#2) they're a pc player and not a console player

[nekrosmos]

My Dragon's Dogma GhostSoap adventure is going very well so far

Soap's ID is GOYDPVCBNSEZ for anyone interested !

[dragonagepolls]

@avgmagetrev

[jeff-from-marketing]

Hey it's been a hot minute, I'm gonna go off about Helldivers 2 for a bit, because the whole thing fascinates me.

Funnily enough it's not even the actual game itself that truly fascinates me, as great as it is. I do genuinely think that, while not perfect, it's a very solid game that knows what kind of experience it wants to deliver, and does a fantastic job delivering on it. The Starship Troopers-esque satire is hilarious, and I love how much the gameplay reinforces that satire through things like reinforcements canonically being a whole new Helldiver sent into the meat grinder, and that the mission still counts as a celebrated victory even if you never make it back alive. I could even talk about how the objectively clunky system for calling in orbital support is actually a positive for the game, but only this game and the type of experience it's selling.

But none of that is what fascinates me about this game so much. Because y'see, I played the first Helldivers game, and it was also a great bit of fun! It's actually why I was interested in the second one to begin with. But I also know that the first Helldivers was not a very wide reaching game, none of Arrowhead's games have been. They've not done poorly by any means, they're still in business and have been for over a decade now. But they've always been fairly niche affairs. Until now. To really sell the picture, I wanna rattle off player counts for their previous games:

Magicka in 2011, Arrowhead's first big game and published by Paradox, had an all-time max player count of 11,727 players according to SteamDB. I don't believe it was on any other storefronts, but I could be mistaken. A quick wikipedia visit tells me that the game sold roughly a million units over a year which, again, not bad! Especially for a game that is admittedly fairly unusual, but is a lot of fun!

The Showdown Effect in 2013, which I only just found out about right now after double checking my numbers, had a all time high of just 3,284 according to SteamDB, and is now delisted from Steam. Though apparently there's a remake from another company happening? There's a lot less info on this one in general.

Gauntlet in 2014, this one I do know a bit more about since I also played this one. A remake of the original 1985 game, and was a good bit of fun as well! This one is trickier to get an accurate player count reading, because it did have a PS4 release and those are harder to find numbers for. Regardless, it was also on Steam, so therefore I can use those numbers at least, which gives me a max consecutive player count of 12,730. I don't know how much PS4 factored into this.

And now we get to the real interesting one: Helldivers 1. Again, this is tricky because not only was it on console, but it was actually on console before it was ever on PC, which heavily skews numbers. SteamDB has the peak at just 6,744, but this doesn't sit right with me. I've seen estimates of 50k people around the place, some say 35k, but never a solid source. It's also very difficult to search atm because of how much Helldivers 2 is blowing up. Speaking of...

So Helldivers 1 is their most popular game, and I'll be generous and say that the 50k count is the accurate one. So surely Helldivers 2 can't be that much more- oh I'm not even going to pretend, you already know what's going on here. The game has reached ~450k concurrent players just on Steam alone! And the game also exists on PS5, and if I recall correctly: there's official statements saying that the player counts are roughly equal with each other. That means a peak of ~900,000 individual players. To illustrate how bonkers batshit insane that is, motherfucking Fortnite has a current consecutive player count of roughly one million.

Let me reiterate: a game that came out of basically nowhere with little marketing, from a small studio with only about 100 employees, is rivaling the juggernaut that is fucking Fortnite. That is insane.

As someone who has played all of Arrowhead's previous games besides The Showdown Effect, this is bonkers. There's a reason the sentiment was "there's no way to have predicted this" when the servers were at their worst, because look at the previous data! How is anyone supposed to predict a sequel to a niche game (from a company very few people have heard about) to get a ~1800% increase in max player count? Their initial server capacity was 250k, which would've been very optimistic if you were just going by Helldivers 1 numbers. But then that wasn't enough. And then 360k wasn't enough. And then 450k wasn't enough. We're now at 700k server capacity and just finally getting things under control. This game just exploded in a way no one could have reasonably predicted. And I have no idea why this is the case either.

I'm not saying it's not deserved; it absolutely is! Like I said, game is great, and there's not even any shitty business practices I can bitch at this time! It's just so sudden and out of nowhere that it baffles me. Such a small percentage of these players would've even heard of the first game, let alone played it. It didn't have a massive marketing campaign, this is pretty much all spread through word of mouth, which is insane in its own right. It's not even like the game is entering an untapped market, it shares its existence with games like Deep Rock Galactic, Vermintide, Darktide, the actual Starship Troopers game, probably some others I'm forgetting. And yet, despite all of this, it breached containment something fierce. I don't have a big conclusion to make from all this, I'd love to be able to say "oh people are just getting tired of Triple A- oh I'm sorry, Quadruple A gaming and this is a breath of fresh air" and it is that, as was Baldur's Gate 3, but I'm not naive enough to think that's the main reason. Not when so many other great games continue to go undiscovered, and so many people still end up buying whatever the next big Triple A thing is. It's a great game to play with friends, and there's a lot going for it and a lot of charm, but such is also the case for the other games I already listed in this paragraph and they don't see the same popularity.

