From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action


Have you gotten used to typing "2026" yet? I think I'm just getting
the hang of it, finally. Anyway, another month has rolled around, so
it's time to re-start this thread. Y'all know the drill. Play the
games, then list 'em here so we know what kept ya busy. Maybe even
throw a few thoughts in about the games (or not, it's all good).

Lemme getcha started.


Superbrief
---------------------------------------
* Cyberpunk 2077 (continued from last month)
* Dystopika
* FBC: Firebreak
* Skald: The Dark Priory



Maximum Verbosity
---------------------------------------

* Cyberpunk 2077 (continued from last month) https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/32470/Cyberpunk_2077_Ultimate_Edition/

Well, that didn't go as planned.

In more ways than one, actually. I ended last month playing this game,
and thinking, "Well, I'm almost done; a few more days and I'll be quit
with this game." It took me /three weeks/ after that to see the
end-credits. I have to admit, by this point I'm just a little bit
tired of the whole game; I'm a little sour on the whole experience.
"Cyberpunk 2077" is a /long/ game.

But also... well, see, I had /plans/ when I started this game. I was
gonna do me some role-playing in this here role-playing game. I was
gonna take on the role of a brash, violent young streetpunk who --in
the course of his adventures-- just happened to get himself infected
with a bit of malware that looked and talked a lot like Keanu Reaves.
At first the relationship between the two would be openly hostile, but
as time progressed --I intended-- my street-punk (his meat and
cyberware slowly being absorbed by the Keanu-virus) would come more
and more to agree, look, talk and act like his alter identity. Then,
when the time came, the virus would take control and the adventure
would end with street punk gone and the Keanu-personality in charge.

Which was all well and good... right up to the end when --instructed
on how to 'choose' so that Keanu ended up in charge, somehow I did the
exact opposite. Ooops. I /knew/ I should have dropped a save-point
first. Well, you know what they say about the best laid plans...

On the whole this playthrough --my second-- didn't really change my
opinion of the game. It's a grand experience to be sure, and an
excellently crafted game... but not one of the truly, timeless greats.
Its scale and detail --and to some degree its story-- are incredibly impressive, but a lot of its actual implementation aren't quite as
good as they should be. The combat is good, but not mind blowing. The
city is vast, but shallow. Your options as a player always feel just a
/touch/ more limited than they should be. There's a lot of reasons for
this, which I'll generously not go into here, but the long and short
of it is that I just wasn't as enthralled with the game as I could
have been.

Certainly the "Phantom Liberty" DLC did nothing to help. While it did
finally open up somewhat after where I stopped last month, still it
seemed a fairly unexciting romp; too linear, too focused on combat,
with little of the fun grey-on-grey morality or interesting characters
found in the main game. It felt a lot like cutting-room floor
material; lower-quality stuff dumped into a DLC that was 'more of the
same'... just not as good. Not terrible, certainly not... but
definitely the nadir of the overall adventure.

And, again, it's not that I think this is a bad game. It's not. It's a
very good game. But it's a 9/10 when it /could/ have been a 10+... and
it hurts me that it came so close and missed by so little.



* Dystopika
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2379910/Dystopika/

Continuing on the cyberpunk theme, I moved to "Dystopika". This is
less a game than a sandbox where you can plop down futuristic-themed
buildings and create a future dystopia of your very own. Similar to
games like "Tiny Glade" or "Townscraper", there's no management
aspect; it's all about your creativity and making your city look like
you want it to look. You need not worry about any rhyme or reason to
your city; any building can be plopped down anywhere (even on top of
other already placed structures). Like many games of its type, it uses
some procedural generation to lock things together, which is rather
clever in its implementation.

But "Dystopika" is also far more limited than other city-creators,
with only a limited variety of props and everything looking very much
the same. It doesn't help that your city is shrouded in an endless
night; it's way too dark to see very much, and actually placing
structures with precision is made difficult by the constant gloom. The
end result is that, after a while, all your creations start looking
very much the same, and there's not too much you can do to
differentiate your city from anybody else's. Your little metropolis
has very little personality. It's pretty to look at and it's fun for a
while to build, but after 30 minutes you've seen everything the game
has to offer, and its time to move on.



* FBC: Firebreak
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2272540/FBC_Firebreak/

This game reminds me nothing so much as of the "Rambo" cartoon.

Did you even know they made a children's cartoon based on the Rambo
movies? Even in the 80s, when the program was being aired, there was
comment on the incongruity of making a show for children based on a hyper-violent movie franchise primarily aimed at adults. It wasn't the
only movie to get that treatment (I seem to recall both "Aliens" and
"Robocop" also got cartoons of their own). The 80s were a weird and
wild time.

It's this same sense of incongruity that connects those cartoons and
"FBC: Firebreak". This game is based upon Remedy's earlier game,
"Control". That game was a stark single-player adventure-shooter, best
known for its atmospheric setting. Itself loosely based on Internet
'new weird' paranormal settings (like the Backrooms or SCP),
"Control's" art-style and mood were well received. It's gameplay
--slow-paced third-person action/shooting-- didn't get quite the same
praise, but neither was it greatly disliked. Overall, the game got
favorable reviews, and it was no surprise that a semi-sequel was soon announced. That game, of course, being "FBC: Firebreak".

But while "FBC: Firebreak" shares the same setting as "Control", it is
a completely different beast. It's not just that "Control" was a
single-player third-person experience and "FBC" is a co-op
first-person shooter. It's that the entire mood of the original game
has been scrapped. You know, that one thing that made "Control" so
memorable. "FBC" has none of the weird horror vibe; it lacks the tight
controls or strong story or tense pacing. in fact, the first thing I
noticed about the game was how... well, how /silly/ it seemed to be.
It's in the voices, and the interactions, and some of the weapons.
There's an overall goofiness that's been added to the setting that
totally changes the vibe.

Sort of like making Rambo friend-of-all-children whose massive machine
guns never actually kill any of the baddies, like in the cartoon.

"FBC: Firebreak" never goes so far as that, thankfully. This still is,
after all, a shooter, and there's still a vague hint of the
suspenseful setting of the original in the design of its monsters and
setting. But at the same time, it also feels a lot lighter in tone,
what with its customizable avatars (with ever so many exciting hats to
apply to your character) and the cheerful, almost bubbling comments
your hero makes as you fight through the hordes. It screams of a game
desperate to attract the hordes of Fortnite players with some of its
colorful designs. As a fan of Remedy's earlier games -- "Control",
"Alan Wake", even "Max Payne"-- this is not the tone I was
expecting... or wanting.

