oh, yeah. that’s the stuff. That was back when I was a PC gamer exclusively. Loved heroes. Loved the mainline M&M stuff, too
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Oh, HoMM3. My friend and I spent weeks playing this at his place back in 2000, but we never got very far. Something about the combination of randomized heroes and upgrades you could acquire meant that playing this felt almost like a roguelike in how quickly a game session could turn for the better or the worse. I should revisit that some day.
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Me too! They’re very beer-and-pretzels compared to the simulation- and narrative-focused Ultimas, or the chilly git-gud difficulty of the Wizardries, but at this late date I think they hold up the best of the classic RPG series – I’ve certainly had just as much fun going back and replaying them as I did back in the day (admittedly, while I’ve gotten through most of the series, I’ve never touched 9, which by all accounts is just awful and more or less killed the franchise. The legacy revival, 10, was actually pretty well done though!)
Yeah, this can certainly be the case, especially if you’re playing single scenarios or a random map instead of the more-scripted campaigns (which is perfectly valid, I know lots of people prefer that approach to things!) But you can easily get a starting hero with an awful initial skill, and some of the towns are straight-up better than others, which can be super frustrating if you get deep into a game without realizing that a run of bad luck means the whole scenario’s going to be a slog.
Happily, it doesn’t take too much esoteric knowledge to avoid that sort of thing, and I think the game is worth the revisiting if you’ve still got interest in it – definitely get the HD mod so it plays nicely with modern interfaces, though. And balance-wise, the castle and necromancer towns are probably the easiest ones to start with, while heroes who are good at diplomacy, earth magic, and logistics generally have the easiest time.
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I notice you didn’t put Twilight Princess on your ‘would work well as a first’. That was the first and only one I tried at length, when the Wii was new and I was trying new games on it.
I remember an open world, no sense of what I should be doing, just having no interest in what anything looked like or what anyone said. I’d say none of the games appeal to me aesthetically or in subject matter, so there’s probably no point really talking to me about them at length. But I wondered, if because Twilight Princess wasn’t on your list, you thought it was particularly unfriendly in any way? I have no sense. I just know I didn’t like it and it also reminded me of a bunch of Square games that gave me a similar feeling – that I was expected to be interested in the lore before I even began. Then characters started saying stuff and I didn’t care because they never made me care. Vagrant Story (a very different game) was incomprehensibly repulsing to me in the same way.
-Wade
I think the last M&M mainline game that I really got into was VI. I blasted through that game obsessively. It was closely connected to Heroes III, in some way, if I recall.
Or closer than Adventure of Link and Ocarina of Time are to one another, anyway.
Maybe I should pick up MMX one of these days!
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Yeah, M+M VI was a sequel to HOMM 2 and sets up some stuff that pays off in HOMM 3; M+M VII likewise follows on from the events of HOMM 3, and sets up one of the HOMM 3 expansions. For a plot-light series, it’s pretty well done!
M+M X is set in a different world - the Heroes franchise got reboot somewhere after I lost track of it, and it follows along with those changes - and it’s also got tile based movement and is strictly turn-based, so in some ways it feels like a throwback to the earlier games. If you liked VI, though, VII is much of a muchness albeit with some upgrades. And VIII uses the same engine too, which definitely starts to feel a bit long in the tooth but the “play as monsters” gimmick is actually pretty fun.
When I did some replays recently, though, I and II actually wound up being my favorites. It’s hard to go too far wrong!
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Did you draw your own maps?
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Yup! That is a good chunk of the fun - and indeed, the intended gameplay, since you can only save at inns and death can come relatively quickly. But dying after mapping a bunch actually means you’ve made good progress so it feels much less frustrating.
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Impressive! I just don’t have the patience anymore. Otherwise, I think I would have replayed World of Xeen by now. I really liked that one.
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Ghostwire: Tokyo. It is one of those open-world collectathons, but the level of environmental detail is really impressive. It takes place in a sort of afterlife limbo, so a lot of the gameplay is centered around exploring abandoned buildings while encountering supernatural enemies. It is basically urban exploration crossed with The X-Files.
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I have that downloaded, but I have yet to play it. I sometimes have trouble getting into first-person games, but I feel a lot of goodwill toward Shinji Mikami and Tango Gameworks.
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I feel like the gameplay would of probably been better in 3rd person. There are a lot of platforming sections that are made slightly annoying by the face that you can’t always see where you are in relation to your surroundings. Plus, you can customize your outfit, despite the fact you never see yourself outside of cut-scenes.
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The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.
I really like it. 
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My wife and I are working on Spellbreaker.
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Me too! Just had my first substantial play session. Good times.
Keep us posted! Lots of Spellbreaker fans around here.
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Playing “Detroit: Become Human” on PS4. Love the story and choices whereas the “gameplay” e.g. being told to turn the analog stick in a half circle or tap the x-button repeatedly hasn’t much to do with gameplay but I simply ignore that and enjoy the story.
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I’m still at it with TotK! I’ve discovered that all of my Breath of the Wild horses are available at the stables. It was nice to be reunited with Epona (she looks nothing like the Ocarina of Time Epona) again. I decided to investigate the blizzard to the northwest but hit a wall after the low temperatures became too extreme. There is an armor set that offers adequate prediction, but it costs two thousand rupees That may as well be a million, so I’ve headed east to do battle with swamp lizards.
I have three added hearts and two stamina upgrades. With more paraglider range and the ascent ability, I feel very mobile. I’ve been able to make my way to almost anywhere I’ve wanted to go.
My IF vacation will end soon; I will begin the capital-N Next capital-G Game by the end of the week, I think. Meanwhile, immersing myself in TotK has been a remarkable experience.
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I don’t remember how cold it is there since it’s been a while since I was in that part of the game, but I know one thing you can do to warm yourself in those cold environments is fuse a ruby to your weapon or shield, since they contain the power of fire. It should be able to keep you adequately warm, even when you aren’t holding the weapon/shield out. You just need to have it on your back at the very least. And it won’t use any durability while doing so.
Rubies are definitely rare though, so it’s understandable if you may not want to do that, but it’s a neat detail to keep in mind just in case!
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I played “Secrets of Raetikon.” I think I drew the wrong idea about its implied theme…
Open for spoilers
I put more weight on the “nature red in tooth and claw” theme than the “effect of technology on nature” theme that the developer said he was going for.
The developer’s comments makes it clear that the two themes are definitely meant to stand in contrast to one another. However, the technological theme is too much in the background IMO.
That said, the game has a palpable feel of violence which meshes well with the twist ending. I’d say the ending works as a genuine, mechanics-based plot twist rather and is far less cheap than some have accused it of.
The world is also very well designed. Lots of landmarks, and even when there isn’t a landmark, each place looks a bit different despite its low-poly style.
Highly recommended though, 4.5/5. One one hand I’d say you should know absolutely nothing about it before playing. However, I’d suggest going in knowing that there’s a shock ending … that’s what I did. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t really have paid attention to the mechanics that hint at it.
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I just started Tears of the Kingdom and I think I love it even more than BotW!
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