Whether it's just dumb fucking luck, or a really oddly specific set of circumstances at play that I can't see, I'm just dumbfounded and flabbergasted. But I'm not exactly gonna complain. It's fun getting sent into the meat grinder to spread Managed Democracy, and I'm glad the game is doing as well as it is, though I do hope that the devs get to have a bit of rest once the dust finally settles a little bit.

[exeggcute]

after some trial and error I think I finally have the perfect PS2 setup for the modern gamer. behold:

PS2 (old reliable) + power cable + magicgate memory card for those eight delicious MB of storage

retrotink adapter: a must-have in my case because we don't have any TVs that support analog input. you COULD go scrounge up an old CRT instead of shelling out for an adapter but (1) I have no desire to fistfight a melee player over who gets dibs on the CRT we both spotted on craigslist at exactly the same time (2) I have nowhere to put a CRT and (3) the retrotink is sick. worth every penny imo. this thing has upscaling, lots of settings to mess with (including psuedo-CRT settings to add scanlines and whatnot), and zero lag. there are significantly cheaper adapters out there but I did a shitload of research and nearly all of them have some kind of dealbreaking problem, save for the retrotink, whose only problems are that it isn't cheap and it runs out of stock quickly because they're all made by one guy in his garage.

component/YPbPr cable: the retrotink won't accept the regular AV cable that I've had for two decades (with the red/white/yellow inputs), but apparently AV input kind of sucks so component is the way to go for quality anyway.

wingman PS2: this thing is SO fucking cool dude. if you only pick up a single item on this list let it be the wingman. being able to play PS2 games not just wirelessly but on a modern controller (dualsense ftw) feels amaaaaazing. rumble works great, pairing is easy, no lag as far as I've noticed. the only downside is that modern controllers don't have the same pressure-sensitive buttons that the PS2's dualshock did, which means the handful of games that utilize that feature won't be a 1:1 experience.

so now your wallet just took a hit on all these peripherals—but not to worry, because we're also in the golden age of PS2 piracy:

if you have a stack of compatible DVD-Rs and a disc reader for your PC, you can use freedvdboot ESR patcher to patch an .iso of almost any PS2 game, burn that patched .iso to a disc, and then run the game on unmodified(!!!) PS2 hardware. there's a handful of caveats though:

(1) not all PS2s can take advantage of the exploit; it depends on the version of your console's DVD player. atm I think all slim models are compatible, and some fat models are compatible, but people are working to crack the last few holdouts so don't lose hope if yours isn't supported yet.

(2) technically not all games are compatible either, but more games seem to work than not. games that do work are essentially indistinguishable from a legit copy, though—some of the other game piracy methods I looked into (like MC2SIO) have a lot of performance issues that freedvdboot-patched games don't seem to suffer from at all.

(3) not all DVDs are equal; someone on reddit compiled a list of DVDs that worked/didn't work with freedvdboot-patched games. (they aren't on this list, but I used Verbatim DVD-Rs and they worked fine.)

I have yet to find any good text-based guides about using the patcher, but this guy's video tutorial explains everything well. howeverrrr you can skip all the parts about "creating backups" of your "original game discs" and just use the .iso you downloaded off of Vimm's Lair lol.

bam. not quite free since you have to buy discs, but just about. and a 50-pack of DVDs was still cheaper than any of the used copies of ape escape 3 that I could find on ebay

[princesssmars]

in love with the thought of you and jordan playing video games with marie.

like. i imagine in the group home the only way they got to play any games were physical ones and if they could sneak in a few minutes on cool math games during computer time. and as much as i think marie would kick ass at life and chutes and ladders, she'd constantly miss the game consoles she had at home.

so she meets you and jordan and college, and jordan takes gaming serious but not so seriously. they'll dick around in online games and scarily become a master manipulator when they can be convinced to play among us once in a blue moon, and once marie tells you she hasnt player a real video game since middle school you both make it your personal missions to help her play any game she wants.

and i feel like she would kick ass at nearly everything! and annoyed as she gets at randoms screaming in her ears she can enjoy a game of cs:go or call of duty, and had a week long obsession with slime rancher, constantly coming over to your dorm to play the game on your pc while you give her tips in the background.

yes her favorite is the honey slime. yes she made too many gordos and stopped playing for a month because the tar killed them all.

and dont even get me started on mobile games...jordan probably begs her no to play them because :

1. they're corny as hell

2. you play them religiously, and everytime a game says 'share to get an extra _' you send them the link. she goes through their messages and there are probably 200 shared links from you.

but its inevitable. once she gets a phone you send her a link for choices/episode and its all over. but once she has her first diamond choice where she has to tell her love interest (definitely modeled after you or jordan) she hates their guts she gets pissed off. if you give her money to buy some diamonds she'll be unstoppable.

but my favorite headcanon would be her playing games while high. just on weed, but it was when jordan told you they were going to try to teach marie how to play fortnite, and you had a really bad but really funny idea to do it while high.

it was supposed to be just you, but marie joined in which landed the two of you cackling after you both fell off a tower and died, jordan with their head in their hands as the 'you ranked #80!' lit up the screen.

[dystopianam]

Unpopular opnion: When a website or any other person on the internet talks about The Sims, it really annoys me that they only mention The Sims 4 as if it were the ONLY The Sims that exists just because it is the newest and still active.

