Agamon

Ah, good point.

Yeah, not only won't you have to kill stuff to try and level up to continue, you fly up in level so fast, there will be a bunch of quests you can ignore because you'll be able to walk right through them (unless they change that for 3).

PC No Man's Sky (315 min) XB1 Slay the Spire (924 min) Busy long weekend with not much gaming taking place (well not much video gaming, some board gaming happened). A couple of sessions of NMS inserted into a bunch of Slay the Spire. Winning a lot more in StS than not this week, now that I've gotten used to the meta of the different decks again.

Arcade Metal Slug X (13 min) Not much this week, but played a bit of Metal Slug X before heading to a movie this weekend.

PC No Man's Sky (686 min) XB1 Slay the Spire (523 min) Still playing NMS. Almost to the point I was at in my pre-Beyond game in my new one, in less than half the time because I know things this time around. Most of the common bugs people were complaining about look to have been taken care of at this point, though I'm still unable to remap my Steam controller touch pad from acting like a thumbstick to acting like a mouse, so I'm using my Xbox controller. I played mouse and keyboard for a while, but dogfighting is tough with that setup. I picked up Slay the Spire on Steam while it was in Early Access last year. Played about 30 hours before moving on. I haven't tried it again since it officially released, but it popped up on Game Pass, so I started again on the XB1. Five runs in and I got to the top of the third level, but didn't quite have enough defense to take out the final boss. Not usually big on roguelikes, but I love deck builders and this game is a lot of fun.

I'm pretty pumped after LGR's review. Looks great.

PC No Man's Sky (1358 min) XB1 Borderlands 2 (134 min) The update for NMS is a tad buggy, but nothing game breaking and the developers are doing a good job squashing them with updates. I've both started a new game, as some fundamental things have changed, but I've also continued my original game, and that works fine. Exploring is a lot of fun in this game, and the storyline is interesting, too. Also still plugging away at BL2 with my brother

Looks awesome. I'll probably wait to try it out, currently stuck in No Man's Sky's grasp. I heard it's not optimized for HOTAS or k&m and that your best bet is a controller, but I haven't looked to closely into why, exactly. Might wait for the console version, if that's actually the case.

I had a few crashes playing before Beyond, and I've had one since. I try to keep the ship nearby to save as much as possible. My biggest issue is remapping controls doesn't take on PC. And they changed the way the Steam controller works (touchpad as joystick = unplayable). 8bitdo controller maps as Switch controller with the buttons reversed (shakes fist at Nintendo). Not even going to bother trying a DS4 or XB1 controller, I've read on Era that people are having issues with those, too. I'm just using mouse and keyboard until they fix it. And that biofuel generator needs to be changed. If it took 50 trees worth of carbon to power your house for an hour IRL, we'd still all be drawing on cave walls.

Inventory spots are increasing from 250 to 10000! Seems excessive, but parts of this game before this update could have known as Inventory Management Simulator, so I'll take it.

This update looks fantastic. https://www.nomanssky.com/beyond-update/

PC No Man's Sky (1758 min) This game is a lot of fun. I looked up what it stared as, and what each update added to it, and the progression is pretty unreal. A big update is coming on Wednesday for VR, multiplayer, and QoL changes. Hello Games really deserves kudos for keeping at it and turning a pretty-looking, but dull, launch game into a great space sim/base building/open world(s) style of game.

Just picked this up on sale, really enjoying it. Just found my 2nd ship, and I'm happy that it feels different flying it compared to the 1st ship. I loved when I found my first non-hazardous environment world. Thought it was great until everything was constantly trying to kill me...lol.

XB1 My Time at Portia (587 min) Pandemic: The Board Game (197 min) Started the week off with some more Portia. Not done with it yet, and I'm closing in on the endgame, but I've spent a lot of time with it, with all the resource collecting, building, exploring, learning things from NPCs, and a bit of fighting, and decided to try something different this weekend. Pandemic was one of the new games on GamePass. I don't like it as a co-op board game, it's too easy for one person to take over and just tell everyone else what their optimal decision should be. So this version works better as a one player puzzle type of game. PC No Man's Sky (615 min) Picked this up during a recent sale, as I've heard it has improved a great deal since its launch. I'm enjoying it quite a bit. It has resource collecting, building, exploring, learning things from NPCs, and a bit of fighting...hmmm, that sounds familiar. But, hey, now I have a space ship, so there's that.

NES Arkanoid (10 min) Bionic Commander (12 min) Played a bit of NES this weekend, but not as much as I'd have liked...

XB1 Blazing Chrome (17 min) My Time at Portia (1329 min) Still plowing away at MtaP. It has a grindy-ness to it, but it's not too bad and there's new things to discover. Blazing Chrome is an interesting Contra-style game that I need to dig into some more.

Ah, yes, that's for certain. Even in the first run, anything more than a few levels above you is a tough fight. More than 10 is next to impossible.

When shipping over the border got bloody insane a dozen or so years ago, I stopped using eBay for the most part, too. I found a ColecoVision collection in Toronto a couple years ago, but haven't used it for years otherwise.

Oof, thanks for the warning. If I ever go to play it again, I'll just start a new game. Though that's unlikely. Great game, but damn, it's long.

I have trouble picking favorites, but I've really enjoyed Fallout 4, Breath of the Wild, Witcher 3, Spider-Man, and Horizon Zero Dawn. Sooo...I guess I do have a favorite type of game...

XB1 Borderlands 2 (133 min) My Life at Portia (1151 min) Dang, I didn't realize what a commitment MLaP would be when giving it a try. Almost 50 hours in, I've evolved only one relationship to "friend", uncovered about a quarter of the map, and have almost finished Year 1. I'll keep playing while I enjoy it, though. I gave up on Stardew Valley in late year 2, so I'll see ho far I keep going with this one.

Not much, but played some 2 on 2 before going to a movie, and tested some hardware with a game of Balloon Fight. Arcade 2 on 2 Open Ice (9 min) NES Balloon Fight (5 min)

For sure. My brother has one, and it works well. Just make sure the dongles and controller have the same version of Bluetooth. The newer controllers have trouble syncing with older versions of the dongle.

For sure. I think this shift is too little, too late. They're about to join Blockbuster in corporate heaven.

Boardgame cafes are literally already things, and are very popular up here in Canada (there's, like 8 of them here in Edmonton). Not sure a "video game cafe" is a thing that would be legal, but someone in Calgary is giving it a go: https://supersmashcafe.ca/