Flip. Boy, this EE business is impressive in its badness.

Bad MB and CPU. Ugh.

For anyone who wants XCOM 2 but hasn't gotten it yet, Humble Bundle has it as part of the January Monthly Bundle so you can get it for $12. I highly recommend it, it improves on the first game in many ways and already has pretty good mods out.

Well, the machine is back up and running, this time at 4.5ghz, so that's a nicer binned CPU than the last one. And a much larger ZFS pool, so that's nice.

BIG NEWS OOTP FANS

OOTP 18 will have Historic Negro League Teams!!!

Full Press Release:

January 20, 2017

Out of the Park Baseball 18 Releases Worldwide on March 24, 2017

Follow-up to Metacritic’s 2016 PC Game of the Year features a new Challenge Mode, Online Profiles and Leaderboards, real 2017 major and minor league rosters, historic Negro League teams, improved 3D mode, new tournaments, and much more

OOTP 18 Available For Pre-Order Now With 20% Discount & Gold Master Access

Out of the Park Developments, an official licensee of MLB.com, the MLBPA, and MiLB.com, today announced that Out of the Park Baseball 18 will be released on March 24, 2017. The follow-up to the acclaimed Metacritic 2016 PC Game of the Year includes several exciting new features and a treasure trove of deep improvements to its award-winning gameplay.

For the first time, Out of the Park Baseball 18 introduces an all-new Challenge Mode. This will allow series newcomers to enjoy a powerful way to learn the intricacies of this deep strategy title, while driving community engagement for all users via the creation of online profiles to share accomplishments on new leaderboards. The Challenge Mode is just the beginning of an all-new, long-term expansion of OOTP’s online platform -- more will be unveiled during the course of the 2017 baseball season.

Out of the Park Baseball 18 will also include:

2017 roster sets with all Opening Day MLB rosters, as well as the complete minor league system from Triple-A to rookie leagues as well as the Arizona Fall League. All major league (and over a thousand minor league) player ratings will be based on the popular ZiPS player projection system. The 8 international leagues, as well as independent minor leagues in the US, also return this year with accurate rosters.
Historical Negro League clubs, thanks to a partnership with OOTP’s acclaimed historical database experts and Seamheads.com. This feature will allow baseball fans to explore the league’s rich history, create compelling what-if scenarios, pit major league clubs against their Negro League counterparts, and much more.
Improvements to 3D mode, including: Even more ballpark detail; better on-field player models and enhanced on-field decisions; and the ability to save all 3D highlights and watch a highlight reel, whether the game was played out or simulated.
Custom and real world tournaments for all the teams included in the game. National and international tournaments are a breeze to create, as is the ability to import historical teams.
Extensive AI improvements, including roster management, trades, and in-game decision-making.
A redesigned injury system that features detailed injury histories for all players, little nagging and long-term injuries, and more.
Many more improvements, including:
A beautiful new interface
Improved game recaps
An upgraded player morale/team chemistry system
Enhanced play-by-play text and league news
A sophisticated system for team relegation and promotion between leagues
The ability to retain player salaries in trades
The incorporation of many 2017 rule changes
Faster import speeds of historical minor league seasons
And more to be announced prior to release

Through January 27, customers may pre-order OOTP 18 for $31.99, a 20% discount off its full retail price. From January 28 to March 23, customers may pre-order OOTP 18 for $34.99, a 10% discount off its full retail price. All pre-order purchases include access to the Gold Master version on March 20, four days ahead of the official launch on March 24.

OOTP 18 can be pre-ordered through this link:

http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/out-of-the-park-baseball-18.php

OOTP 18 runs on PC/Mac/Linux and, like last year, it features the American League and National League logos, the World Series trophy, official logos and jerseys for all 30 MLB teams, over 150 Minor League Baseball league and team logos, and historical MLB logos.

“Our recent success has been an overwhelmingly positive experience,” said lead developer, lifelong baseball fan, and Out of the Park Developments CEO Markus Heinsohn. “As always, our passionate community has driven us to continue improving every aspect of our game. We’re confident they will love this year’s title. The huge infusion of new fans last year has also fueled us to think bigger for the future, and we’re incredibly excited about what we’re building to dramatically expand our community and delight a new generation of Out of the Park Baseball players.”

“Out of the Park Baseball is the gold standard of sports strategy games, and last season’s awards proved that yet again,” said Out of the Park Developments CMO Richard Grisham. “That has inspired the team even more to expand the reach and relevance of this great game to put it in the hands of every kind of baseball fan. With so many modes to play, Out of the Park Baseball 18 can be enjoyed by everyone in their own way.”

For anyone who wants XCOM 2 but hasn't gotten it yet, Humble Bundle has it as part of the January Monthly Bundle so you can get it for $12. I highly recommend it, it improves on the first game in many ways and already has pretty good mods out.

Nice! I've been waiting for it to come down a bit from EIGHTY FREAKIN' DOLLARS.

Follow-up to Metacritic’s 2016 PC Game of the Year features a new Challenge Mode, Online Profiles and Leaderboards, real 2017 major and minor league rosters, historic Negro League teams, improved 3D mode, new tournaments, and much more

17 was the first time I found the 3D mode playable. Now I find it's my go-to play mode. My dream is for maybe some Baseball Stars level of graphics with visibly distinguishable players.

A sophisticated system for team relegation and promotion between leagues

This sounds intriguing.

If OOTP forces me online to play it, that'll be the end of me and OOTP.

Challenge Mode? Seriously? Are OOTP players clamoring for ~leaderboards~?

A lot of the other stuff advertised seems very very cool though. I'm particularly interested in the new injury mechanics.

