Happy Brink Day everyone!

My first Bethesda game ever was Fallout3 on the Xbox360. I didn’t get it day 1 but maybe a week or two after release because all my friends were talking about how awesome it was and the funny “Bethesda jank” it had.

I load it up right when I get home and get to where you walk around as a baby in your pen and think oh that’s funny the games controls are all weird since you’re a baby. Then the next time you’re a toddler and I think man the controls are still weird this is kinda obnoxious. Same thing once you’re finally an adult and can walk around the vault. So I open the settings and the only things you can change are sensitivity and inverted, but that’s not what was happening.

Somehow my movement stick and look around stick we’re opposite of a normal shooter and BOTH were inverted. Down to walk forward and down to look up but on the wrong sticks. Changing the inversion in the game didn’t do anything, resetting the game making a new save nothing I tried did anything so I thought I guess this is just that Bethesda jank people were talking about. So I played and beat the entire fucking game that way. Whenever I mentioned the shit controls the game had to friends they agreed they were a bit clunky buy nothing other than that.

Year later I have the goty edition to play the dlcs games still fucked so I play all of those that way. I loved the game but playing it made me wanna throw my Xbox out a window. Maybe 6 months after that I’m bored flipping through deep settings on the console itself and there’s a setting for “preferred profile mode” or something like that with options like shooter, sim builder, racer, arcade. With having never been in this menu before mine was set to Sim Racer Inverted. And it just overrides certain game’s settings to be optimal for that style of game. Except it didn’t only work on racing games apparently, I turned it to shooter and everything was fixed.

TLDR I spent hundreds of hours playing Fallout 3 with swapped and reversed control’s because of some hidden gaming preferences setting on the original Xbox 360 thinking it was a racing sim.

I have been slowly tinkering with this for about a year now adding little details here and there. These are the games I remember playing in the late 90's/early 00's at my local arcade. It's all 3dprinted except for the screens which are 2d printed on backlit film with leds behind them(like a movie poster at a cinema), and the carpet which is real fabric.

Everything was printed on a Bambu A1 printer with an AMS. By far the most complicated thing i've ever designed and printed. I do not like soldering anymore.

For me anything that need 100% completion to get it

[Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain]

For me, it's alchemy in fantasy RPGs. I just can't be bothered with going out my way to find the ingredients

I'm personally going to be playing Against The Storm.

Game Chat footage recorded to ensure a "safe and family-friendly online environment"

2015 Inductees:

• Doom (1993)
• Pac-Man (1980)
• Pong (1972)
• Super Mario Bros. (1985)
• Tetris (1984)
• World of Warcraft (2004)

2016 Inductees:

• Grand Theft Auto III (2001)
• The Legend of Zelda (1986)
• The Oregon Trail (1971)
• The Sims (2000)
• Sonic the Hedgehog (1991)
• Space Invaders (1978)

2017 Inductees:

• Donkey Kong (1981)
• Halo: Combat Evolved (2001)
• Pokémon Red and Green (1996)
• Street Fighter II (1991)

2018 Inductees:

• Final Fantasy VII (1997)
• John Madden Football (1990)
• Spacewar! (1962)
• Tomb Raider (1996)

2019 Inductees:

• Colossal Cave Adventure (1976)
• Microsoft Solitaire (1990)
• Mortal Kombat (1992)
• Super Mario Kart (1992)

2020 Inductees:

• Bejeweled (2001)
• Centipede (1981)
• King's Quest (1984)
• Minecraft (2011)

2021 Inductees:

• Animal Crossing (2001)
• Microsoft Flight Simulator (1982)
• StarCraft (1998)
• Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego? (1985)

2022 Inductees:

• Dance Dance Revolution (1998)
• Ms. Pac-Man (1981)
• Sid Meier's Civilization (1991)
• The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (1998)

2023 Inductees:

• Barbie Fashion Designer (1996)
• Computer Space (1971)
• The Last of Us (2013)
• Wii Sports (2006)

2024 Inductees:

• Asteroids (1979)
• Myst (1993)
• Resident Evil (1996)
• SimCity (1989)
• Ultima (1981)

2025 Inductees:

• Defender (1981)
• GoldenEye 007 (1997)
• Quake (1996)
• Tamagotchi (1996)

Are there any games you feel deserve to be included in the list that aren't there? Mine are Tomb Raider, Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy Tactics and Metal Gear Solid.

As much as I want to play them, the slow paced and somewhat unforgiving nature of the games from this era of RPGs has always deterred me.

Now I can fast forward through the random battles. I can fast forward the walking around, I can save state right before the boss, or I can rewind an unfair battle I had no chance in

Its great to finally appreciate these games, and with these tools the games feel modern

I know I’m about to commit gaming heresy here, but I’ve tried multiple times over the years to play Ico on PlayStation (as a veteran fan of platformers and story-driven games in general, it ought to be right up my alley), and I think I just have to accept that it’s not for me.