But even disentangled from Remedy's earlier works and accepted on its
own merits, "FBC" doesn't seem much fun. Yes, some of the monster
designs and the styling of the levels are neat. But everything else
about the game -- all its mechanics-- just weren't enjoyable. The
uninteresting layout of the maps; the repetitive structure of the
missions; the overly complicated skill system that demanded excessive
amounts of play before you got to any of the interesting stuff; the
weird QTE to activate items or pick up ammo. There was nothing about
the actual gameplay that made me want to engage with it. In fact, I
found the game more annoying than anything else.

I will give "FBC" this much credit. For the brief time I played, the
community seemed fairly welcoming (I tried a few matches with
strangers). But nice as they were, the other players couldn't make up
for the dull gameplay.

"FBC: Firebreak" has an interesting premise behind it (largely lifted
from its predecessor) but the game itself targeted the wrong audience
and failed to put its premise to any good use. Remedy tried to tap
into the lucrative 'live service' market, despite the fact this
ignored their strengths in creating compelling single-player
experiences, and what we got was a weird game that just isn't worth
playing.



* Skald: The Dark Priory https://store.steampowered.com/app/1069160/SKALD_Against_the_Black_Priory/
I feel like I've been here before.

Not because of the game's retro-resemblance to classic CRPGs like
"Ultima" or "Magic Candle", although that certainly helps. Or because
it draws so heavily from the tone of Lovecraftian tales that I'm
familiar with. But... a long chain of islands in the wild north, on
the edge of civilization, where the warp and woof of reality run thin?
A low-magic world where passage through the wilderness was as much a
struggle as the random encounter with bandits and monsters? Has
somebody been reading the notes to my D&D campaign?

All of which probably speaks more about the lack of originality in my
own games rather than as a criticism of "Skald", but boy oh boy, did
this game /feel/ familiar to some of my tabletop adventures. Maybe not
so much near the end (I tend not to go full Lovecraftian) but
otherwise so much of the tone and pacing of the game felt familiar and comfortable to me. The game won bonus points for that alone.

I just wish it was a better experience mechanically. The retro-theming
did add a certain ambience to it (it added an eerie, ancient feel to
the game), but as often it worked /against/ the game's feel too. The
pixelated graphics often made it hard for me to figure out what I was
seeing... or even differentiate my characters from the background. Was
that blob of pixels some unholy Cthulian monster... or just a giant
rat? I never could tell. The constant fog-of-war was annoying --just
let me see the whole fucking overland map already!!!-- and the combat
was slow and tedious (especially the inability to attack or move
diagonally). It felt like an ancient DOS game... but the limitations
of those classics were due to weak hardware and archaic design. We
loved the games /despite/ those problems, not because of them. Writing
them back into the genre is nothing I've ever desired.

That said, overall I enjoyed "Skald". Yes, its gameplay had its weak
points and its story railroaded the player a bit much, but it was fun hacking-n-slashing my way through a classic CRPG-styled game. And,
like I said, I adored the game's style. The engine itself is also
moddable to add new 'adventure modules' and I can imagine some other
fans taking it upon themselves to polish away some of the game's
rougher edges. Until then it's an adequate romp down Nostalgia Lane,
especially if you've already over-played the /real/ classic it
imperfectly apes and are looking for something new.



---------------------------------------

So, that's how I started the new year; a pretty good romp through a
handful of video games. How about you?

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

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What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

Trek To Yomi
As a big Kurosawa fan, I found the art direction in this game, and cinematography I guess you'd call it, magnificent. You jump into a room,
and are lavished with flickering flames, moving chiaroscuro shadows, a
bright lamp behind a ricepaper screen -- contrast, shading, wind and fire effects are throughout a delight to behold; samurai period detail in the architecture, costuming and myth-making another constant source of pleasure. As a piece of interactive cinematic art Trek To Yomi gets double thumbs up! Combat gets divisive reviews from players -- as with any fast moving
gameplay that requires quick responses, precision timing and learning combo moves to become proficient. I enjoyed it, with only minor frustrations as I was learning enemy movesets & such, but TTY forums are full of complaints on this score, which I just shrug off: lower the difficulty if you find it too hard. Trek To Yomi is a gaming gem as far as I'm concerned, and whets my appetite for more samurai games.

Okami HD
Finally, finally finished this nearly interminable game, 50+ hours. I spent far too much time chasing minor sidequests, but as this is a reissue of a title from a much earlier era where all this extra stuff was expected, and which the devs clearly put much effort and time into, what can I say: Avoid all of it unless you are seriously chasing a platinum achievement. The Japanese mythology the game is built on is interesting (some of which is mentioned in Trek To Yomi); the basic myth of a dragon eating the sun and demanding human sacrifice was a good one, and I never got tired of the high quality art.

Looking at Obra Dinn & Spirit of the Samurai for next games!

rms

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On Sun, 1 Feb 2026 10:45:09 -0700, "rms" <rmsmoo@moomoo.net> wrote:

Trek To Yomi
As a big Kurosawa fan, I found the art direction in this game, and >cinematography I guess you'd call it, magnificent. You jump into a room, >and are lavished with flickering flames, moving chiaroscuro shadows, a >bright lamp behind a ricepaper screen -- contrast, shading, wind and fire >effects are throughout a delight to behold; samurai period detail in the >architecture, costuming and myth-making another constant source of pleasure. >As a piece of interactive cinematic art Trek To Yomi gets double thumbs up! >Combat gets divisive reviews from players -- as with any fast moving >gameplay that requires quick responses, precision timing and learning combo >moves to become proficient. I enjoyed it, with only minor frustrations as I >was learning enemy movesets & such, but TTY forums are full of complaints on >this score, which I just shrug off: lower the difficulty if you find it too >hard. Trek To Yomi is a gaming gem as far as I'm concerned, and whets my >appetite for more samurai games.

I liked Yomi, and had much the same response to it as you. It's
incredibly stylish and its visuals are a beautiful homage to Kurosawa.
I did have some issues with the controls --when I reviewed the game, I
noted that I had to fight a whole battle without the ability to turn
around because the game just ignored that keystroke for some reason--
so I don't think it's really just a 'git gud' issue.* I also found it
got a bit repetitive as the game progressed. The gameplay definitely
played second-fiddle to the style.

Still, if you're a Kurosawa fan, "Yomi" is one to pick up. If you're
not, well, you'll get less enjoyment but it's still pretty good.





----
* note: I played the game in 2024, so that particular bug may have
been fixed. Still, control responsiveness was a real problem and not
just an issue with difficulty for me.



