JonCole

Since this game doesn't really teach you very much and instead expects you to learn largely by long periods of trial-and-error, I feel like some degree of reading how to do stuff makes the experience much more manageable and easy to "finish" by reaching the end game. For instance, I never even thought of the idea of Skybridges until I read about them, and they largely changed how I played the game for the better. Had I not read about them, I'd have to work 10x harder for a key currency in the game's systems and probably would have grown tired of tedious farming.

Agreed. I'd rather hold onto a key or gift copy indefinitely until a regular turns up that wants it than give either to a leecher. If nobody wants your key and you're tired of dealing with it, there are any number of websites out there specifically meant for giving away Steam keys or trading. Let's leave this thread to sharing between friends (loosely termed), rather than giving stuff to random strangers who pollute these forums.

As a fan of Fable I and Fable II, I'd say that it's not very good. If you didn't play either, I imagine it'll feel pretty good. It's just that it's very much on the descending end of the bell curve of that series of pretty good games.

Are you planning on playing any games that require an install? GTA V has a 8GB install, for instance, which isn't very friendly to low storage drives.

As someone who loved Terraria, Starbound is very much my cup of tea. I just got it yesterday and played pretty much continuously from 8pm to 1am with my girlfriend. In many ways in this early stage of the game, it feels like a more refined version of Terraria - your character automatically mounts one-block inclines (like stairs), you can swim, pickaxes affect a much larger area, and the matter manipulator reduces the amount of wiggling your character has to do in the world to do things like place objects. Essentially every minor point of friction that made Terraria unnecessarily user-unfriendly has been removed, so I have to say that if you liked it for the exploration and pure OCD building aspects you'll probably enjoy Starbound for at least a handful of hours. I'm looking forward to the space features of the game though I'm really keeping my expectations in check. At this point, being Terraria+ is more than enough for my tastes. Also, the server stuff is so bad. I wish that the developers didn't jump behind stuff like "we wanted to make an open game that anyone can create any multiplayer solution for", because I'm not really the "anyone" they're talking about so multiplayer is a huge hassle for me. That said, I think I have the wherewithal to transfer the server files to my HTPC and run that as a personal server for me and my friends, granted that works without me being logged into Steam. Even still, I've already had a couple instances of my girlfriend being unceremoniously disconnected from the server running on my computer even though we connected over wired LAN.

I really wish there was a way to sync saves from platform to platform, although I can see why it doesn't happen. Just a shame that I don't plan on playing S2 on 360 while that's where I finished it, and I probably won't buy S2 on PC until I finish S1 + 400 Days on that platform. Meh.

I am so annoyed that Dr. Luigi is not coming to 3DS. That'd be THE PERFECT GAME for this platform.

On that note, Just Cause 2 is $3 on Steam right now, I imagine in honor of the multiplayer mod. Good a time as any to pick up that rad game.

Yeah, if you'd be willing to have me that'd be great. Let me know how you want to handle the money stuff.

Anybody want to split a Starbound 4-pack? It'd be $11.25 a head, if I can find three others.

Oddly enough, I feel like this fits the bill: Gears of War: Judgment (March 19, 2013): While people knew about its release and it had the slightest amount of fanfare thereafter, Jugment mostly got attention because the Gears community had to decide whether or not to transition from the pretty damn good Gears 3 multiplayer to what turned out to be a fairly mediocre Judgment multiplayer. That, along with the fact that the story was an origins-type thing, means that I can't imagine anyone gives this game much thought. That said, I loved the game mostly because I'm deep into the Gears fiction from the books and this one dug into that previously side-story material. In a year of exemplary story/plot shooters (Bioshock Infinite, Metro Last Light) and mediocre competitive shooters (Battlefield 4, Call of Duty: Ghosts), Judgment was well rounded with great graphics, an origin story that didn't seem totally meaningless (hello Batman Arkham Origins), and solid Gears gunplay. I'm a little disappointed that it didn't get any GOTY attention, because pound for pound it beats the crap out of something like COD: Ghosts.

Hey, it's only $100 now. Anyways, highly recommended - http://shop.steelseries.com/us/keyboards/steelseries-6gv2-red-switch-us.html

I paid $120 for my keyboard, so I'm not a good judge of technology value.