Sunless Sea free to play this weekend through steam, and is on sale for $6.45

My game at the moment (received through the February Humble Bundle) is SteamWorld Heist. It's like Worms, but with character progression...and sassy robots.

I know I'm a sucker, but I'm super hyped for the switch

Why couldn't my motherboard have waited to go tits-up until after the AMD 8C/12T parts were available? Sigh.

I think Sunless Sea was pretty awesome and unique, although hard to finish. Sequel on Kickstarter

Holy #### this game Blackwake on Steam early access is the most fun online team experience I've had since I put 100 hours into Rocket League. The game is early access in name only really, there's hardly any bugs and the gameplay is rock solid. You're basically tasked with picking one of three ships (two sloops and one galleon) and then a side (pirate or British) and then you can nominate yourself for captain if you think you're up for it.

If you're not captain you can be a gunner, general maintenance and supply guy, or just sit around with a cup of tea yelling "ahoy matey!" It's awesome. The graphics are really immersive, especially on a nice big monitor at 1440p. My i3 6100 and GTX 1060 can run it at high/medium around at 1440p around 40-60 FPS, never dips below 40, which is great.

If you get a good captain and the game clicks for your side and boat it's a real feeling of team work and accomplishment. If your captain sucks it's still a lot of fun and you can vote to mutiny and select another one. The community, for the most part, is troll free and wants to communicate and be a team. I was nominated for captain one time out of sheer desperation by our side and I did OK, that was after about 10 hours, so there is a decent learning curve, but it's easy to just hop in and be a crew member.

An appeal to the hardware experts of OTG: I am in semi-urgent need of a new system and intend to build one, and could use your help optimizing my build! I can spend up to $600, but my wife would be much happier if it were a lot closer to $500.

* I do need a case; I like them big and simple. Bigger the better; I have plenty of room and would rather it be as easy as possible to get in and out of for upgrading.
* I don't play the most modern games, so I will be content with merely decent graphics. I'd rather sacrifice graphics for price's sake than CPU.
* I intend to install Windows 7 on it, so would need a compatible chipset and don't need to buy a separate OS.
* I don't need much primary storage. Currently I have a 128GB SSD, which is not enough, but 256GB will be plenty. I have a big HDD to store the music and the wife's millions of baby pictures and so forth.
* Don't need any monitor/keyboard/mouse/speakers.

Any build recommendations?

For a full tower I recommend this, like all full ATX towers it's pricey, but it's well made and roomy.

As for hardware, AMD's Ryzen is out and if you're mostly doing CPU intensive stuff (video editing, encoding, audio production, heavy multi tasking) rather than gaming you might look into it but personally I still prefer Intel. The i5 6600K is a beast and you can easily overclock it to 4.0ghz on the stock cooler.

All chipsets are Windows 7 compatible, don't have to worry about that.

The best budget video card is probably the RX 480 4GB version, it's going for $199 or less on Amazon now. The GTX 1050TI is a good bet at the $139 price point but with DX 12 in the pipeline the AMD card will "future proof" better as it's got some fancy architecture that will be unleashed in the next wave of games, probably in 2018 out.


For an SSD just get the Samsung Evo 240GB, the non "pro" version is fine.

RAM is RAM, get 16GB, it's cheap and then you give one thousand Chrome tabs open a long with half your steam library.

Hopefully that helps a bit. Reddit's PC forums are also good starting points, they have some custom builds usually that are changed each month -- best value all that.

What version of Windows 7 are you planning on installing? Because Starter and Basic have a max of 8gb RAM. Windows Home Premium is 16gb, Pro is 192gb.

I'm assuming you're installing a 64 bit of Windows 7. If you're installing 32 bit, then RAM is capped at 4gb regardless of version.

No, it will be 64 bit and I expect 16GB of RAM will be fine for my needs for at least a few more years.

Honestly, if the value's way better I'd consider a 4GB video card (it'll have more staying power, at least) but even 2GB is probably overkill for everything I'd ask my video card to do right now. Plus, I'd rather keep the power draw down to where I don't have to spend $150 on the PSU.

The best budget video card is probably the RX 480 4GB version, it's going for $199 or less on Amazon now. The GTX 1050TI is a good bet at the $139 price point but with DX 12 in the pipeline the AMD card will "future proof" better as it's got some fancy architecture that will be unleashed in the next wave of games, probably in 2018 out.

I got the 8GB RX 480 in January for £153. They usually go for around £220 here, and that bargain was just way too good to pass up. Have been very very pleased with it so far. Can definitely get by with the 4GB version if there is a big price gap though.

After spending a few hours shopping around, it's quickly become apparent that a respectable PC can't be built at my price point anymore. A predictable effect of polarization of the computing market, I suppose: what used to be the low-end-to-middle PC market has almost entirely migrated to tablets and most people who buy PCs nowadays are high-end gamers or graphics editors who pay top dollar.

It's been a good five years since I last went PC shopping. I'm surprised how far upstream the market has moved.

If you can hold off on the video card, you should be able to get the rest for around $500. This is not a real recommendation, I just did it in 2 minutes, but it's about the price you can pay for each component.