I feel like a complaining old woman who says "in my time things were better", but I'm TOO sad that titles that really made history like The Sims 1 and The Sims 2 are forgotten because they're old.

The Sims 4 can't compete with any of its predecessors in my opinion. It has its good things, but there are more defects than good things.

Quoting (not literally because I don't remember every single word perfectly) Plumbella: "It's obvious that new players won't understand our complaints and the lack of mechanics and vibes if they've never played any other The Sims beyond the 4"

You may or may not like The Sims 4, but The Sims 4 IS NOT The Sims, it's ONE of the The Sims.

Please remember that there is a whole franchise behind this logo, not just PC games but for every type of console.

[jeffgerstmann]

How much of a factor do you think the steam refund policy is in COD continuing to do the garbage COD HQ shit? The hours being combined means you can't get the automatic 2 hour refund, so its more of a hassle to refund it. Is the COD HQ crap on consoles? Is that how it works on the other PC store fronts?

They do this across all platforms, it's not some weird plot to keep people from refunding the game. They're not wrong to want a unified platform, it's a pretty good idea. Warzone being an evolving, free-to-play piece of the game every year makes keeping everyone in the same launcher the right move.

The execution really sucks, though, and I'm not sure that it could be much better, considering the way the games are built. This is a game that still requires full restarts every time they do a patch-less update, and you might already be two or three menus and two executable loads deep before you hit the "update requires restart" wall.

That's a horrible experience that they just haven't changed... I'm guessing that's because the way the game hands itself off to different executables isn't exposed as directly on console as it is on PC, where the game literally shuts down and relaunches.

Breaking the games apart would effectively require them to update a game at the end of its year to completely remove Warzone from it, because Warzone is typically attached to the current year's game. The alternative would be to break Warzone out into its own thing entirely, but then creating a situation where Warzone more directly competes with the paid product instead of it all being part of the same package.

Combining those things also keeps filesizes down, because having them completely split apart would mean you couldn't share player models or any other assets between the installs.

[jaythelay]

The way things are going with Xbox, I think Sony might be on top of the console wars. Permanently.

The thing about Microsoft is they suck ass to communicate with, their software is buggy, and they want devs to port games to both Series S and Series X, with the S being as weak as last gen.

This culminated in Black Wukong not coming to Xbox, and thus, Sony got the Chinese market. They bought PS5s in droves. Microsoft failed to get the japanese market and then failed to get the chinese market.

With that in mind, and the fact the Series S sold 2:1 with the Series X, I don't see Microsoft recovering. They're still way down from the Xbone's always online DRM nonsense. And Good. They deserve to lose their entire marketshare for pulling such an absurdly out of anyone's mind, anti-consumer bullshit.

But because of Microsoft, consoles will no longer be present after another generation. There's no way to lower prices apparently, and 700$ for a mildly better PS5 basically doomed consoles into a future niche. Nintendo doesn't compete, they legally attack, and they got nothing on Sony, so they aren't competing that way either.

So. Since Nintendo vs Sega, the victor of the console wars going on nearly 4 decades, was Sony. Playstation. Insane, I honestly thought they were doomed after the PS3 but Microsoft just fucking sucks so god damn much Xbox never stood a chance in the first place.

Anyways. Move to PC folks. Better deals, better hardware, better software, better games, better performance, refunds, reviews, profile customization, server browsers, modding, and you can play on Linux at this point. But if ya choose to stick with consoles, in 10 years, you won't have such a choice. Long-term, Sony is gonna fumble like Microsoft/Xbone eventually, and with no one to take their marketshare, consoles will fade into niche obscurity.

Ya really can't have a console war when there's only one real player. And that's Sony now. And tbh, not one of the 3 remaining console manufacturers inspire any amount of joy within me. No matter who won, we were always going to lose. Sony might be slightly the better of the 3 to win I guess. But trust me when I say, they will price gouge the fuck out of their next and final console. Guaranteed. It's the beginning of the end of Consoles. I'd mourn but I already did when the 360 was nearing it's end and I knew that was the last hurrah.

I expect more rumblings to come as time marches on about this topic. I'm confident Microsoft cannot return to form after Xbone, and Sony is going to flop hard with anti-consumer bullshit eventually. And Nintendo...well we try to pretend they're not apart of the gaming family, what with their inability to not sue someone frivilously for being noticeably far superior to them. Buncha babies with no ability to create IP but regurgitate their 3 decade old IP.

[potatowitch]

This is going to be me being negative about Veilguard so uh. If you don't want that, scroll on.

Judging by what content we've seen about Veilguard thus far, I'm confident I'm going to love the story, the aesthetics and the companions. I'm also confident I'm going to fucking hate the combat to the point where I probably won't replay DA4 often at all.

Look. I enjoy Mass Effect. I do! Again, I love the story. I love the characters. I love the vibes. The combat, though? Worst part of the series as a whole, by far, in my opinion. I don't use the ability wheel in ME. I just don't. I bump my difficulty all the way down just so I don't have to worry about what my squadmates are doing because I HATE how you have to give them orders. I assign all my abilities to hotkeys, and if I can't assign something to a hotkey, I'm not bloody using it.

