Motion of FRIDAY!

[Gusington]

 :o

[JasonPratt]

Just played Mission #1 of the Radio Commander campaign. The dramatic radio chatter flavor is about as expected (and some of the acting suffers a little from the dialogue having been translated from something other than English) -- it's kinnnnd of on-the-nose and stereotypical of a Vietnam movie featuring Southern US characters, be that as it may. ;) The voice-acting itself is mostly fine although I caught at least one line reading that wasn't directed for context so had weird inflections. I appreciate that the designers wanted to add some plot flavor to keep things moving along between contact plot points.

Gameplay was fine; wasn't sure how much to micromanage being on and off paths. The replay only partially clarified this: I was pleased to see the platoon (I chose to only use one) stay on paths as much as possible when broadly traveling to a location, but then later I was trying to clarify they should use paths and they seemed to be paralleling the path instead. Could be a glitch in the system's own internal mapping of the piece to the "map" graphics, so to speak. I had the option for variable coordinate accuracy turned on, and when the firefight started I got somewhat unreal variations when asking for position reports on the platoon and the enemy. (Um, spoiler, there is an enemy on the board to fight.) I might turn variable coordinate reports back off again, hard to say. I think I may have accidentally turned off click-coordinates (point-clicking to assign coordinates) without understanding what the result would be, too; so I had to visually map-read and dial in coordinates. This appears to have broken the "click on suspected VC site to send them there" functionality, so that the tutorial was telling me to do something I couldn't do.

The tutorial is very decent, by the way.

I enjoyed it, but I came away from the first mission with more of a desire to play Vietnam 65 or the Afghan sequel again, than to continue onto the second mission yet.

I'd probably restart the campaign and bring in Bravo company for support next time: they're around and after the fact I feel like I should have gotten them some experience, too. Plus not doing so seems to have broken the opportunity to call in air or arty support, so Alpha took more casualties than they might not have done otherwise against an enemy that outnumbered them.

[solops]

Multiplayer Dominions 5, TW Warhammer II and Sword of the Stars I (modded). I need to get some Sword of the Stars II time in with the player patch sometime....?
Just got down to the family place near Leakey. Still no deer :(   That's five years in a row with no white-tails because of the coyotes. Looks like we'll be thinning the pigs and shooting the encroaching imported exotics again. They seem to laugh at the coyotes.

[airboy]

Had buddies over, played poker, watched Auburn roast the Hogs.  Made bambi chili for the first time in six months which everyone likes.

[JasonPratt]

Watched Tennessee pretend to nearly not lose to Alabama last night. Or rather, heard about it at close second-hand.

(Commentators, both on the network and at hand, seemed to agree that this represented an improvement in Volunteer capability this year so far...  :P )

[Sir Slash]

The Vols played a good game. They were in it right until the last quarter. Much closer than the score indicates. The Tide's season maybe done unless they get their Quarterback healthy quick... they got L.S.U. coming soon.  :hide:

[JasonPratt]

LSU is always tough.

The family's general opinion is that we might have won if our freshman qb hadn't injured his neck again, requiring him to get out of the game. The players apparently don't like the first string qb at all, or don't work well with him, or something: our play quality goes straight down the toilet.

This wouldn't explain our amazingly weak defense during the first part of the season, but I've seen us getting better (again) there. The Vol Wall used to be fearsome, with blitzes and dogs shutting down the opposition qb and forcing turnovers. (Which we basically had to do because our secondary has always been traditionally weak, so we had to stop the pass and long runs at the source.)

[CJReich46]

Well,

I had two "family functions" - A Wedding on Saturday  and a Birthday Party for my nephew on Sunday

So the gaming has been minimal this weekend.


I did successfully install and run my copy of Sword of the Stars (with Argo Naval Yards) so I'm trying to grok that.  I forgot how rusty I was. YIKES.

[Gusington]

My rut sinks deeper. Arkham Asylum is definitely solid, just not what I am looking for right now. And Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition, while clearly a classic, just played and looked to dated. Hoping that Witcher 2 (whose combat flummoxed me years ago) or the new Wasteland game will break me out of this. I tried Wasteland when it was new but it also didn't engage me at the time. Fingers crossed.