It's amazing how cheap SSDs have gotten.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-7500 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor ($192.33 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: ASRock B250M-HDV Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($66.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Crucial 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2133 Memory ($55.39 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Samsung 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($79.99 @ B&H)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 1050 2GB Video Card ($104.98 @ Newegg)
Case: BitFenix Comrade ATX Mid Tower Case ($27.99 @ NCIX US)
Power Supply: Corsair CXM 450W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($32.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $560.65
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2017-03-09 03:11 EST-0500

- Might as well get the Kaby Lake since you're not paying a premium.
- That's one of the newer Corsair CXM line, not the old one. Fairly big difference, the straight CXs you see tend to use lower quality capacitors (CapXon and worse, Jun'Fu) while the newer model (black and white logo instead of neon green and white) mixes CapXons with some Japanese capacitors. Also, the new CXM series ditches the group-regulated design, going with the superior, modern DC-DC converter to generate the minor rails. The latter greatly improves the voltage regulation, simply because a group-regulated design can have serious crossload issues.
- Fit in a GPU, I could get a 1050ti in there by pushing to $600, but you did seem uneasy about that.

On a side note, there's now really *no* single-GPU solution where you actually need a $150 PSU. GPUs use less power than ever; my GTX 1070 with a factory overclock, doesn't hit 165W, about 100W under my old 7970 which got half the performance.

Glorious day!! Got my OOTP 18 beta today, if anyone is interested in getting a sneak peek of it this weekend, I'll be streaming it on twitch.

On a side note, there's now really *no* single-GPU solution where you actually need a $150 PSU. GPUs use less power than ever; my GTX 1070 with a factory overclock, doesn't hit 165W, about 100W under my old 7970 which got half the performance.

what a time to be alive.

if anyone is interested in getting a sneak peek of it this weekend, I'll be streaming it on twitch.

What is your twitch ID?

Good Old games sale going on. Witcher 3 for $30 with all updates. Debating budget versus all my free time for the next 6 weeks.

Witcher 3 is a terrific game.

626 - Gamerguyinasuit and also thehiddenlevels

Holy #### this game Blackwake on Steam early access is the most fun online team experience I've had since I put 100 hours into Rocket League. The game is early access in name only really, there's hardly any bugs and the gameplay is rock solid. You're basically tasked with picking one of three ships (two sloops and one galleon) and then a side (pirate or British) and then you can nominate yourself for captain if you think you're up for it.

It does look pretty fun. I think I saw a similar game a few years ago using this team principle for zeppelin-based combat.

What's the online community like? You have trouble scouting up enough players for a team game?

Poked around for an hour or so in the new OOTP beta last night on twitch. Pretty cool that they managed to incorporate the Negro Leagues now. As for Blackwake, I'll be giving that one a shot tomorrow night.

Good Old games sale going on. Witcher 3 for $30 with all updates. Debating budget versus all my free time for the next 6 weeks.

Witcher 3 is easily the best open world RPG I've ever played, quite possibly the best RPG period. When I finished it, I just sort of stopped playing games for a few weeks. Other games seemed lame and lifeless in comparison. It's worth paying the full price, but if you can get it on sale it's a no brainer.

What's the online community like? You have trouble scouting up enough players for a team game?

The community is amazing. There are less trolls and goofs in this game than most. I've rarely felt such comradeship with strangers online. I love being a captain but I also enjoy being a crew member.

Servers are plenty full for US based players. At any given time there's about 2K players online. Personally I think this game is so good that I wouldn't be suprised to see it grow to 10K by the end of summer.

The dev team is adding more and more content, it's a bit barebones at the moment but I find myself logging on for 2-4 hours almost every night after work. If you get a good crew together it's so much fun. You can usually find me on US West 1 or 2. Same name as here. I'm like 4th on that server in wins at the moment as captain. Was higher but can't play as much as the no lifers.

Any thoughts on the Scorpio specs?

That article sums up my thoughts well.

Pretty great actually...though sadly living the nomadic life of academia means I am separated from it for long stretches of time (such as now).

I was thinking of building a "Steam Machine" pocket sized one to help with that. I actually know where I'm working next Fall (which usually doesn't happen until about mid-summer), so I'm gearing up to spend some money stupidly in the coming months! My investigation led me to believe I could put together a decent one for $500 or less. But some key games are not part of the SteamOS band wagon...so maybe I'd end up splurging for Windows.

Technically, if you can live without changing the wallpaper and the occasional nag, you don't *have to* use a registered Windows. There's Linux, too.

But I'm glad the rig's been treating you well. Given that I try and convince people to build their own -- both to get a higher quality build for the money and the positives at learning the innards of a PC -- I want the experiences to be good!

Spec wars never seem all that effective on consoles. Possibly because consoles don't tend to be *that* impressively specced out.

Though we got some great commercials out of it over the years. GENESIS DOES! NINTENDON'T!

Not sure if any of you were waiting on Civ VI at all, or turned off by it initially, but with the latest patch the difficulty level has finally gone up. I had been having a relatively easy time on Deity (the hardest setting), but not so much any more. There's always the one or two must have techs or units, but there's been a good job balancing the game out to really make you decide what you want to build or what path you want to go.

I won't touch it until all the DLC is out and they've started on Civ 7, but I'd heard there was a longstanding bug that made the AI essentially unable to take any city that has walls.

Still need to write out all of my thoughts about how Civ I was mechanically the best game in the series, one of these days...

I won't touch it until all the DLC is out and they've started on Civ 7, but I'd heard there was a longstanding bug that made the AI essentially unable to take any city that has walls.

Still need to write out all of my thoughts about how Civ I was mechanically the best game in the series, one of these days...

Yeah, the DLC thing is a money sink if you buy them every time, I've got the base game, going to wait until they are bundled and on sale before adding any expansions. Wasn't necessarily a bug, just an extreme unwillingness to attack cities if the odds were against them (which they almost always are, until that final hit). The biggest change now is that it's much harder to attack other Civ's early in the game. Pre-patch the strategy was to steam roll at least one adjacent civ, if not two early game and then do whatever for victory. Post-patch, without those extra cities and eliminated or at least severly gimped neighbor civs, its very hard to play catch up. Means you've got to be very strategic with war timing, as your neighbors inevitably have a tech (and unit) advantage.

