Topic: What PS5 Games Are You Currently Playing?

@Kraven

Whiteclad Noble second phase no joy also still not beat big head Wandering Wight, shockwave wrecks me everytime, also went too far outside arena and big heads healthbar reset lol. Gonna check out some help guides.

It's been a while since I've been active,

Been working through the backlog

Assassin's Creed Valhalla - 7/10
Very much what we've seen and I enjoyed it for the most part, this was a game which was too big, if that's even a thing, way to much to do and most of it's pointless but the main game/story I enjoyed.

Hogwarts Legacy - 6/10
Big Harry Potter fan and for the first 10-15 hours I actually really enjoyed the game, thought the combat was great and the graphics are easily some of the best to date, as the game went on I felt it got stale, story became predictable and I actually got bored that everyone you interacted with was just a goodie-toe-shoes and overly nice, it also had alot of pointless side stuff and I basically ran through the story towards the end.

Doom 2016 - 7/10
Enjoyed it, mabye I just needed some mindless running and gunning after the last few games but it was simple and the last few boss fights where quite challenging.

Remant 2 & DLC's 8/10
I absolutely adored this game and really went all in, I am actually close to the plat and will probably grab it when I return for the 3rd DLC. A Soul's like shooter with plenty of enemies and boss fights and a great atmosphere, never played the first one so can't compare but this was a treat.

Diablo 4 - 7/10
I actually enjoyed the story and played abit of season 4 but ultimately wanted to move on, definitely worth picking up for the campaign though and the builds are quite good, I know it's had its controversy but I had fun with it.

Ratchet and clank a rift apart- 8/10
Great game with good fun gunplay, plenty of weapons to try out. Rivet was a good character to add in the game and the graphics and colours really showed off what the ps5 is capable of.

@Ravix the smithing in KCDII is going to be immensely indepth, no doubt about it. The witcher had cool side quests for the special armours and I imagine it'll be similar for the really special gear.

The thing about KCD is if you're bad at the combat, how good your weapons or armour are doesn't really matter much haha. At the moment I find bandits and cumans well balanced, I have to use my full set of skills to defeat them but it's not frustratingly difficult. I'm still no where near good enough to final the Rattay tourney (which I've definitely rage quit a few times). Definitely need to train axes and maces with Bernard before trying the tourney again.

I try and layer my clothes so that I carry the least amount of extras as possible. So base layers are all dark and quiet, good defense on the middle layers, and then high charisma on the outerlayer. Keeping spare leather gloves for hunting/sneaking.

Honestly I love a lot of the boring stuff in the game, just riding my horse, trading, picking herbs, etc, it's just such a nice environment it makes boring tasks in other games, a really relaxing experience in this one. The atmosphere and charm of KCD is unparalleled

@torquex I love souls games but I think there's a time and place for it, too many action games are soulslikes now. Would you say Wukong is worth full price or should I wait for a little discount on it?

@SlipperyFish Hey, Lad! Don't you want to put a little wager on the Rattay Tourney?

Yep, they really nailed the feels and tone of even the simplest of things. Similar to RDR2 I'd just get lost for ages wandering and admiring the world. If the next game had a legit sim element where you could just go and grind flour, skin animals, smith etc instead of going to war. I mean, maybe there is the potential to one day use the world and mechanics for KCD Online where people can just chill and sell flowers or become bandits 🫨🫨🫨

@Ravix what's more annoying, Peshek or that quest popping up all the time?

Skinning animals needs to change in KCD2, unlocking a perk just for skins to be a random chance event was a very lazy way to do it, especially when there's bloody tanneries already in the game. It would be great if KCD2 is basically medieval life simulator. It's funny isn't it, all these games about killing each other but the best elements are arguably when there's little fighting. Maybe it's a metaphor, I dunno, I just wanna wander around Kuttenburg already!

@MaulTsir Nice work, buddy! Looks like a quality diverse set of recent games. Too bad that Hogwarts fell a little short for you, but I can understand your sentiment. I continued to enjoy it through to the end and it was my GOTY last year, but a lot of the open world tasks do get a bit samey. In the end I also gave up on clearing all the Merlin trials, balloons, etc before it became too rote, and still ended up sinking 80 hrs or so into it. The story was middling, but I enjoyed the HP lore so much that it made up for it.

I also agree with your Rift Apart and Doom comments. Both solid games for when their respective mood strikes.

A couple of your other games pique my interest, namely Remnant II. I’m playing Dark Souls 2 right now and getting my Souls fix for a while, but Remnant II recently dropped onto PS+ Extra so it caught my eye. I actually have the first game in my library also from PS+. The first game was fairly well received but the second one really received some very high praise, so I think skipping straight to it might be the way to go. How was the difficulty? Are there ways to grind levels and farm for experience if you’re struggling, like the Souls games? And do you think you’ll go back and try the first game now?

