The Video Game Thread: What are you Playing?

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noman said:
Speaking of good old games, I played a lot of Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri last year. I use the Alien Crossfire expansion, but with the original seven factions.

The plot is Earth is screwed, so the UN sends a giant colony ship to Alpha Centauri in a hail mary effort to save humanity. Once they reach orbit, the ship's captain gets murdered, the ship begins to break apart, and the crew break into seven factions, each led by a charismatic sociopath. You then start the game as a single colony on a world that's semi-sentient and wants to murder you. It's a lot of fun.

I always role-play it in my head. I imagine I'm a mid-level dude on the ship who'd be a valuable asset. Something like an engineer, a military officer, or someone who makes really good tex-mex. I then go from faction leader to faction leader, prior to the exodus to the planet, to see what they've got to say and decide which faction I'm going to join. It goes something like this:

I approach Sheng-Ji Yang of the Human Hive.

Me: "So you're basically Space China."

Yang: "A gross oversimplification and an embarrassing display of your ignorance. What I'm offering is a new society free of the cancer of self-involved individualism, where the average citizen puts him or herself at the service of the society that feeds, nurtures, and protects him. A utopia where the illusions of faith, gods, and magical thinking are cast aside, and each citizen instead finds value in their service to the Collective Good through self-discipline, hard work, and self-sacrifice."

Me: "Why would anyone want to be part of this?"

Yang: "You'd be surprised. Besides, go talk to the other faction leaders, then come here and look down your nose at me."

I approach Prokhor Zakharov of the University of Planet.

Zak: "Science!"

Me: "Hey, I like science."

Zak: "But how much do you like science? Do you like it enough?"

Me: "I don't know. How much should I like science?"

Zak: "Enough to join a technocracy of elite scientists and engineers who pursue pure research without any oversite or regulation.

Me: "Wait, no regulation at all?"

Zak: "That's right."

Me: "..."

Zak: "Because not everyone is suited for STEM, or even menial labor. We've got a place for those kinds of people."

Me: "Human lab rats."

Zak: *nods enthusiastically*

Me: "So basically, you're Nazi Germany if Josef Mengele was in charge and not Hitler."

Zak: "You get me!"

I approach Nwabudike Morgan of Morgan Industries.

Morgan: "Mo money, mo money, mo money!"

Me: "Hey, I like money."

Morgan: "Then you're in for a treat. Full-throttle, unregulated, Laissez-faire capitalism. Think Ayn Rand's ideas dialed up to eleven."

Me: "So, basically you're Zak, except with capital rather than scientific research."

Morgan: "Bingo."

Me: "You'd have massive income inequality. Not everybody can compete in a cutthroat environment like that."

Morgan: "Survival of the fittest, my friend."

I approach Miriam Godwinson of the Lord's Believers.

Me: "No. Just no."

Godwinson: "Wait! Just hear me out!"

Me: "Your research sucks."

Godwinson: "But that doesn't matter. We're the strongest combat faction in the game. We can crack the Hive's or Morgan's defenses, probe the hell out of the University, and otherwise make every other faction on this planet our bitch --- I mean help them find the Salvation of the Lord our God. They do our research for us."

Me: "I'm an atheist who doesn't believe in God."

Godwinson: "Not for much longer."

I approach Pravin Lal of the UN Peacekeeping Forces.

Lal: "Welcome! I hope-"

Me: "Go fuck yourself."

I approach Deirdre Skye of Gaia's Stepdaughters.

Skye, speaking with a delectable Scottish accent: "Welcome."

Me: "I'm in! No wait! Gimme your pitch!"

Skye: "We seek to create a peaceful society that never repeats the mistakes that ruined the environment of earth. To this end, we seek to live in harmony with Planet's native life."

Me: "That sounds nice. What's the catch?"