So I picked up a quirky little digital boardgame a couple of weeks ago when it went on sale for 50% off. I'm not really in to boardgames but Gremlins Inc. is pretty fun with an appealing art style and accessible gameplay mechanics. I wish it was a little more accessible to being played on the couch with a controller, but it's a perfect game for short save-abe sessions against the AI. I'm not ready for playing against other people yet, I'd presumably get slaughtered.

Soundtrack is fantastic too, if you can get this on sale for $7.50 give it a whirl.

Paradox Weekend on Steam. About time to dive back into Stellaris. I so enjoy being a space racist. The Chosen of Wacego-Iftar will purify the galaxy!

Mass Effect Andromeda is better than I expected after some of the early complaints, it reminds me a lot of the first game. There's certainly plenty of the open world bloat in regards to the tasks, but the actual missions are by and large a lot of fun. My Ryder is basically an oversexed grad student, she doesn't know she shouldn't hit on all of her co-workers.

It's funny how beneficial genocide is in Stellaris. I random my civs, but the games where I can commit special cleansing are just smoother.

Mass Effect Andromeda is better than I expected after some of the early complaints, it reminds me a lot of the first game. There's certainly plenty of the open world bloat in regards to the tasks, but the actual missions are by and large a lot of fun. My Ryder is basically an oversexed grad student, she doesn't know she shouldn't hit on all of her co-workers.

Was that wrong? Should I not have done that? I tell you, I gotta plead ignorance on this thing, because if anyone had said anything to me at all when I first started here that that sort of thing is frowned upon... you know, cause I've worked in a lot of galactic colonization initiatives, and I tell you, people do that all the time.

I'll probably pick Andromeda up in a week or so. I'm sure the hackneyed writing will irritate me, but I keep hearing the combat is really good. Plus traveling the stars, teaching alien women how to love.

In the meantime, I grabbed Grim Dawn on a Steam sale a few weeks ago and am impressed with it. Top notch action RPG, better than Diablo III, and at least as good as Torchlight II or Paths of Exile. So if you like clicking on things and picking up loot it's worth a shot.

Hey I actually finished a game. Torment: Tides of Numenera. Aka, the fanciest choose your own adventure book ever kickstarted. I went full on brains and basically talked everyone to death. Which is good because the combat is t-e-d-i-o-u-s. However skill tests to escape combat lose a bit of luster when they are always 90+%. I guess generally, so is combat in most RPGs, it just takes longer.

It's funny how beneficial genocide is in Stellaris. I random my civs, but the games where I can commit special cleansing are just smoother.

I wonder if an interesting twist on this genre could be made called "Fermi's Paradox" (alternate title: "The Great Filter") What if you took out FTL travel, and made the time scale gigantic?

I wonder if an interesting twist on this genre could be made called "Fermi's Paradox" (alternate title: "The Great Filter") What if you took out FTL travel, and made the time scale gigantic?

This sounds like it could make a fantastic mod. You'd need to really improve the amount of stuff that can be done in system, and significantly expand the tech tree, but the intergenerational interstellar travel is already easy to set up by changing how fast warp speed is.

Couple weeks with my Asus Strix OC 8GB RX 480 now and I have to say it's probably the best mid-range card I've owned since the Nvidia 8800 GT back in 2007. The RX 480 came with a 10% or so factory overclock and I pushed it another 5% or so using Afterburner. Haven't met a game it won't handle yet, even in 1440p. It's a nice card and haven't had any crashes yet due to driver problems, even on early access games.

Came down to that or the 1060 and at the price I got the 480 at ($219) I'm happy with my choice. Card shot back up to $239 on Amazon the day after I bought it.

I finally finished my "new" build that I started about 2 years ago. Moved on from a i5 2500k R9 380 4gb system. Just picked up the i5 6600K (upgrade from i3 6100), quickly OC'ed it to 4.2ghz, and everything is now awesome. Runs all my games no probem. Could have gotten the i5 7600k but I saved $50 picking up the 6600k on Amazon warehouse. Only like a 2% difference IPC anyways.

Corsair Carbide SPEC-01
EVGA 450B1 500 watt
GIGABYTE GA-Z170X-Gaming 3
i5 6600k @ 4.2ghz
Samsung Evo 850 M.2 SSD 250gb
1TB WD Blue 7200 RPM
Corsair Corsair Vengeance 16GB DDR4 DRAM 3000MHz
Asus STRIX OC 8GB RX480

No fancy cooling or anything just running some nice arctic silver paste with the stock cooler on the cpu and the intake and outflow fans stock on the case. I dunno, I own a computer store, I do it for the customers if they want but I just usually think it's superfluous, especially in the PNW where ambient are temp is rarely over 80.

Admittedly I'm a bit miffed that Ryzen is so damn good. Maybe my next build will be AMD, that would be the first ever.

I was planning to upgrade to an i5-7500 in the next few weeks, but would I be better off with a Ryzen 5-1500x? I've always used AMD Processors, but sort of soured on the company because the last AMD video card I had was really bad.

Intel vs. Ryzen, all else being equal, tends to come down to use. The Ryzens are terrific values at workstation applications, but the Intels with the superior ipc still maintain a slight edge in gaming, pound-for-pound. Mostly a gaming rig? Intel. A lot of content creation or other types of applications that are highly threaded? Then you see the case for the Ryzens.

