FiveFootNinja

I've done a short sprint this weekend on the main quest line stuff pretty much from where you are @Boothjan, partly because it was a kind of locked in path, but also I felt like I needed to resolve a few things However I have just... It feels a bit like I'm entering the final Act and was a bit of a natural beat, so I have gone back to exploring for a while. Midgard is now at 91% complete with lots of the areas now fully done. And I've just taken on a favour that has lead me to a new, large area, which I think should take me to somewhere near 95% complete looking at the lists. I also went for a wander around... As it stands I've used a guide for about 8 of the ravens if I haven't been able to track them down after a good explore of an area, and feel fairly vindicated as several of them have been very obscure to find. But everything else has been discovered through natural movement around the areas, or some more dedicated exploring to try and mop up missing bits. I don't feel too bad about it though as I've not hit collectable fatigue like I have with so many other games. Still loving this and hoping to wrap up the story this week and then see how much is left over to do for the platinum.

As someone who doesn't generally get much out of musicals, is this good enough to be worth a try anyway? My wife is very keen to watch it tonight and I'd been planned to go in the other room and watch something else or play God of War, but the love this is getting is making me think I should maybe give it a whirl.

Also it's interesting about the more detailed/hardcore control scheme for power management and I'm wondering how that will work on console. In the old days of these I was joystick/keyboard (in fact one of my mates actually loved being my "R2 unit" and handling the systems on the keyboard while I concentrated on the dogfighting with the stick, it was ace) but you had the greater volume of shortcut buttons easily available for one touch control if you needed it mid fight. I think Elite Dangerous does a really good job of fairly complex systems controls on a gamepad, but I'm rarely doing lots of that while trying to dogfight so I can't imagine how I'm going to be able to easily swap variable power levels, shield directions, weapon modes, etc... easily. In fairness I don't have a HOTAS yet so there may be things on there that help that.

Just as an aside... the Kinect was actually a pretty clever bit of tech hardware and is still used in loads of contexts other than gaming (augmented reality stuff, interconnected robotic movement related sciency stuff, university projects, etc...). I have a mate that uses one in his university lab still. It just wasn't a great as mainstream gaming accessory and a pretty huge gamble. Anyway, regardless of it's flaws I absolutely adored my 360, and in fairness Microsoft could not have handled my 2 RROD replacements better (other than them not happening in the first place obviously). I did end up getting a PS3 super slim on sale right at the end of the generation basically to play Gran Turismo and Last of Us, but the 360 will always have a special place in my gaming heart. Series S looking like the front runner for me depending on a few of the final spec details when we know them.

Yep, my son has already watched it. Can't comment on the quality of the stream as I had a work meeting.

She's also been interviewed a couple of times on the Adam Buxton podcast (as has Matt Berry) which were good. Worth a listen in general as it's a great podcast.

Yeah, generally I prefer that if a game does have collectibles it has some sort of mechanic/map inside the game to help find them, even if it doesn't get unlocked until after the main campaign is over or something. I'm on 33 of 51 ravens finding them as I go so far so I'll see where I get to but I'm hoping there aren't too many to mop up at the end.

I probably will give it a go. I've got the platinum for Bloodborne and Spider-man already so it would be rude not to add this to the collection too.

Quick status update... not sure how many hours I've put into it now (lots) but what a bloody fabulous game this is. I came into it with very high expectations based on the reviews/comments, and after the first 3 hours or so I have to say I was feeling a bit 'meh' about it. It looked amazing, but the combat felt quite sloppy, the difficulty seemed to centre around mob battles without any decent mob control mechanics, and having never played a GoW before Kratos just felt a bit one dimensional and grumpy. I was so 'meh' about it that I spoke to @jonamok about it, but was told to stick with it as the game opens up... and open up it certainly does! The game properly has it's hooks into me now and I'm jumping on basically every night for either just a quick bash (PS4 rest mode makes this very easy to pick up and put down), or for long stints where I go to bed 2-3 hours later than I planned after getting drawn into a new favour or area. I've literally just turned level 5 before turning it off and... I'm not sure how far I am into it ultimately but I'm really clicking with it now and really enjoying just cruising around in my boat being a badass. The scale of it, the visuals, level design and art direction are all phenomenal (I had a proper wow moment climbing up to the Thamur's Corpse level) and the way Lake of Nine evolves is brilliantly done. I'm even liking Kratos more now that story is unfolding. Absolutely loving this game. I feel incredibly lucky that on the back of playing Spider-man, then The Last Guardian and now this (with HZD downloaded and ready to go too) in quick succession it feels like I'm getting treated to some huge chunks of brilliance from this generation.

If Microsoft could "God of War" a Ninja Gaiden reboot I'd be all in. I'm midway through the former and it's such a well judged bit of nostalgia fused with a genuinely fantastic modern game. Xbox could really benefit from something like that rather than just general IP sequels with a few more shinies. Never played Otogi. Demon Souls that while you are at it and I'd give it a whirl too

Oh. Really? I haven't seen it but it sounds like I might need to pack some bits back into the excitement bag for now then.

From what I've seen it's looking like: 20th July = First party games reveals ?st/rd/th August = Series S reveal (We could obviously get a little teaser for B in A as well or they may surprise everyone completely and drop both) Excited to see how they pick the Halo ball up after dropping it massively with Guardians, I hope they have gone bold with it and mixed up the format. Also really looking forward to The Initiative's (possibly Perfect Dark) reveal too, the list of talent they have pulled together to create the studio is impressive. Does anyone have a list of rumoured games that might get seen beyond these?

I concur. I’ve got the Red jumpstart kit and it’s got quite a bit in across the included PDFs, specifically the “world book” which gives a run down of the game world’s main historical events, details Night City life, etc... over 20 odd pages of info, and then extra bits more passively through adventure settings and things. The rule book also has bits the sorts of classes, cyberware and weapon you will likely see, as well as some of the world slang and things. You can definitely tell it’s the starter set of info, but for the cost it’s pretty good (if you are into it). I picked it up from DriveThruRPG. The proper full Red sourcebook is due out any time (It was supposed to be with the game) which will have more in. Red is the official link between 2020 and the 2077 game so will be a good source for where Night City is up to.

Half the price seems optimistic but I'll take it.

Only just stumbled upon this thread in passing. I started watching The Expanse when it came out but with lockdown removing my daily train journey viewing I've fallen behind on loads of things and only started season 4 last week. After absolutely loving the first 3 I found 4 a little bit of a slower burn to begin with, but now I'm up to episode 6 and it's getting rolling again. I still think it's on the top 5 sci-fi series of all time for me. Sort of tempted to try the books at some point.