[Aptorian]

After my disappointing experience with Just Cause 3, I jumped to Assassin's Creed: Syndicate.

God damn is this game good. I say that as an unappologetic fan of the series, but still, it's really fucking good.

The new climbing rope gun thingy has changed up the game quite a bit. Now you can move from ground to the top of towers in a matter of seconds. You can cross large open areas or big streets with out having to descend, you can use the lines for air assassinations. It makes for a fresh new addition to the game.

While clunky, I find the horse cart driving fun. It's fun to have obstacles on the streets, jumping from rooftop to rooftop or just racing around like a stock car derby and smashing Templar carts into kindling.

The new mobile headquarters is strangely fascinating. It's a moving base (train wagon) that continously travels across the city. Meaning every time you step out of it you could be a new place. It's fascinating to look out the door and see the city passing by.

And most importantly perhaps, this time around the main characters are not completely idiotic. The brother/sister dynamic makes for fun stories.

This post has been edited by Apt: 13 December 2015 - 07:15 PM

[Tiste Simeon]

That is so good to hear. I think my wife is planning on getting it for me for my birthday...

[Morgoth]

I bought Journey: Collectors Edition on the PS4. That game was wonderfull. And the Cooperation mechanic is the best I've ever encountered.

[Mentalist]

Barbarossa mission 4 is trying my patience.

I'm walled in tightly and I crushed Venice, which was the source of my naval troubles. but now I'm dealing w/ Verona, and they've got Padua and that traitorous bastard Henry the Lion backing them up, and my attacks just get overwhelmed- too many Paladins and Teutonic knights, and I'm not willing to commit more than half of my pop to attack.

So many dead enemies, its a beautiful thing. Thinking back on it, I need to get a castle built on the mainland. The Lombard League WILL fall.

This post has been edited by Mentalist: 15 December 2015 - 07:37 PM

[Maark Abbott]

Currently up to Mission 8 of Thief: TDP (Gold) on Expert. Just gone into the Tower of Earth. Fancied the expert run for a bit more of a challenge, you taffers.

[Mentalist]

Maark, on 14 December 2015 - 03:04 PM, said:

Currently up to Mission 8 of Thief: TDP (Gold) on Expert. Just gone into the Tower of Earth. Fancied the expert run for a bit more of a challenge, you taffers.

Thief Gold is awesome. The bonus maps kick so much ass.

once I finish having fun with AoK (round mid-spring, probably), and then do a New Game+ run of Arkham origins and maybe play Arkham Knight (if I can find it + a season's pass for cheap this holiday sales season), i'll go back to my "immersive sim" run, with Thief 3, Bioshock Infinite, Arx Fatalis, Dishonored, and then probably Mankind Divided.

And then Blood and Wine will be out and it'll be time to replay TW3...

[Maark Abbott]

Mentalist, on 14 December 2015 - 03:13 PM, said:

Maark, on 14 December 2015 - 03:04 PM, said:

Currently up to Mission 8 of Thief: TDP (Gold) on Expert. Just gone into the Tower of Earth. Fancied the expert run for a bit more of a challenge, you taffers.

Thief Gold is awesome. The bonus maps kick so much ass.

once I finish having fun with AoK (round mid-spring, probably), and then do a New Game+ run of Arkham origins and maybe play Arkham Knight (if I can find it + a season's pass for cheap this holiday sales season), i'll go back to my "immersive sim" run, with Thief 3, Bioshock Infinite, Arx Fatalis, Dishonored, and then probably Mankind Divided.

And then Blood and Wine will be out and it'll be time to replay TW3...

Don't forget to turn off that setting that makes PCs go nuts in the Cradle, you taffer.

Everything is now a taffer. Burrick's breath.

[Mentalist]

Burrocks suck. That is all

[Maark Abbott]

Mentalist, on 14 December 2015 - 05:03 PM, said:

Burrocks suck. That is all

They don't suck nearly as badly as Haunts.

[Mentalist]

Are Haunts the red guys or the regual undead?

Cuz the red guys were ok, nowhere near as many of them, and worse night vision.

[Cause]

Mentalist, on 09 December 2015 - 05:31 PM, said:

Welp, i'm addicted. Went to bed @ 4 AM after curb-stomping the Chinese. Took 5 tries to make a successful amphibious landing and bring my petards in range to blow up the wonder about 15 years before the clock ticks down. If the Jin actually put up a gate leading up to their dock, i'd have been screwed.