First AMD CPUs worth picking up for a mainstream, desktop rig since the Phenom II x4s or so.

Does anyone here play Hearts of Iron IV? I played it a bunch over the summer, but haven't touched it since early September. Looks like two major patches have come since then. Has the AI improved?

Also, any "must have" mods that have been released in the past 6 months or so? I took a look at most subscribed ones on Steam yesterday and didn't recognize a good number of them.

You around Fancy Pants? With expansion coming, I'm back in FFXIV again.

Cool things going on in gaming lately:

Civ V lead designer has been hired by Paradox.

Also, if you have not seen Dead Cells yet, I HIGHLY recommend it. Not even my type of game and I've been absolutely hooked.

If you enjoy the concept of Blackwake and don't wanna mess around with multiplayer, Corsair: Man O War from the Warhammer series is also out and quite fun. Open world adventures on the open seas? Count me in. Naval battles and melee combat included!

Renowned Explorers is an awesome gem hiding away on Steam and released a fabulous expansion pack: The Emperors Challenge. Another solid addition to an already fantastic game.

Immortal Redneck is another gem tucked away on steam that is an absolute blast to play, especially on Twitch as it has chat integration that allows the chat to determine your fate.

Civ V lead designer has been hired by Paradox.

Have there been any whispers about where Paradox is going next for its historical games? CK II and EU IV are still being improved (which is kind of crazy when you think about it), and the new Hearts of Iron is still less than a year old I think.

But returning to Vicky would be nice too!

DJS - I'm not Fancy Pants, but I'm on Malboro, if you are still in FFXIV.

Fancy turned back up! Getting ready for expansion. We need Fancy, he's our best tank!

We're on Midgardsormr.

Well blackwake is dead for the moment (only 100-250 players now at any given time and the one remaining US server banned me for being too good mostly) so I saw Crusader Kings 2 on sale and picked it up a long with a couple of the DLCs. It was only a $20 investment even with the DLC, everything is basically half of 2/3 off on Steam this week.

I can't tell if I will be really able to get into the self driven narratives that drive the game mostly, but I'm going to give it a shot. There is something sort of appealing about trying for ahistorical outcomes and I can create my own Duke, which seems like something I'd try.

If nothing else I might learn a bit about history and some vocab. One of the first results for "Crusader Kings 2 guide" is a vocab lesson on all the feudal terms and governance lingo. ha.

Renowned Explorers is an awesome gem hiding away on Steam and released a fabulous expansion pack: The Emperors Challenge. Another solid addition to an already fantastic game.

It's a fun game with bright colorful visuals and an easily-accessible rock-paper-scissors mechanic helpfully illustrated by icons of actual rocks, papers, and scissors. I wish it had controller support because I'd much rather play it on my couch than at my desk, but it was well worth whatever I spent to get it on early access.

If nothing else I might learn a bit about history and some vocab. One of the first results for "Crusader Kings 2 guide" is a vocab lesson on all the feudal terms and governance lingo. ha.

Be careful...the Paradox games are a rabbit hole which has swallowed many men. I do think they are great educational tools for history. Not just for the attention to detail you mention, but there are some underlying historiographical assumptions that underpin their games that are worth exploring.

My favourite run involved the creation of a great Welsh kingdom which had its tendrils in Ireland, Scotland, and Brittany.

Renowned Explorers is an awesome gem hiding away on Steam

WTH this game is hard! Reminds me of FTL.

I've recently got into The Curious Expedition, which is an entirely different, but similarly themed game.

Ck2 is amazing, I'm playing as a pagan for the first time starting in 786 and aiming to take t over Prague as the Lobkowicz family. Several family members sacrificed to Chernobog later, and I was able to snipe it while the Premyslids were busy getting decked by the Avars.

I like having a game I can play for 10 minutes in the am to wake up, and right now that have is Thumper. It's excellent, and very tense.

Also, Endless Space 2 is out in full, and my empire of clones are expanding mercilessly. All shall be harvested for their best traits as we make everything beautiful and in our image. It's very much like Endless Legend in all the right ways.

Steam Summer Sale is on! The thing I'd recommend off the top of my head is Total War: Warhammer. 66% off, so $20 bucks. Darkest Dungeon, a pretty, grim, and pretty grim roguelike which at times was my favorite game last year, is 50% off.

OOTP is 50% at $19.99 on Steam too.

Darkest Dungeon, a pretty, grim, and pretty grim roguelike which at times was my favorite game last year, is 50% off.

I bought that in early access in 2015 and played the hell out of it. Still haven't finished the last map in the last dungeon dammit. And now they just released their first DLC, "The Crimson Court", for $10 which I of course scooped up during my Steam Summer Sale binge over the weekend.

Also acquired:

"The GTA Trilogy" - GTA3, GTA Vice City, and GTA San Andreas. For $9 this will be good stupid fun to play on the couch this summer.

Dishonored - Great stealth game, a true spiritual successor to the Thief games. For $2.50 you seriously cannot go wrong here.

Grim Dawn - TGF pimped this game here previously and I had it on my wishlist for a long while. Action RPG like Diablo 3/TitanQuest/Torchlight, reviews have been glowing. $12.50

Far Cry 3/Bioshock Infinite - Two former AAA titles for $7 each. And hey, now there's no doubt I'll be able to get the 60+FPS experience with all the bells and whistles cranked up!

Salt and Sanctuary - Looks cool. Supposed to be like a 2D Dark Souls game, I never played that series but it does look cool! $10, sure, I'll roll the dice.

