Good to know. I’m still working through the story and will try conquest again once I’m done. We tried it in co-op and got our asses kicked.
Having multiple paths to victory is important and a military AKA Domination victory is among the hardest. (The wolf clans entire focus at the expense of all else)
The Boar clan specializes on the Wisdom victory but they can also easily switch to other victories as well, Trade, Fame, and including even Domination, but only late game. They start as a small snowball rolling down hill. They are all but unstoppable late game if you know what to do.
Your population increases with each territory you gain and there are no happiness penalties regarding non-upgraded houses. This is a huge pressure value release and net gain. But you can go even further: The Defensive military tree increases your population further by building watch towers in every territory…, you win by pure attrition as long as you can feed everyone.
Ohh good to know. Thank you!
Also since your population is increasing by other means you rarely have to build houses, so the ignore house penalty is largely extraneous, but still helpful, in a rich get richer sense. I think I built between 2-3 houses tops. Food is really your only concern, which is quite unlike every other clan that has to build houses and upgrade them to increase pop & maintain happiness, in addition to food. The boar clan can just ignore the former.
OP.
Furthermore one of their unique clan skill tree options is increasing production on all non-upgraded buildings, effectively upgrading all non-upgraded buildings. Ridiculous.
We hear you:) We were playing the other day and Soren said “boy! I am really happy with the game, I really wanted to continue with one more turn!” So, while yes, it is his game, we make games we want to play and continue playing. I feel this way about Offworld Trading Company!
I really enjoyed reading through all the comments in this thread, many on here suggested new games and gave feedback on games I want to play around the Holidays, the comments are highly informative. I should probably make my own list and share it, but it will be very similar to some on this thread.
I will take a moment to wish everyone Happy Holidays, hang in there, we’d love to hear your thoughts on our game, so please tag us.
This is a good dry run for the 2020 best of, so let’s go my steam and gog purchase history:
Amid Evil - it’s no DUSK. It tips a bit too far into abstract vs representational space for me, but it’s still a neat retro shooter.
Resonance of Fate/End of Eternity - Well. That was a weird take on a JRPG.
Return of the Obra Dinn - Kind of excruciatingly clever. I think I respect it more than I like it, but I still like it a lot.
Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones - It’s clearly trying to bite off more than it can chew, and the end is super truncated, but I dunno, I really liked this one?
Encased - It’s an early access purchase, but I like what I’ve seen so far.
RimWorld - I don’t know what I can say about RimWorld that hasn’t already been said.
Metro Exodus - It’s a good open world shooter, but this was the point where Silent Artyom hit the breaking point for me - talk to your wife you fucking dipshit!
Resident Evil 3 - I think it’s fine? Coming off one of the very best games of recent years, “fine” is a letdown, and every space could do with like 20% more room to breathe, but I still 100%:ed it.
Final Fantasy XII The Zodiac Age - I played a bit of this back in the PS2 days, but I forgot how extremely Star Wars Prequel it is. (In art design, not writing.) You can feel the strains of its production down to the fact tat the protagonist is just wrong for the story, but I still love it.
Onninaki - it’s a weird action JRPG that is engaging and upsetting for the first half, and then progressively falls apart.
ATOM RPG Trudograd: Another early access purchase. It’s more polished and contained than its predecessor.
Wildfire: A quasi-immersive sim stealth pixel art platformer, whose gameplay verbs lean more into Dishonored than Thief. I thought it was neat.
Persona 4 Golden: It’s Persona 4 Golden.
TROUBLESHOOTER: Abandoned Children - It’s Manhwa XCOM. It’s probably the most time I’ve spent with a game this year. The way it unfolds its narrative is so extremely clumsy I wish didn’t care about anything that happened, but when I’m playing with the charcters on the board, I can’t help it.
Immortal: Unchained - a very ok b-tier Dark souls clone.
The Surge - Also an ok Dark Souls clone…but I think I prefer the rhythms of Immortal unchained.
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night - A compellingly tacky Castlevania clone.
Observation - Hmm. Probably more clever than good. It is very clever though.
Terminator: Resistance - The low-rent Fallout 4 clone that I like more than Fallout 4.
Final Fantasy XIII - Visually, this still hold up pretty well. Gameplay-wise, it does not. In terms of narrative, I don’t think even it knows what it’s doing.
That visual novel binge I went on:
The Song of Saya - Yikes. I mean, I really liked it, I think. But yikes.
428 Shibuya Scramble - Pretty cool, until the branch permutations you need to get through to hit the end become maddening.