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Dang. February already? Um, I played the same games. Finally, I resumed
Star Wars: The Old Republic yesterday and today! I realized I am still
on chapter 1 as a Sith Warrior. This is going to take a while. :(


Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:

Have you gotten used to typing "2026" yet? I think I'm just getting
the hang of it, finally. Anyway, another month has rolled around, so
it's time to re-start this thread. Y'all know the drill. Play the
games, then list 'em here so we know what kept ya busy. Maybe even
throw a few thoughts in about the games (or not, it's all good).

Lemme getcha started.

...

So, that's how I started the new year; a pretty good romp through a
handful of video games. How about you?

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

--
"Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength." --Deuteronomy 6:4-5. What a poopy start 4 a new day, week, & mo. so far. :(
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/\___/\ Ant(Dude) @ http://aqfl.net & http://antfarm.home.dhs.org.
/ /\ /\ \ Please nuke ANT if replying by e-mail.
| |o o| |
\ _ /
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On 2/1/2026 7:47 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

Just 'My Time at Sandrock'. I spent a lot of time screencapping the six Extended Edition Middle Earth movies and fast-forwarding thru the INSANE amount of "Making Of" stuff Jackson included. Somewhere in the
neighborhood of 60 hours covering every single detail about how the
movies were made.
--
I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
dirty old man.
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On Mon, 2 Feb 2026 03:20:21 -0000 (UTC), ant@zimage.comANT (Ant)
wrote:

Dang. February already? Um, I played the same games. Finally, I resumed
Star Wars: The Old Republic yesterday and today! I realized I am still
on chapter 1 as a Sith Warrior. This is going to take a while. :(

One day I'll give SW:TOR another try. I initially played as a Jedi
knight ('cause, you know, I'm the hero-type ;-) and it was okay. The
story was fun, but it was filled with too much MMORPG grind to be a
/good/ game, at least in my eyes. The constant up-selling in the game
was annoying too (Pay for more storage! Pay for more characters! Pay
for more guns! Pay for new levels!)*

But the level design was pretty, the voice-acting was cool, and the
cutscenes were terrific. I always wanted to see what it was like to
play the other classes got up to.

Likely, though, I'll only get around to it three months after they
shut down the game. ;-)







* Mind you, this was 9 years ago. Things may have changed since then.
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On Sun, 1 Feb 2026 21:15:28 -0800, Dimensional Traveler
<dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:

On 2/1/2026 7:47 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

Just 'My Time at Sandrock'. I spent a lot of time screencapping the six >Extended Edition Middle Earth movies and fast-forwarding thru the INSANE >amount of "Making Of" stuff Jackson included. Somewhere in the
neighborhood of 60 hours covering every single detail about how the
movies were made.

Alright; I'll bite. Why?

(Why the screencapping, I mean, and not why Jackson made so much
'making of' documentation. The answer to that is itself already well documented: ego and money ;-)


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On 2/1/2026 7:47 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

* Cyberpunk 2077 (continued from last month) https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/32470/Cyberpunk_2077_Ultimate_Edition/

Agree to disagree on this one 10/10.

I'm not sure combat could've been much better without it getting either
silly (Borderlands) or turning into a clone of one of the modern FPS
games and thus boring.

Story is amazing, in both the main game and DLC.

For a first outing it's way better than anything else I've seen even if
it was supposedly horrid on release.

I can't wait to see it's sequel.

* FBC: Firebreak
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2272540/FBC_Firebreak/

Co-op maybe, but sounds disappointing.

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

TL;DR:
*** Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
***** Dark Souls III

/verbose

* Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
Very weird semi souls-like. It's got some weird art style, reminds me
of Toxic Avenger a bit. Combat is o.k. I don't like the artifact
system, though you can just skip it. Basically you play a dice game on
a mat where both you and your opponent roll a bunch of dice, whoever's
got higher total wins. But you use up to 3 artifacts to lower/defend
destroy dice which must line up or be close to each other. I typically
lose or at best tie doing that, and all that happens is a minor buff or
debuf on the fight after.

You don't have weapons really, you can pick them up but they break
quickly and are probably worse than your fists and feet once you upgrade
a skill a bit. I'd like a bit more variety because you only get enough materials to invest in one 'style' even though you pick up several.
Because of this I got a bit bored of it, and put it down.

***** Dark Souls III
Yes I went back to this. I originally wanted to just do some mad
invader PVP cos-playing as the moundmaker Hodrick himself. But that
dulled pretty quick as I wasn't getting fights much even on the weekend.

I decided I wanted to try to go legit. Trying to get through the game
with no damage spells and no co-op or npc summons and specifically to eventually get to and beat Midir with dragonslaying weapons build. It's
been a hard road, but I did it. At least the base game. A couple of
the bosses gave me a really hard time - both very lategame - about 50
tries each for Champion Gundyr - who I had to learn to parry, and
Lothric who I broke down and used a bandit knife with quickstep on,
which might be considered cheese by some. I came to realize how unfair
these fights are.

Gundyr has pretty much non-stop attacks in his second phase, and the
should tackle so fast you can't avoid it, the only way to do so is not
to be in melee range. Hard to do with a melee character, so that leaves parries. Fortunately almost everything he does can be parries, but
mostly not so easily.

Lothric teleporting attacks are total bs, making it nearly impossible to
see what's going on with DS3's crappy camera controls, and a one shot
laser he does which seems to be undodgable, the only way to avoid it is quickly get the camera on him and rush into melee range, and of course
just finding where he teleports to do that is hard.

I'm currently stuck on Freide, the 1st DLCs end boss, 90 tries so far.
I seem to be getting slowly better, but it's an insane amount of
frustration. I'm almost thinking there's something wrong with my game,
as one of her moves always gets me, I think I'm doing what I have to do
to avoid it, which is run under her super black flame jump explosion,
but it still gets me.
--
-Justisaur

ø-ø
(\_/)\
`-'\ `--.___,
¶¬'\( ,_.-'
\\
^'
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Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote at 15:47 this Sunday (GMT): [snip]

---------------------------------------

So, that's how I started the new year; a pretty good romp through a
handful of video games. How about you?

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

Lots of rougelikes again:
- balatro
- osfe
- gimmiko
- cloverpit

There is one new game that I've played though, a really cool
puzzle/narrative game called TR-49 thats like an alternate universe type
game where you're looking through records on an old vacuum tube
computer.
--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom
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I played the first level of PW's "American Tampon Sniffers".
Its a truly awful game, only good if you have an imminent
need to vomit. PW sure is a complete doucebag.
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There is one new game that I've played though, a really cool
puzzle/narrative game called TR-49 thats like an alternate universe type
game where you're looking through records on an old vacuum tube
computer.