Overcooked - Multiplayer cooking game that allows couch-side co-op. Bought this to play with my daughter, looks like fun for $8.50

I have Darkest Dungeon and the random number generator can be just BRUTAL at times to a party. I had a near party wipe because the opposition hit TWO crits in a row on my healer. I haven't gone back to it in a while, but it sits near the top of my list.

I got Shadow of Modor as a gift, and it's going for around $6 right now. I look forward to that one.

My friend got me "Subsistence", which is (yet another) survival/crafting game. Except, this is single player, and NPC opponents will also start crafting and building stuff after a few days. I'm not a fan of these games, but my friend keeps buying them for me as gifts so I keep trying them. At least in the multiplayer games I hang out with him so there is a social aspect to it. In this game, I was dead twice in less than 15 minutes (wolf out of nowhere, and then I ran into a bear trying to avoid a wolf), and then spent 35 minutes trying to collect enough stuff to build a fire before night came. I built the campfire, but I couldn't light it in time and died from the cold.

I have Darkest Dungeon and the random number generator can be just BRUTAL at times to a party. I had a near party wipe because the opposition hit TWO crits in a row on my healer. I haven't gone back to it in a while, but it sits near the top of my list.

Good game, and while the RNG can at times be annoying, you can mitigate that through proper party construction/gearing. The worst problem with that game is how grindy it is. You need to level up multiple teams of heroes, outfit them, train them, and pimp them out in good gear. But in order to do THAT, you need to level up the Hamlet. Factor in the 5 (or 6, I can't even remember) types of currency you'll need to farm to do those aforementioned tasks, and it becomes a daunting grind. I still liked it and would recommend picking it up on sale, but just be prepared for the long haul.

Grim Dawn - TGF pimped this game here previously and I had it on my wishlist for a long while. Action RPG like Diablo 3/TitanQuest/Torchlight, reviews have been glowing. $12.50

Well worth $12.50 just for a single playthrough. I strongly recommend getting the Crucible DLC if you have an interest in expanding beyond a single, normal difficulty, playthrough, simply because it's the best source of loot available, and is super useful for outfitting alts or farming for rare items. Grim Dawn is the successor to Diablo 2 that we all didn't know we needed.

I grabbed Star Crawlers ($15ish? Already forgot, but it's on sale now) and have been pleased so far. A turn based, cyberpunk-themed dungeon crawler, with grid movement like the olde schoole Wizardry games. Indy game. Fairly lighthearted with some nice humor, but serious enough to not feel overly silly or jokey.

Good game, and while the RNG can at times be annoying, you can mitigate that through proper party construction/gearing. The worst problem with that game is how grindy it is. You need to level up multiple teams of heroes, outfit them, train them, and pimp them out in good gear. But in order to do THAT, you need to level up the Hamlet. Factor in the 5 (or 6, I can't even remember) types of currency you'll need to farm to do those aforementioned tasks, and it becomes a daunting grind. I still liked it and would recommend picking it up on sale, but just be prepared for the long haul.

The developers rolled out an alternative mode ("Stygian Mode" I think) that reduces the grinding and increases town events to give you a bit of a leg up. Also don't forget the Steam Workshop now hosts all manner of mods for the game to take some of the grind out of it, like better-stacking items so you can carry more loot and supplies.

I bought Victoria 2 with all the DLC for $11. What a deal. Makes me regret spending $40 on Stellaris and $35 on CK2 as neither of those games clicked for me like Victoria II. CK2 I found just not that interesting as it's mostly a personal relation simulator and requires constant drill downs into hard to read menus. Stellaris is a good game, especially with all the patches, but for whatever reason once I got 30 or so hours in I had no desire to play anymore.

I no-lifed a couple playthroughs as Brazil this past weekend and had a lot of fun. My current goal is to see if I can somehow expand my navy enough before 1870 or so to try and grab some of Africa. I did a playthrough until 1905 and finished #12th in the great power rankings which I felt was pretty good but according to the interwebs more is possible with Brazil.

Overcooked - Multiplayer cooking game that allows couch-side co-op. Bought this to play with my daughter, looks like fun for $8.50

So I finally got around to playing this with Lil' Kneesocks yesterday once we got back from our family vacation and it was a hoot as expected. It's a silly little cooperative time management game, I'm sure there's a more specific genre it could be lumped under, but it's fun and easily-accessible. Still only $8.50, good clean fun and my wife has never seen us so eager to wash a dish.

Dead Cells

Recommended by our own GGIAS (Poster Nutbag) while watching him play it on his Twitch stream, I am hooked on the game. It's a Rogue-like platformer with permadeath and upgradeable weapons/skills, it's just challenging enough to make me come back for more, but not so that I give up in frustration.

If you've played Rogue Legacy (or Spelunky), you'll know what you're getting into.

It's in early access, so it's constantly growing/changing.

Damn you, GGIAS! It's taken up all my free gaming time!
(And I'll keep reminding you in Twitch each week I see you online!)

Haha! I'm so glad you enjoy it! Dead Cells is really just an incredible game, and the third major update is JUST around the corner. It's so amazing when you consider that this isn't even the full game yet. It is easily one of the best Early Access games I have ever been lucky enough to get in on.

The site I got my new job through (Indeed Prime), in a classic "rich get richer" move, rewarded me with a free PS4. What games should I get? Obvs The Last Guardian and the Okami remake. I'll get the cross-platform multiplayer (Destiny 2, et al) here, instead of on the PC. Something like Shadow Of War I'd prefer to play in 1440p on the big computer. So what else is there? Any interesting indies on the Sony store?

