What You've Been Playing This Week

[Golgo]

Streets of Rage 4. Put this down after an initial run-through ages ago, but dipping back into it now and surprised by the amount of depth to it. It's great.

[importaku]

Another entire weekend spend surviving in the backyard on Grounded, making lots of progress gotten quite a few very useful mutations including one that strips rare drops from enemies when you loot their corpses so i have been able to craft some really decent protection. Also found half of a trinket so i looked online to see what was up with that and it led me to finding the other half to make something stupidly good.

My current goto setup, using the tiger mosquito sword as i have upgraded it to unlock it's lifesteal so with every hit my health is recovered which makes it extremely useful as it hits fast so even black widows can't kill me easily now i'm starting to fight back lol. Have a crazy amount of effects & stats active.


two leggy bitches thought they could suprise ambush me as i made my way back up the shaft from the collapsed stump lab. Lol silly wolf spiders you are about to be turned into crafting materials.


Up on the picnic table is a half finished game of D&D you can go inside and explore the model labyrinth and find a couple of neat secrets.


Speaking of secrets the game is packed with so many, i found a random tunnel in a small puddle that i had missed a ton of times walking past it was the sunlight was shining down that i noticed it wasn't shallow so i equipped the bubble helmet and went to see what was in there, a small tunnel dive later i come out in a sealed cave with a single 4 leaf clover which unlocked something,


Inside the sandbox lab theres a curious diagram on the whiteboard near the exit, i realised it wasn't just some random scribbles.


If you use the yellow shovel as a marker and wait till a certain time in the afternoon the sun will cast a shadow and in the middle of the hole in the handle if you dig that spot a key is there. Goes inside the chest at the back of the sandcastle, something in there that i was very happy to find.




Black widow thought she could take my ass on in the toybox

Not today bitch, YEAH thats what you get for having the audacity to rush me


One thing i'm glad to have found out online is that you have to find all the milk & super milk molars to max out your character before you enter new game plus or you lose the ability to finish off upgrading apparently. Also found out there's multiple new game plusses with more stuff unlocking each time lol talk about value for money. So my current target is milk molar hunting i hit the motherload there's a jar un upper yard thats buried topdown in the ground it took me a while to find out how to get in it but i found the tunnel and vines that was blocking access. Still loads to find though as they are all over the place usually hidden in way out aread to encourage you to really get out and explore inaccesible looking places.


Yup still loving it although i see animal well has released i must try to remain strong as i'm dying to play that as well.

[QualityChimp]

My son had been playing The Binding of Isaac, so I played that for a while, but it's a bit stressy!

Like Golgo, I fired up Streets of Rage 4 and love it.
I played through when it was on GamePass, but I've been itching to replay it for ages.

It's so much more than a button masher because you're looking at ways to crowd control or work out who's the biggest threat.
I think I got to stage 4 before needing bed.
Looking forward to finishing it and hopefully get my son playing as player 2!

[MartyG]

Reshaping Mars

A base building / factory game. Pretty noddy stuff and I'm unlikely to be going back to this one. 5 automations out of 10.

Park Beyond

It's a theme park management game. Not a bad effort, probs not worth £40 as there's not much new here, but you can easily pick this up for under a tenner. The park building itself is well done, with plenty of static rides and attractions to play with. 7 Alton Towers out of 10.

Fashion Police Squad

A boomer shooter where you don't kill people, no, instead you correct their fashion faux pas by whipping them with belts, and firing dye or stitching at them. Splendid, but a touch on the easy side. 8 Coco Chanels out of 10.

And still playing RimWorld, which is still good and you should still buy it.

[QualityChimp]

That Fashion Police Squad sounds bonkers!

How does Park Beyond stack up against Roller Coaster Tycoon or Parkitect?

[MartyG]

The pathing and track layout I think is easier than both of those. Planet Coaster is probably still the best in class though.

[QualityChimp]

Cheers Marty. I'm finding myself happier to game on the sofa these days, but I've added this to my wish list, alongside Parkitect.