@Th3solution I mean, it's hardly fantasy, it's historical fiction and medieval life sim, like you say, so it should suit you nicely anyway 😁 and if you don't try it soon, Henry will come to see you 👺

If you're not in a rush 100% yes.

Did some 2 player couch co-op yesterday. Finally finished the broforce campaign, great game.
Then moved onto Warhammer Chaosbane, a top down hack & slash game. It has satisfying combat, but as is common with these games, the story and characters are very forgettable. A shame but still fun to team up with a friend against the hordes.

Since finishing the Elden Ring DLC I have been playing Doom Eternal, which was actually one of the first games I bought for the PS5 when I got it at the end of 2021. At that time I was pretty new back to gaming , having got back into it after we got a Switch for the kids at the start of the pandemic, and I got stuck early on ([spoilers] at the first mancubus in the cultist base [/spoilers]). I just could not get the hang of it - it was a while ago now but I'm pretty sure I must have tried lowering the difficulty (from Hurt Me Plenty) to no avail. I could barely remember what all the buttons did, and if I did remember it took me about 30 seconds to look down at the controller and find the button I needed, let alone use anything strategically during combat! I came to the conclusion that returning to gaming in my mid-40's this game and games like it were just beyond me.

Now, playing on Ultraviolence (?), I'm past the point I was stuck at ([spoilers] beat the cultists base and on the Doom Slayer level [/spoilers] and having so much fun! There were a few encounters later in that level that I thought I had reached my limit and was considering turning the difficulty down, but made it through before I cracked.

I have also been playing Cult of the Lamb on PS+ to wind down.

One aspect that I thought was pretty cool for Chaos Bane was if one person is going through their skills or equipment to make some changes / upgrades, the other can still run to the next area and everyone will tag along automatically and you won't be forced to simply wait.
Considering most developers have thrown couch co-op in the bin, it's very refreshing to see someone trying to improve the experience.

Still at Star Wars: Jedi Survivor. I definitely don't like it enough to play it consistently, it seems, as I keep having long periods not playing it. But at times I do like playing it for a while. It's a weird one. I feel like I'm nearing the end, at least I hope I am. Side stuff has become pointless as I don't want to collect anything or take bounties to unlock stuff I won't use as soon as I'm done with the story anyway. But overall I've liked the game, I guess?

Combat just feels off to me, though. It is like there's button lag, yet it's still easy enough to win fights anyway, I'm just not doing it as stylishly as I'd anticipated, and I barely ever perfect dodge at all, I just dodge and still get hit, or dodge far enough to be fine anyway nearly every damn time, and it's boring 😅 and I don't think it's a case of "I'm getting too old for this s***" something just isn't clicking with me in this game and I can't get it to flow. I will beat a big bunch of enemies and then be thinking "hope there's a meditation point because I just can't be arsed to do that again, ever" whether I rest or not, I'm just happy to be past segments so I can move on.

There's also soooo many skills, too many, I'd say. I've barely used slowdown through the whole game, and now I'm just adding spare points I've accumulated to it and forcing myself to try and remember to bother. Same with quick draw. Same with jedi super auto dodge. I'm just never using the tools it's giving me, because it never feels situationally right, or a cool enough moment somehow. Not wasting special abilities on a bunch of repeated enemies, and by the time I'm at a boss I've just carried on in the style that got me there forgetting to use any of those, quite clearly, not required tools for survival 🫠

I dont know... Unintended vent over, I guess 😅

@Th3solution Thanks man! Yeah tried to mix it up a bit in terms of gameplay and genre so games didn't feel stale whilst working on the backlog lol

Yeah I don't know if it's just me but everything was there for me to really love hogwarts and like I say for the first 15 hours or so I was really enjoying it but as it went on the game just became abit stale in my mind and then I was just rushing through the story which like I say didn't feel that great to me in the end. Combat was really good though and I enjoyed using the spells but just hated the dialogue and the characters by the end of it.

Remnant 2 is fantastic, it's strange because Soul's like is the way to explain it but really it doesn't do it justice because it's really it's own game and genre, just has some soul elements, like resetting to last save point on death. The way they did then Worlds and the story is really interesting, each world has 2 story's and the levels are generated so can be different.

Difficulty is similar to Soul's as in depending on how much you grind and level up will depend on how easy/hard you make it for yourself, which answers your question about levelling up 😂, there's alot of variety on builds and the secret stuff is as obscure as the Soul's games.

Boss fights are good and great when you finally get through them, it's co op up to 3 players as well and I did abit with friends which is really fun. I would definitely recommend it, I picked it up when on sale with all DLCs for £22 around $26 I guess and it's well worth it for that price

@Ravix I also found that I just gravitated toward a specific play style and mainly used the crossguard and double-bladed stances. A combination of those two gave me options for fast crowd control or the quicker enemies and ranged fire, and then switching to the heavier hitting crossguard for spongy bosses or when I need the power. I dabbled a little in the dual wielding but found the double bladed move set more to my liking. I wanted to like the blaster stance but the shooting was too limited and by the time you get access to it the muscle memory is hard to change up. But I know many people really liked the blaster and it’s definitely the most unique set of moves and abilities.