Skye: "The catch is our security forces are the worst. But that won't really matter after we develop the ability to leash local animal life and use it to OBLITERATE THOSE FOOLS WHO'D DARE TO SPOIL THE NATURAL BEAUTY OF THIS PLANET! GO! GO! GO, MY PRETTYS, AND EAT THEIR BRAINS!!!"

Me, taking a few steps back. "You're losing me. Anything else?"

Skye, collecting herself: "Yes, we have orgies in the garden every Sunday."

Me: "Let me get back to you."

I approach Corazon Santiago of the Spartan Federation.

Santiago, speaking in heart-melting Puerto Rican accent: "Guns."

Me: "Hey, I like guns."

Santiago: "Big fucking guns!"

Me: "Hey, I like big fucking guns!"

Santiago: "Big fucking guns for everybody! Also, I'm ridiculously hot. With guns."

Me: "You're going to have to do better than that, though. Deirdre has remote-controlled mind worms and orgies."

Santiago: "We're the most flexiable faction in the game. Anybody unlucky enough to spawn next to us is toast, and we can go toe-to-toe with the Believers without batting an eye. We go free market and are making money even when at war, something no one else can do. And we hit peacetime, we can go full diplomatic/freemarket and bring in more money than anybody else except Morgan. And Dierdre's mind worms? Heh. We've got elite troops with hypnotic trance. Bring it!"

Me: "But orgies."

Santiago: "Look, you perv. Which would you prefer? A bunch of space hippies who can't last more than five minutes because their cardio is weak, or hot guys and gals who're in great shape...and also have guns?

Me: "Where do I sign?"
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... it's so sad that of those options, I'd probably have to go with the Lord's Believers despite also being an atheist. I wouldn't last long anywhere else. The Human Hive would declare me a burden on the populace and euthanise me, the University of Planet would use me as a lab rat, Morgan Industries would throw me out for being exceptionally unproductive, Gaia's Stepdaughters would throw me out for sneezing at too many flowers and the Spartan Federation would use me for target practice, that being the only way I could even remotely be of military use! :tongue: At least most major religions have a long and proud tradition of feeding worthless people a few scraps if they agree to pretend to be pious. And I am not too proud to go "hallelujah!" on command if it means I get fed. :shade:

Mind you, if I were to actually play the game I think I'd go with the brainiacs. If I'm roleplaying anyway, I might as well roleplay as someone whose brain doesn't break when told to calculate limit values. :shade:
 
Baeraad said:
... it's so sad that of those options, I'd probably have to go with the Lord's Believers despite also being an atheist. I wouldn't last long anywhere else. The Human Hive would declare me a burden on the populace and euthanise me, the University of Planet would use me as a lab rat, Morgan Industries would throw me out for being exceptionally unproductive, Gaia's Stepdaughters would throw me out for sneezing at too many flowers and the Spartan Federation would use me for target practice, that being the only way I could even remotely be of military use! :tongue: At least most major religions have a long and proud tradition of feeding worthless people a few scraps if they agree to pretend to be pious. And I am not too proud to go "hallelujah!" on command if it means I get fed. :shade:

Mind you, if I were to actually play the game I think I'd go with the brainiacs. If I'm roleplaying anyway, I might as well roleplay as someone whose brain doesn't break when told to calculate limit values. :shade:
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Lol, I'm pretty much the same way. I wouldn't last five minutes with most of the factions. Even the Spartans, my fav, well, I'm just not gung ho enough to really fit into a paramilitary society ruled by a military dictatorship. I'd probably end of with the Gaians, as my temperament is more suited for their culture.

really, though. It's a dark game. Here's the quote you get when you build the recycling tank building for the first time (a building that grants extra food, energy, and production):

It is every citizen's final duty to go into the tanks and. become one with all the people. —Chairman Sheng-ji Yang, "Ethics for Tomorrow"