I'm intrigued! How long did this take you, and I read on reviews the
voice acting is annoying, did this affect your playthrough?

rms

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Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:

On Mon, 2 Feb 2026 03:20:21 -0000 (UTC), ant@zimage.comANT (Ant)
wrote:

Dang. February already? Um, I played the same games. Finally, I resumed >Star Wars: The Old Republic yesterday and today! I realized I am still
on chapter 1 as a Sith Warrior. This is going to take a while. :(

One day I'll give SW:TOR another try. I initially played as a Jedi
knight ('cause, you know, I'm the hero-type ;-) and it was okay. The
story was fun, but it was filled with too much MMORPG grind to be a
/good/ game, at least in my eyes. The constant up-selling in the game
was annoying too (Pay for more storage! Pay for more characters! Pay
for more guns! Pay for new levels!)*

But the level design was pretty, the voice-acting was cool, and the
cutscenes were terrific. I always wanted to see what it was like to
play the other classes got up to.

Likely, though, I'll only get around to it three months after they
shut down the game. ;-)

* Mind you, this was 9 years ago. Things may have changed since then.

I started like a couple years ago. Yes, grinding hence why I am still on chapter 1. I am avoiding its side quests and sticking with main quests.
Now, I am too busy again to play. Who knows when I will play again!
Stupid life. :(
--
"As it is written: 'No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived--what God has prepared for those who love him...'" --1 Corinthians 2:9. 2day sucks. Will 2morrow suck like 2day?
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On 2/2/2026 7:27 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

On Sun, 1 Feb 2026 21:15:28 -0800, Dimensional Traveler
<dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:

On 2/1/2026 7:47 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

Just 'My Time at Sandrock'. I spent a lot of time screencapping the six
Extended Edition Middle Earth movies and fast-forwarding thru the INSANE
amount of "Making Of" stuff Jackson included. Somewhere in the
neighborhood of 60 hours covering every single detail about how the
movies were made.

Alright; I'll bite. Why?

(Why the screencapping, I mean, and not why Jackson made so much
'making of' documentation. The answer to that is itself already well documented: ego and money ;-)

Its a hobby. Been doing it for ~20 years now. I like watching movies
and TV series and its a way of sharing what I like.
--
I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
dirty old man.
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* Clash: Artifacts of Chaos

I've played through the first game in this series, Zeno Clash, largely because it was so odd, ha. First person melee combat arena-style, mostly boxing, which was mildly engaging but got a bit repetitive by the end. Good for an indie game though!

***** Dark Souls III

I made a half-hearted start on DS2 a year or two ago, but have gotten
used to the newer graphics nowadays, and it was tough to keep interest. I like reading of your adventures though!

rms

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rms <rmsmoo@moomoo.net> wrote at 23:18 this Monday (GMT):

There is one new game that I've played though, a really cool >>puzzle/narrative game called TR-49 thats like an alternate universe type >>game where you're looking through records on an old vacuum tube
computer.

I'm intrigued! How long did this take you, and I read on reviews the voice acting is annoying, did this affect your playthrough?

rms

Well, I beat the game in one night and about 4 hours. The actual
requirements to "beat" the game are really basic, the challenge just
comes from figuring out what to do. Going for 100% articles uncovered
will probably take a bit longer though.

The worldbuilding and sheer immersion is really really really good,
though!

I really didn't find the voice acting that annoying, but most of it is
optional and triggered through pressing the intercom button. You can
also just mute voices in the settings.
--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom
--- Synchronet 3.21b-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

On Mon, 2 Feb 2026 16:18:44 -0700, "rms" <rmsmoo@moomoo.net> wrote:

There is one new game that I've played though, a really cool >>puzzle/narrative game called TR-49 thats like an alternate universe type >>game where you're looking through records on an old vacuum tube
computer.

I'm intrigued! How long did this take you, and I read on reviews the
voice acting is annoying, did this affect your playthrough?

I saw this one too, and considered it (arguably, still am) but put off acquiring it largely because of the CRT-filter on the vacuum tube.
Even just looking at the screenshots, it hurt my brain. ;-)

It did remind me of "Brazil", though.


--- Synchronet 3.21b-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

On Mon, 2 Feb 2026 09:05:01 -0800, Justisaur <justisaur@yahoo.com>
wrote:

On 2/1/2026 7:47 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

* Cyberpunk 2077 (continued from last month)
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/32470/Cyberpunk_2077_Ultimate_Edition/

Agree to disagree on this one 10/10.

I'm not sure combat could've been much better without it getting either >silly (Borderlands) or turning into a clone of one of the modern FPS
games and thus boring.

Story is amazing, in both the main game and DLC.

For a first outing it's way better than anything else I've seen even if
it was supposedly horrid on release.

I can't wait to see it's sequel.

* FBC: Firebreak
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2272540/FBC_Firebreak/

Co-op maybe, but sounds disappointing.

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

TL;DR:
*** Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
***** Dark Souls III

/verbose

* Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
Very weird semi souls-like. It's got some weird art style, reminds me
of Toxic Avenger a bit. Combat is o.k. I don't like the artifact
system, though you can just skip it. Basically you play a dice game on
a mat where both you and your opponent roll a bunch of dice, whoever's
got higher total wins. But you use up to 3 artifacts to lower/defend >destroy dice which must line up or be close to each other. I typically
lose or at best tie doing that, and all that happens is a minor buff or >debuf on the fight after.

You don't have weapons really, you can pick them up but they break
quickly and are probably worse than your fists and feet once you upgrade
a skill a bit. I'd like a bit more variety because you only get enough >materials to invest in one 'style' even though you pick up several.
Because of this I got a bit bored of it, and put it down.

***** Dark Souls III
Yes I went back to this. I originally wanted to just do some mad
invader PVP cos-playing as the moundmaker Hodrick himself. But that
dulled pretty quick as I wasn't getting fights much even on the weekend.

I decided I wanted to try to go legit. Trying to get through the game
with no damage spells and no co-op or npc summons and specifically to >eventually get to and beat Midir with dragonslaying weapons build. It's >been a hard road, but I did it. At least the base game. A couple of
the bosses gave me a really hard time - both very lategame - about 50
tries each for Champion Gundyr - who I had to learn to parry, and
Lothric who I broke down and used a bandit knife with quickstep on,
which might be considered cheese by some. I came to realize how unfair >these fights are.

Gundyr has pretty much non-stop attacks in his second phase, and the
should tackle so fast you can't avoid it, the only way to do so is not
to be in melee range. Hard to do with a melee character, so that leaves >parries. Fortunately almost everything he does can be parries, but
mostly not so easily.

