Here we are again on what's promising to be a hot but not unbearable day around these parts. I have a new fitness equipment piece coming today for my landmine setup so I can viking press with my seven foot bar and that has me pretty excited. Just a handle, but it's going to be a game changer for me. I'm also not working this weekend so that's a huge positive. Let's see what's WRUP'ing.
Remnant 2 is out with some mixed feelings. I played the first game, Remnant: From The Ashes and it wasn't bad necessarily, but it did feel very much unfinished. The second in the line looks quite a lot more fleshed out with procedurally generated worlds to explore and a lot more attention to enemy and level design as well as rewards. So far the soulslike with guns has some issues running smoothly; it's even been stated that Remnant 2 is designed to be used with a graphics upscaler. I haven't played it yet but I've been reading a little here and there and so far people seem to agree that it's miles beyond the first title in more or less every way. The biggest complaint seems to be that the main story is lacking some nuance and is regarded as simple and somewhat unimaginative. I think I'm still interested in seeing for myself and as for a review, here's one from PC Gamer.
Something I'm ever increasingly more excited about playing soon is Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon. Bandai Namco and FromSoftware keep on giving us little tastes of what's to come in just about a months time and I just can't wait to finally experience it. The previous titles are known for (even infamous for) their level of complexity and depth just sort of tossing players to the fray and letting them learn by doing. It looks like tons of customization for your character is involved and being as said character is a big humanoid robot fighting suit, it's quite stylized. Interchangeable heads, arms, legs and torsos, even tracks if you want to forego legs. Lots of weapons from bombs, guns, swords, cannons, lasers, missiles, shields, mines... etc. Not to mention the level freedom that is presented as you can jump, fly and skate all around while performing turns on a dime and hair trigger dodges. The combat looks incredible and of course because it's Bandai and FromSoft we will see some great boss fights. It looks pretty ambitious and has been created by a relatively small amount of developers for the AAA scene. Or so they say. Three hundred developers seems like a lot of damn developers to me. Here is a game play video directly from Bandai, if you've got an extra thirteen minutes I'd highly suggest watching it. And if you're like me and really chomping at the bit for AC6 to come out, check out Daemon X Machina. It will probably scratch the itch, just don't expect quite the same level of detail and level design as AC.
One of my personal favorites, SnowRunner, has released a tenth season DLC expansion. I feel the pull of big medium and heavy duty truck simulation set to drag me back into the tundra. Set in a semi-fictional British Columbia this time the new season has two new maps and a couple of new rigs from Mack and Kenworth for your virtual god of off road trucking to drive around. Here's the overview from Focus.
Okay that's about it from me today. Enjoy your weekend everyone and stay cool.
Playing Games?
Greywolfe: as predicted: culdcept is VERY slow. but it's a game that - if you have 45 minutes - you can likely get something done. [though that something is often small. i figure i'm going to be playing this for a while before i've completed it.] - i haven't had time enough to play too much blood omen, but i've played a little bit - enough to remember how sometimes janky the combat is. it's fun, though i'm still taking a while to get used to the control system [it was initially on the playstation and then ported to pc and the pc port is basically the playstation version with no real changes beyond some mild settings for aspect ratio and so on. so it plays EXACTLY like that version, with it's wonky control scheme and all.]
Scrooloose: So far this is going to be a chill weekend, thankfully. I'll probably be into Diablo 4 some more... but I'll be damned if SnowRunner isn't putting out it's tenth expansion, so I may just be back to driving in horrible conditions.