They're recycling their own dead into nutrients, soylent green, style. *shivers*
 
So the laptop I've been using to play CK2 is acting up, and I can't get the game to load. It's an older one, so I think I might need to get it checked out (it tends to be slow as is). Thankfully, I had it installed on another one, so I started a new game. For a change of pace, I am playing Ghana all the way down the map. I conquered one kingdom next to me, and suddenly I'm a threat. So all these christians, vikings and muslims are pacting against me. It's kind of funny, because they are so far away. Now I'm waiting for when I can attack another neighbor, and increase my territory. It's an early age, so I'll probably go through a few generations before I even get north or east from where I am now.
 
cross posting this from MeWe:

So as I keep learning how to play CK2, I picked up on things I obviously glossed over when I was reading an online tutorial. Basically how to get my council members to actually do stuff and all. I scrapped all my previous games, and now have 2 running, one each on separate laptops. One is set in Georgia in the Viking era, but the one I'm really digging is the one that got me figuring stuff out. I'm playing Ghana, and I'm having a blast. I became a threat early one after conquering a neighbor, so I kept a low profile, and built up my kingdom.

After 5 years or so, I went after the Muslims to the north, and have won every war, but lost some battles pretty badly. I've since fought Christians, as there is Christian kingdom on the Morocco coast. Those battles have been hard, because their armies have a technological edge over mine, so I had to overwhelm them with numbers. Thankfully when the king calls levies, I get a large stack (right now it's 6 - 7K troops), and most of the vassals I call on for help send troops (I installed some of my younger sons in power along the western edge of the map, so they always join in. We're family after all) I even fought back an invasion from Crete, where some Muslim enclave was pressing a claim on a newly conquered region.

I've integrated some Muslims into my regime, as I would get a lot of prisoners after taking castles and the like during sieges. All my current concubines are Muslim. I've avoided conversion, since I don't have Sword of Islam and don't want the game to end. But I had a lot of children taken captive, and not all of them get ransomed. So I assign them guardians, put them on house arrest, and raise them myself. After a period of time, they end up becoming actual courtiers. Since most of their guardians are members of my family, they seem to end up having 1 useful skill (most of them are pretty good at martial skills, since almost all of my sons are pretty good warriors)

My current Marshal is one, and my former spymaster is also. He caught spying for me in Leon, and I ransomed him when I could. I made him a Baron in the only castle I own (taken from Christians) for his service after my daughter took his place. He got me tech points 3 times in a row before getting caught, so he earned it. That really helped improve my military a little, which has helped close the gap with my Christian enemies

One cheat I used was making my king Immortal. I was enjoying playing this one too much to let him die. Seeing him earn and lose traits, some of which are bad (right now he is a drunkard, gluttonous and lustful. He recently lost Brave, and has suffered injuries in duels for the Children of the Storm society). I always provide support for provinces that suffer famine (which happens every year), because while I rule with an Iron Fist (I imprisoned my daughter in law for plotting to kill me, and refusing to end the plot), I am charitable to my subjects. This is the game that finally got me to actually like CK2. I still think that Medieval Total War has advantages over it (in that game, you can start as a Muslim or Pagan without the need of a DLC), but CK2 does let you play Mongols in one, which MTW does not. So it does have it's own advantages. Of course, Paradox always having a sale means I can get stuff cheap every so often, as long as I control my impulse, and only buy 1 item at a time :tongue:
 
Wanted a fun arcade shooter so I picked up the rogue-like Enter the Gungeon and it is scratching that itch very well even though I suck at it.

 
Okay, I actually got curious enough to buy Alpha Centauri. (you can get it for five bucks, apparently) So far, I'm floundering a bit and trying to figure out what all the bits and pieces of the interface mean. I'm actually considering raising the difficulty, though - given how much I suck, I feel very strongly that I should have gotten destroyed by now, and the fact that I haven't been just makes me feel like the computer is humouring me! :tongue:
 
Yakuza 0. Good story, great voiceacting, arcade style combat and a lot of funny minigames. I love it.
 