Lothric teleporting attacks are total bs, making it nearly impossible to
see what's going on with DS3's crappy camera controls, and a one shot
laser he does which seems to be undodgable, the only way to avoid it is >quickly get the camera on him and rush into melee range, and of course
just finding where he teleports to do that is hard.

I'm currently stuck on Freide, the 1st DLCs end boss, 90 tries so far.
I seem to be getting slowly better, but it's an insane amount of >frustration. I'm almost thinking there's something wrong with my game,
as one of her moves always gets me, I think I'm doing what I have to do
to avoid it, which is run under her super black flame jump explosion,
but it still gets me.

*--

I can't put myself through the Dark Souls games any more. Remember
when you tried to help me a long time ago with DS3? We didn't get
very far lol. 2nd boss max. I keep thinking about starting up Elden
Ring again but I don't think I want to go thru that difficulty again
either. I through out the hundreds of pages of info and strategy and walkthroughs that I had on my office floor. I bet I went through one
or two toner cartridges just for ER! Besides, I don't remember how to
play it! :-)

-pw
--- Synchronet 3.21b-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

On 2/3/2026 7:26 PM, PW wrote:

On Mon, 2 Feb 2026 09:05:01 -0800, Justisaur <justisaur@yahoo.com>
wrote:

On 2/1/2026 7:47 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

* Cyberpunk 2077 (continued from last month)
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/32470/Cyberpunk_2077_Ultimate_Edition/

Agree to disagree on this one 10/10.

I'm not sure combat could've been much better without it getting either
silly (Borderlands) or turning into a clone of one of the modern FPS
games and thus boring.

Story is amazing, in both the main game and DLC.

For a first outing it's way better than anything else I've seen even if
it was supposedly horrid on release.

I can't wait to see it's sequel.

* FBC: Firebreak
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2272540/FBC_Firebreak/

Co-op maybe, but sounds disappointing.

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

TL;DR:
*** Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
***** Dark Souls III

/verbose

* Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
Very weird semi souls-like. It's got some weird art style, reminds me
of Toxic Avenger a bit. Combat is o.k. I don't like the artifact
system, though you can just skip it. Basically you play a dice game on
a mat where both you and your opponent roll a bunch of dice, whoever's
got higher total wins. But you use up to 3 artifacts to lower/defend
destroy dice which must line up or be close to each other. I typically
lose or at best tie doing that, and all that happens is a minor buff or
debuf on the fight after.

You don't have weapons really, you can pick them up but they break
quickly and are probably worse than your fists and feet once you upgrade
a skill a bit. I'd like a bit more variety because you only get enough
materials to invest in one 'style' even though you pick up several.
Because of this I got a bit bored of it, and put it down.

***** Dark Souls III
Yes I went back to this. I originally wanted to just do some mad
invader PVP cos-playing as the moundmaker Hodrick himself. But that
dulled pretty quick as I wasn't getting fights much even on the weekend.

I decided I wanted to try to go legit. Trying to get through the game
with no damage spells and no co-op or npc summons and specifically to
eventually get to and beat Midir with dragonslaying weapons build. It's
been a hard road, but I did it. At least the base game. A couple of
the bosses gave me a really hard time - both very lategame - about 50
tries each for Champion Gundyr - who I had to learn to parry, and
Lothric who I broke down and used a bandit knife with quickstep on,
which might be considered cheese by some. I came to realize how unfair
these fights are.

Gundyr has pretty much non-stop attacks in his second phase, and the
should tackle so fast you can't avoid it, the only way to do so is not
to be in melee range. Hard to do with a melee character, so that leaves
parries. Fortunately almost everything he does can be parries, but
mostly not so easily.

Lothric teleporting attacks are total bs, making it nearly impossible to
see what's going on with DS3's crappy camera controls, and a one shot
laser he does which seems to be undodgable, the only way to avoid it is
quickly get the camera on him and rush into melee range, and of course
just finding where he teleports to do that is hard.

I'm currently stuck on Freide, the 1st DLCs end boss, 90 tries so far.
I seem to be getting slowly better, but it's an insane amount of
frustration. I'm almost thinking there's something wrong with my game,
as one of her moves always gets me, I think I'm doing what I have to do
to avoid it, which is run under her super black flame jump explosion,
but it still gets me.

*--

I can't put myself through the Dark Souls games any more. Remember
when you tried to help me a long time ago with DS3? We didn't get
very far lol. 2nd boss max. I keep thinking about starting up Elden
Ring again but I don't think I want to go thru that difficulty again
either. I through out the hundreds of pages of info and strategy and walkthroughs that I had on my office floor. I bet I went through one
or two toner cartridges just for ER! Besides, I don't remember how to
play it! :-)

Even if DS3 is my favorite game, I get it. It's got the hardest start
of any of the souls games for new players. And even I'm irritated by
those 2 bosses bullshit. Most of the bosses have some amount of BS. It's
just a matter of learning how to deal with it. ER I don't find very
hard in comparison, it's just long.

There's now a 'seamless co-op' mod for both which lets people go through
it totally together instead of only certain parts, and you can adjust difficulty some amount - at least down to same difficulty as if for one person.
--
-Justisaur

ø-ø
(\_/)\
`-'\ `--.___,
¶¬'\( ,_.-'
\\
^'
--- Synchronet 3.21b-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

On 2/2/2026 5:40 PM, rms wrote:

***** Dark Souls III

  I made a half-hearted start on DS2 a year or two ago, but have gotten used to the newer graphics nowadays, and it was tough to keep interest.
I like reading of your adventures though!

Oh no, now you've done it!

I've beat Friede since I posted. 105th try. In a way I felt she was
actually more fair than either Gundyr or Lothric. Except for when her
father joins the fight. 2 on 1 no fair! She does go invisible too. And
has a bunch of near 1 shot attacks. And 3 phases. I guess not that
fair. Mostly it came down to me reading and watching a lot on how to
fight her. One of the things I sort of discovered on my own which no
one actually mentioned is you have to lock off her when running under
her jumping attacks in phase 3, otherwise the game makes you follow her
into the explosion when she hits the ground.

I also realized why the control scheme is bad, those three bosses you
want to be able to roll or sprint while moving the camera, which you
can't do unless you adopt 'the claw.' That's where you somehow twist
your right hand into a way you can use your index finger on the right
stick and thumb to hit or hold roll/sprint.

Off to Demon Prince(s) now. Only 4 tries so far.

I discovered the DS3 discord is actually still fairly active and it
hasn't been too hard to get help on my pyro-cleric which I've gone back
to when I don't feel like beating my head against the bosses. Even
though it's on NG++ I haven't really had much difficulties with summons.
Lothric and Friede both took me 1 try, Demon Princes only 2 and my
summon died fairly early both times. I actually got invaded a couple
times, which somewhat surprises me, as at level 192 now I'm way above
'meta' pvp levels of 120-150.