Played some more Streets of Rage 4 last night.
Got all the way through to the final boss on Normal, but that last battle is too much alone.
I got a long way on my first try, but it wasn't easy.
I realised by the end of the session I was proper pumped! All hot and I'd been squeezing the joypad! Like the old days!

Chuckled at some of the trophies I won like when I smashed all the motorbikes to look for health and it popped "You're walking home!"

Don't want to add some assists to beat the final level, but may have to suck it up if I want to complete it.

[Neon Ignition]

"This week I 'av been mostly playin' Yellow Taxi Goes Vroom on't computer box, Hitman: Absolution on't Steam Decked an't Stellar Blade on't Pay£70Station"

[fuse]

Getting near the end of Eiyuden Chronicle: 100 Heroes now. Will ramble more in first play, but finding it a decent enough RPG, though dogged by some buggy moments and the challenges of balancing a game that's so focused on volume.

Started Pepper Grinder, which seems a decent platformer. I've never played Screw Breaker / Drilldozer, but I get the impression it's borrowed a fair bit from that. Plus points for having a Mac version so I can play on my desktop without jumping through 50,000 hoops.

Also started 1000xResist, which generated a lot of buzz from folks I follow. There's hints of NieR Automata in terms of its mysterious story, but the main action in the first couple of chapters is more like a sedate Gravity Daze? Keen to stick with this.

[Colin]

Started Titanfall 2, a game that completely passed me by at the time so it's a first play. Bloody excellent from what I've played of it so far and still looks brilliant. There must be so many games out there I've missed that I could probably continue to keep ignoring next gen for quite a long time!

Last week I had a run through of Wolfenstein II, another game that also still looks and plays brilliantly, and is exactly the kind of mindless FPS I like!

[QualityChimp]

I never finished Titanfall 2 and have some Wolfenstein on the shelf, and I really should just crack on with them!

[nonny]

Started Titanfall 2, a game that completely passed me by at the time so it's a first play. Bloody excellent from what I've played of it so far and still looks brilliant. There must be so many games out there I've missed that I could probably continue to keep ignoring next gen for quite a long time!

Last week I had a run through of Wolfenstein II, another game that also still looks and plays brilliantly, and is exactly the kind of mindless FPS I like!

Titanfall 2 has arguably the best campaign of any modern day shooter. It's right up there with best.

[nonny]

I've been enjoying Small Kitty, Big City on game pass. Lovely little cat adventure sim where you're running around a small Japanese suburb collecting stuff and exploring. Just nails the cute factor and doesn't outstay it's welcome (about 4-6 hours)

[hudson]

I've finished Stellar Blade this week. Proper loved it. Hope they announce a sequel. I've completed all side quests and all collectibles. Just a few trophies off the Platinum.

Balatro - Still one of the best games to play in between games. Managed to complete a few runs in the higher stakes.

Helldivers - Still spending time with friends, spreading democracy.

Next, I'm onto Ronin and Bayonetta

[MartyG]

Inertial Drift

Something a little different as racing games go, obviously about drifting cars, but it has a unique control system where both the left and right analogue sticks are used to controlling turn and drifting (along with balancing accelerate/brake). It sound counterinuitive, but you soon get the hang of it. All the cars handle very differently though, and some better than others. No punishing hard barriers to progressing either, so you can play through the story even if you don't win every encounter.

EA Sports WRC

The lastest in the WRC series. This had a troubled launch with performance issues all over the place, stuttering and hitching. I think it may have been sorted now as I didn't run into any noticible problems, it was all smooth as butter. There's a lot of content here, I particularly liked the "Moments" races, picking out cars and routes from various decades. I picked this up for £16 in the sale and definitely think it's worth that.

Castle of Shikigami 2

A great Shmup from the arcades with a good PC port. You can run tate if you like, but it seems the one downside of this game is resolution only goes to 1080P. Different characters allow different playstyles through the various stages - it starts off quite easy (so good one for noobs), but ramps up at stage 3. It's very good, one of the best I've played in this genre in a while.