What are you playing this week?

Minecraft. I’ve gotten sucked in all over again, lol. Happens every other year at this point

Last of Us part 1. Never played a Last of Us, but streaming to the steam deck has got me playing more single player games.

Jet Set Radio Future!
- Stellar game. Looking forward to Bomb Rush Cyberfunk.
  
  Bomb Rush Cyberfunk is the reason I'm replaying JSRF all these years later! I'm (im)patiently waiting for its release
- Man, I loved that game and played the hell out of it when I first got it. The music is just so damn good that I still listen to it despite not playing for so many years.
  
  The music is so fucking good in JSRF and JSR. I've had the tracks in playlists for years despite not touching JSRF since I was a kid with access to the OG Xbox. It's a shame it was never brought up to any other platform so I'm forced to emulate

Returnal
God this game is difficult
- That game looks super cool. Will prob buy it when it’s on a deeper steam sale.

V rising. I'm playing on my own server with just my husband on occasion. At this point it's mostly barbie dream house. I send the servants off to farm and keep redecorating.
I'm a little conflicted about having a prison in my house though. My husband tells me I'm a vampire so that makes it ok.

Finished the campaign for D4 over the weekend, still lightly dipping into TOTK, trying not to rush through it.
Waiting for the first season to not burnout on D4, probably in need of picking up another game here soon. Really could go from something like Stardew….

So much Street Fighter 6. I've played fighting games my whole life, but I'm enjoying taking this one a little more seriously. I still suck in online but am slowly improving! Also playing Back 4 Blood with some friends, which is always fun!

For me:
Wo Long, again, on the PS5 this time and with the Season Pass. I'm a freak so I'll get it done before the first DLC drops this week
FFXVI. I have many, many thoughts about this game right now but I'll hold my tongue until I finish it. i probably will.
PSO2:NG. I'm done with grad school so I'm delving into those big, forever games again. FFXIV is boring to me now so I thought I'd give NG a try. I played PSO2 a lil bit now and again. if you play this lemme know! I'm on Ship 3, but I literally just started, so
Battle Bit Remastered. The only FPS I've ever been good at is Apex. This is not that, but it's fun and low stakes so I'll take it.
Ender Lilies and Afterimage. I've been on a Metroidvania kick lately
Street Fighter 6. still searching for my main (and my skill in this game)
- I've been playing "Haiku the Robot" that was recently featured in Humble's Metroidvania bundle. It's a really nice, small Hollow Knight clone.

I somehow skipped over Hollow Knight until now. I'm playing that this week, and maybe forever.
The game is dope.
- I'm not a gamer.
  I beat the original Contra on NES and I've barely played anything ever except the first Animal Crossing and AC:NH during the pandemic.
  I picked up Hollow Knight for Christmas last year and it's the first game I've played to completion in literally 35 years. I just got [no spoilers] ending with 105% completion like two weeks ago.
  I can't begin to convey how much I love this game. It's definitely what I'm (still) playing this week.
  
  Right? It's just that good!
- Slight spoiler warning:
  Same for me. I put it down for a few days after failing Mantis Lords and Soul Master and getting salty about the bench placements, but after watching this video on why the Mantis Lords are fantastically designed , I picked it up again and start to really enjoy it – winning both of these boss fights in two attempts. Before engaging them again, it was worth exploring more and getting stronger. The game doesn't communicate well how strong you currently are (e.g., by not having health bars for the bosses). The best clue was to see how well you can score against the standard monsters in that area.

I finished Overload this weekend, so I'm wandering through my backlog looking for a next thing that sticks with me for more than five minutes. Oxygen Not Included doesn't seem to be cutting it, so.. we'll see. I've got Cataclysm: DDA around as a light diversion until I get pulled into something, and there's always Guild Wars 2 and Deep Rock Galactic.

Deep Rock Galactic on my own (rock and stone!), Stardew Valley with my wife, and Boomerang Fu with my kids. I'm visiting family next week, so I'll need to decide on something to play on my Deck.

Tears of the Kingdom as I have been every day since it came out and as I likely will every day until I've one hundred percented it.

- I played the heck out of it too! The base building mechanics are pretty satisfying. I do like how they've set up exploration, and I can't wait to see some of the location designs, plus once they build up combat, it may create a pretty fun loop. The underdust is a pretty cool location too, hopefully it gets more than the one variant soon. That being said, I do think the roadmap is a pretty achievable one, and it'll keep people coming back when there are major updates.

Playing Cyberpunk 2077 for the first time and having a lot of fun
- I wish I could forget the game and start again (hoping for something along those lines once the Phantom Liberty update dropps lol) Enjoy!

I started playing Battletech... (thank you Gog summer sale)
- I've been into the BattleTech universe since I was a kid (when I first got MechWarrior 2 on Win95), and nothing has frustrated me quite as hard as some BattleTech missions.
  There are some mega mod packs for that game too that drastically change the ruleset (hit mechanics, how cover and evasion works, etc) as well as add in hundreds of new units ('Mechs, armor, VTOLs, even Clan Elemental infantry if you're playing one of the post-3050 mods). RogueTech is absolutely fucking infuriating, but so far it's the closest you can get to tabletop rules.
  
