Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? (September 16-17)

I beat Starfield yesterday on the Xbox Series X after playing it for almost 70 hours.
Currently continuing my playthrough of Ace Attorney: Justice for All I started on my Switch before Starfield.

Planning on starting Firewatch later and finally starting either God of War: Ghost of Sparta or Ratchet & Clank: A Crack in Time on Ps3.
Might also start Baten Kaitos 1+2 HD on the switch.

It will be the same as last weekend and probably every free weekend for the forseeable future: Baldurs Gate 3 and Starfield.

Still on my first playthrough of Baldur's Gate 3, which is definitely Game of the Year, so every other game may as well stand down now and accept that they have been bested.

Also, still itching to play my unopened copy of Starfield, but as I'll be squeezing every drop out of BG3, it'll probably stay sealed for another month yet...

We have family over, so I’m likely going to just play some Breath of the Wild on the Wii U (because all TVs will be taken).

When they go though, Starfield!

Continuing with Witcher 3, but itching to get in some soulsborne action with Lies of P and somehow dip into Cyberpunk before PL drops. Neither of the latter are going happen this weekend, so just some W3 for me.

Starfield - I think Im nearing the end of the main story, will probably wrap up some side missions first as I found them to be the best missions the game has to offer. But after that Im done. And I dont think I’ll replay it as I often do with Bethesdas RPGs, just dont see myself enjoying it enough. Not a bad game at all, its very good most of the time even with all the issues, its just not a great game imo.

The Crew Motorfest - played the trial for a bit. Very positively surprised at how good it was, like a mix of Forza Horizon and Need for Speed. Will be playing this one for sure.

More Starfield for me, in-between short bouts of Quake 2's included expansions.

Mainly Starfield, I have a love and hate relationship with this game. After doing quite a few side quests (Which were quite amazing), I decided to streamline the main quest and im quite dissapointed at the direction its going and also how repetitive it get searching for artifacts.
I can see why it got 7s and 8s in some reviews. For me personally it was a 9 until I did the main quest, which really hurt the game due to how repetitive and unfun it became.

Tearing up the galaxy with Andreja in the wonderful Starfield.

Crewfest 5-hour trial, Starfield and Baldur’s Gate 3 for me….whenever I can wrestle the TV away from the wife.

Starfield, still enjoying it. But I’m getting more frustrated with lots of little things. So hopefully when mods come they sort it out.

Starfield and Bg3. Loving both of them very much. Even though Starfield isnt perfect and it wont win game of the year its the type of game I love. About 65 hours in and nowhere near the end I feel.

Bg had a lot of bugs on the console edition like broken tutorial and such so was hard to enjoy it but now that most is fixed i can see the praise it gets is deserved and starting to like it more.

I started Dead Space last night so probably continue with that and Sniper Elite 5 on PS5 . On Xbox it'll be more Starfield probably just going to stick to the main story missions now and get it finished. I'll maybe give the Crew Motorsport trial a go too just downloaded it.

My Series X is in for repair this weekend, annoyingly so me continuing Starfield is on ice for a few days.

In the interim on the PS5 and The Crew Motorfest trial, dabbling in a little bit more Hogwarts Legacy trying to finally get it finished and dent the backlog with how busy October is looking for releases right now.

Series X - Starfield, after many hours in now the game has me hooked.
I being honest I thought it would not.
But I stuck with it and learnt modding weapons and skilling up to do so.
If wasn’t for the internet helping me along to learn I would have got frustrated.
They should have made the system a lot easier or obvious for how to mod and the skills you need to do so.
Yes you can read through loads of tutorials but gaming shouldn’t be that way.
It should have intuitive systems in place.

Xbox - Starfield (my mining empire is going great)
Playstation - kingdom hearts 1.5 remix
Nintendo - nothing
Pc - Pumpkin Jack

Going to be all Starfield all the time for a while, except for my once a week Remnant 2 group.

My time is split between Starfield and the crew Motorfest when I need a break from Starfield..

Have fun!

Just a couple levels left in Sea of Stars and then I want to see I'd I can properly get into Starfield. Looking forward to playing some F Zero 99 on Switch as well.

Starfield (XSX) I got the Razorleaf Ship during the week, and even managed to add some new bits to it like extra cargo space and extra fuel tanks. I’m quite enjoying the game but I wouldn’t (yet) say I’m loving it.

The Crew Motorfest (PS5) Been playing this since Monday and having an absolute blast. Lots to do and gorgeous graphics. Already better than the first 2 games, despite a smaller map.

Pikmin 4 (NS) Probably my most played Switch game of the year, yes, even more than TOTK. Love the way the game drip feeds you everything, and you can just play the game at your own pace.

Still Starfield, about 80 hours in and only just got my first "Power". I've started playing around with the outpost builder now so messing around with different concepts before finding somewhere nice to make my home base.

