The Groginati Sales Thread

[Gusington]

^That's the way, uh huh uh huh

[bbmike]

So far: The Forest, Niche - a genetics survival game, Stable Orbit, Arms Race - TCWE, Deity Empires, Transport Fever

[Jarhead0331]

So far: The Forest, Niche - a genetics survival game, Stable Orbit, Arms Race - TCWE, Deity Empires, Transport Fever

Let me know if Arms Race is any good. ts been on my wishlist for awhile...

[Toonces]

Pillars, eh?  I might need to finally jump in on this...I feel a strong desire to add to my unplayed RPG list.

[Bardolph]

Picked up Foxhole on sale right before the Winter Sale, and its on sale again now.

Slow paced but have already stayed up way too late several nights in a row. First two nights I mostly did logistics stuff, tonight I decided to go fight.
Got into a fun infantry battle for a half hour or so where we were invading one of the enemy's maps, but we got kicked out. Went to a different part of the world and got into a hilariously fun fight where we lined up 4 halftracks with about 2 squads of infantry in support and were sweeping the enemy before us. Till their tanks and RPG guys showed up. My halftrack blew up and I had forgotten to set my spawn point closer to the battle so I had to walk across most of the map till I found a truck with some fuel left in it but by the time I got back we were in retreat there too. They were rushing AT assets to the front to try and slow the enemy advance. The enemy has had tanks for a day or two now, we just finished researching them tonight and the vets were saying it would take around 6 hours or so for them to start showing up on the frontlines. Tomorrow should be a more even battlefield.

In spite of our tank deficit we are winning the war at the moment. I think.

It's slow, and you can find yourself spending a fair deal of time not fighting, and the isometric 3rd person view and the limitations it imposes can be annoying... but I am digging it so far. Like a slower paced, isometric view Planetside (original). People are working together. People will help you. I see units actually taking the time to form up before attacking.
One very cool thing I heard last night was a message from the fighting close by that reported an enemy tank had shown up and attacked them but after a couple RPG rounds sent its way the tank decided to break off its attack and go find its friends. Can't think of many modern shooter type games where that happens. But here a tank represents a lot of resources and hard work, so most of the players are inclined to treat them as a valuable weapon and not just rush in and get blown up. You respawn, but the tank doesn't. Someone has to build another one.

Not perfect, but it seems like they are working on it and to me it shows some promise. Was easily worth the sale price of $11 ($12 now I think).

[Tuna]

Watching some videos, Foxhole looks pretty good, but it all relies on how well people play with you. Can you team up with friends?

[airboy]

Pillars, eh?  I might need to finally jump in on this...I feel a strong desire to add to my unplayed RPG list.

If you are not planning on playing it in the next six months, I would wait for the price to drop some more.  It is 34% off the original price.  I would also finish the original Pillars of Eternity before getting this.

Pillars magic and item system is diffrerent from D&D based games.  Not bad, not good, just different.  You don't have magic users who can lay waste to everyone.  Your fighters have to deal most of the damage.  Your magic user types are subtracting from your enemies and adding to your friends for the most part.  In the D&D games a lot of the time your fighters are just damage absorbers so your magic users can blast down the opponents.

Pillars also does not have overwhelming powerful items.  You cannot armor up to be unhittable, you don't have weapons that by themselves lay waste to everything, and you don't have wands of blasting to blow away your opponents.  You have to coordinate all of your party members and the combat is more subtle than D&D type systems.

Until I grasped the significance of the Pillars system I was frustrated.

[JasonPratt]

I've been watching Foxhole for a while. I like how it seems to be a "war story" generator, in effect. The following review is somewhat typical of good experiences in the game:

When I was originally deployed, I spent my first day gathering scrap in Meta for our brothers fighting down South. Spent three hours, nonstop just gathering scrap and materials, giving it to people who would deliver it to the battlefront.

Upon arriving back at Meta the following morning, a truck pulled up to my scrap heap. Telling me that men were needed on the front line, I loaded into the truck with a gun and rode to the battlefront. It was a three minute ride, so the boys and I were talking amongst ourselves. It was all our first time going into combat, we were excited to see it first hand.