AI: The Somnium Files - Neat premise, I liked the twists and turns, the qte action sequences stray a biiit too much into absurdist comedy for its own good.
Death Come True - The fact that it’s full-on FMV makes me like it more tbh, and keeps it snappy. Plus, I found the low-rent effect surprisingly effective.
The Halo Master Chief Collection Purchase
Halo: CE - I played it way back when, but it still kind of holds up, repetitive encounter design aside. It’s also probably the most functionally written of the bunch?
Halo 2 - On the other hand this doesn’t. The story is a very dumb space opera, doesn’t conclude, it’s tuned too hard, and has a bunch of “fuck you” encounter design.
Halo 3 - A return to form, and the best of the main trilogy in my book. Encounter design is back on track, the flood is the best it’s been.
Halo: ODST - My favourite of the bunch. Nathan Fillion supplies some actual charisma even if his model looks blatantly incorrect, great mood, the open world even if its anemic does wonders for the pacing.
Halo: Reach - Ehh, it’s fine. The tuning dips back into too hard territory again, it supplies some cool sci-fi imagery - launching into atmosphere will never not make me stand up and yell “Nice!” - but it’s a prequel, we know where it’s going, and Cortana showing up in the way she does makes me go wtf?
G String - A Half-Life 2 mod gone out of control, and a drunk impulse purchase. It’s not great, but also very impressive for a one-woman joint. The gameplay is awkward, but the aesthetics are extremely my jam. Ultimately though, what I will remember from it is not the annoying traversal and floor is lava puzzles, but the bit where you’re desperately trying to sprint to safety through an oncoming hurricane while the soundtrack samples some dipshit nattering about all the ways humanity has conquered nature in a moment that feels perfectly 2020.
Wasteland 3 - It’s a sequel to Wasteland 2 that’s less sprawling and more polished. It’s a fun time, and I appreciate that they shrunk down the scope and stakes.
Crusader Kings 3 - Sadly, a case of having played 200+ hours of CK2 making me pre-emptively burn out on this one.
Cyberpunk 2077: TBD, an amount of patches and a 3080 purchase later.
Blade Runner - Blade runner still rules.
Metal Gear Solid - This game totally works in so many ways, and is so awkward in so many others.
Metal Gear - This totally doesn’t though. It’s like pulling teeth, playing this.
Metal Gear Solid V - Totally fucking rules, and between this, Death Stranding and the Yakuza games, it feels weird to realize the vast majority of my favourite open world games are Japanese.
Yakuza: Like a Dragon - It’s a new Yakuza game. I always like these, but this is like the most extremely Yakuza a Yakuza game has ever Yakuza’d. It’s the goofiest these game’s have been, it’s the most earnest and urgent one of these games have ever felt. It’s my game of the year by a country mile.
So you’d recommend this game, even now? It’s been out for so many years, I figured I missed my chance. But I noticed it’s on sale for 3 more days for $10.
It’s worth $10. Graphically it does show its age, and in my opinion it becomes too easy before the game ends and the (included DLC) kicks you in the face 5x harder, but it does have a few dungeons I really enjoyed exploring, and trying out the combat system justifies the purchase alone (fighting a Chimera is just so cool).
There’s some stuff that doesn’t work for me, like the crafting, but it was worth playing.
- A villain.
- Must be a villain.
- Can only be a villain.
- Villain!!
(I laughed)
I’m going to say, in a game with a lot of dubious writing, that is straight up capitalized for emphasis Good Writing.
I’m really enjoying what I played so far. I just played (yesterday) that mission in the Prophecy Park where you meet a lot of characters (including the “Villain!” one) and I’ll say that those very short moments got me not only intrigued, but actually caring about some of the characters I saw for mere minutes. That is good writing or design or whatever. ;)
BTW, are Alisa or Ray or Irene or Bianca romantic options for Albus? Because I’m already SHIPPING THEM ALL
I liked the scene/moment where Irene is alone and they play Somewhere over the Rainbow.
I am currently playing this on PC and love it. Kinda like Skyrim with better combat. You can have a party and craft items and follow quests.
The best game this year for me was not Bloodborne, Doom 2016, Resident Evil 2 Remake (almost) and other games I started or continued this year.
No, it was Inside Such a great, unique atmossphere and the puzzles are really great and logical. And the final is amazing, the build-up to the final hour was brilliant. They are working on a new game for a long time, supposed to leave the 2D plane and enter a 3D design. I wonder, what they will come up with.