I'm a PC player. For the past three DA games, I've had a hotbar to put abilities and consumables on - though Inquisition only gives you 8 ability slots and 2 consumable slots aside from your health potions, and I hate that. I hate it. I thought it was a bit of a piss take, honestly. This is what my hotbars in Origins and DA2 end up looking like by the endgame:

I like having all my abilities and consumables there to use on the one or two occasions I think "hey wait, wouldn't X ability be useful here?". Obviously the ones right at the beginning, bound to the number keys, are the abilities I use the most, but it's just nice to have all the options in the world if you want them.

Veilguard not having a hotbar at all is just so disappointing to me. I understand that console players who are used to an ability wheel aren't going to have this problem, but I play RPGs almost exclusively on PC, and most fantasy PC RPGs have hotbars.

Tactics are my next issue. I LOVE the tactics system in Origins and DA2. I love being able to assign my companions a list of "if - then" orders and full customise what they do in combat without having to micromanage them in the moment. I love being able to say "hey, Anders, if someone is attacking Varric specifically, I need you to cast a Glyph of Paralysis on the enemy". I was disappointed in Inquisition when the extent of your tactics was telling companions when it's appropriate to use a health potion and how much stamina/mana they should reserve. The fact that Veilguard, from what I've seen, has no tactics whatsoever? Disappointed, but not surprised.

What I AM surprised by, and not in a good way, is that from my understanding (what I saw while watching the combat breakdown, which I also don't recommend you do if you don't want massive story spoilers) you cannot directly control companions during combat in Veilguard at all. You're relying exclusively on orders given in the action wheel to position them, tell them what combos to use, what abilities to use, when to change who they're attacking. That's really shitty, dude. You've been able to do that for all three Dragon Age games thus far. Bioware removing the ability to directly control companions is a massive step backward. Let me know if I'm wrong and I just missed something where they showed taking control of companions or explicitly said it'd be possible, because dear lord I really hope I'm wrong.

Finally, the two companion limit. Again, I know why Bioware chose to go from three companions to two, and I also think it was a dumb fucking decision and everyone involved in making it are idiots. It also looks like some companions will be required for missions - so say if you're going on a mission where you NEED to bring Davrin, and you're also playing as a warrior - well, you'd better hope nothing needs lockpicking OR you don't need a healer, because you will need to choose between bringing a rogue or a mage. Class synergy is out the damn window.

Again, I want to reiterate that I think I'm still going to have fun with DA4. I will play it. I will probably have all sorts of nice feelings about the story and the characters and the worldbuilding. I will also most definitely have all sorts of nasty horrible negative feelings about the combat, and until I can mod it to look more like it did in previous games, DA4 will not be super replayable for me unless everything other than the combat is phenomenal enough to make up for all the ways Bioware have fucked the combat.

[whit-doodle]

Path of Titans is one of those games that people either seem to love or they hate. There doesn't seem to be a middle ground for most people. For me, I find the game quite enjoyable.

It's one of the few games I actually bought the day it released on console. Even as an adult, I never outgrew my childhood "dinosaur phase" so I was ecstatic when I first found out about it.

The changes and improvements the devs at Alderon Games have made since its release have been astounding, honestly. Yes, there are things that definitely need to be worked on, but overall, it's really not as bad of a game as many people would want others to believe.

Plus, one of my favorite things about it is the cross-platform playability. The game is available on console, PC, Switch, and Mobile so unless you have cross-platform settings turned off, you'll find players from every device in a server. And kudos to those who only play on mobile because I have no idea how they do it. I have tried but I much prefer my Xbox and a controller.

One of my favorite dinos to play is the Amargasaurus. I lovingly refer to mine as the "walking buffet" because it's an instant target when spotted by carnivores. This is as screenshot from a couple nights ago. That Ceratosaurus followed me and let his buddies know where I was. In the end, 3 Ceratosaurus, 1 Sarcosuchus, and 1 Spinosaurus were needed to take down my Amargasaurus. I honestly laughed the entire time because 1) I am terrible at PvP and 2) The Spino was called in for backup because the rest of them couldn't take down my Amargasaurus.

I flew over Impact Crater on my Thalassodromeus, and the Hatzegopteryx was so high up I didn't even know it was there until it nearly knocked me right out of the sky. I flew for my life, but alas, my poor little Thal didn't stand a chance after the initial hit. I had just been passing through to see what was happening in IC because it's always either a bloodbath or everyone is gathered around the pond just chilling.

I don't know what it was with Ceratosaurus players the other night, but I ended up switching from Gondwa to the Panjura map after my Amargasaurus got taken out. I was in the server maybe 5 minutes before this Cerato in the background tried to make a meal out of my Latenivenatrix. They failed after I was able to outrun them, but I give them an A for effort.

Path of Titans is one of those games where people do get frustrated due to how many times they're targeted by other players. Global chat can be full of toxicity and sweaty PvP players. Then there are days where you'll find a large group of players hanging out in Hotspots, just chilling and chatting in global.

I personally don't mind being targeted by other players. It's a PvP game after all where the end goal is literally make it to adulthood then see how long you can last.

[dr-spectre]

May I just say that I'm really impressed with the Nintendo Switch, especially after the direct.

