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PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   2006 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for January 9, 2026

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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Video game thread! What did you get over the holidays, what are you playing?

Having a blast playing Skyrim modded. Been playing a lot and also just looking through modlists. This is one area I've found AI to be extremely fun and useful to work with, which has been rare for me lately.

I keep putting hours into ARC Raiders. It's low commitment to just go do a run or two. I also keep playing Marvel Cosmic Invasion, which was phenomenal at start but later on in the game it starts piling up more frustrating enemies. I don't know how I feel about that.

ARC Raiders

I got a copy for free (for which I am grateful!), but found it falling far short of what the hype promised. Maybe I just don't get it.

Bad:

  • Rifling through trash and doing inventory management on the fly are not fun but merely annoying.
  • The randomized nature of the loot means that you have no way to reliably get a specific item that your progression requires. Blueprints are the worst offender.
  • The progression is extremely grindy and gamey, very anti-immersive.
  • Knowing what to keep and what to get rid off effectively requires using a guide; advance knowledge is key.
  • The out-of-run inventory management in the main menu is very repetitive and boring.
  • The third-person shooter combat is entirely underwhelming. Sorry, but Helldivers 2 spoiled me here.
  • Running through the same maps over and over and getting the same trash out of the same trash cans and then extracting at the same elevator...did I already say repetitive? It is repetitive. Repetitively.
  • The whole family-friendly nobody-ever-dies thing is just baffling. We shoot each other with guns, blow each other up with bombs, and somehow we only ever get "knocked out" and then magically reappear in the base.
  • The NPCs are a woke diversity cast.
  • Player customization offers no facial hair and only unisex clothing.

Good:

  • It's technically very competently made. File size, performance, graphics, sound, animations, stability are all top-notch.
  • One thing I'll give it is that the solo player experience is unusually good for a PvPvE game; most solo players are unexpectedly not out to kill you and you can cooperate with them and even exchange items sometimes. (The same is NOT true in team games.)
  • Being able to barricade doors and set up ziplines is a nice touch.

Overall I grant that it's well-made and well-marketed, but at the same time it's a soulless consumer product.

I don't think you're not getting it, we just have a different gaming profile. The progression is frustrating and randomised, but personally I just put out of my mind. All it does is inform which buildings I'm likely to target for looting in a run but other than that I'm happy just getting random stuff and shooting ARC. I don't hate the looking through trash aspect. And the shooting is satisfying to me.

I'll grant that the out of run inventory management is annoying and especially coupled with the slow progression. I'm filling up with materials to build stuff I just don't have the blueprints or levels to build; and there's little use in building a bunch of entry level equipment, you'll always be able to build them right before a run.

It's not game of the year, but it's the low time and mental commitment that makes it so I keep coming back for a handful of runs a day.

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