WHAT VIDEOGAMES ARE YOU PLAYING RIGHT NOW?

author=Craze
Just bought NV during the Halloween Steam sale. I'm starting it today, hopefully, now that I've finally released Wine & Roses.

The heck? Don't tell me that the offer lasted only one day.

I am trying to finish Persona 4 Arena at the moment.

Next up on my list is Resident Evil 6 and Corpse Party Book Of Shadows. :P

I started playing the mobile version of Need for Speed: Most Wanted last night. I've been a fan of the series since way back with NFS2 on the original Playstation, but I've been a bit disillusioned and turned off by the series for the past few years. Needless to say, these new interpretations of Hot Pursuit and Most Wanted are actually REALLY fun and I never thought that I'd enjoy a racing game on my phone. It's also worth noting that the mobile version of Most Wanted looks really beautiful.

I've also been playing Primal Carnage a lot on Steam with some friends. What a fun little game that is! It's definitely the best dinosaurs versus humans game that I've ever played. There is actual strategy involved, and it's great to see teamwork being encouraged so much in the game. You'll die extremely quickly if you go rambo, especially if you're playing a human. The only character that can work well all alone is the novaraptor since they're all about being sneaky and attacking from the rear. It's a BLAST to play as a raptor and pounce on and kill unsuspecting rogue humans who are simply trying to find other humans to group with. Anyone who likes dinosaurs and/or PvP really should check out Primal Carnage because it's a surprisingly enjoyable game. Plus additional content will all be free. This includes new game modes, maps and classes that the developers are going to add over time.

http://armorgames.com/play/13132/monsters-den-chronicles

Will probably make a topic on it soon. It's an absolutely fabulous dungeon crawl with cloud saving if you're logged in to Armor Games or Kongregate (wherever you're playing). One of the two flash games I've actually bought the premium content for.

Enchanted Arms. Besides the crappy voice acting. I don't mind it.

author=0range00
I looked that Primal Carnage up, looks very interesting! Looked like Turok done right. I'm gonna start playing that with my brother once I get some time for new games..

Unsurprisingly, it feels a lot like Jurassic Park. The raptors and T-Rex sound exactly like the Jurassic Park versions, and some of the maps just ooze this sort of Jurassic Park vibe in droves. The abandoned facility in the jungle is probably the biggest culprit.

The best part of the game is the balance. Both sides are pretty evenly matched and it's actually a lot of fun to play either team. You'd think that in a dinosaurs vs humans game most people would want to be dinosaurs, but the human side is just as cool and interesting thanks to the varied classes.

I'm playing Mass Effect 3.

Soon I'll be able to read books in the dark without a light!

I caved and bought Assassin's Creed 3 the other day. I'm only about two or three hours in, but I'm enjoying the game so far despite not using Connor yet. Haytham is a cool character, but since he isn't wearing the iconic assassin's robe, I'm not really feeling 100% immersed in my sneaky activities yet.

I've been replaying Dragon Age 2 again. I don't know what got me in the mood... I guess I needed a little more Varric in my life. This time I played as an archer rogue. This is the second time I've played it on nightmare difficulty and the third time total, so I have some final thoughts about class/character balance.

Warriors
Aveline is the best companion. She's the only character who is better at a role than Hawke, due to the lack of a proper tank specialization. Massive damage resistance and knockback/stun immunity make her pretty immovable.

Fenris really doesn't bring anything unique to the table. All of his unique abilities are mostly pulled from Hawke's specialization but with a different name. They should've given his unique tree more disruption/crowd control abilities to make up for the fact that he doesn't take a hit as well as Aveline. His damage is poor unless the enemy is affected by BRITTLE, in which case Mighty Blow is pretty powerful (but this is a generic Two-Hand ability that Hawke also has access to as a warrior).

As a damage-oriented warrior, Hawke is the strongest. The Berserker specialization has a lot of boons that nobody else can access. She probably does higher melee damage than Isabela in this spec, but can actually take a hit and brings superior disruption via the Warmonger and Templar trees. As a tank, Hawke is respectable. She doesn't take a hit as well as Aveline but she brings better disruption via the Templar specialization. Like Aveline, Hawke will do completely negligible damage in this role. In nightmare you can get away with a 2H Hawke as your tank, but you will probably have more fun if Aveline tanks while you smash things. A shield Hawke will tank Nightmare just fine.

