do eventually go back to the main quest I’ll be pretty OP.”
He’s been saying that for weeks now!
Despite his claim to the contrary, Tuffcub has been playing Destiny 2, but he has also actually played another game. “I have played Far Cry 6. It made me want tequila, so I had tequila and then forgot about playing video games and went out for Tacos.”
As always, it’s been Dead by Daylight for Nick P, who dove into the second Resident Evil event – “Wesker is now out and he is GREAT! Throwing people into other people is an absolute joy.” He’s also made a start on Lost Judgment.
Jim’s been enjoying The Last of Us: Part I, which is “unsurprisingly excellent,” even if it will come down to personal choice whether it’s worth you buying it. He said, “A good chunk of that time was spent fiddling with the new photo mode features that borrow heavily from Part II as well as the lighting system from Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales. There were section of TLOU I had completely forgotten about, the remake’s level of environmental detail forcing me to stop and soak in the passion that’s gone into crafting this post-apocalyptic world.”
There was also some Marvel Snap alongside that, which he thinks is “perfect for whittling away those long commutes.”
Steve’s been carrying on with both Xenoblade Chronicles and Arcade Paradise, mixing in a bit of Tinykin, Chibi Robo and Pikmin alongside for a packed week of gaming, while Miguel’s got into Cult of the Lamb alongside his usual rounds of Apex Legends and Fortnite.
MrYd
After too many hours, I finished off Yakuza: Like A Dragon. Which is completely deranged. In a good way. The turn based combat is an interesting idea, but there’s definitely a difficulty issue there, in that you can just spam the latest attack you unlocked and it never really gets harder. And the final section of the game lasts over 2 hours with no save points and unskippable credits. Overall, lots of fun, but I can’t be arsed with the grind to get the last few trophies.
And then as it just appeared on EA Play, Grid Legends. Which is a decent enough, I guess. Although who wanted a story mode in a racing game? And such a terrible one with some appalling acting.
Oh, and Phantasy Star Online 2. Waited 22 years for a sequel after enjoying the original on the Dreamcast. And then 2 come along at once, effectively. Ok, “New Genesis” isn’t officially PSO3. But that’s what you get, and the original (10 year old!) PSO2 is available as a separate DLC (yes, they’ve made it confusing). So it’s PSO3 really. And PSO2 included, if you notice the DLC. Possibly spent a few too many hours in that already, so it’s worth the download. For free.
hornet1990
Haven’t had much time for gaming recently but did manage to start Bioshock 2 remastered only for it to fail to save the game at the first save point due to sharing an arbitrary fixed amount of save space with the first game – grrr. Deleting a few old saves solves the problem apparently but I didn’t feel like replaying the first part again straight away so I started Far Cry 5 instead. Spent a couple of hours clearing the starting island and causing some chaos around it…
willbuchanan
I got the multiplayer trophies in Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood, so I managed to get all the multiplayer trophies in all 3 AC games that are having the servers switched off… and then they announced that they’re not switching them off for another month. I still don’t know how I feel about that. The last multiplayer trophy I got was a bronze (Abstergo Employee of the month) but it felt like a platinum when it popped, such was the relief! On the one hand, I’ve got it all done and don’t need to worry about the servers for those games anymore but on the other hand, the stress I felt going through it…!
I also got the last online trophy I need from Mercenaries 2, for having a billion dollars while connected to the servers, before the servers get switched off for that in November.
Lessons learned, do these things at the time instead of coming back to them years later in a flap. Also, keep back up saves, everywhere. That way you’ll only need to play the game once, even if you do postpone it.
Meanwhile, I’ve also been working on the single player trophies for AC Brotherhood (yup, I didn’t keep my save from a decade ago, so it’s all from scratch) and I’m a trophy away from the platinum in Lego Jurassic World on PS Vita.
Hope things calm down for you soon Stefan L, good luck with the house move! Make sure you have tea requirements (kettle/cups/teabags etc) close at hand – they’ll probably be the first things you need!