What are you playing?

I completed a low chaos/nonlethal runthrough of Dishonored.

Now I'm gonna play through it again, hewing my way through everything in my path, leaving oceans of blood and piles of body parts in my wake.
Is there an achievement for that? "Maximum Chaos" or some such?

--Patrick
 

GasBandit

Staff member
Is there an achievement for that? "Maximum Chaos" or some such?

--Patrick
Not that I can see... there are achievements for doing it in low chaos, and all non-lethal eliminations of the bosses, but not vice versa, in the base game. Looks like the DLCs (which I haven't bought) do have both low and high chaos achievements, though. The game anviliciously keeps reminding you via loading screens and what not that the high chaos end is different/gonna be dark.
 
Far Cry 3

Bought this when it was on sale along with Subnautica, and now that I'm done with Subnautica for now I fired this up. Pretty good, pretty good. It offers the kind of open-world gameplay I enjoy. The mechanic of climbing towers to reveal the map, collecting stuff, looting corpses for stuff, stealthily killing enemies, killing enemies by dropping on top of them from above... all remind me of a first-person version of a certain other Ubisoft series. Fortunately, I like Assassin's Creed, so I'm having quite a lot of fun here.
I found it fun. But like the dragons in Skyrim, I just wanted the villain to shut. the. fuck. up.
 
Gravity Rush: WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE oh god, I just killed those people with my irresponsible use of gravity ... WHEEEEEEEEEEE

And now I get to collect furniture so I can live in a sewer. Is there anything this game cannot provide?
 
World of Warships has consumed my soul, and I've finally sprung real money to purchase a couple premium ships - te Dunkerque and the Warspite.

Fucking Russians and their excellently capitalist game business models...
 
World of Warships has consumed my soul, and I've finally sprung real money to purchase a couple premium ships - te Dunkerque and the Warspite.

Fucking Russians and their excellently capitalist game business models...
I got sick of that game after playing it obsessively for a month. The grind gets unreal.
 
I got sick of that game after playing it obsessively for a month. The grind gets unreal.
Usually the grind gets me, as well, but for some reason, I've been able to slog past it. Some of the events have been helping - earning the Arpeggio ships has been a blast. And watching channels like Arlios' and learning how to citadel properly has been fun, to say nothing of Jingles' commentary.

It's gotten to the point that I've been trying to teach myself how to Fraps videos properly, and adding a few montage-style videos on my Youtube channel...
 

GasBandit

Staff member
Usually the grind gets me, as well, but for some reason, I've been able to slog past it. Some of the events have been helping - earning the Arpeggio ships has been a blast. And watching channels like Arlios' and learning how to citadel properly has been fun, to say nothing of Jingles' commentary.

It's gotten to the point that I've been trying to teach myself how to Fraps videos properly, and adding a few montage-style videos on my Youtube channel...
I really recommend getting OBS instead of fraps. It's slightly more complicated to set up, but it will save you SO much hard drive space. I wish I'd made the switch sooner.
 

GasBandit

Staff member
Plus it's free, instead of "free." :p
Well, yes, and there's that.
I hear NVIDIA and AMD have both cooked up their own now, too.


--Patrick
Shadowplay is decent but you get more control with OBS.

I've been rather disappointed with Shadowplay (which is now no longer standalone and is part of "The NVidia Experience" program)... OBS will let you stream, record and buffer (as in, have a button that saves the last x minutes to a file instantly) simultaneously, and Shadowplay doesn't like to buffer while it does other stuff. Also I've been severely disappointed in the stream quality and level of control/configuration in Shadowplay.
 
Been getting back into Skyrim after building our new computer. It was cool playing on the Xbox 360, but with mods this game is amazing. Just gorgeous. Really looking forward to what I can do with more mods :)
 
Been getting back into Skyrim after building our new computer. It was cool playing on the Xbox 360, but with mods this game is amazing. Just gorgeous. Really looking forward to what I can do with more mods :)
You should be wondering what it would look like if you hooked it to your television with those mods enabled.

--Patrick
 

GasBandit

Staff member
On the not-so-awesome front, though, I discovered the source of my recent performance issues. I got a second monitor working a few days back by reactivating my onboard intel gpu and plugging a monitor into it. Turns out, it seems nvidia drivers HATE this, so my FPS started flip-flopping every few seconds between 30 and 60 fps, which is unacceptable (oh how times change). Confirmed this by disabling the intel gpu in device manager, bam, solid 60fps on the GTX1060 again. I guess if I want a second monitor on this rig, I'm gonna have to buy a new one that supports displayport... as the 1060 only has one DVI socket and no VGA - just 4 displayports.