It's not discontinued, as far as I know, it's simply only sold in a bundle with a wireless controller labeled "Xbox 360 Wireless Controller for Windows". So the product can be bought genuinely, despite the drivers for Mac probably being 3rd party. Edit: Lu beat me to the punch. Of course, you could always just buy the bundle and sell the controller after the fact. Also, I just looked on Razer's site. They updated the Onza to a new product called the "Sabertooth", looks like it's built with the same sensibilities as the Onza but maybe fixes the D-Pad that some people had issues with on the Onza. That said, I don't see anything about Mac drivers for it - http://www.razerzone.com/gaming-controllers/razer-sabertooth

There are third-party drivers for the Wireless Receiver on Mac, yeah. Logitech controllers actually feel pretty nice, in my opinion. However, they do have the PS3 button configuration (no offset analog sticks) so that might be a hurdle. Otherwise, they look and feel pretty nice, even having the same colorization of the XYAB buttons of the 360 controller. I've also briefly used the Razer Onza Tournament Edition on PC and it felt way better than the standard 360 controller, but I don't know what the driver situation is for Mac on that one.

Gone Home: Origins Sam is a baby and her parents can't find her in the house. You play her Dad, who reaches some stunning revelations as he discovers secret baby-sized alcoves in the house filled with clue-ridden artifacts that may give some insight into where baby Sam wandered off to.

Okay, you got me. Of course, I'm still down for Destiny and Infamous: Second Son and planning on buying a PS4, but all that's probably four or five months from now. Until then, Wii U feels like the right choice for what's out now and what's on the radar.

Yup. I'm not particularly suffering for my lack of Killzone and Forza on my PC.

GONE HOME 2 CONFIRMED

Ah, I knew that to be true from hearsay but it's good to know that the game more or less makes that clear through experience. I already have an idea of how to potentially "cheese" him if I remember the layout of that area correctly, now that I think about it.

Pro: Steam Machine prototypes shipping on Friday, about three hours until the beta participants are notified. SteamOS is releasing same time units ship, presumably this Friday or very soon. Con: Little bit of a bait and switch with this beta program, turns out the 300 prototypes will only be going to US beta testers due to regulatory hurdles. Sorry, most of you guys. http://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamuniverse/announcements/detail/1930088300965516570

"Havel the Rock" seems to jive with what he looks like, so yeah. I was able to cheese him down to 20% health using just firebombs and a crossbow, it's just that having to repeat the same set of actions (pulling him, going outside his attack range, firebombing him, firing a crossbow before he runs down the stairs, running forward to pull him again, etc) 30 times over just gives me so many opportunities to get sloppy. In everything I've heard about the master key, I've definitely detected that it's a double-edged sword in terms of usefulness vs opening up areas that I'm sure to be unprepared for. That being said, I think I can handle this guy given enough attempts. Firebombs and crossbow bolts are cheap, I can get the ~30ish bombs I need after clearing the small part of Burg I'm in just one or two times. However, it didn't occur to me that since I opened that door, Havel wasn't... necessarily meant to be an avenue to choose in proceeding with the game. I might take him out, spend his presumably nice soul payout on leveling, and give the Taurus Demon another shot. Might give the backstabbing a go too, saw a bunch of writing on the ground suggesting it but I haven't been able to do it very reliably (nor parrying, which I've done right maybe... twice ever).

So, I played just a little bit last night until I got crushed by this Taurus Demon thing at the top of a tower. I wasn't quite in the mood to play more, so I put it down after just that little bit. However, I had to drive someone to the airport early this morning so I had a couple hours of time available and decided to jump back in. Got crushed by the Taurus Demon one more time for good measure before giving that a rest, then got crushed by this Black Knight thing under a bridge thing. Then I found this guy at the bottom of the tower that literally killed me in one hit, except for sometimes when I'm blocking he reduces me to 1HP then takes me out after I stumble and he gets a second shot in. I tried to beat that dude a couple times, realizing that he can't leave the tower but returning to his spawn if you leave it. I decided that the easiest way to proceed between these two minibosses and one boss was probably to cheese that dude at the bottom of the tower, so I got very familiar with wiping the Burg that far and buying all the firebombs and bolts I could afford from the merchant. I got really close to killing him that way, but I think it was just too early in the morning to reliably perform the same action something like thirty times to kill a guy. In other words, I got destroyed by a few dudes like 20 times and only gained a couple levels in the process. Without belaboring this story further, am I on the right track? Is my firebomb and crossbow method of cheesing him the easiest way to beat him? Will beating him even take me in the "right" direction? I'd rather not "waste" another two hours trial-and-erroring this section, if I can help it.

That was a very enlightening overview of how items/economy works! Interesting that burden is only based on what's equipped, so the box loses some perceived utility but I'm still a sucker for inventory management in RPGs so I imagine I'll get my soul's worth there. So, taking what you've all said into account, weapons and armor should be highly deprioritized at merchants. Is there anything I should be looking out for in particular at a merchant? I'll probably go back and grab that Burg Residence key after doing a bit more exploring. Otherwise, I'll dump into endurance until I get to the blacksmith. I've watched enough Dark Souls LPs that I know it shouldn't be too long until I find him, but at least I have a plan until then. I think I missed the parry tutorial box, what's that all about?