  Thank you! Are these the expansion packs? Or are these user mods?

Recently started playing Project Zomboid. It's a slow burn, but very satisfying when you make any kind of progress.

I've just picked up Brotato yesterday, it's a roguelike bullet hell where you build up your character and try to survive 20 waves using loads of different weapons and items. The great thing is you control your character with just one analog stick, but it's a lot harder than it sounds. Reminds me a lot of old flash games I used to play as a kid. I've only played for a few hours so far and managed to win one run. Personally, I love the experience of figuring out a gameand working out optimal strategies, an itch which Slay the Spire has been scratching for a long time for me. I can already tell I'm going to invest a lot of time into this game, I was hooked right from the beginning. Loving the sound of SMG bullets decimating entire hordes of enemies. Well worth picking up on steam, plays really well on the steam deck. The game is only £4 at full price, and it's 20% off right now.

Stellaris, all day every day. I'm not exaggerating either. Last weekend you could play it for free, so I thought why not give it a shot, you know? I like sci-fi themed games and I haven't played a 4X game in a while. So I give it a shot and... it's suddenly 1AM. So I buy the game. And most of the earlier expansions.
And now I play it every day. And when I'm not playing the game, I think about it. What will I research? How can I improve my economy? Will I attack my dickhead neighbours for laying claim to MY systems? Nah, just kidding. I'm actually thinking on HOW I'm going to attack them. A game hasn't hooked me this bad in a long while.
- You know what's the worst part of Stellaris? Every time you think that you know all the content and that it's getting boring, the devs just crank out a new DLC that significantly alters how the game plays.
  So, it gets another couple of play-throughs.

Got Fallout 4 with all the DLC for a steal so I am currently enjoying that. Also Battlebits Remastered on and off again.
- Mannnn.... I really want to enjoy battlebits. Looks like it captures the old battlefield 'feel' really well. It's just super unfortunate that they are switching to an anti-cheat service that requires kernel access. Even if it didn't break compatibility with my system, which it will, on principle that's just too much trust given regarding my computer imho.

Pathfinder: Kingmaker. Great RPG with half baked kingdom management tacked on. I'm still enjoying myself though.
Also, obligatory Tears of the Kingdom. I'm trying really hard to stay focused on saving Hyrule despite the dozens of distractions pouncing on me at every turn.

Just finished TotK and now playing FFXVI. Both games have been absolutely amazing in their own ways.

Tears of the Kingdom, still.

reliving my childhood on call of duty. picture an old man yelling at a screen and you get the idea.
looking for something new though. resource management, 4x maybe, but nothing deep.

A lot of timberborn.
I can't allow myself to use the speedup controls in games, and I'm playing iron teeth (newly revamped) but for some insane reason I'm not letting myself build engines, and i made droughts longer, so basically 50% of the time i have no power and all my bots don't work.
Lol

Tears of the Kingdom on the go, Ghostwire Tokyo when I’m at home!
Also catch up once a week with a buddy to slowly work our way through Diablo 4

Just finished Tunic. I shan't spoil the game since I encourage people to go in blind, but it has so much charm in it and focuses on such a unique sense of nostalgia.
- I plan on getting to Tunic eventual. I'm on Zelda totk and then probably Silksong when it drops, but I need to try Tunic as well.

Hogwarts Legacy.
I kinda stopped playing since it came out I was so busy with university.
Now that I’m finished I can finally pick it up again!!
Also apex legends on the side. I don’t know what it is about the game but I can’t stop playing it, even though it just pisses me off lol
Anyone else can relate?
- I need to start up Hogwarts again soon. I’ve been so distracted by other games that it fell on the wayside even though I was loving it.
- 100% feel you on Apex. I played a bunch on console, decent decent, and could ride through the pissed-off-ness. Moved to PC and the struggle is real. Still love it but ooof.

- Tried it a couple of days ago but was unable to figure out how to interact with the world aside from talking to people... I'm into old games so I will probably try again some time tho

Factorio. Way too much Factorio.
- I feel you.
  
  It is with very good reason called Cracktorio

Final Fantasy XVI, I’m 70% in, and I’m having a real good time.
The story is interesting and keeps you going, not convoluted or opaque like in 13 or 15.
The sidequests are very boring at first, and still mostly fetch quests / fight certain enemies, but they eventually reward you with background story of the side characters, and some of them are pretty good.
The combat keeps throwing you new stuff with a good pace.
The eikon fights are what we can get as close to Asura's Wrath sequel. Every big fights are just hype
Also the music is top notch.
This game is gonna end up as one of my top 3 favorite mainline FF games.
(edit, deleted original post, since I accidentally clicked on post before finished writing)

My friends and I have been getting back into Team Fortress 2. Still tons of fun after all these years, especially the jump maps
- Is the bot situation better now?
  