I've also helped a number of people, being summoned for bosses. Jolly Cooperation Praise the Sun! \[T]/ has always been what I liked most
about these games. I have over 300 embers on my Pyro, I'm guessing most
of those are from helping people (1 per boss you actually help beat and survive with, though you get some as treasure.)
--
-Justisaur

ø-ø
(\_/)\
`-'\ `--.___,
¶¬'\( ,_.-'
\\
^'
--- Synchronet 3.21b-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

Justisaur <justisaur@yahoo.com> wrote at 22:54 this Wednesday (GMT):

On 2/3/2026 7:26 PM, PW wrote:

On Mon, 2 Feb 2026 09:05:01 -0800, Justisaur <justisaur@yahoo.com>
wrote:

On 2/1/2026 7:47 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

* Cyberpunk 2077 (continued from last month)
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/32470/Cyberpunk_2077_Ultimate_Edition/

Agree to disagree on this one 10/10.

I'm not sure combat could've been much better without it getting either
silly (Borderlands) or turning into a clone of one of the modern FPS
games and thus boring.

Story is amazing, in both the main game and DLC.

For a first outing it's way better than anything else I've seen even if
it was supposedly horrid on release.

I can't wait to see it's sequel.

* FBC: Firebreak
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2272540/FBC_Firebreak/

Co-op maybe, but sounds disappointing.

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

TL;DR:
*** Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
***** Dark Souls III

/verbose

* Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
Very weird semi souls-like. It's got some weird art style, reminds me
of Toxic Avenger a bit. Combat is o.k. I don't like the artifact
system, though you can just skip it. Basically you play a dice game on
a mat where both you and your opponent roll a bunch of dice, whoever's
got higher total wins. But you use up to 3 artifacts to lower/defend
destroy dice which must line up or be close to each other. I typically
lose or at best tie doing that, and all that happens is a minor buff or
debuf on the fight after.

You don't have weapons really, you can pick them up but they break
quickly and are probably worse than your fists and feet once you upgrade >>> a skill a bit. I'd like a bit more variety because you only get enough
materials to invest in one 'style' even though you pick up several.
Because of this I got a bit bored of it, and put it down.

***** Dark Souls III
Yes I went back to this. I originally wanted to just do some mad
invader PVP cos-playing as the moundmaker Hodrick himself. But that
dulled pretty quick as I wasn't getting fights much even on the weekend. >>>
I decided I wanted to try to go legit. Trying to get through the game
with no damage spells and no co-op or npc summons and specifically to
eventually get to and beat Midir with dragonslaying weapons build. It's >>> been a hard road, but I did it. At least the base game. A couple of
the bosses gave me a really hard time - both very lategame - about 50
tries each for Champion Gundyr - who I had to learn to parry, and
Lothric who I broke down and used a bandit knife with quickstep on,
which might be considered cheese by some. I came to realize how unfair
these fights are.

Gundyr has pretty much non-stop attacks in his second phase, and the
should tackle so fast you can't avoid it, the only way to do so is not
to be in melee range. Hard to do with a melee character, so that leaves >>> parries. Fortunately almost everything he does can be parries, but
mostly not so easily.

Lothric teleporting attacks are total bs, making it nearly impossible to >>> see what's going on with DS3's crappy camera controls, and a one shot
laser he does which seems to be undodgable, the only way to avoid it is
quickly get the camera on him and rush into melee range, and of course
just finding where he teleports to do that is hard.

I'm currently stuck on Freide, the 1st DLCs end boss, 90 tries so far.
I seem to be getting slowly better, but it's an insane amount of
frustration. I'm almost thinking there's something wrong with my game,
as one of her moves always gets me, I think I'm doing what I have to do
to avoid it, which is run under her super black flame jump explosion,
but it still gets me.

*--

I can't put myself through the Dark Souls games any more. Remember
when you tried to help me a long time ago with DS3? We didn't get
very far lol. 2nd boss max. I keep thinking about starting up Elden
Ring again but I don't think I want to go thru that difficulty again
either. I through out the hundreds of pages of info and strategy and
walkthroughs that I had on my office floor. I bet I went through one
or two toner cartridges just for ER! Besides, I don't remember how to
play it! :-)

Even if DS3 is my favorite game, I get it. It's got the hardest start
of any of the souls games for new players. And even I'm irritated by
those 2 bosses bullshit. Most of the bosses have some amount of BS. It's just a matter of learning how to deal with it. ER I don't find very
hard in comparison, it's just long.

There's now a 'seamless co-op' mod for both which lets people go through
it totally together instead of only certain parts, and you can adjust difficulty some amount - at least down to same difficulty as if for one person.

Is it split screen or network co-op?
--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom
--- Synchronet 3.21b-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action


I started playing Red Dead Redemption 1 (the original). It's good,
and worth the $25 sale I'd say (definitely don't pay $50 for it, it
goes on sale often).

RDR2 online mode got hundreds of hours of gameplay from me. So many
good times to be had there in the first year of release. But I never
finished the single player game. Maybe I'll go back to it one day.

The original RDR is simpler and feels less detailed than RDR2, but in
some ways that's good... like it's not going for the whole "bonding"
thing with your horse which means you don't feel obligated to brush
him and other crap, which to me never really elevated the fun factor.

I don't really follow or care about the overall story of these games,
but I do tend to enjoy the "mini-story" of each individual mission in
Rockstar games.

On the PC and at 1440/Ultra it definitely looks a lot better than when
I briefly tried it on the PS4 back in the day (and quickly ditched it
due to playing with a controller). Visual detail is of course not up
to RDR2 standards, but still better than I expected so I suspect there
was a little bit of "remastering" magic that took place on the 2010
version.

In some ways the return to the simpler style of games circa 2010 is refreshingly nostalgic. I wouldn't say RDR is a better game than RDR2
(it can't possibly be without a lively online mode), but there is
something that feels different about it.

Maybe the difference is that with RDR2, the designers were faced with
the challenge of capturing what was good about RDR and the expenditure
of time was invested in finding ways to modify and hopefully improve
on it. Whereas everything in RDR was mostly a fresh idea (at the
time) and thus the novelty of it more optimized in the moment without
the burden of being asked to try to make it better?
--- Synchronet 3.21b-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

On 2/5/2026 11:20 AM, candycanearter07 wrote:

Justisaur <justisaur@yahoo.com> wrote at 22:54 this Wednesday (GMT):

Even if DS3 is my favorite game, I get it. It's got the hardest start
of any of the souls games for new players. And even I'm irritated by
those 2 bosses bullshit. Most of the bosses have some amount of BS. It's
just a matter of learning how to deal with it. ER I don't find very
hard in comparison, it's just long.