Edit - or maybe not.
Got my displayport to DVI cable in the mail today too. Works like a champ. So I've got my second monitor working again, this time with no annoying FPS dips!

Anyway, My Summer Car -

 

fade

Staff member
Far Cry 3

Bought this when it was on sale along with Subnautica, and now that I'm done with Subnautica for now I fired this up. Pretty good, pretty good. It offers the kind of open-world gameplay I enjoy. The mechanic of climbing towers to reveal the map, collecting stuff, looting corpses for stuff, stealthily killing enemies, killing enemies by dropping on top of them from above... all remind me of a first-person version of a certain other Ubisoft series. Fortunately, I like Assassin's Creed, so I'm having quite a lot of fun here.
This was one of my favorite recent games. I just kind of liked the idea of a dude-bro suddenly becoming a badass and overrunning a whole island.
 
This was one of my favorite recent games. I just kind of liked the idea of a dude-bro suddenly becoming a badass and overrunning a whole island.
Far Cry 3 did one thing very right. It realized it is a rambo fantasy simulator, and allows you to reach max power and be rambo the badass right around the middle of the game, giving you the rest of the game to be a badass in.
 
Far Cry 3 did one thing very right. It realized it is a rambo fantasy simulator, and allows you to reach max power and be rambo the badass right around the middle of the game, giving you the rest of the game to be a badass in.
I was just thinking that. I'm still fairly early in the game, I think, just rescued Liza, and I've only uncovered about two thirds of the north island, but I've already nearly completely upgraded my pouches and gear (just need to do the Hunter quests for a few of the final upgrades) and I'm toting some serious firepower. Not complaining though, I get to stealth-snipe my way through every outpost and I love doing that.
 
Trying to 100 percent Arkham City, and there's always some weird thoughts that come with it. Like, was this night REALLY the best time to do AR training, how long did it take for the Riddler to cement up all those walls covering Riddler trophies, how much was he paying his informants to DO all the dirty work for him, where did he get the money, and why in sweet merciful FUCK did they never inject Killer Croc with Titan? THAT WOULD BE SO BAD ASS!
 
Subnautica got an update. New structures to be found in certain parts of the world, with a correspondingly expanded storyline.

Back down into the depths I go!
 
SWTOR's periodic Rakghoul event is on Corellia, here my Sith Inquisitor's class missions are (the Kaggath against Darth Thanaton). Well, see ya next week, Xenophon.

Crafting gear is great, except I feel like something I'm spending half my playing time checking between characters to see what they need, then going to a character who can make the stuff, but who needs to gather the ingredients first, and that'll take a while, so jump to someone else... I literally have like 2 pages of notes of character levels, gear needs, etc. It can get pretty involved, particularly when the cool custom armor is 7 pieces, each of which needs an armor component, mod component, and a perfect 5/7 need enhancement bits. So just one character can need 28 pieces of gear at a "close enough" level, just to be ready to go. Plus a few more if you're using a custom weapon. Plus you have to try and remember that armor components made by someone with armormech and armor components made by someone with synthweaving give you different bonuses, so if you're going for a tank, you want one and if you're doing DPS, you probably want the other.

One interesting thing: turns out level 10 gathering missions that give you lockboxes contain high level gear. lvl 65-66 at least. Found some good pieces so far.
 
Put a couple hours into CrossCode now that it's gotten a few updates, and it's pretty fun. Once you get the hang of it, combat and movement make exploration entertaining, and there's plenty of side-quests and a leveling/skill point system to sink your RPG teeth into (along with items/equipment).
 
Still plugging away on the new version of NHL 2k17 SuperCard. There are some plusses - if you're willing to sit through ads for other (mostly crappy) apps, you can get extra draft picks. The minuses are that it's still a major ####ing grind to level up, and if you've maxed out all your players, you're going to get beat frequently in quick games because of how other players get different players with better points, or they pro-level their players (yet I have not received multiple copies of ANY of the players that I've seen on Pro level).

Still fun to play, though I'm frustrated that I don't have high-level Preds players.
 