  Much better. I've seen maybe 2 bots in the past month or so and they were kicked pretty quickly

Battlebit remastered! And deep rock galactic

Beat Celeste so decided to try Ori & the Blind Florest and I like it so far. Also been playing Battlebit occasionally and started Horizon Zero Dawn.
- If you enjoy Ori I’d recommend looking into Hollow Knight if you’ve not played it yet. Fantastic game.

FFVIII

Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen. Started it last year but fell off because of how tedious it was. With the announcement of a sequel I thought I'd get back to it. The combat is really something enjoyable.

Raft, still trying to find the last painting.
Also dabbled in Insurgency for the first time in a while.

Brotato.

Don't Starve Together. It's ruining my life since a friend gifted it to me.

I’ve been playing through Octopath Traveler 2 but I got a bit burnt out on it and wanted something different so I picked up Rimworld yesterday and am really liking it so far. Lost my first colony to starvation because I hunted all of the animals and then left them to rot! 😂
- How was Octopath Traveler 1? I started playing it, but it seems a bit easy.
  
  I actually didn’t play the first one. I heard that the second one is better so I decided to skip the first one.

Souldiers was on sale, and I have been wanting to play the game for a really long time. It got a lot of flack on it's release, because of bugs and performance issues, as well as complaints about difficulty, and class viability.
Well, IDK if the devs had to fix a lot of it or what, but it is in great shape now, and I kinda regret not playing it earlier. This game is fantastic! Great action RPG mechanics, combined with really great encounter design. All set in beautiful pixel art. I think it is kind of a mistake for it to throw you in a hard dungeon right away, and that is turning a lot of people off. But the design of all the encounters had me get through it.
I really like this game, and think the reception it got right off the bat is super unfortunate. I hope the developers aren't discouraged from making something else like this again, and can instead file off the rough edges that made it unpalatable to a large audience. I feel like the quality of the graphics really drew a lot of people in that weren't down for what Souldiers was going for. But it is quickly becoming my favorite metroidvania-ish action platformer RPG.

I got a good deal on Assassin's Creed II and finally figured out how to hook up an x-box controller to my PC (yes, I'm dumb). I never played any of the AC games other than the first one when it originally came out, so I'm excited to get done with work and give it a shot.

Currently investing some time back in ESO for a bit to check out the newly released Archanist class... not super impressed so far tbh. I mostly play GW2 these days so coming back into ESO again everything feels super clunky and slow for some reason, yikes. On single player titles, I have been dipping into The Witcher 3 a bit since I recently got a new rig that can run it at top settings, which is nice.
- Those are my two main MMO's. I was grinding GW2 hard when the new ESO expansion dropped and I've been eyeing it. Seems the new class is meh. Even LuckyGhost seemed to drop it quick. So maybe pass on this one for now?

Zelda Minish cap, super mario bros, and some pokemon Gold. just been feeling the childhood games lately
- Oh damn good idea. I will get out the emulator and play some good old Nintendo games as well. thanks for the pointer.

I remain enthralled by TotK
- Second. I'm taking my time and enjoying the exploration and everything. I'm sure this will keep me busy for a few months before I move to find Silksong.
  
  I'm some ~150 hours into it at this point, haven't even gone near the depths beneath the castle. Crazy how much content there is in this game; My wife and I want to play Diablo 4 together at some point soon, but for the moment we've just been cuddling up and both playing Zelda instead ... basically since it came out.

Zelda, Tears of the Kingdom. Still. And probably for the next few months ;)

Sea of Thieves. Always.

Satisfactory. Still got to complete that last step. And put trains everywhere. Can't seem to help it.

I went Diablo 4 to Diablo 3 to Last Epoch currently. Pretty fun so far.
- Tried grim dawn?

Street Fighter 6! My first fighting game and the controls are difficult af, but I'm enjoying the learning process :)

Elden Ring again after taking a break from it for a while. Exploring new areas, it's fun.
- Been thinking of starting it again. After a mage and double claymore playthrough, it would be time for a spear/longsword run.

Playing mostly Honkai Star Rail, and I’m in the middle of a Mass Effect trilogy run - quite literally, since I’m halfway through ME2.

Detroit become human is great! The universe is incredible
- I found it surprisingly nuanced, one of the few games where I will sit through the cutscenes
  
  I wasn't expecting much, I just heard of it and tried it out but it's good!! The question of ai conscience feels very pertinent rn and the story is fun. I like the choices and different paths that we can take

Caves of Qud & Rain World

Been hard on Diablo 4
and OSRS on the side because the grind never stops!
- I got Diablo 4 with a gfx card bundle and haven't opened it yet. I need to get on that. Do you know how good the co-op is?
  Also logged into my pure for a screenshot (Combat lvl 73.4). Was planning on getting strength up before I stopped playing. I love the wilderness in osrs, nothing else like it.