Most Nintendo consoles after their halfway point really slow down and pretty much suffer a slow death, they don't get any big games and Nintendo fans just wait in agony for the next Nintendo console.

The Wii barely got anything in its later years aside from Kirby's Return to Dreamland and like... Mario and Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games (which is actually a pretty fun minigame collection I recommend it.)

The Wii U..... HAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!! I mean there was Breath of the Wild but like... who played it on Wii U? Be honest with me here guys. Don't lie.

The Gamecube... nothing. N64... uh... Dr. Mario?

But with the Switch, we're getting a brand new Mario and Luigi title, a new Mario Party with over 110 minigames and a 20 player online mode, a brand new top-down Zelda game with Zelda as the main character, and Metroid Prime 4!!! LIKE... WHAT?!?!

If the Switch can somehow outsell the DS, then I wouldn't be that shocked. Nintendo, despite having one of the most EVIL legal teams in gaming and being an awful fucking company, they still manage to get exclusives and exciting titles out on a consistent basis. Sure there are some sour spots like the Mario sports games and... Nintendo Switch Sports.. ugh. And sure there are lots of overpriced remasters ill give you that but, the quality and consistency of these titles is something that Sony and Microsoft can't even come close to.

I'm not trying to jerk off Nintendo and turn this into a console war thing but, Sony have really dropped the ball on their management and it has gone to shit. Only pumping out hyper realistic giant 30+ hour games that take so much time and money to make. While I do like most of them, I want there to be more variety and more titles. There's a reason why "PS5 has no games" is a meme. And the pc ports of PS5 games after a couple of years of their release are getting really annoying. Once Spider-Man 2 gets on the PC, I won't ever touch my PS5 ever again aside from Astro Bot coming later this year. Im not saying that these games shouldn't be on pc, I'm saying that it's kinda damaging the dedicated fan base of Sony players and they're gonna start moving over to the PC and not want to use their PS5 anymore. The PS5 will not have a legacy like its older brothers. As a person who grew up with a PS2 and PS3, I'm really disappointed with Sony at the moment.

And Microsoft? Well... we'll have to wait and see the quality of those games they announced recently. But you know what? They did have a good showcase, I will admit.

I'm starting to really come around on the Switch and there are SO MANY games to get for it. There's at least one title for everyone and I think that's really cool. It also has so many indie games and retro collections on it too. The Switch has a giant library of old classics from many generations as well as exciting new games that bring new concepts to the table.

If the Switch 2 can continue that momentum while increasing the fidelity to allow for more games to reach 60fps and higher resolutions... then we're in for something really special.

[faraway-sunshine]

Since we're talking about computers, I'll ask something bigger: what would be your DREAM tech setup? Like, if you could have any setup in your room (including computer, TV, any other gadgets or whatever), what would you want and how would you want it to look? No sci-fi stuff obviously, lol

I'm fairly up to date with computer and console stuff, a bit less with the rest, but this was fun for me to figure out:

First, TV. One of those ones that's big, but not so big that it takes four people to carry it out of the apartment, stacked on top of a cabinet that can house the other devices below it without being too much of a mess.

VCR because we have a lot of tapes and the video stores are still nearly all tapes, but maybe something that reads DVDs for when they surpass them. I mean, CDs replaced cassette music for ages, DVDs are surely going to replace movie tapes. I'm not sold enough to buy a DVD player for real but hey, dream setup, got to be prepared in case.

One of those TiVo digital recording devices they started making last year. A friend of mine at school has it and he says it's great because he doesn't have to keep buying tapes.

Oh, and a cable box, which I'm pretty sure you need for the TiVo. With the package we have now that has most of the entertainment channels.

Nintendo 64, and if games are allowed, Ocarina of Time and Pokémon Snap.

Seeing as this is Dream Setup and money doesn't seem to be an issue, a PlayStation would also be cool so I can try Final Fantasy out. Come to think of it, they're releasing the PlayStation 2 this month, so maybe I should say that? But would Final Fantasy be ready to go for PS2 on launch? I'm not sure.

All the cables so I can set up the consoles, VCR, cable box, TiVo, and possible DVD player underneath with the wires bundled up neatly in order to make swapping them out easy. Honestly that's the biggest change I'd enjoy immediately from the current setup; the back of the TV right now is a mess, and if I want to dig out the Genesis for instance it's a bit of a chore.

Honestly my current PC and monitor is pretty good so I'd stick with that, or maybe wait for that new operating system Quo hinted at for computer. The only other thing I could ask for would be something that can play those music files I download from Napster onto that's portable (or something that can burn CDs for my Discman). There's some devices that do that I think but it hasn't caught on much yet. It would be cool if it did as that way I could have all my music on me all the time instead of having to choose between discs.

I hope this doesn't come across as me seeming greedy. I'm lucky to have what I have and I'm using my computer and Gameboy more than anything these days anyway when I'm not doing homework or some sort of practice (although I have started watching some TV there's only one new episode every week and that's like half an hour or so and I can watch while playing). I'm just trying to dream big for this ask.

(Monday 9th October, 2000, 6:29 AM)

[dragon-snoots-a-boopin]

Console Wars Are Stupid...Change My Mind.