So now that I've learned more about the interface of Crusader Kings 2, I decided to go back and give the tutorial game a try. Not sure why, but the AI has been turning things in my favor. I ended up marrying the daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor, and she's given me 5 children so far. In less than 8 years.

The tutorial then tried to get me to plot to kill one of my brothers (who rules the countries next to me), as I'm their current heir. I declined to do so, and my brother still died, and his lands became mine, expanding my kingdom.

Lastly, the Reconquista started (which it didn't in the previous tutorial game I played). Due to this, I've had more luck attacking my Muslim neighbors to the south (as they are fighting the other Spanish kingdoms), and my councilor in charge of fabricating claims has been doing a very good job. I've had some hard fought wars to expand; the last one I barely won as a stack of over 12K Muslim troops hit one of my armies of 4K that was besieging enemy turf, and beat them. They then beat a 6K stack. Thankfully I got more levies to join with the remainders of those armies, along with a mercenary company I was forced to hire to replace the losses, and finally destroyed that army. Since then, they have yet to raise more than 6K troops at a time

I have to say that now that I've figured out some things, I'm enjoying it more. While I miss being able to fight out battles like in Total War, I do like being able to capture people in battle/sieges. I ransom them off when I can, but sometimes they won't ransom a person, and if I conquer their homeland, they end up as my courtier. Once again, I have Muslim councilors who are really good at their jobs. My spymaster is really good, as is my Marshal. From enemies to loyal vassals in the space of a few years. I guess giving them minor baronies in provinces I personally rule helps.

I cut back on playing more than an hour or two every other day though, because if I don't, I find myself having played 6 or more hours on one of my days off lol
 
Last year around August I impulse bought a PS4. It has since become the console where I've bought the most games in the shortest amount of time. Between discs and downloaded games, I think I'm already closing in on 100 if I'm not already there.

And I must sheepishly admit that I barely play anything. :/

Recently I got Ace Combat 7. I liked it a lot but I simply haven't gotten back to it. That's kind of the story with a lot of games I get and like. I buy them, play them, have a fun time, but then just never have the attention span to get back to them.

I have Super Robot Wars T on pre-order. I should have it by the end of the month. I'm really looking forward to it. I loved Super Robot Wars V, and even though I bitched a lot about Super Robot Wars X, I still played that one all the way through twice. So, I'm hoping the streak of my enjoying Super Robot Wars games continues, and I'm planning that Super Robot Wars T will fully occupy me during April.
 
So Dwarf Fortress is coming to Steam...
www.patreon.com

Dwarf Fortress coming to Steam and itch.io, free version always updated and available | Bay 12 Games on Patreon

Official Post from Bay 12 Games: Hey everybody! We mentioned a big announcement on the development log, and here it is: Dwarf Fortress is coming to Steam and itch with a new tile set, and generally enhanced graphics and audio. We'll continue updating and releasing the free ASCII version on...
www.patreon.com www.patreon.com
Looks like it will be available when the big Villain Update is released and stabilized.
I'm glad that they're adding Steam Workshop support, I loved the few mods that the DF community developed over the years, in particular the Warlocks from the old Masterwork Mod.
While I'm happy to see the game get a wider audience, it also saddens me why they're doing it.
 
Picked up the Spider-Man PS4 game. As a huge Spidey fan, I have to say that it captures the Spidey experience so well. The main thing is that it truly understands what makes Spider-Man interesting is the combination of both Spider-Man AND Peter Parker. The way it gives that feeling of jumping back and forth between the disasters that are unfolding while he tries to also do his job, as well as check in on Aunt May, and all of it running together into a glorious catastrophe is just very very Spidey.

Also, it doesn't hurt that the gameplay and pacing are also both amazing.

Seriously, might consider it the best Spider-Man story outside of the comics. I like it more than all the movies.
 