GasBandit

Staff member
I started over a new game of Subnautica on Friday. I'm about 20 hours in, now. It's ridiculously engrossing and creepy and sometimes terrifying. I've got a decent sized base now with two moon pools, the sea moth minisub, the PRAWN exosuit, and I've even built the Cyclops class submarine (Though I've renamed the sub the Sea Bitch. It's a tradition). I've nearly been rescued (but had my rescuers get blown out of the sky by an automated ancient alien weapon), explored alien ruins, repaired the reactor leak in the crashed ship so the radiation goes away, been infected by an alien plague, found an ancient undersea research station that apparently is still not done getting put in the game yet, found the skull of some long-dead leviathan whose head could dwarf most apartment buildings, crashed the game alot, and gained 5 followers on twitch without even advertising. Not bad, not bad.
 
I started over a new game of Subnautica on Friday. I'm about 20 hours in, now. It's ridiculously engrossing and creepy and sometimes terrifying. I've got a decent sized base now with two moon pools, the sea moth minisub, the PRAWN exosuit, and I've even built the Cyclops class submarine (Though I've renamed the sub the Sea Bitch. It's a tradition). I've nearly been rescued (but had my rescuers get blown out of the sky by an automated ancient alien weapon), explored alien ruins, repaired the reactor leak in the crashed ship so the radiation goes away, been infected by an alien plague, found an ancient undersea research station that apparently is still not done getting put in the game yet, crashed the game alot, and gained 5 followers on twitch without even advertising. Not bad, not bad.
I also played after the update and got approximately as far as you did. I then realized this is pretty much all the game has to offer thus far. Which is already really fun and enjoyable, but there was still a bit of disappointment at realizing I've reached the end of the road as it currently exists.

I've also started some mini-projects to make life interesting for myself. For example, right now I'm trying to fill a three-story alien containment tank with one egg from every type of egg-producing creature, to create a display of the creepy crawlies that would hurt me when I'm out in the wild. So far I've got a stalker, a sandshark, a gasopod, a rabbit ray, and a crashfish, and I'm scouring the Jelly Shroom Caves for a crabsnake egg.
 

GasBandit

Staff member
I also played after the update and got approximately as far as you did. I then realized this is pretty much all the game has to offer thus far. Which is already really fun and enjoyable, but there was still a bit of disappointment at realizing I've reached the end of the road as it currently exists.

I've also started some mini-projects to make life interesting for myself. For example, right now I'm trying to fill a three-story alien containment tank with one egg from every type of egg-producing creature, to create a display of the creepy crawlies that would hurt me when I'm out in the wild. So far I've got a stalker, a sandshark, a gasopod, a rabbit ray, and a crashfish, and I'm scouring the Jelly Shroom Caves for a crabsnake egg.
Heh, I put an egg in my containment tank, and it hatched into a Rabbit Ray. I released it outside my base, and it keeps bonking into the room's walls, as if it's trying to swim back into the tank.

I put another egg in, and it turned out to be a Stalker. I took it to the bottom of the trench below my base, and released it there. I planned to use it to farm stalker teeth. Dumbass mofo keeps swimming up, snatching a camera drone off my base, and hiding it down in the bottom of his trench. Then after a minute he'll come get the other one. I can just move them back in from the scanner room, but later he'll just come get them again. So I stopped bothering, he can hoard them along with his other shiny treasures, I guess :p
 
Heh, I put an egg in my containment tank, and it hatched into a Rabbit Ray. I released it outside my base, and it keeps bonking into the room's walls, as if it's trying to swim back into the tank.

I put another egg in, and it turned out to be a Stalker. I took it to the bottom of the trench below my base, and released it there. I planned to use it to farm stalker teeth. Dumbass mofo keeps swimming up, snatching a camera drone off my base, and hiding it down in the bottom of his trench. Then after a minute he'll come get the other one. I can just move them back in from the scanner room, but later he'll just come get them again. So I stopped bothering, he can hoard them along with his other shiny treasures, I guess :p
Speaking of the scanner room, do you find it almost completely useless? Because I built it in my base, and I found it to have a ludicrously short range. I told it to look for quartz, and it found one that I'd managed to miss in my explorations, but that's all it contributed to my resource gathering.
 

GasBandit

Staff member
Speaking of the scanner room, do you find it almost completely useless? Because I built it in my base, and I found it to have a ludicrously short range. I told it to look for quartz, and it found one that I'd managed to miss in my explorations, but that's all it contributed to my resource gathering.
Yes. Even with TWO range upgrades, it seemed to barely cover 50 meters in any direction, and frequently "detected" things I'd already picked up.

My entire playthrough has been a neverending thirst for silver.
 
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