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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   3202 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for December 9, 2022

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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What video games are people playing?

I just finished the Outer Wilds after picking it up on sale, and wow, that game was incredible. The ending actually made me cry, something I haven't experienced in a video game in almost a decade.

I usually don't go for narrative driven/mystery type games, but Outer Wilds is truly in a class of it's own. I've heard Return of Obra Dinn is similar quality, as well as Disco Elysium, so I'm curious to check those out.

New Path of Exile league started yesterday and I intend to sink at least the weekend into entirely. If you like the mechanics of using loot to buy stuff to get more loot to buy better to stuff to get even more loot it's the pinnacle of the genre. If you don't understand why some people genuinely seem to mechanically like capitalism this is the game that gets you most in the mind of a capitalist(Yes, even more so than Eve online in my opinion)

I will add that the currencies in PoE aren't merely gold or silver like in most RPGs. The currencies are different types of orbs that serve a desirable function in and of themselves, typically to modify gear. For example, one orb randomly changes the attributes of an item; another orb adds one more attribute to an existing item; and so on. The value of an orb (expressed in terms of how many of some other orb it's worth) isn't fixed - it's whatever someone is willing to give you for it. As you'd expect, these exchange rates eventually settle into a rough consensus based on community-wide supply and demand.

The use of currency as a practical entity in and of itself also especially aids players who choose to forego trading altogether - there's even a mode you can enroll into called solo self-found in which trading does not exist.

Personally, I'm excited to see how this league's new optional mode - Ruthless - turns out. In Ruthless mode, item and currency drops are massively reduced compared to the usual lootsplosion of the base game. I think there's far too much loot in the base game, and as someone who likes to find my own gear rather than buy it, I don't like how impractical it is to sift through all the garbage on the ground on the 1-in-1,000 off-chance it's something decent.

I'm a fan of the idea of ruthless. I think I will eventually play it, but not until I get bored of the main league.

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