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I also got it for Counter-Strike, I think most people who joined before HL2 did. I remember that people in CS would obsess over their SteamID which is your user number. If you had a 3 or 4 digit ID you could sell it for a decent amount of money.

Maybe I worded that poorly. I just mean it's another game that narrates your play.

I have to reluctantly admit that I didn't enjoy The Stanley Parable that much. The narration is obviously key to the whole thing, and I simply did not like the delivery, or much of the actual text. I've heard nothing but how funny this game is, but none of the jokes hit for me. I didn't enjoy Bastion either, so maybe it's just me.

I played using a keyboard actually, but I imagine you can use something like xpadder and make a controller work without much hassle. Not sure how well the digital controls would work with an analog stick though.

Is anyone here a fan of the classic Tomb Raider games? I know some people find that the controls make the games unplayable. Personally I don't have that many problems with them. They're slow, but they're also precise. Last year I played through the first two games, and after a bit of a break from them I decided to continue with Tomb Raider III. I'm surprised how much I enjoyed it, and it's not nostalgia either because I only played bits of TRIII at a friend's house. It a beast of a game, it took me almost 30 hours to finish it. Here I was starting to feel that games don't hold my attention any more and then a 16 year old game does it just fine. Compared to the previous two games the level design is much more complex. There's 19 levels (and a bonus one I didn't get because you need all the secrets and good luck with that! I got 39 / 59), but five of them are short boss levels, which leaves 14 proper ones. So each one took 2 hours on average. I feel like that's twice as long as the first two TR games. Core just went crazy with this game. Playing it on PS1 with limited saves must've been a nightmare. I'm not going to pretend these games don't have issues, there are tons of cheap death traps, the vehicles control like absolute garbage and there's the perviness of the people who made the game (the game literally ends with a screen filling close up of a CG butt with "The End" pasted over it). However the TR games scratch an itch I don't think any other games do. Being left to explore a huge environment filled with platforming challenges, there's nothing else like it. The levels in this game are insane, you're given exactly zero direction and there are no interruptions whatsoever. It's so strange to me that no one's attempted anything quite like it. I mean, these games were a huge success. There's something to the blocky environments too. It makes it so you can tell which jumps are possible and which aren't, where you can stand, crawl, grab onto etc. in an elegant way. They don't need to colour code grab points or anything like that, so (almost paradoxically) the environments feel more natural. I'll finish by saying that my favourite level was Madubu Gorge, if anyone remembers that one. It's a gorge, obviously, filled with waterfalls and rapids that end up in a cave system and that you make your way up, down, over, under, across, in and whatever other ways there are. It's amazing. These games make such great use of space, with paths that constantly loop back on each other. It puts most modern games to shame. A few of screens (btw, I think it's noteworthy that these games had such a minimalistic HUD that only popped up when it was needed. A design trend that wouldn't catch on until well over a decade later):

As someone who used to like GTA but doesn't anymore I found this video to be on point

Maybe he just wanted to work with Totilo again

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Complete is a mod Anyway, I haven't played the first two and I have a hard time recommending DayZ unless you already have friends who are playing it, plus there's a good chance it'll run like complete garbage for you. The S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games are great, two of them anyway, but you probably won't want to play them back to back. They take a lot out of you, plus they're a bit too similar. I think I'd recommend getting the first one, Shadow of Chernobyl, and then maybe something else. I guess that + South Park adds up to less than Alien.

Cara is one of my favourite games writers, but I wouldn't want her to end up at Giant Bomb.