Giganotosaurus said:
So Dwarf Fortress is coming to Steam...
www.patreon.com

Dwarf Fortress coming to Steam and itch.io, free version always updated and available | Bay 12 Games on Patreon

Official Post from Bay 12 Games: Hey everybody! We mentioned a big announcement on the development log, and here it is: Dwarf Fortress is coming to Steam and itch with a new tile set, and generally enhanced graphics and audio. We'll continue updating and releasing the free ASCII version on...
www.patreon.com www.patreon.com
Looks like it will be available when the big Villain Update is released and stabilized.
I'm glad that they're adding Steam Workshop support, I loved the few mods that the DF community developed over the years, in particular the Warlocks from the old Masterwork Mod.
While I'm happy to see the game get a wider audience, it also saddens me why they're doing it.
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Why are they doing it?
 
EmperorNorton said:
Picked up the Spider-Man PS4 game. As a huge Spidey fan, I have to say that it captures the Spidey experience so well. The main thing is that it truly understands what makes Spider-Man interesting is the combination of both Spider-Man AND Peter Parker. The way it gives that feeling of jumping back and forth between the disasters that are unfolding while he tries to also do his job, as well as check in on Aunt May, and all of it running together into a glorious catastrophe is just very very Spidey.

Also, it doesn't hurt that the gameplay and pacing are also both amazing.

Seriously, might consider it the best Spider-Man story outside of the comics. I like it more than all the movies.
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If you like reading comic books, you may want to check out the new PlayStation Spider-Man comic book mini-series, starting next week.
There's also the prequel novel, which is okie.
 
Just finished a lovely point and click "Don't Escape: 4 Days in a Wasteland"

It's set in the 90s after an apocalyptic event where the moon is cracked in half.
 
I am ashamed to say that I pre-ordered Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. Never pre-order a video game through Steam - there's no goddamn reason, they're not going to run out of bits. But I'm such a 'souls fanboy (going back to Demon's), that I felt compelled to do this thing.

Also stupidly, I agreed to meet some friends for drinks on Friday night. It's going to be a long night with multiple Red Bulls.

In other news of upcoming releases: not a video game, but the next Expanse book drops next Tuesday.
 
Edgewise said:
I'm terribly sorry. Terraria is going to swallow you for a while before it spits you out.

I've been playing since the start. Every couple years I go back, because they have updated it substantially and consistently. It's big and deep and so much fun.
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It's amazing. I haven't even scratched the surface, and I'm already pretty blown away. :ooh:

And I've died, like, three times. :skeleton:
 
Edgewise said:
I'm terribly sorry. Terraria is going to swallow you for a while before it spits you out.

I've been playing since the start. Every couple years I go back, because they have updated it substantially and consistently. It's big and deep and so much fun.
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As soon as I saw his post, I remembered that I haven't played it in years and it's got me thinking about going back and seeing what is new. It's also occurred to me that I haven't introduced my nephews to it despite their obsessive love of Minecraft. They've been spending the last month building a base they want me to assault with them defending it.

Anyway, it's my birthday, and I have gotten a lot done lately, so I decided to just goof off all day and finally learn to play Hearts of Iron IV, Paradox's WWII grand strategy game. They have a big sale going now, so I loaded up on DLC. I decided to pick an out-of-the-way country to just goof around with to see how things work.

I'm playing Mexico, and so far its been a game of me seeing just how much I can poke the US without prompting an invasion. I put Leon Trotsky in charge of my army, which satisfyingly managed to make both the US and the USSR equally angry with me. The US is being steadfastly isolationist, which is annoying, as I really want them to get bogged down in a foreign war so I can nationalize all the US and British-owned oil wells in Mexico with a lower chance of getting crushed.

As for The Expanse, I haven't read the books, but I just hit the end of Season Three of TV version this week. I'm tempted to get into the books at this point.
 