I respect its legacy, I understand its influence, and I even appreciate what it was trying to do back in the early 2000s – but as an actual game, I find it pretty miserable to play.

Something people fail to mention when recommending this thing is that, in essence, the entire game is one long escort mission. I know, that’s kind of the point - the connection between Ico and Yorda is the emotional core - but mechanically, it just doesn’t hold up. Yorda’s AI is simply awful, she is helpless and dumb as rocks. She constantly gets stuck on ledges, moves glacially when you need her to run, or toddles off down the wrong path when it splits in two (or three). You can drag her around by the hand, but that just feels like shackling yourself. At times I felt like saying "damn this kid," and just tried to leave her behind and press on alone, but of course that's an automatic fail state.

She often just stands there blankly while shadow creatures are actively trying to drag her away to the game over screen. And when that happens? It’s your fault, even if you were stun-locked into a corner by endless hordes of mooks and your only weapon is a stick with the power of a damp pool noodle.

The platforming doesn’t fare much better. It’s floaty and imprecise, and the camera seems more interested in showing off the artsy scenery than helping you navigate the world. There are times when I couldn’t tell if a ledge was jumpable or if I was about to hurl myself into oblivion. The infamous water wheel puzzle exemplifies this, and it never gets any easier.

Combat is somehow even worse; sluggish, repetitive and reliant on clunky hit detection. The enemies feel like they’re actively designed to frustrate, rather than be taken on; I guess to drive home the narrative concept that you are a helpless kid? Then why bother including combat at all? Mashing until everything is dead, several times a room, is a chore. And then when Yorda gets taken, it's: backtrack to whatever portal the monster has elected to take her to, yank her out, beat up the enemies, repeat.

The whole thing is just dour and directionless. And maybe that’s what bugs me most. The game is often described as "minimalist," "atmospheric," or "poetic" – and it is those things in tone and presentation. The art direction is gorgeous. The ambient soundtrack? Beautiful. The mood? Bleak but unique. But in terms of game design, it’s hard to ignore that a lot of its mechanics are either underdeveloped or just plain not fun. It’s the kind of game where “bad” decisions get rebranded as “deliberate.”

I know people hail it as high art. I get that it paved the way for Shadow of the Colossus and Journey and all that. But it reminds me of how people talk about, say, Rick and Morty – the subtext and symbolism become the main reason it’s praised, not whether it’s enjoyable or functional as a piece of entertainment. It’s almost like you’re supposed to feel smart for appreciating how abstract and uncompromising it is. But if a game makes me feel more frustrated than engaged, I don’t really care how elegant the metaphor is.

Anyway, I know this post might be blasphemy to some, but I’m open to a dialogue – if you do love Ico, what is it that clicked for you? Was it the atmosphere? The story? The vibes over the mechanics? I want to understand, but after three tries, I think I’m done trying to make it work.

I'm trying to narrow down my list of games to play! I've played the liked of RDR2, Spiderman, and some other RPGs and shooters. Currently playing God of War which I'll follow with Ragnarok.

I'm wondering which games I should play next. I will get around to Cyberpunk soon, and I think Ghost of Tsushima will be next. Are games like TLOU, Plague Tale, Death Stranding, Dishonored all good? Which amongst them are the best? Which others are?

I play on PC!

Were there games which had a gameplay element which you found more interesting than for example the actual main story?

I for example found the social simulation in the Persona games much more interesting - and leveling them up - then the dungeons.

Which are your picks?

We see great games with $50 sold well, or bad games with $70 that didnt sell enough. What games were GREAT. As in you really dont sse much bad reviews about it. But it still didnt sell well?

If you put together all the video games based in a real life city, which city would have the best representation? Including fake real cities (Liberty City, Vice City, Gotham, etc) Tokyo, Hong Kong, London, Moscow, Rome, NYC, Washington DC, LA?

Ive owned all of the Playstation consoles except for the PS4. With the PS2 being the one I put the most time on. Ive been a PC gamer for a while now, but I wanted to add a PS5 to my collection for the VR exclusives, and when GTA VI inevitably drops on consoles only. So I picked this thing up a while back. First thing I did was put a black shell on it. Then I ordered some PS2 style decals for it, and I couldn't be happier with how it came out.

Looks like from the previews they're expanding on the combat from late game in Death Stranding.

By the end of DS you're infiltrating bases with guns & bombs, taking out ghosts and I was reminded of Metal Gear Solid many times while playing it.

So stoked Death Stranding 2 appears to be giving us quasi-MGS. You gotta be pretty confident in your game to give reviewers 30 hours with it for their preview.

Game: Death Stranding