Then we arrived.

We were pinned down at Husk, enemies were advancing over the bridge and we were being mowed down like flies. I had a medic kit and was doing my best to keep people alive, but you can't save everyone. Mortars were blasting our position, and after forty-five minutes I thought we were going to be overrun. Just as this thought crosses my mind, a half-track blows past me with the gunner screaming for men to follow the vehicle.

We pushed halfway across the bridge, further than we had been all morning. The half track kept pushing, but was blown to hell after an RPG hit it. The enemies ended up blowing the bridge behind my squad, there were ten of us. We had to hold the line until that was rebuilt, which would allow for reinforcements to let us make it across the rest of the bridge.

Then there were only three left beside me. I watched six men get murdered, friends I'd grown attached to during this hours long battle. I was on a machine gun, and I fired and fired and fired at any enemies I could see. Screaming at them. The four of us, held the line for fifteen whole minutes before reinforcements arrived. Once they did, we were able to take the bridge and advance onto the Jade Cove.

This is just one of many stories I have in this game. If you want a persistent game, where every action you make matters to the war, buy this right away. This is the best purchase I've made in a while.

Looks like a game that the Grogs (and ArmDrags ;) ) would enjoy together a lot.  O:-)

[Bardolph]

Watching some videos, Foxhole looks pretty good, but it all relies on how well people play with you. Can you team up with friends?

Yes. Sort of. LOL. You can form a squad once you gain the rank of Corporal or above. But there doesn't seem to be much difference in gameplay. They seem to leave such things up to the players. You can just as easily "form a squad" by playing together with your buddies. The only thing I could see was by forming a squad of at least 5 players and having the rank of Sgt you can then place markers on the map.
I generally dislike the trend towards handholding in games, where everything has a big glowing icon so you don't have to think too much. So I don't mind that my squad didn't get different color icons from the rest of my side, or that they didn't show up on the map any differently. Kinda like when I was in the army, except they didn't show up on the map at all then lol! We were still able to work together, we just had to communicate and navigate. I'm ok with that.

I could see it being fun with a good group, the same way Planetside was a blast with a good group.

[Huw the Poo]

Yeah it does look pretty good, but I'm not buying it while it's in early access.

[GroggyGrognard]

All of this discussion of Foxhole has perked my interest in the game. Looks and sounds like a lot of fun, even for an early access game.

*sigh* Too many priorities, too many games, and not enough time.



Groggy

[Bardolph]

I'm having fun with it. But it is quirky, and can be frustrating at times. Combat is generally fought at the edge of the screen due to the isometric view, and the good players rotate their view to use the corners of the screen to maximize their view distance. I know this, but tend to forget it when the bullets start flying. If you can't catch a ride it can be a long walk to the front. Fortunately most folks are happy to give you a ride if they have room but sometimes you walk.

One nice thing is if you just want to kick back on a low stress mode but still contribute to the war effort you can just go do logistics for a while. Mining resources or making the stuff needed to keep the fight going, or driving a truck to haul troops to the front etc.

Like I said before, I easily got my $12 out of it already. Got a library full of games I paid a lot more for that I've barely played, or not played at all.
If you liked Running with Rifles this is along the same lines with deeper logi side of things.


Sorry for the thread derail.

[Pete Dero]

https://www.gog.com/game/distant_worlds_universe?pp=a93c168323147d1135503939396cac628dc194c5

Distant Worlds : Universe   -85% !  54.99 8.29 €

[Tpek]

So far: The Forest, Niche - a genetics survival game, Stable Orbit, Arms Race - TCWE, Deity Empires, Transport Fever

How is Deity Empires.
I'm really considering purchasing it.

How does it compare to Dominions?

[bbmike]

So far: The Forest, Niche - a genetics survival game, Stable Orbit, Arms Race - TCWE, Deity Empires, Transport Fever

How is Deity Empires.
I'm really considering purchasing it.

How does it compare to Dominions?

I haven't play it yet but I did fire it up to see what it looked like. My initial impression is that it is much like Master of Magic. I don't think it compares to Dominions (at least not yet).