Rogues
Varric is awesome. His unique crossbow allows you to pump Cunning because you don't need to meet Dexterity requirements for new weapons. His unique tree actually makes him competitive with archer Hawke against elites/bosses because of his ridiculous attack speed. He doesn't bring the same burst damage as archer Hawke though, so he can't point at the mage that is about to wipe the entire party with a lightning spell and melt it with one blow. If Hawke isn't a rogue, Varric is the clear choice.

Isabela is probably the worst character in the game. In order to be effective you either have to micromanage every action she takes or load her up with defensive abilities and tactics. By loading her out this way, she does considerably less damage than Varric and Hawke. The alternative is to see her dead corpse on the ground during every fight, which is even less useful than when she's alive and stabbing.

Hawke destroys Isabela as a melee rogue. Because you are likely controlling Hawke most of the time you are able to give her the proper micromanagement to make a melee rogue effective. Her specialization trees are powerful--especially Assassin. Your burst is absurd and your steady damage against elites/bosses is equally absurd. A melee rogue Hawke is the highest single target damage you can get in the game and is also a lot of fun to play. Archer Hawke does quite a bit less damage but is a lot safer, and it's a pretty fair trade. Archer Hawke is less fun, though.

Mages
Merril sucks, but doesn't suck as much as Isabela. The problem with blood magic in Dragon Age 2 is you can't stack sustained spells as easily as in Origins. And even if you could, Merril doesn't have access to the Creation tree for Heroic Aura and Haste is now an activated ability rather than a sustained buff. Blood magic requires you to eat up extra tactics slots to account for healing immunity, which is also a concern. She does more damage than Anders because she has access to both the Elemental -and- Primal trees, but the Primal tree is crap and doesn't make up for the lack of access to Creation. The Tempest spell is a bad joke.

Anders is solid and will likely be your healer. His crowd damage is good enough because the Elemental tree is so awesome. His unique ability tree is hit and miss. Vengeance mode makes him immune to healing so it requires the same goofy tactics as blood magic to make him effective, but his Panacea aura brings respectable healing. I actually don't even use Panacea anymore, even on Nightmare, because his mana is better spent on disruption spells (some of which are sealed off when Panacea is active). Anders is probably the most important companion if Hawke isn't a mage, but he is still pretty good even if she is.

Hawke is better at nearly every role than all of her companions, but the gap between Hawke and the other mages is more like the Grand Canyon. You can ignore blood magic. As a damage dealer, force magic brings more crowd damage and also gives all of your spells disruption capabilities by adding massive knockback to all of them. Only enemies with impressive fortitude will ever get a chance to act while Hawke bombards them with fire and ice. Where mage Hawke really shines is as a spirit healer. Healing Aura has bigger range and twice the potency of Anders' Panacea. Group Heal has twice the potency as Anders' Aid Allies. Revival has twice the potency and a fraction of the cooldown of Regroup. As a bonus, your party is also immune to Injury. Basically, spirit healer is at least twice as effective as Anders' equivalent spells. The amount of healing Hawke brings to a fight lets you ignore basically every mechanic in the game. This actually makes the game less fun. The only downside to a pure spirit healer is the Arishok duel takes like thirty minutes.

The optimal party is probably spirit healer Hawke, Aveline, Varric, and Anders. You can heal through everything, AoE everything, deal solid single-target damage, and you get the immeasurable benefit of Varric's commentary on every scenario.

I recommend giving Dragon Age a spin when you find the time, kentona. DA2 is a flawed game that I enjoy a lot n spite of that. The characters and improved combat mechanics carry it for me. That said, DA:O is a better game overall.

When you do get around to them, whatever difficulty you play and enjoy DA:O in... increase that setting one tier when you play DA2. DA2 has a reputation as lacking tactical depth, but this is only because Bioware dialed back the default difficulty a bit from DA:O. Normal is a touch hard for what is "normal" in most RPGs, but they definitely turned the dial too far backwards for DA2, which is most enjoyable at hard.

DA2's combat plays out basically the same way as DA:O's (albeit without the option for a tactical camera angle, which I never used but many players did), but they increased the number of ways abilities from varying classes can interact and compound their potency, so the tactical depth is actually even greater and a lot more satisfying. The character skill trees are also more balanced, offer divergent development paths, and can be mixed and matched in more compelling ways.

Both games have a tactics system that you use to configure the AI for your characters. It works similarly to FF12's gambit system except it has fewer but far more flexible and intelligent conditions. If you don't want to manage tactics, you can use the default AI behaviors which function more or less the same as they do in Baldur's Gate. Or, you can disable behavior entirely and micromanage your party via the pause button.