Topic: What PS4 Games Are You Currently Playing?

@Th3solution @TheBrandedSwordsman How are you two doing? I haven't been too active lately feels like forever since we had a chat

@Jimmer-jammer my bad for bringing up Ashen in the Biomutant thread... didn’t want to clog it up so relocated it to here.

So yeah, I agree totally it is a great game and a souls-like of the highest order. It is a little short (shorter than most souls-likes anyway) but not in a bad way. The best thing I can say is that it is the first souls-like for gawd-knows how long that evoked that classic ‘souls-ian ‘anxiety’ on a long journey between Ritual Stones (bonfires). If it’s one issue that I have with Dark Souls 2 and especially Dark Souls 3, is that there are far too many bonfires dotted around. There were a fair few moments in Ashen where I was getting pretty ‘desperate’ for a Ritual Stone tbh.

As I mentioned, I still have to beat the final boss and play the whole thing through again on the unlockable harder difficulty (which I reckon will be tough!) but it’s a very high quality game for a first time developer.

Tagging @TheBrandedSwordsman as I know you wouldn’t want to miss out on any souls chat. I’m yet to play every souls-like (I have a few queued up in the backlog) but my personal ranking would be ‘something’ like this.

1. Bloodborne
2. Demons Souls
3. Dark Souls
4. Dark Souls 3
5. Nioh
6. Ashen
7. The Surge
8. Dark Souls 2
9. Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order
10. Code Vein
11. Immortal: Unchained
12. Lords of the Fallen

I personally don’t consider Sekiro to be a Souls-like but wouldn’t have a problem with people who do. If I had to include it I would probably slot it in at around 5.

The ones I’m yet to play (that I own, there might be a couple of others which I haven’t picked up yet) are Demons Souls Remastered, Nioh 2 (and the two PS5 remasters), The Surge 2, Mortal Shell and Chronos before the Ashes.

@Jimmer-jammer Remnant was awesome (definitely my favourite game so far this year) but I’d never class it as a souls-like. First and foremost it’s a co-op looter-shooter with a smattering of souls-like elements. I’d suggest anyone to give it a go, it’s as tight a third-person shooter as I’ve played.

I really enjoyed The Surge and I’ve only heard from reliable sources that The Surge 2 is a massive improvement over the original. In regards to the original, once you make some decent progress, the build variety is phenomenal, can’t wait to see how they’ve expanded on that in particular. I’d definitely consider it underrated and anyone who enjoyed the sub-genre should consider giving it a go.

Fallen Order was good but I actually found myself having to ‘force’ myself to plough on with it... can’t quite put my finger on why but it didn’t provide the scratch to the souls itch as consistently as a lot of the others... for me at least.

@Jimmer-jammer well if you do so, definitely let me know how you get on.

Also, don’t let me put you off of SW:JFO. It didn’t necessarily hit all the right spots with me but the vast majority of people really enjoyed it... and even though I only ‘liked’ it, I’ll certainly play the sequel.

@MaulTsir I replayed Tomb Raider (2013) earlier in the month as it goes. Really good game and I’m quite excited to play the sequels when I can find the time. They might miss out (a bit) on the just blockbuster-ness of the Uncharted series but they’re better games for sure. I came to the series late too, glad you finally stumbled upon them though.

Also, I’m a big fan of AC: Odyssey.

@TraCuz- Doing well, my friend. Just navigating a world in never ending crisis. Otherwise, trying to do a little video gaming between moments of sheer trepidation. 😜

How ‘bout you? What you been playing?

@colonelkilgore Thanks for the tag, I think that is a good ranking system but, alas, there are many Souls fans who disdain Bloodborne for not being a "true" Souls game @Jimmer-jammer Yeah I am hoping for a reveal soon, the rumor mill is certainly currently churning at high velocity!

@TheBrandedSwordsman yeah everyone likes and dislikes different things... and I'm open to each and all opinions... apart from Bloodborne-hate. Even I have to draw the line somewhere! 🤣

@TheBrandedSwordsman @colonelkilgore Yeah to put it bluntly, those people are idiots! Surely, there would be only 4 games on the list it only included 'true Souls' games? Which would be a way less interesting list.

@RogerRoger Yeah I think it will be a game that can be played for a long time to come, I certainly would recommend it to anyone who had doubts about its age, its just refreshing to play a game that it paced really well, the action and world exploring keeps the story moving forward and it never feels like I'm just dredging through, even the secret tombs are mainly on your way to the next point so I've never felt like their a burden to do them I've throughly enjoyed the experience.

@colonelkilgore I remember when it first come one Tomb Raider (2013) and I just thought nah been there and done that but I was so wrong, I can't believe I've let them slip through for so long just really a fun game to play.

I was a big fan of the original assasins creed and I played the first 3 but after that I fell away from them, lost interest in the story and the games all felt a bit repetitive, the last one I played was the one during the American revolution and you play as a guy called Connor I believe, but I picked up Origins last year and put some serious hours in to it during the first lockdown and really enjoyed it so looking forward to continuing the journey, I would say this however about these new Assassins Creed games I'm my opinion they would be so much better if they were just about these people and cut all that animous bull crap out.

@MaulTsir I agree with on AC, I've always disliked the present day and sci-fi aspects of the games. The historic settings and stories are good enough imo to hold their own.