I was enjoying Horizon Zero Dawn when I was abusing my brother-in-law's PS4 while I was dogsitting for their holiday this summer. Because it's a ps4 exclusive, and I don't have one for myself, so wanted to play something I wouldn't have a chance to otherwise. If you are looking forward to Shadow of War / liked Shadow of Mordor, you will probably enjoy it. Gameplay is pretty similar. World building is great, and the visual aesthetic is pretty breathtaking.

(minor spoilers:) Though I am surprised Disney didn't sue them, over the feisty, bratty redhead archery girl, who becomes a Brave...

Civ V lead designer has been hired by Paradox.

This does not constitute good news to me....

FWIW, I have spent a lot of time on Civ6 -- and while I still think it fails to rise to the level of Civ4 (albeit, full expansion/BTS civ4), I've finally warmed to the continuing series.

I still think it's fatal flaw is that it loses the genius of the pre-5 Civilization: The idea of the 'meandering' game where the goal is not so much to 'win' as it is to 'build a civilization' which contains various avenues to 'win' as a bit of an afterthought has been lost in favor of picking a victory condition and beelining/directing your energies towards that victory condition. The STILL lack of an in-game map editor -- and the very late addition of a simple 'regenerate map' button (yes, mods added this earlier) are very much evidence that this style of gameplay was just never on the developer radar. The game remains tailored towards people who want a ~5 hour single session game and a victory screen to the detriment of people who play meandering 50+ hour multi-session games spread out over months where you might never expect to actually 'win'.

However, I'm quite pleased with the menu of various mods available in the workshop -- and if you implement enough of them in the right combination, you can still get to a place where you can squint and see the "old" game.

I've lost track of what improvements have come via patching versus mods I'm running - but I do think the AI is markedly better as of now than it was at release. Any decent player should still be able to run rings around the AI in war, but find me a game where this isn't the case.... and as a turtler/meanderer who doesn't immediately set out to do the modern equivalent of horse archer rushes to conquer the world before gunpowder, an AI that I can just beat back when it goes Hitler insane (which it DOES still do) is enough for me. I've not really had a problem with the AI taking walled cities -- and it can be quite challenging in its initial attack (its problem is that if you beat back the initial attack, it virtually collapses. Units being such a premium, once you kill enough - while prioritizing not losing your own except in extreme need circumstances - the AI seems incapable of recognizing that it needs to switch production and do it fast).

In short, I felt like I got cheated paying for 5... but I've gotten my money's worth out of 6.

I find the Civ games are funner when you can play them as role play. In other words "what would this particular civilization, with its past experiences, do in this situation?" rather than "what is the most efficient path to a victory condition?"

The fact that there is an end-point is the great tragedy of the game.

Also, article on the historiographical arguments of CIV 5/EU 4 has one last editorial hurdle to leap over...so I'm this close to being a published author on the topic, and therefore having a demonstrably superior opinion to all of you on those games!

I'm looking forward to the release of "Heat Signature" on September 21st.
It's got randomly developed maps, the ability to create your own solutions to problems (like blowing out the wall of a room to suck everyone else into space), and a great sense of humour.
I've had my eye on this one and was waiting for it to be released. I think it's going to be my next obsession (while waiting for "Dead Cells" to get out of Early Access).

The developer (Tom Francis, former PC Gamer magazine writer) is the one that created "Gunpoint", which was a fantastically written indie game.

West of Loathing is outstanding and a steal at its retail price of $11.

Okay, after a couple of hours of Heat Signature, I'm kinda hooked on it.
It starts off slowly because you don't realize the mayhem that can happen until it happens.
I was pretty boring in my stealthy attempts at assassination/kidnapping/theft, until I got a device that you place as a trap on the floor. If someone (other than you) walks over it, it teleports them to a nearby location (not a solid object) of your pre-determined choosing, including the cold, dark, airless environs of space.
Planting that in a hallway and then deliberately making noise to draw guards into the trap is fun.

Thankfully, the game opens up into a lot more depth after just a few runs (and deaths, as it takes time to figure out the game) to allow for more/varied missions.

This game, plus Middle-Earth : Shadows of Mordor<b>, and <b>Dead Cells are the games I'm currently bouncing around between in my spare time.

(Overwatch has now fallen to the wayside after some really unpleasant competitive matches last month. I don't need the hassle, and maybe I'll go back to it again. I got more than enough hours out of it to make it a great purchase, but 15 months later it shouldn't be surprising if it doesn't hold my interest any more.)

I went ahead and purchased Fire Pro Wrestling for $20 on Steam just based on how many people I'd heard rave about it over the years. I was never a console gamer so I never knew the earlier versions, and of course I'm incredibly bad at it so far, but it seems to have a good deal of goofy fun replayability. And of course the Steam Workshop is full of custom versions of all your favorite wrestlers to build your promotion around, including some great throwbacks to back when it was real. Looking forward to figuring out the tag team mechanics so I can take Dr. Death and Terry Gordy all the way, brother.

My friends, whatever you do, DO NOT CLICK THIS LINK.

Thank you.

Steam is having a Halloween sale through Wednesday, it's mostly horror-themed stuff (naturally) but there's a nice mix of quality games to pick up on the cheap if you don't have them already. YR recommends:

The Forest ($11.24)
Darkest Dungeon ($7.14)
Inside ($9.99)
Limbo ($1.49)
Beholder ($4.39)
Vampire The Masquerade ($4.99)
Outlast ($3.99)
Sunless Sea ($6.26)
Dead Island Collection ($11.99)
Amnesia Collection ($3.49)
Fran Bow ($4.49)
Grim Dawn ($8.49)
Darkwood ($11.99)

Those jerks at Sony are going to make me pay money to play Shadow of the Colossus again, aren't they?