It really boggles my mind that in current year something that is as stupid as arguing about "what game console is better" is still a thing. I honestly though we were past this but no. I saw either a video or a picture that was related to Helldivers 2 saying something like "we need reinforcements, we need our Xbox players" and people in the comments were like "We don't need no fucking Xbox players. If they wanted to play this game, they'd get a fucking PC or PS5 and join us" and it's like why do you have to be so immature about a video game??? I also saw some comments that's basically a trade of like Xbox players get Helldivers 2 when Playstation players get Halo, as if a game like Helldivers 2 is actually worth Halo but like I have not played Helldivers 2 and I don't really care to at this point.

The point is that all of this just seems really childish and immature to me. It's also kind of interesting too. It seems to me that Xbox players like PC players, Playstation players like PC players but Playstation players absolutely HATE Xbox players with a passion and then you have Nintendo players in their own little world, doing their own thing.

I know that this is going to sound like the most insane thing ever to some people but like, people just want to play games regardless of what they're on. I think it would actually be cool if PS players could play Halo and/or Forza and if Xbox players could play Spider-Man, God Of War etc. I understand that both Microsoft and Sony want exclusives because that's what sells consoles but like, I think that's going to become more and more irrelevant, especially when both sides are pumping games on to PC so that PC players get the best of both worlds. But why not let PS and Xbox consoles also have the best of both worlds too?

Again, I realize that this is a wild idea to some people but, like I said, people want to play games so why not let them without having spend hundreds to have all the current consoles and a PC and I think that is just over the top to expect people to do.

[gren-arlio]

Olympics ain't until next year, so let's talk about the objectively cooler one. Welcome to Episode 9 of (Waku) Puyo Extras.

(Always liked how the characters are drawn when they're small. Oh, and the lad next to Satan? That's Rasp, and I believe they don't have a set gender. Least from what I heard from the EPPC.)

Hello one and all, it's the guy who's harassed by Witches (or just a single Witch) all day, every day without fail. Seriously, outta anyone in the world, it's the dude with the Yosuke pfp, it really does run in the Persona Bro archetype to have wack ass luck. (World's worst crackship)

Silly stuff aside, welcome to the 9th episode of Waku Puyo Extras, and if you've been following for a bit, nice to know you've stuck around, and for new guys, it's fine, there's no continuity. Im just late posting this.

This time around, we're talking about PuyoLympics, and I hear you wondering, "Didn't you say you'll talk about Arle's Travel Log last time?" And you're absolutely right, I did. However, it's kinda hard to find footage for the game itself, and I do need extra time, so we'll cover it next time. Curse these games for being niche.

I'm glad PuyoLympics isn't as niche as the others we'll cover some other time (Madou Sugoroku is going to be awful to find footage for,) and I've had this on my backlog, we may as well cover it now, yeah?

So let's cut to the chase, shall we? Not having a tiny video to translate does feel weird still, but otherwise, hope you enjoy.

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So, What's the Origins?

Like Serilly's Happy Birthday, PuyoLympics was also a Disc Station game, released in 1997 for PC. Is it safe to say that PC got more games can console players?

(Not exactly the coolest looking start screen, but the opening itself was pretty cool.)

What's interesting about this game is that there's...two versions of it. Well, sorta. PuyoLympics in Basa~ru is technically a sequel, but it's more of a minigame from the original, so there's that. (Covered an entire game in one paragraph.)

The game itself is a sports game, yeah, but it's also somewhat a collection of minigames as well. Think those Mario Party sports minigames, but Puyofied and also you only can choose 2 characters.

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Alright, So What's the Story?

It begins as usual, to be honest. Satan is cooking up devious shit again but he somewhat wants to have a twist. In the meantime, Arle and Witch are arguing (leaving even the narrator a tad confused,) about Arle being unathletic.

(The peak of this argument. Words I can't even say.)

They then stumble upon a flyer, stating basically "Yo the Olympics are starting. Win to get a wish." and to settle their scores, Arle and Witch compete, along with a couple of other guys we can't play as, notably Rulue, Draco, and Schezo.

Satan decides that everyone will duel for the prize itself, though you only really play as the two girls. But to get in spirit, he dresses up as a coach to fully begin the thing.

(For some reason, all the footage I got were on Witch's side, even with looking on NicoNico. It was legimately hard to find footage for Arle. However, I do know both their endings, at least.)

For Arle's ending, Satan does say that she can indeed make a wish. However, Arle's unsure of what she should even do, and settles for...losing weight. In which Satan gives her...whatever is shown on the bottom.

(Seriously, what is this? They say it's a magician training cast but...I dunno, man.)

And how about Witch's ending? Well, Satan gives her the choice of whatever she wants, and she's also kinda unsure. However, unlike Arle, she has too MANY wishes to have, and Satan gets absolutely fed up and leaves, angering Witch. And you know what? Good on you, Satan.

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So, How's the Gameplay?

Gameplay itself is compressed of several minigames that you play as either Arle or Witch. The Olympics are a big deal after all.

Some of the events are things like the Meter Dash (I'd assume 100,) swimming, and...one game where you smack Puyos aside. I can't explain that one well.

Though in the swimming one, other characters appear at the very least.

(The whole squad came to cheer you on. You can't tell me they're not good friends.)