Once the Wonder's gone, I like to assume the Jin leader committed suicide in shame. Sat back, teched up to Imperial, developed up to improved cannon Galleons, and then demolished coastal defences. At the same time, started scouting the mainland beyond the Great Wall (demolished the gates, built my own there, and planted a Castle at the entrance) and the other 3 factions didn't even have walls, and only one had any towers. Also found six cannons from the "Chinese Engineers". Took the cannons, trebuchet, and a bunch of teched up Mangudai and Heavy Camels to wipe out the Jin, coming up from the same harbour entrance. I never get tired of seeing Cavaliers rushing in to get slaughtered by Camel riders, and fully teched up Mangudai are super-deadly (when you got thumb rings AND Partian tactics) Then swept around the coast up the river, and landed up the Sung's backside (guys with towers). Majority of my casualties came from my own cannons doing AoE damage. Reinforced, and did a pincer on the Tangut, and then also the last one (Hsi Hsia). Skulls for the Khan!

What game is this? Tell me everything

[Maark Abbott]

Mentalist, on 14 December 2015 - 06:46 PM, said:

Are Haunts the red guys or the regual undead?

Cuz the red guys were ok, nowhere near as many of them, and worse night vision.

Haunts were the skeletal Hammerites who weren't great with sensing things but were stupidly fast and could kill you very, very quickly indeed.

Up to the Lost City mission just now.

[Gothos]

Thief: TDP had its fantasy element as I guess LG were a bit afraid to go completely clockwork punk on that ass... but I kinda like it, it has its place in that game, and for the more tech oriented stuff there's the spectacular, monumental masterpiece that is The Metal Age. There's a reason why levels such as Return to the Cathedral and Shalebridge Cradle are as memorable as they are.

In any case, once you start semi-ghosting (0 damage done the entire campaign), the gameplay difference between natural and supernatural enemies fades and you're left with ambience and atmosphere. And those fantasy missions like RttC and Lost City deliver on that, imo.


In any case, the first two Thief games are simply incredible, and there's nothing like them since.

[Mentalist]

I dunno about Metal Age. It had some neat missions (Bank, the City + the Citadel, Police station), but honestly, the cameras and the animatons made it all too similar to Deus Ex. And I know it's not a fair comparison, b/c DX built on ideas from Thief and not vice versa, but I found the mechanistic bits of Thief 2 to be a tad jarring. My preference goes to Thief Gold, for the sheer variety of missions and locations.

[Maark Abbott]

I loved TMA. Never finished it because my lappy died gaming-wise just as I got to the last mission. I'm planning a run through it again, though - the mission where you case the mask mansion was utterly great. Avoid all contact with everyone? No knockouts? No being spotted? Yes. And who can forget "THE WIRDS OF KARRASH, THE WIRDS OF KARRASH".

Deadly Shadows also definitely had moments. The Shalebridge Cradle was spectacular.

[Mentalist]

I'm yet to play Thief 3, and face the Cradle; if you take a scale of 1 to 10, where would you put Bloodlines' Ocean House, and where'd you put the Cradle?

[Mentalist]

Incidentally, I still haven't wiped out the Lombards, due to only playing for like 40 min yesterday. But I DID set up a base with a Castle in what' left of Verona, and both Verona and Henry the Lion's ragtag band of rebels are now homeless transients, running from one newly-built Town Center to the next, untill my army of vengeance smashes them like a fist of God. Due to timely relief from Padua, I still haven't wiped them off the face of the map, but I'm close. Really, I just want Henry dead, for backstabbing me TWICE. Then I think I'll just build the Wonder in Verona, after sticking a Castle next to every ford and blockading the Paduans. If any Veronese manage to hide under a rock and survive that long, more power to them- their city are belong to me already.

[Aptorian]

All this talk about Thief is sort of making me want to re-download Thief 4. I really liked that game. Hmm. Maybe in January.

[Maark Abbott]

Mentalist, on 15 December 2015 - 06:11 PM, said:

I'm yet to play Thief 3, and face the Cradle; if you take a scale of 1 to 10, where would you put Bloodlines' Ocean House, and where'd you put the Cradle?

I don't know bloodlines, but The Cradle is universally loved and acclaimed to the point PC Gamer wrote a six-seven page essay on why it was so excellent. If you've not played T3 I'd advise you rectify this now. If you don't care about spoilers I'll tag a few below:

Spoiler

Effectively, the Cradle is a sentient haunted house that locks you in when you enter, and the only way to escape once you have what you need is to make it think you've killed yourself. There are a lot of undead who die very hard, the Puppets foremost among them - these are former inmates of the Cradle who died but were preserved by the house itself and are played with sort of like psychotic dolls. Oh, and the best bit? It was an asylum and an orphanage AT THE SAME TIME. The level design is REALLY claustrophobic and creepy, to boot.

Apt, on 15 December 2015 - 07:49 PM, said:

All this talk about Thief is sort of making me want to re-download Thief 4. I really liked that game. Hmm. Maybe in January.

Got XBL Gold and an Xbox one? It's free for the next few weeks.

[Aptorian]

Nah. I already have it on Steam.