Glad you are enjoying your time with Tomb Raider, I really enjoyed the trilogy. The first one had my favourite story out of the three games, and the third had the best gameplay and tombs of the three. It will be interesting to see what they do next with the series, there is supposed to be some kind of announcement this year.

Hope you had a nice holiday, did you go anywhere nice?

I'm still playing through Biomutant, loving the interactions and gameplay and the compliments and praise from NPCs I am receiving for my character's morally virtuous actions throughout the game. And yes, @colonelkilgore even though my character is an animated anthropomorphic fox I still consider myself to be using a Greatsword-based 'Guts' build. 🤣

@Th3solution @TraCuz- @JohnnyShoulder do you reckon you might try Biomutant?

@MaulTsir I agree about the newer AC games being so much better without the present day nonsense. Ubisoft just seem entrenched in their thinking on the subject though for some reason.

I enjoyed Odyssey a lot more than Origins but there are fans on both sides of the debate. For me ancient Greece and sailing the Aegean Sea was my cup of tea. I'm looking forward to eventually playing Valhalla too.

@TheBrandedSwordsman I don’t have plans for Biomutant, but never say never. I’m not a huge fan of animal-humanoid protagonist games, although I had to make an exception for Ratchet & Clank. Otherwise, I have trouble connecting with them (Sonic, Crash Bandicoot, Sly Cooper, etc.) Biomutant does look good artistically though and I can appreciate the unique approach to the characters and setting.

I think I'll try some Knockout City tonight. Anybody dodging any balls?

@JohnnyShoulder yeah the idea of just setting the game in historical times is good enough for me don't need all the nonsense, it was OK during the first few was a bit of a twist but seems to me from what I've played of Origins and now Oddesy it doesn't really need it.

Yeah I'm glad I've given Tomb Raider a try, Well worth it, I would hope that the games improve and not decline that would be a shame. I'll be looking forward to any future stuff now.

Just Caravan in the North East England, was just nice to get out, weather could of been better but was good to feel normal again lol

@colonelkilgore To be honest I tried Origins for about and hour and didn't like it, felt weird the r1 and 2 buttons being the attack buttons and felt the characters where a bit bland, then I went back to it during lockdown and just really enjoyed it, couldn't believe I put it down mabye I just wasn't in the mood for it as I was coming off some pretty big games (rdr2, Spiderman, god of War, horizon Zero Dawn, the witcher 3). In the end I really enjoyed Bayek and his story.

I've chosen Kassandra for my Oddesy playthrough and so far so good, didn't take me long to get in to the swing of things again.

@MaulTsir Glad to see you enjoyed the TR reboot. I thoroughly enjoyed the whole trilogy, although the first and the last are a cut above imo. Rise of the Tomb Raider is my least favorite of the bunch, but still a great game. I prefer the approach of emphasizing exploration and tombs over combat, but you get a mixture in all 3 entries. I look forward to hearing how you get along with the rest of Lara’s adventures.

As for AC, I’m in the same boat (ba-dum-tsshh 😄) as you regarding falling off the series after AC3 and then picking back up at Origins. Likewise it took a little time to warm up to Bayek and to Origins in general but I enjoyed it overall. I was looking forward to Odyssey but then became distracted by other games before I could start it. I didn’t want to play too many open world RPGs too close together and after Ghost of Tsushima I haven’t felt like going back to AC yet, worried it might be a step backwards. Also, the heavy emphasis of naval battles and ocean exploration was what turned me off of AC4 in its opening hours and so I’m worried that Odyssey might be the same. Let us know how you like it. Always curious to hear everyone’s experiences.

@Th3solution I'd have to say man since about the beginning of April FFXIV just absolutely consumed me, I haven't had desire to play much else. The other day I did get a little tired of the repetition of leveling my classes so I jumped into a few matches of Apex then got to Biome 2 in Returnal. But once I get all my classes leveled I'm full steam ahead to catching up to the story in FFXIV. One of my favorite multiplayer experiences in a long time.

Not sure I have anything to teach ya @RogerRoger but sure... Lessons cost £499.99 per minute! An absolute bargain!

I had a brief look at Pathfinder: Kingmaker - Definitive Edition I bought the other day and it's pretty impressive how they've translated over the pen and paper roots of it (I believe it was an offshoot of D&D's 3rd edition or something?)

The character creation is... Pretty much like making a character for those types of things baring having to come up with a backstory.

9 races, 16 classes (with each class having the option of 3 additional sub classes (Archtypes as the game calls them) to choose from), skills, feats, ability scores, spells/actions, their alignment alongside their voice, name and appearance.

Took me nearly an hour to just get through all that! 😅

Only thing so far is there's portraits you can pick for your character for dialogue boxes (Instead of it using your character model.

The artwork is really quite nice (the character models aren't too great compared to Divinity). There's like 20 or so human portraits but the other races only get 2 (1 for male, 1 for female) which is a bit disappointing, if very minor in the grand scheme of things!

@TraCuz- Sounds awesome. FFXIV looks really good and if I had the time it’s a MMORPG I’d actually like to try. As it stand though I really have my hands full in the single player world. Do you figure you’ll stay with Returnal, by the way? I have the disc sitting by my PS5 waiting to be loaded, but I am not sure when I’ll do it. Probably this week. I’m nervous the game will destroy me - either through losing my life to addiction to the gameplay or demoralization from the high difficulty. 😅