The games themselves are fairly short, and usually range about the 40 seconds to about a minute or so, they ain't called minigames for nothing. Still, there's some enjoyment itself with playing them.

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How About the Visuals and Characters?

Visually, least in my opinion, the game looks really good, and the OST itself is up to par with the series as a whole. Every character looks fairly well made to boot. Good on ya Compile.

And how about the characters themselves? Well...thankfully, they're fairly retained to what we're used to. Let's talk about the main two.

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Arle:

Our 2nd favorite girl Arle is roughly the same that we usually know her of. Here, she's still pretty dang cheerful thankfully, though with the argument with Witch and the whole going to the Olympics thing to settle their score...it's not petty, I swear.

However, something I want to note is that (supposedly not) due to Witch's comments about her being unathletic does actually kind of stick with her, as her wish is to lose weight...even if Satan kinda went the weird route to help change that. At least it shows she does have insecurities. (Seriously, what the hell is that armor going to do?)

And hey! If you play her route, Rulue makes an appearance early on, as well as Draco, who's sporting her outfit from Puyo SUN.

(Why are Rulue pants so different anyways? Still, it's nice to see her and Draco appear, even if she's more-so just a conversation with Arle and another for Witch.)

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Satan:

Ah, good old Satan. Never fails to just being a stupid idiot that we love. He's the whole reason why this Olympic thing began, and he's somewhat embracing it. Due to image limits (Yes, I plan the image routes ahead of time,) I can't show...In photos.

Here's a link to it. May as well, since it's so relevant.

He's a blast to actually hear and listen to. I genuinely like this version of Satan. And he even got turned into stone from a comment once. Now THAT'S comedy. I wouldn't say he carries the game, everyone does their part, but I gotta say that he's easily one of, if not the best, written character in this game.

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Witch:

As per the Gren Norm, I got so much more to say about Witch because...if the meme told you anything, she's definitely out there. The whole Olympic thing somewhat escalated due to Witch insulting her over being unathletic, which I mean...ouch.

If you play her route, you actually get a cameo appearance with our boy, the 2nd big guy in this Tumblr blog, Schezo Wegey. And if you know me, I'm gonna explain what happens. (At this point I document every misdeed this girl does)

So, Schezo comes into the frame wearing his Puyo SUN outfit as well, and while Witch says hello and why is he here, immediately labels him as a pervert after he claims he wants Arle again and also wants to win the Olympics.

(Silly Schezo. You're not playable.)

Witch then asks to take off his cape, because he looks like a pervert when he does...and low and behold, he actually does it, shocking her.

And frankly, I'd be surprised also. However, as none of us predicted, Schezo says if she's gonna laugh, to just do it. But she doesn't. Rather, she compliments him. A lot.

(If you've seen the meme, she's basically saying that he has a nice physique for his title, and that he has really healthy skin.)

Schezo asks if she's okay, (she's not) and she yells that he's wonderful/beautiful, causing our boy to think that she's gone insane and runs.

And she chases after him.

(Welcome to my ""Job"". Went from knowledge and Schezo to Knowledge, Schezo, and a lot of documenting of Witch and Arle. You signed up for this.)

Good on Schezo for taking the initiative and actually just leaving...well, more like run away, but good on him.

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So...Final Verdict?

The verdict is fairly simple honestly. Elementary, even. The game itself is a very charming game, with a really nice OST, artstyle, and even character writing to an extent. Every character is just fun to read ok and listen to, and it's nice to see such a silly concept be done fairly well.

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And For Those Wondering About Arle's Travel Log And Updates Overall:

Don't worry, I got it planned. I'm writing it, I didn't forget it. It's just footage is hard to come by and I want to make this the best I can. And besides...I'm making a Halloween special. I gotta.

And after that special, I plan to take a week or two off to relax. Then...idk, we try to translate Arle's Route of Waku Puyo Dungeon. The Waku part of Waku Puyo Extras will become real AGAIN...

Then, I'll take a break during New Years/Christmas. I don't want to risk burnout. But that'll be all for this time.

See y'all another time.

[toyota-supra]

hey do you have any pc car racing game recommendations

fuck I mean. my entire library probably. though honestly the most fun I have with racing games are emulated, but I feel like that should be separate.

art of rally - gorgeous rally game. tough to start with due to very tight controls, but really satisfying to learn. I've spoken lots about it here before, just look for the "#art of rally" tag. no multiplayer, in fact there's only your car on the road, but it's really really good

Horizon Chase Turbo - it's one of those SNES-style racing games where the car is (kind of) static on the screen and the road is the one moving. it can get pretty hard but I think it's worth it due to the amount of content it has. hundreds of different tracks, great music, a lot of cars that are each very different, a lot of modes, three DLC campaigns, and 4-player multiplayer in every game mode.

The Crew 2 - open world racing game with all sorts of types of vehicles. it has a GIANT map with different US states. I honestly prefer it to Forza Horizon. it runs pretty well for a game of that scale, honestly! only buy this on discount.

Circuit Superstars - top-down circuit racer. it's really fun! there's a lot of different car types that all feel very different, online works pretty well (I only played with a friend tho I cant find people online). my favorite thing about it is just doing laps on time trials to try and cut my record time. it is pretty fun.

Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed - Mario Kart clone with SEGA characters (and some cameos). I like it a lot over Mario Kart because of its tighter controls and its Mission Mode, which is where most of my playtime went towards (I especially recommend Drift and Traffic events). Online mode also works super well. (note: this game has crashes in computers with Nvidia RTX cards. please look up this specific issue to find a patch or just ask me to find it for you)

Forza Horizon 4 and 5 - open world racing games that don't run super well and have a lot of annoyances but they are The Big Ones for no small reason. impossibly huge car list, very good handling controls, and a satisfying loop. plus, in FH5 there's plenty of Fate liveries to find as I've been putting them in every car I have 💀

V-Rally 4 or any other rally game you find that looks good - V-Rally 4 in specific has a lot of annoying performance issues but fuck I mean it's pretty fun. gorgeous game, great controls (in a controller!), fun cars and rally courses. sometimes levels can honestly feel like roller coasters more than anything, as I've taught myself to just take corners automatically, without thought. it goes EXTREMELY cheap on discount (Steam is getting a big sale in a week btw) but there's other rally games out there like Dirt Rally (which I haven't played yet) that may be worth it over it. I don't know!

overall though it disappoints me to say, it's not very easy to find truly great car games on PC, at least nowadays. I do like these games, and there's some others I liked that I don't have much to say about (NFS Heat, Assetto Corsa, Pixar Cars) but I think for racing fans, unless you want Simulation stuff which I really don't, you've gotta keep old console games with you too. PS1, PS2 and PSP emulators are your friends.

also Grand Theft Auto V and Online are great car games but I do not care for their racing modes. I think they're boring at best and "oh my god I hope all of these people die" at worst.

THANK YOU for the ask I genuinely love talking about this stuff

[lighthearted-pewpews]

purposefully dumb ooc ow hcs my friends and i discussed:

🦊‼️ shimada brothers + kiriko edition

hanzo & genji do like bbq actually. genji prefers honey bbq the most though; contrary to hanzo's favored type. it's not like they constantly argue or anything but it's up to you if they reach an agreement. kiriko's a ranch type of girl fr. for chips? kiriko's sour cream n onion (not self projection).

"oh hey guys so uh haha i got some chips for us!" kiriko pipes up, accidentally walking into a provoking conversation the shimada brothers were discussing (honey bbq vs standard??). they both turn around and look at her; the girl holding an ever-so familiar green bag—sour cream and onion flavoured chips.

hanzo drinks coke and genji has sam's cola as his fave (they're literally like the same i think). kiriko prefers pepsico products because they're sweeter to her (pepsi, dr. pepper, mtn dew). also genji would like lemon lime stuff maybe possibly indefinitely.

also hc that he probably was a soda junkie or something in his youth. over time though he kinda savors it like a "fine wine"; where he'd prefer to not have it by himself. rather, he'd drink it to complement a certain food he's having. this one actually makes sense somehow.

hanzo's a playstation person, genji's xbox, and kiriko's nintendo. basically colour coded fr. apparently also: hanzo's pc, genji's console, and kiriko's mobile. though, my friend INSISTS that genji's a mobile player (he plays mobile fortnite and probs got that samsung galaxy skin).

hanzo plays fortnite also to "practice his aim". genji (un)ironically gets all of the anime collab skins and somehow is goated with pickaxing the poor players early on. kiriko is their supplies manager and carries all of their meds and shields because the brothers are busy collecting all of the cool broken guns.

i'm unsure who'd be super good at building. i feel like they'd purposefully play on no build because "only the most talented players don't rely on building" or something dumb as kiriko instinctively pressed the buttons to build stairs as they get third-partied.

btw kiriko loves driving cars esp the fast sports ones and makes one of them sit on top of oit (since only two players max can get on it). she interrupts battles that other plays are in and has genji and hanzo pick off the surviving ones like little scavengers.

they're so good and can actually get into comp stuff, but they'd rather not since they're "lighthearted" (hanzo's upset he's getting bot lobbies and genji's getting reported for "hacking" whilst kiriko's the string holding the whole team together).

if they played splatoon obvs you can tell hanzo's stringer, genji's splatana and maybe kiriko's something supportive like n-zap whilst still having great frontline potential.

i know a lottt more about 2 than 3 actually. i'd say maybe genji would like things with echolocator even if that's more of a widow thing. i thought of reg. squiffer first but that's my main but i think mainly it's how genji can rush in and w aggressive front/mid-line squiffers you just see them go in and out of the ink, trying to kill you w either trickshots or something dumb (it's ok ily guys). also genji's ranged too as well.

maybe also he might play roller because 1: technically melee (his sword) + in reference to his shurikens, the vertical and horizontal spray of the roller can be in reference to his. or maybe he's ANNOYING and plays carbon roller (deco) with ninja squid. ninja squid.

hanzo plays pure mpu bamboozler and then shits on other players for having pure gear because "it's way more affective to have a mixed, sorted array subs instead of trying to make it all the same"/j

tbh the whole "genji, hanzo and kiriko" stuff is just literally splatoon 3 splatfests honestly. hanzo's vanilla ice cream, genji's chocolate, and kiriko's strawberry. i don't know how to explain it.