If both fail I may be Divinity 2 Definitive Edition on sale this weekend. Maybe I just need something new/shiny.

[JasonPratt]

I recall you've had trouble getting into ArkAsy in prior years, too.  :-\

Hm. It's Halloween. You need something seasonal and atmospheric but not the usual thing.

...
...

...late 1700s French Canadian Irish hunter-trapper (or lumberjack) vs werewolf invasion simulator?  :D

https://store.steampowered.com/app/227220/SangFroid__Tales_of_Werewolves/?snr=1_7_15__13

Cost is totally free for some reason right now! -- and has been for some time, although I've forgotten it.

My review from mid-Sept 2017:

I am a lumberjack and I'm okay!
I hunt all night and I chop alllllAAAGGHGHGSHSRHLLLL.. {killed by werewolf}

Sang-Froid. Currently free for reasons I have no understanding of, but well worth the original full asking cost.

I would try to include some critical realism about the game's shortcomings, which do exist, but I literally write silly songs for this game when it goes on sale, so I'm just going to pretend this game is made entirely of awesome.

I don't have to pretend hard. This game drips atmosphere and charm, even if the graphics seem a tad cartoony and the English voice acting is... passable, at best. Might be better in French; the game is fully subtitled in English anyway, and listening to Irish settlers in French Canada, one of whom has a Native accent for reasons that sort of make sense in the plot, should be stunning in at least two senses of that word.

Be aware, as other reviewers have said, that the controls are going to seem... well, actually ARE, a bit clunky. I'm not sure if this is by design, or if the devs have made a virtue of an engine problem, but you aren't supposed to be a whiskey'd up Irish French Canadian ax ninja. (Note to self: suggest this for volume two when-if-ever the devs get around to it...!) In fact, I recommend that even beginners should start with Jaques, the brother who's better at hunting and not so great with an ax, anyway. He's designed to be harder to survive, but I find that adds an extra bit of tension to the game.

[JasonPratt]

Looking back, I think you tried Sang Froid before but couldn't get involved in it.

Here's my written demonstration AAR (with screenshots) from back in 2014; my Steam review borrows from it slightly. http://grogheads.com/forums/index.php?topic=11576.msg298987#msg298987

[Gusington]

This was my first try with Arkham Asylum - I'll go back to it just not right now. BTW there has been more interwebz chatter on the next Arkham game yesterday and today with not so subtle hints dropped on The Twitter, etc.

I have never played Sang Froid either - a couple of years ago I did play through a similar sounding game - can't remember the name of it but it was originally produced in Poland, with a top down view, set in Poland or somewhere similar in eastern Europe...

[JasonPratt]

Doesn't ring a bell. This is definitely a 3rd-person shooter (or chopper as the case sometimes is), with some strong defensive strategy pathing, a little like a tower defense. Comparisons to Orcs Must Die would not be completely wrong, but the game design is meant to be a little more realistic, especially if you're playing as the hunter/trapper brother (as I think the game was originally designed). He can axe-fight, but he isn't a lumberjack like his brother so it's easy for him to tire out and to over-reach and overstep taking a swing.

And even though he's a much better shot than his brother, he still only has a muzzle loader. Loading powder and shot and tamping it down etc., is done automatically when loading or reloading, and it can be hastened at no cost other than right-clicking furiously, but it still takes A WHILE -- which when you've got wolves (or werewolves) gearing up to eat your face, can be stressy. 

Back when I wrote my introduction to the game and its mechanics (in its first mission), I couldn't save video so I had to try to take screen snapshots manually as things happened, or in between things happening, and in this game that was disastrous! I have played with the idea of doing eps for Halloween...

[Gusington]

Well I played through The Witcher 2 tutorial and I think because I completed The Witcher 3, combat is not as difficult anymore...found my game, I think.

Also played through the Endless Legend tutorial...that game is damned complex! Almost as complex as Endless Space...

[Sir Slash]

I managed to get in some quality time with BG 2 this weekend. Anybody have a really, really big shoe I can borrow?