There's now a 'seamless co-op' mod for both which lets people go through
it totally together instead of only certain parts, and you can adjust
difficulty some amount - at least down to same difficulty as if for one
person.

Is it split screen or network co-op?

Network. There's a different Split-Screen mod, though you still have to
play through the game for each person as normal only summoning where available. I wonder if you could combine them to have it do seamless
local co-op.
--
-Justisaur

ø-ø
(\_/)\
`-'\ `--.___,
¶¬'\( ,_.-'
\\
^'
--- Synchronet 3.21b-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

On Wed, 4 Feb 2026 14:54:49 -0800, Justisaur <justisaur@yahoo.com>
wrote:

On 2/3/2026 7:26 PM, PW wrote:

On Mon, 2 Feb 2026 09:05:01 -0800, Justisaur <justisaur@yahoo.com>
wrote:

On 2/1/2026 7:47 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

* Cyberpunk 2077 (continued from last month)
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/32470/Cyberpunk_2077_Ultimate_Edition/

Agree to disagree on this one 10/10.

I'm not sure combat could've been much better without it getting either
silly (Borderlands) or turning into a clone of one of the modern FPS
games and thus boring.

Story is amazing, in both the main game and DLC.

For a first outing it's way better than anything else I've seen even if
it was supposedly horrid on release.

I can't wait to see it's sequel.

* FBC: Firebreak
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2272540/FBC_Firebreak/

Co-op maybe, but sounds disappointing.

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

TL;DR:
*** Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
***** Dark Souls III

/verbose

* Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
Very weird semi souls-like. It's got some weird art style, reminds me
of Toxic Avenger a bit. Combat is o.k. I don't like the artifact
system, though you can just skip it. Basically you play a dice game on
a mat where both you and your opponent roll a bunch of dice, whoever's
got higher total wins. But you use up to 3 artifacts to lower/defend
destroy dice which must line up or be close to each other. I typically
lose or at best tie doing that, and all that happens is a minor buff or
debuf on the fight after.

You don't have weapons really, you can pick them up but they break
quickly and are probably worse than your fists and feet once you upgrade >>> a skill a bit. I'd like a bit more variety because you only get enough
materials to invest in one 'style' even though you pick up several.
Because of this I got a bit bored of it, and put it down.

***** Dark Souls III
Yes I went back to this. I originally wanted to just do some mad
invader PVP cos-playing as the moundmaker Hodrick himself. But that
dulled pretty quick as I wasn't getting fights much even on the weekend. >>>
I decided I wanted to try to go legit. Trying to get through the game
with no damage spells and no co-op or npc summons and specifically to
eventually get to and beat Midir with dragonslaying weapons build. It's >>> been a hard road, but I did it. At least the base game. A couple of
the bosses gave me a really hard time - both very lategame - about 50
tries each for Champion Gundyr - who I had to learn to parry, and
Lothric who I broke down and used a bandit knife with quickstep on,
which might be considered cheese by some. I came to realize how unfair
these fights are.

Gundyr has pretty much non-stop attacks in his second phase, and the
should tackle so fast you can't avoid it, the only way to do so is not
to be in melee range. Hard to do with a melee character, so that leaves >>> parries. Fortunately almost everything he does can be parries, but
mostly not so easily.

Lothric teleporting attacks are total bs, making it nearly impossible to >>> see what's going on with DS3's crappy camera controls, and a one shot
laser he does which seems to be undodgable, the only way to avoid it is
quickly get the camera on him and rush into melee range, and of course
just finding where he teleports to do that is hard.

I'm currently stuck on Freide, the 1st DLCs end boss, 90 tries so far.
I seem to be getting slowly better, but it's an insane amount of
frustration. I'm almost thinking there's something wrong with my game,
as one of her moves always gets me, I think I'm doing what I have to do
to avoid it, which is run under her super black flame jump explosion,
but it still gets me.

*--

I can't put myself through the Dark Souls games any more. Remember
when you tried to help me a long time ago with DS3? We didn't get
very far lol. 2nd boss max. I keep thinking about starting up Elden
Ring again but I don't think I want to go thru that difficulty again
either. I through out the hundreds of pages of info and strategy and
walkthroughs that I had on my office floor. I bet I went through one
or two toner cartridges just for ER! Besides, I don't remember how to
play it! :-)

Even if DS3 is my favorite game, I get it. It's got the hardest start
of any of the souls games for new players. And even I'm irritated by
those 2 bosses bullshit. Most of the bosses have some amount of BS. It's >just a matter of learning how to deal with it. ER I don't find very
hard in comparison, it's just long.

There's now a 'seamless co-op' mod for both which lets people go through
it totally together instead of only certain parts, and you can adjust >difficulty some amount - at least down to same difficulty as if for one >person.

*--

The absolute hardest thing I remember from DS3 were the controls.
Didn't matter much if I switched to a controller. The camera was
pretty much impossible to get under control, which got me killed all
the time!

-pw
--- Synchronet 3.21b-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> writes:

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

I guess just Borderlands 4. And even there, just running around, doing
some little side missons and things on the map.

Too much fiddling with my home network. I guess but it could be called a
kind of game. With help from Gemini it's been more fun that otherwise.

Oh and I kind of figured out the issues with Gsync and dual displays
I've been having, although this may have been in December. One issue
with dual displays has been that some games come up with a black screen
if they're setup for 1080p full screen (displays are 1440p). Turns out
it helps to turn off the other (non-gaming) monitor.

Then the more annoying thing, why was I stuck at 60 fps in some games
despite Gsync and everything setup as recommended? Turns out everything
wasn't everything, the Windows desktop refresh rate also matters and it
was set to 60 Hz. I don't actually remember now if that's mentioned in
the Blur Busters guides but I don't think I ever saw it mentioned.

Also, I finally got around to installing my new video card. What do you
know, turns out it's so thick it covers my only x4 slot with my little
adapter card and 4 TB of extra SSD storage. And of course, most of the
games I wanted to play were on those...

Oh well, I had to copy everything from those SSDs to a HD. Work in
progress, stuff's copied, I still have to see about moving them where
Steam finds them. Might be some GoG or Epic games there too and some
other stuff like mods. But when that's done I can at least run the games
again.
--- Synchronet 3.21b-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

On 2/5/2026 12:23 PM, Justisaur wrote:

On 2/5/2026 11:20 AM, candycanearter07 wrote:

Justisaur <justisaur@yahoo.com> wrote at 22:54 this Wednesday (GMT):

Even if DS3 is my favorite game, I get it.  It's got the hardest start
of any of the souls games for new players.  And even I'm irritated by
those 2 bosses bullshit. Most of the bosses have some amount of BS. It's >>> just a matter of learning how to deal with it.  ER I don't find very
hard in comparison, it's just long.