Hey all, I realize self-promotion is generally frowned upon BUT we've got a great cause today, so I will be doing that no-no right now.

Extra Life Game Day is today, and for those that don't know, this is like a PBS drive for gaming where the funds go to needy children. The Extra Life program is amazing. For the next 24 hours, my channel will be hosting this marathon to help raise funds. It will be myself playing different games from my Steam account (West of Loathing is one I have on tap for today, as well as Kingsway) and a few buddies to give me a break here and there. If anyone finds themselves bored today, or just wanting to help a little, you can find us playing here and the donations go here. Thank you all for your time. <3

I have West of Loathing on my wishlist. Sure, I'll watch.

West of loathing will start at 1:00pm PST today :)

Welll, our schedule got thrown out of whack yesterday, but I did get to West of Loathing (twice!!) and it is quite a fun little game, I must admit. The humor is fantastic, it's silly while still being totally engaging and fun. Overall, Extra Life raised over $7 million yesterday!

I have another Game related thing to bring up. Has anyone here ever played Hardball Dynasty? Is anyone here interested in trying their first season FREE? I have ONE opening for a rebuild project in a world I run there, and I will pay for your first season if you are new to the game and would like to try it out. It is a VERY deep baseball dynasty simulator, similar in some ways to Out Of The Park, but is played exclusively online with other real, live owners that you wheel and deal with regarding trades, FA negotiations, etc. The world I run is unique to HBD as it represents the true MLB setup (within the confines of the games structure, of course). These are all fictional players, not real-life MLB players. Just the cities and teams are. Let me know if one of you brave souls wants to give this a shot and I will get you in asap.

Kinda enjoying the epic shitstorm EA is getting these past 2 days, won't lie.

Kinda enjoying the epic shitstorm EA is getting these past 2 days, won't lie.

Couldn't happen to a shitter bunch of jerks, is my way of thinking.

Have to say I've missed it ... what'd they do?

If you don’t want to pay to unlock them, or “pay to win” as it’s sometimes called, a practice EA is rather notorious for, unlocking Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader would require 40 hours of gameplay each.

Most full games don’t require that much time to complete, and some viewed this move by EA as a cash grab.

Someone calculated the amount of time it would take to unlock everything in the game, and it comes to 4,528 hours, or $2,100 if you want to pay for the features instead.

link

I think I'd enjoy a game that still has things to aim for after 40 hours!

But of course, I get the sense that this Star Wars game is pretty far removed from the type of game I normally play.

I think I'd enjoy a game that still has things to aim for after 40 hours!

But of course, I get the sense that this Star Wars game is pretty far removed from the type of game I normally play.

Yeah, EA has all sorts of sins to answer for, but I don't really get the outrage here. Ok, it's a grind to unlock some particularly juicy content, but the real question is, "do you enjoy the gameplay?" If the answer is yes, then who gives a ####? If you're having fun, then what does it matter that it's taking you 40 hours of gameplay to get the toy you wanted? It was fun! And if you're not having fun? Stop playing, you're wasting your time.

For instance, I'm fond of MechWarrior Online, a F2P PvP game that involves giant stompy robots shooting each other. It's grindy as ####, but I happen to enjoy running around in a giant stompy robot shooting fools with muh lazors, pew pew. So the grind doesn't bother me.

Eh, there is a huge difference between a game that is F2P, and a 60$ AAA title that you paid full freight for.

The gameplay is clearly setup in a way to try and gauge people for more money. When you pay sticker price for a AAA title, you should have some expectancy that this includes reasonable access to all relevant features. Trying to bleed people for more money for things they have every right to expect as standard is just sleazy behavior.
And 40 hours for a single unlock (in a game with dozens or hundreds) is an inherently ridiculous amount. It does not matter how much you enjoy the gameplay, that is a ridiculous number. There is NO reason to put it that high, other than to try and push people into whipping out their credit cards. Making it 4 hours would change nothing about the game, except fewer people would pay for the character. Again, for something that they have a reasonable expectation for being included in the sale price.

And now there have been further reports, that apparently the game has a lockout timer, that prevents you from earning more credits, if you start making too many. Again, the only reason to put bullshit like that into a game, is for the purpose of a paywall. It is complete and utter horseshit.

Over the years I've come to understand that a growing company begins its terminal decline at precisely the point that Marketing gains decisive power over Engineering (Development, as a game company would call it) and Operations.

EA is certainly a shining example.

How many games does Brian Hoyer have to win in Madden to unlock Tom Brady?

Eh, there is a huge difference between a game that is F2P, and a 60$ AAA title that you paid full freight for.

Fun is fun and grind is grind. If the grind is fun, people shouldn't care; they're having fun doing it! If it's not, stop playing. It won't magically get better with a Darth Vader skin.

And 40 hours for a single unlock

Is not really all that much. Especially for an online multiplayer game.

My friends, whatever you do, DO NOT CLICK THIS LINK.

Thank you.

Stick with your paperclipping until you get to 100 trust. Trust me on this.

Eh, there is a huge difference between a game that is F2P, and a 60$ AAA title that you paid full freight for.

Also, because it's a multiplayer game, you end up being at a significant disadvantage to people buying crates, so it's harder to earn what you need to get your own (free) crates.

Cyber Monday question: I'm thinking about getting some new RAM for my current computer, which only has 8 GB right now. It's one that Syzm helped me pick parts for a couple years ago, and it still can play almost every new game at near peak graphics and stay above 50 FPS, but I figure the 8GB ram is currently the weakest link in the chain. The motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-Z97MX-Gaming 5, the current ram stick is DDR3-1600.