Chickens Can't Fly (Windows Phone) - Just started this a few days ago. Kinda reminds me of Downfall a little...

Contre Jour (Windows Phone) - Around 3/4 of the way done with this. I've been enjoying it very much so.

I'm playing Like the North Star on PS4 (Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise) and also started Samurai Warriors 5.

On Xbox I was thinking of starting Mad Max since after watching the movies I'm in a mood for that.

Apunkalypse for the win.

!!!!!!!!MORTAL KOMBAT!!!!!!!!!!

and F Zero 99

I played mostly The Crew Motorfest (+ season FH5) after getting a break from Starfield. After playing the Closed Beta I had high expectations for it to be on the same level as FH (somewhat). The overall experience is still fun, but not as good overall as I thought it would be. Bikes & boats or okay and planes are good when you can't fast travel at first or just want to enjoy the view of the map. The handling of the planes when trying to set a good time not as good + drifting feels horrendous (but maybe that's a me problem because I'm used to doing it a lot in FH5). Game progression is at 93%.
There is a lot of room for improvement, but since IT supported their last games regularly, I'm hopeful some tweaks can be made.
After playing the CB I must admit, I felt some FOMO towards this game and bought the UE (I hope I learned my lesson not doing that again soon )

EDIT: I have the Dream cars to finish (Supercar Blondie = real YT channel) but haven't got enough funds to enter. I followed the SP content & only bought a plane because of fast travel wasn't yet available. Without buying that, I would've had the opportunity to enter it (EDIT2 not exactly true because I bought some needed Summit Contest vehicles), but now I need to do some more side activities for credits (already did a lot) or pay additionally more real money (MTX) to move on. Going straight to that last Play List is not possible because I need to buy a 1M Lambo to enter .

Starfield if I manage to find some time. Have also not played any FFXIV this week and would like to get my weekly tomes goal so hopefully I find some time for that too. So far the outlook of me playing anything is looking low, though.

Starfield and nothing else. Anything else can wait.

Just Starfield. First Bethesda RPG that has really hooked me, love all that it offers and I haven't even really scratched the surface of the main story because I'm going around completing sidequests and when I nearly done with one, another pops up.

For me it’s Starfield and Motorfest. Both great games!

@Pusher2021 We seem to be having very different experiences? I made well over 1million just doing the first three cards, and the second card gives you a plane, so you have no need to buy one?

Drifts a matter of taste. I hate it in Horizon and its the reason Im not complerionist on that game. In Crew Motorfest its much easier to maintain a drift, so drifting is much more approachable and drift challanges now feel balanced with the other events - for me.
Ive felt no need at all for mtx, and you can easilly rack up any money you need to purchase vehicles by replaying races a few times to build up cash which is the same mechanic as any other car racing title. With the races being so fun (they seem more than even horizons), im keen to replay many, so I dont forsee any issues with obraining money needed for progression at all.
Im glad you have enjoyed it. Myself and my wife are both whooping it up and laughing with pleasure playing this game. Its stopped me going back to Starfield for 2 days on the trot - and I really didnt expect that! 😀

@Titntin The game is fun, but now I call it a FH5 light. Done all the races (100%) and my credits account is about 200K. I looked at the Bugatti's and there are about 15 of them with an average of 2M a piece. That is a lot of races for just 1 brand. If I'm not mistaken, the last LBW race gives you the highest amount of money? + Summit Events are weekly, so check those out if you haven't already!

Tbf, when playing the CB I was a bit over the moon (comparing previous entries) and really liked it (completed everything). In hindsight, they could've given a much better UE version.

The reason I bought a plane + boat so soon is because of the CB. I had so much fun combining those during the CB, I was playing like they were already there. I played the CB for 2 days straight, so driving to events wasn't as fun for me because of the annoying (ghost/no ghost) traffic was still there. I have a clip doing a Slalom and all cars are ghosted until the last one changed suddenly in a non ghost car and collided. I rewatched the clip and it was ghosted until the collision.

The drifting, I'm not feeling it yet. It feels like I'm not in control of the car like in FH5 (all settings off & RWD).

The MTX thing, you can play as long as you want, you don't need to use them, I agree, but ... imo, they just don't belong there! (maybe because I already paid €120 for it)

Glad you are enjoying the game and with your wife (that is awesome)

Race games are my favourite genre, so for me the game is still good (low 8) + FH has some competition (still my fave).