The main hub world (Koboh I think it’s called) is simply too big. It was a relief when I realized that not every location was going to be that large and wouldn’t have that many side distractions and Metroidvania type areas to go back to. It’s quite overwhelming.

I also agree that the side content and exploration gets a little old, mainly due to the lack of any meaningful rewards or collectibles when you go through the trouble of engaging with the optional activities. I still did almost all of the map and all the little puzzle rooms, etc because I just really enjoyed being in that world and the gameplay was fun, but to spend 30 minutes puzzling out how to get to a particular spot in the map then fighting some tough enemies, only to find out that you are rewarded with… ta-da!… a new facial hair option for Cal! 😅 Or a new color palette for BD-1! Sometimes I’d change up the colors and outfits for grins, but there was way more than necessary and I would have liked some more meaningful collectibles.

Overall I really liked the game though. But just like Hogwarts Legacy, a love for the franchise really helps carry it through some of the gaming weaknesses. It’s not a bad Souls-like either, and does well in terms of accessibility for a more casual Souls approach.

@MaulTsir As I was mentioning, the real star of Hogwarts Legacy was the well-crafted world. The attention to detail for the HP IP was superb.

As an aside, the best quest in the game, imo, was the PlayStation exclusive quest, I forget the exact name but I think it was called “Minding Your Own Business” about the shop in Hogsmeade. Really enjoyed that one.

As far as Remnant II, I’m simultaneously pleased to hear what a great game it seems to be, and also disappointed because my backlog can’t really support much more! 😅 The good thing is that quality Souls-likes are always a nice thing to have, since many of them are mediocre and don’t live up to the FromSoft benchmark. The only other Souls-like that I’m seriously curious about right now is Lies of P. But I still want to clear the From catalogue first. However, Remnant 2 has enough unique going for it that it’s worth maybe mixing in somewhere regardless, since it’s not a 1-to-1 Souls swords and magic type of game. The shooting in the gameplay I saw seemed to remind me of Borderlands, in my limited experience of shooters. Maybe it’s just the HP numbers popping off as you ahoot that made me think of that. Anyway, it is a good one for me to keep in the back pocket when I have a shooter, grim-dark world mood going.

What’s next on your agenda? After conquering Elden Ring are you thinking about going back for Erdtree? Or any interest in going back to pick up the Dark Souls series? Reckon you’ll follow up the Valhalla with more Assassin’s Creed (there’s always plenty of those to mine), or maybe try the follow up Doom Eternal? Or are you ready to dive back into FF7 universe and take on Rebirth? So many options… 😄

@Th3solution Yeah, I already respecced once from dual wield to try the blaster, as it feels like the only genuinely unique one compared to all other jedi/sith/whatever, but the amount I forget to use the quick draw shot, means I'm basically just fighting one handed in a fencing style with the odd blast here and there.

I just want to kind of have Cal as a more grey, questionable tactics force for good, so blaster suits his sometimes lack of jedi ways. There is always the odd hint that he is struggling to keep it together and his emotions can get the better of him, so it suits my vision for the character 😅 but, yeah, it feels a bit limited. I think people just like it because if you use perks you can make it unstoppable and cheesey, tbh. I always liked double bladed in the last game, I should have just stuck with it, I think. It is definitely the nost fluid feeling. Dual wield has my favourite parry, so maybe I'll switch back to that instead, but serpents bite or whatever it is called can be super janky to look at for your regular attacks.

The R1 force lock on is also terrible in combat, so quickly zipping about and transitioning to force lift a bunch of people rarely actually triggers properly. They introduced fun ideas, I think it's just the execution of combat in a combat heavy game could be a lot better.

Overall, it is still fun enough, I just wish I could make the combat flow better I think

@Th3solution pretty much scratch the last comment, as I ended up respeccing again tonight. Deleting all the force lifts and slams that don't really flow in combat, and piling the points into twin blade and dual wield, leaving a few important ones in Crossguard, as that is handy still. And not bothering with the blaster, even though I like the idea of it for Cal.

So now I can go to tactics where I draw all enemies on top of me with the twin blade and use all the moves that suit close quarters and surrounded combat, and hopefully it just looks and feels cooler to play.

Hopefully I have a few main quests to go, not really sure though tbh 😅

Was playing Animal Well and got the ‘credits’ but I have 31 eggs and seem to have hit a brick wall of just wandering round looking for more. It’s a great game but does wander slightly towards the obtuse at times, in ways that would make The Witness blush.

Playing Classified: France 44. Never heard of it before but my Dad picked it up and did not like it.

It's like X-Com but set in 1944 in the build up to D-Day. It is pretty decent so far, however it can tough in places and you can only change the difficulty when starting a new game. Luckily you can save as often as you want and it auto saves on a regular basis.

Not played a game like this for ages, and felt like something totally different to Edlen Ring.