Baulderstone said:
As for The Expanse, I haven't read the books, but I just hit the end of Season Three of TV version this week. I'm tempted to get into the books at this point.
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The TV series is roughly on par, in terms of quality, with the books. You can go a lot of places in a book that you can't in a TV show, but I really enjoy the actors on the show, and they have been doing a great job at the general work of adaptation.

I don't know how or even if they are going to find a way to film the current and final trilogy - I won't say why because of spoilers. But up through book six they have plenty of terrific and easily-adaptable material to work with. I really enjoyed seven and I look forward to eight, but they're going to be tricky to film.

That's probably enough book-and-TV talk in the video games thread from me.
 
Baulderstone said:
Anyway, it's my birthday...
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noman said:
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Edgewise said:
How did I miss this? Happy Birthday, dude!
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Thanks, guys. As to how did you miss it, its probably because we have had crap luck getting a gaming session together the last few weeks, depriving of me of the chance to subtly drop the fact that my birthday is coming into casual gaming conversation.
 
Baulderstone said:
Thanks, guys. As to how did you miss it, its probably because we have had crap luck getting a gaming session together the last few weeks, depriving of me of the chance to subtly drop the fact that my birthday is coming into casual gaming conversation.
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I brought you some cake! :cake:

 
Baulderstone said:
finally learn to play Hearts of Iron IV
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Let me know if you have any questions. I'm not sure how it happened but I've got around 1030 hours.
I've been spending way too much time playing around with the Ship Designer. I don't know if I'll ever need a heavy torpedo cruiser, but by god I'll design it!
Haven't played too much with the new fuel system yet but my preliminary take is that it seems to be fine.
Haven't gotten a chance to use the Take over Faction mechanic cause all the factions I've been in required me to have millions of troops I couldn't possibly raise before the end of the war.
Baulderstone said:
Anyway, it's my birthday
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Happy Birthday!
 
Giganotosaurus said:
Let me know if you have any questions. I'm not sure how it happened but I've got around 1030 hours.
I've been spending way too much time playing around with the Ship Designer. I don't know if I'll ever need a heavy torpedo cruiser, but by god I'll design it!
Haven't played too much with the new fuel system yet but my preliminary take is that it seems to be fine.
Haven't gotten a chance to use the Take over Faction mechanic cause all the factions I've been in required me to have millions of troops I couldn't possibly raise before the end of the war.

Happy Birthday!
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Thanks. I've played enough Paradox games that I have the basics down, but I am sure I will have questions as I get into more detail. Mexico slipped into a long and messy civil war after my last post, which gave me a lot of time to get a handle on how combat works. Mexico has a lot of mountains, desert and jungle which makes going on the offensive really rough.

When the dust settled, I ended up with the Soviet Mexican Republic.
7913

Note the very high number of US divisions that have taken up positions along my border. I suspect my game might not go on much longer.

The fuel system seems to work pretty well. It creates some difficult choices, but it isn't overly fiddly.
 
Man, there are so many jokes to make about that US border buildup, but I think that might be getting to political for these forums :B.
 
Hmm, just noticed that Crackdown is free now, downloading it to my Xbox 360 as we speak ... I played the hell out of that a while back, would be fun to take another spin.
 
My copy of Super Robot Wars T is allegedly out for delivery today! I might get to start blasting things with Captain Harlock's Arcadia tonight!
 
Got in some more Hearts of Iron last night. Trotskyite Mexico was not long for the world. in 1938, after six months in power, it prompted a Catholic uprising that I almost avoided. There was a countdown to the uprising, and it would be stopped if I could get Mexico's stability up to 60%. The countdown reached its conclusion with stability at 59%.

Having put down one uprising already, I confidently put my battle plan together to crush the partisans, sending my troops on the offensive. I got a little distracted by real life and when I looked again, my troops were not just failing to move the line forward, they were being being driven back. Looking closer, I realized that while I had been looking away from the screen, the forces of the Third Reich had shown up to help them out.