Starfield is a game I will play in chunks for years to come .
There are some awesome clips out there:

https://twitter.com/IdleSloth84_/status/1702621112150978833

@Pusher2021 cheers dude appreciate your thoughts and insight 👍

@Titntin Didn't watch reviews until just now. Luke Reilly knows his racing stuff & mostly agree with him (and points out some things I felt during my playthrough)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9y4aXBYy2s8

Well this week yet again proves interesting. Being free of those morning shifts feels oh so very good. Plans this weekend are fairly simple. Play some trails to azure and stay cozy with some football on the tv. Peak Fall vibes and it ain’t even fall. And I definitely wanna go hard on Trails To Azure minus Monday where I wanna do some Future Redeemed I wanna try to beat Azure soon so I can get even closer to playing Trails Into Reverie. Over on the PS5 tonight is a debate between FFXVI and Baldurs Gate III. Im thinking of restarting my play through of BG3 with a Origin character like Shadowheart as I feel it’ll finally click if I do that and I won’t feel Elden Ring levels of choice paralysis. I know BG3 is special I just ain’t gotten to the core yet. Otherwise this week kinda special. Got Bomb Rush Cyberfunk last week and been enjoying it but this week I’ll be nabbing a copy of Mortal Kombat 1 my first real MK game tho I dabbled in 11 a little. Probably take some trades for it too so I can nab some eshop and psn money for The Teal Mask and Phantom Liberty DLCs for Pokémon and Cyberpunk respectively. Very very excited overall just very good vibes. Otherwise the rotation of games is simple as always. On switch we got Zelda TOTK, Pikmin 4, Trails To Azure, Fire Emblem Engage: Fell Xenologue, Xenoblade Chronicles 3: Future Redeemed, and on PS5 we got FFXVI, BG3, Sea of Stars, Tales of Arise, SF6, KOFXV, and Bomb Rush Cyberfunk. Anime of the week of course is a big one this week as we have 4 finales this week meaning you won’t be hearing about these anymore: Atelier Ryza, Ayaka, Liar Liar and Yohane The Parhelion. All excellent shows and they made for great summer watching and I can’t wait to see how they end. Also big shoutout to Bungou Stray Dogs for giving me even more trauma then I already have y’all know what you done. And of course shoutout to my podcasts of the week: Castle Superbeast, Big Think Dimension, Giant Bombcast, Friends Per Second and Remap Radio. As always Happy Gaming to all and have a awesome weekend.

Trying to finish up sea of stars tonight. Other than that, Starfield

After finally completing Dead Space, I used this weekend for finally going on in Lost Judgment and again, Modern Warfare 2.

I tried Crew Motorfest today, and tbh I was kind of stunned by how bad it is compared to Forza Horizon 4 and 5.

Beforehand I thought it was a bit weird how much of a Forza copycat it was, including the whole Motor"fest" theme. But thought oh well, I love driving games, it might be fun anyway.

But man, the physics are laughably bad, especially the "drifting" with just a fake rotation angle snapped on, and no semblance of actual car physics. The sense of speed is also terrible, Forza feels about twice as fast, and Forza is so far ahead in everything else it's not even funny - the world design, the visuals, the races, the road network, the upgrade system, the events, the AI, the animals, the offroading.

If you're going to do arcade handling, at least do it well and make it fast and snappy and precise like Outrun 2 or Ridge Racer, but this game feels so slow and imprecise and wallowy, yet still basic and arcadey with terrible fake drifting.

I played Forza Horizon 4 immediately afterwards and thought wow, now this is a proper driving game

It makes you realise how good Forza's physics are, perfect simcade. Accessible and fun, yet realistic enough with enough weight and inertia to feel like you're driving a car, and solid drift physics with countersteering.

@NintendoByNature About how long do you estimate Sea of Stars takes to complete?

@theduckofdeath 25-27hrs. Worth every minute as I finished last night

@NintendoByNature Thanks. I am playing Starfield now (when I find the time) and got MK1 last week. I'm easily distracted by Game Pass entries. 😄 The big June through August releases haven't been touched. I've heard good things about Sea of Stars and want to give it a shot.

@theduckofdeath you and me both dude. I'm also trying to devote time to starfield but it's a little slower paced. Payday3 sounds nice, solar ash sounds nice, and I'd give lies of P a shake if I wasn't horrible at souls games. I think with Halloween season upon us I'm going to force myself to play RE8 even though it's not on GP.

@NintendoByNature Oh, man...I keep forgetting Lies of P opens up tonight. There are worse problems to have, I guess. The goal has been to put a sizable dent in Starfield, and the last two weekends have been failures in that regard. I'm pretty far along in the RE4 Remake (I made a big push in an attempt to complete it before Starfield).

@theduckofdeath yep, alot coming out in way too short a time frame. I'll probably skip on Lies though, it'll be a waste since I'm terrible at the genre.

I actually didn't buy RE4R since I've played through the original recently. I never thought that game needed a remake. 1 does, 0 does, CV does, but not anything after 4 imo.

Here's hoping you find the time you need 🙂. And here's hoping I can decide if I ACTUALLY wana start up RE 8 tn lol