Where'd you visit? Just curious (as a Swede )

It was probably one of their worse sales, but to say it sucked means we are a little spoiled. It definitely felt like the bigger games that released in the second half of the year got smaller discounts than they have in the past. Maybe publishers are trying to fight back against the race to the bottom. I still ended up buying a lot more than I have in the last couple of big sales, but barely any of it was featured on the front page. My haul: POP: Methodology Experiment One 140 (wasn't discounted though) Shatter E.Y.E.: Divine Cybermancy Bleed Hexcells Complete Pack Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines Shadowrun Returns Toki Tori Escape Goat The Stanley Parable Final Fantasy XIII Rainbow Six 3: Gold Kane and Lynch 2 - Dog Days Lovely Planet Mostly super cheap stuff. I also sold trading cards for the first time. Honestly, the EVE player in me thinks it wasn't worth the time it took to list them. I made like 3.5€.

A little late reply, but yes it was him

I love things like that. Things that only stand out to you because you have such rigid expectations of how games behave, and that make you question design norms that you otherwise wouldn't.

I don't follow this much, because I'm never on twitter, but my favourite youtuber uploaded a video in which he spends a minute or two explaining that he doesn't see the point of GG. Apparently that was enough to outrage people, because this is such an important cause that you're not allowed to just have an opinion on it. If you feel the need to make an example of everyone who disagrees with you then maybe it's time to re-evaluate your priorities.

Well, I picked up all those four. Anyone played Consortium? It was in last week's Humble Bundle but I missed it because I'm bad.

I hadn't heard about Hernhand until now. I really liked Bernband, so I'll have to check it out. Also, while on the topic of that game, I thought the pictures of the troll dolls were super out of place and it bummed me out a little. Make some fake alien art, cmon. PS. The number of "Hernhand" and "Bernband" on this page makes you all look like crazy people. It's like a nonsense conversation inside Bernband.

I played through 140 the other day, it's a short music based platformer. Everything in the game is executed very well, the music, how is builds, how the platforming mechanics are built around the beat etc. it's fantastic. I do wish there was more of it though, because there's only three stages and I think the concept could've been pushed further. On the other hand it's nice to play something so focused that doesn't suffer from trying too many things. Watch the , if you like it I think you'll enjoy the game.

There's also an updated version of DSMfix floating around, for those too stubborn to buy a controller (which is me and about four other people).

I played through Second Encounter recently and didn't enjoy it nearly as much as First Encounter. The weapon progression was strange, it felt as if the game was reluctant to give me the fun and useful weapons, at times the level design got convoluted in a way that slowed down the momentum of the game and there was a lot of encounter design (coupled with the weapon progression) that I didn't care much for. First Encounter was more straight forward and better for it I think. Things like the bouncing room might be funny the first 10 seconds, but it's annoying to play. I'll take 1000 Kleers rushing at me thanks.

I was browsing for cheap stuff I haven't played and a few things caught my eye: E.Y.E.: Divine Cybermancy - 0.99€ Bleed - 1.25€ Hexcells - 1€ Anyone got anything good or bad to say about those?

I'm almost done with my masters, and I was going to say all this job hunting sounds like too much of a nightmare so I'll just go for a PHD instead and now you're telling me it's worse! I guess I can get a second degree and put off becoming an adult a bit longer. The thing I hate about CVs is trying to make myself sound better than I am. I can't do it, but everyone does it so you have to.

Ah, I almost thought there wouldn't be a podcast this week, but here it is! Looking forward to hearing the Talos Principle talk.

I saw this on RPS today and decided to buy it (massive epilepsy warning): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhtcJyo0hgM It's a collection of short minigame vignettes to accompany the music and I kinda liked it. It's only $3 on Steam at the moment

I don't know what to make of it anymore. Since such large parts of it have aged so poorly I feel weird saying it's the best, even though I still love it. Also, as much as I like the writing, it sometimes feels like they just dropped a bunch of philosophical concepts in there at random. Of course the out of nowhere philosophy hour is one of the endearing parts of the game, but it never uses it to say much of anything. Take one of my favourite conversations in the game: It's thematially relevant, but it's tucked away like a secret and never explicitly touched on again (as far as I remember anyway).

I'm tempted to check those out, but they probably don't stack with the sale do they?