If I'd been paying attention, I might have had some success switching to a defensive stance and using all my jungles and mountains to my advantage, waiting the the Germans to get bored, wander off, and invade Poland. Instead, I'd been pushing forward into them.

I made a sad last stand outside Tijuana, and that was the game for me.
2019-03-21.png


When you are wiped out, you can go into observer mode to see what happens. You can even pick up another country and play if you want. I was tempted to continue with Axis Mexico, but just decided to speed up time and watch things unfold. This was my first game, I made so many rookie mistakes that I'd rather start fresh.

War broke out in Europe, and Mexico joined the Axis. It began gobbling up British colonies in the Americas and Caribbean, and this militarism in the Americas ended up being the thing that prompted the USA to join the war against the Axis in early 1940. They invaded Mexico, and by this time, Germany was too deep into war in Europe to send much help (and things weren't looking great for the Axis in this timeline), so that was that. Mexico put up a pretty good fight, but having just gone through two civil wars, there simply wasn't much in the way of manpower left. I'd been trying to mitigate that by teaching women to be pilots just before I got knocked out the game, but my plans didn't carry forward into the pro-Axis regime.

Given that the Axis were already stalling in Europe, along with the early American entry, I stopped watching at this point.

All in all, it's a pretty fun game. I'm looking forward to trying it again with a better understanding of how things work. With Paradox Grand Strategy games, my philosophy is always to just start playing and figure it out as you go. Trying to fully understand one before you start means you probably never will.
 
Baulderstone said:
Got in some more Hearts of Iron last night. Trotskyite Mexico was not long for the world. in 1938, after six months in power, it prompted a Catholic uprising that I almost avoided.
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That's some really good emergent storytelling. I'd be sorely tempted if Sekiro didn't just drop last night. I'll file that away.
 
Edgewise said:
That's some really good emergent storytelling. I'd be sorely tempted if Sekiro didn't just drop last night. I'll file that away.
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Yes. It's a good alternate history engine. After I was wiped out, it was fun peeking into the other countries to see what was going on there. Japan had gone pretty quiet after invading Manchuria, making no real movements further into the Pacific and never joining the Axis. When I took at look at Japan, I could see their pending battle plans all pointed into the Soviet Union and vice versa. The Soviet Union, for its part, never took part in the invasion of Poland, and hadn't joined the Allies. I don't know if that would be a separate war or if it would have been

Unlike the other Paradox games, you can set up battle plans ahead of time, drawing your offensive and fallback lines on the map, and painting your spearheads. You then get bonuses for preparation time before actually carrying out the plan. It rewards planning over just pointing and clicking your armies around on the fly. Once I was in observer mode it was a fun looking at all the countries not yet at war to see where their battle plans were pointed at.

It does have a Historical Focus checkbox when you start a game. If you have that checked, countries will tend to follow their historical objectives. Unchecking it allows them to go in all kinds of directions.

As for their being too many games, I understand. As I was downloading HOI4 the other day, I decided to pick up the DLC as Paradox has a big sale this week. I noticed that they just had a major patch for Stellaris that dealt with the growing pains from its economic overhaul. I was really tempted to go back to Stellaris instead, but I've been putting off learning HOI4 for a while. Given that we are less than a month from Rome: Imperator, I needed to catch up.

I've been watching a little of the Rome: Imperator dev clash on Youtube, and it should be reasonably easy to pick up based on playing EU4 and CK2.
 
Baulderstone said:
As for their being too many games, I understand.
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I should hope so, cuz it seems like you really enjoy the most time-consuming games this side of EVE Online and Dwarf Fortress. Don't get me wrong; I'm envious, as I have a hard time committing to anything that requires full brain activation.
 
I gave in and got Seikro, Shadows Die Twice. I found the tutorial level rather annoying but now that I’m in the game proper I’m enjoying how viable stealthing is compared to the Souls games. Also encountered some cool NPCs and hidden areas already. Digging the heavy Japanese/Buddhist folklore setting as well.
 
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