There's now a 'seamless co-op' mod for both which lets people go through >>> it totally together instead of only certain parts, and you can adjust
difficulty some amount - at least down to same difficulty as if for one
person.

Is it split screen or network co-op?

Network.  There's a different Split-Screen mod, though you still have to play through the game for each person as normal only summoning where available.  I wonder if you could combine them to have it do seamless
local co-op.

I looked it up and you can!
--
-Justisaur

ø-ø
(\_/)\
`-'\ `--.___,
¶¬'\( ,_.-'
\\
^'
--- Synchronet 3.21b-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

On 2/5/2026 7:00 PM, PW wrote:

On Wed, 4 Feb 2026 14:54:49 -0800, Justisaur <justisaur@yahoo.com>
wrote:

On 2/3/2026 7:26 PM, PW wrote:

On Mon, 2 Feb 2026 09:05:01 -0800, Justisaur <justisaur@yahoo.com>
wrote:

On 2/1/2026 7:47 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

* Cyberpunk 2077 (continued from last month)
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/32470/Cyberpunk_2077_Ultimate_Edition/

Agree to disagree on this one 10/10.

I'm not sure combat could've been much better without it getting either >>>> silly (Borderlands) or turning into a clone of one of the modern FPS
games and thus boring.

Story is amazing, in both the main game and DLC.

For a first outing it's way better than anything else I've seen even if >>>> it was supposedly horrid on release.

I can't wait to see it's sequel.

* FBC: Firebreak
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2272540/FBC_Firebreak/

Co-op maybe, but sounds disappointing.

What Have You Been Playing... IN JANUARY 2026?

TL;DR:
*** Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
***** Dark Souls III

/verbose

* Clash: Artifacts of Chaos
Very weird semi souls-like. It's got some weird art style, reminds me >>>> of Toxic Avenger a bit. Combat is o.k. I don't like the artifact
system, though you can just skip it. Basically you play a dice game on >>>> a mat where both you and your opponent roll a bunch of dice, whoever's >>>> got higher total wins. But you use up to 3 artifacts to lower/defend
destroy dice which must line up or be close to each other. I typically >>>> lose or at best tie doing that, and all that happens is a minor buff or >>>> debuf on the fight after.

You don't have weapons really, you can pick them up but they break
quickly and are probably worse than your fists and feet once you upgrade >>>> a skill a bit. I'd like a bit more variety because you only get enough >>>> materials to invest in one 'style' even though you pick up several.
Because of this I got a bit bored of it, and put it down.

***** Dark Souls III
Yes I went back to this. I originally wanted to just do some mad
invader PVP cos-playing as the moundmaker Hodrick himself. But that
dulled pretty quick as I wasn't getting fights much even on the weekend. >>>>
I decided I wanted to try to go legit. Trying to get through the game
with no damage spells and no co-op or npc summons and specifically to
eventually get to and beat Midir with dragonslaying weapons build. It's >>>> been a hard road, but I did it. At least the base game. A couple of
the bosses gave me a really hard time - both very lategame - about 50
tries each for Champion Gundyr - who I had to learn to parry, and
Lothric who I broke down and used a bandit knife with quickstep on,
which might be considered cheese by some. I came to realize how unfair >>>> these fights are.

Gundyr has pretty much non-stop attacks in his second phase, and the
should tackle so fast you can't avoid it, the only way to do so is not >>>> to be in melee range. Hard to do with a melee character, so that leaves >>>> parries. Fortunately almost everything he does can be parries, but
mostly not so easily.

Lothric teleporting attacks are total bs, making it nearly impossible to >>>> see what's going on with DS3's crappy camera controls, and a one shot
laser he does which seems to be undodgable, the only way to avoid it is >>>> quickly get the camera on him and rush into melee range, and of course >>>> just finding where he teleports to do that is hard.

I'm currently stuck on Freide, the 1st DLCs end boss, 90 tries so far. >>>> I seem to be getting slowly better, but it's an insane amount of
frustration. I'm almost thinking there's something wrong with my game, >>>> as one of her moves always gets me, I think I'm doing what I have to do >>>> to avoid it, which is run under her super black flame jump explosion,
but it still gets me.

*--

I can't put myself through the Dark Souls games any more. Remember
when you tried to help me a long time ago with DS3? We didn't get
very far lol. 2nd boss max. I keep thinking about starting up Elden
Ring again but I don't think I want to go thru that difficulty again
either. I through out the hundreds of pages of info and strategy and
walkthroughs that I had on my office floor. I bet I went through one
or two toner cartridges just for ER! Besides, I don't remember how to
play it! :-)

Even if DS3 is my favorite game, I get it. It's got the hardest start
of any of the souls games for new players. And even I'm irritated by
those 2 bosses bullshit. Most of the bosses have some amount of BS. It's
just a matter of learning how to deal with it. ER I don't find very
hard in comparison, it's just long.

There's now a 'seamless co-op' mod for both which lets people go through
it totally together instead of only certain parts, and you can adjust
difficulty some amount - at least down to same difficulty as if for one
person.

*--

The absolute hardest thing I remember from DS3 were the controls.
Didn't matter much if I switched to a controller. The camera was
pretty much impossible to get under control, which got me killed all
the time!

Yes the camera sucks, I agree it's the worst thing about the game. KBM
is easier than controller just because of that. Not only the camera, but
fast far moving or teleporting bosses break lock on frequently, which
makes the camera much worse.

I love the games in spite of that, but my love is slowly fading. The
more I play them the more the flaws stand out. Part of that is
insisting on playing without summons right now, which I don't think I'll
ever do again. When you're co-oping it's not so bad as someone will be
in position to engage usually.
--
-Justisaur

ø-ø
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¶¬'\( ,_.-'
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^'
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On Mon, 09 Feb 2026 15:20:02 +0200, Anssi Saari <anssi.saari@usenet.mail.kapsi.fi> wrote:

Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> writes:

Also, I finally got around to installing my new video card. What do you
know, turns out it's so thick it covers my only x4 slot with my little >adapter card and 4 TB of extra SSD storage. And of course, most of the
games I wanted to play were on those...

Ah, the fun of overly large video cards ;-)

It has gotten so bad that some people are using PCI-extension cables
so they can mount their GPUs vertically because that's the only way to
get all the components to fit.

Maybe it's time for a new motherboard standard: ATX-fat, for gamers
with obese GPUs ;-)




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