What other games are we all playing?

[LanceLord]

Stopped reading at that point. Bought it, playing it, loving it.

Ditto.

WTH though?? HTH did this priceless gem miss me on Steam?!!

Obsidian literally snuck this one under radar because I haven't seen any AAA style announcements for it. Probably because it's a AAA alpha just debuting on Steam From the game trailer/description, it sounds like Grounded is the love child of an insect sim version of Ark and the 80's movie Honey I Shrunk the Kids

Anyways, I'll do anything to support this innovative AA dev who produces AAA titles. Downloading right now and will give it a go over the next few weeks. Alpha testing this, Sub Nautica Below Zero, and playing ESO/RDR online updates are going to be a nice distraction before CP 2077 release this fall. And based on Steam player feedback so far, it's clear the masters of RPG are re-dominating the RPG universe yet again. Excellent job on what looks like another home run Obsidian!

edit: spectacular job on the online version of this game by sticking to 4 person CoOp btw. Seems Obsidian the founding father of the Fallout universe, are once again schooling their errant child Bethesda on how to develop a proper multiplayer game. Had Bethesda implemented their father Obsidian's model in developing F76. Embraced their once loyal fan base transparency during their early dev phase. Instead of relying on secretive, disingenuous marketing strategies to shill their work developing their first MMO title. F76 would never have been the broken, buggy, micro transaction infested mess of an MVP that destroyed the Fallout brand and fan base franchise loyalty to date.

 

[askavir]

I find it odd that Obsidian has to release a game as an early access... It's not like they depend on crowdfunding to make a game.

 

[Navigare Necesse Est]

4 player coop is Grounded? That isnt really what I,'d expect of Obsidian. But I get that sometimes you just have to do something different.

 

[LanceLord]

I find it odd that Obsidian has to release a game as an early access... It's not like they depend on crowdfunding to make a game.

IMO this may be for 2 reasons:
1. Microsoft is their new publisher
2. what Obsidian said in the game title description. Direct cut and paste from Grounded's Steam page:

Why Early Access?
“From our previous crowdfunding experience, we found incredible value in involving the community early in the process. Early Access gives us the ability to receive and implement community feedback in a way that helps us more nimbly build a better game. Grounded is the type of experience in which community feedback will be critical, and Early Access will enable that feedback loop from the very beginning.”

To paraphrase: We've insightfully learned from our experiences (and mistakes) in developing our game titles in the past. This most likely included a front seat ticket witnessing Bugthesda's ongoing dumpster fire that is F76. Finally given that M$ is our new official publisher, we now have the potential to expand our PC based franchises to the highly profitable console gamer market. So it would be prudent business sense to build in an innate multi player capability of the game in alpha phase. So the fan base, YTer influencers and professional industry critics the likes of IGN etc. alike will have tons of time to audit, excoriate, champion or shame online features of said multiplayer mode. But unlike Bugthesda, we're not going to divorce and abandon our core PC gaming fan base for the micro transaction infested, multi billion dollar, glitzy Golden Goose that is the console gaming market.

Or something like that.

Anyways, if they maintain this level of transparency that other alpha titles (the likes of EGS and SubNautica) have to date, then this strategy will definitely benefit them financially in the long run when the game releases. Especially since they're NOT taking hundred of millions in backer funding. Like a certain game that-will-not-be-mentioned-here which has been in alpha phase/Early Release for the past 7+ years. And which now appears to be shifting 100% of its dev focus to producing the perfect road map to reboot the game's now abandoned road map....

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpyYxqEe--o&feature=emb_logo


You simply. CANNOT. Make. Any. Of. This. Up.

Thank God for industry devs like Obsidian and CDProjekt Red. At least they've produced actual GOTY single player games. Regardless of what production schedule slips or setbacks they've experienced during game development, they've always managed to release their past games within the finite human lifetime of their fan bases.

 

[Iskariot]

Wildlands is the last good one...if I'm honest. Breakpoint isn't up to much at all. Rainbow 6 series died with the latest multipew only offering too...no campaign. If you see GR Wildlands on sale anywhere, it's well worth a playthrough given your history with the franchise.

Breakpoint is a different game know. Much more comparable to Wildlands, although Wildlands is still the better game. Wildlands in my opinion is the best open world tactical shooter I ever played.
Breakpoint is not perfect of course, but I am having a lot of fun playing it solo now. The game definitely needs a smarter AI that reacts more aggressively and actively tries to search for snipers. The AI teammates make it too easy. I am now considering dismissing them,
I do not care about multi player, so I have no opinion about that part of the game.

 

[wrmiller]

What am I playing? Pretty much anything other than this game. I've gotten tired of these across-the-pond game schemes tbh.

Waiting on new Flight Simulator and FC6 atm.

 

[Iron Golem]

Ah memories of the old Ghost Recon's, Rainbow 6's and SWATS....loved those tactical shooters, I got the SWAT 4 disk somewhere, must dig it out and see if it works in win 10.

At the mo I've re installed the "classic" Xwing games...all 4 on steam (yes I know GOGs are better but I'd already bought them on steam a few years back). Got them all working on my new win 10 PC, 3d hardware, joysticks, sounds all good.....man I LOVE these games although Xwing is HARD!!! Even with the relatively crap graphics it's like I'm IN Star Wars.....Can't wait for Squadrons!

I had that old Rainbow 6 box set. Good times.

Since its been in recent posts worth noting Grounded is being offered as a teaser on Game Pass, not the whole game, just a demo? It also has cross play.

 

[Mole HD]

I had that old Rainbow 6 box set. Good times.

Since its been in recent posts worth noting Grounded is being offered as a teaser on Game Pass, not the whole game, just a demo? It also has cross play.

Grounded is being released as an early access preview...I don't mind taking a bite since it's free for me with Gamepass ultimate. As much as I generally loathe survival games of any kind...I watched a couple of vids of this being played and I'm intrigued enough to want to try it out...

 

[Iron Golem]

Damn, I thought that Grounded on Gamepass was the full game. It's still in early access though so that might be why.

As much as I generally loathe survival games of any kind...I watched a couple of vids of this being played and I'm intrigued enough to want to try it out..

Not my cup of tea but looks cool. Seeing it inspired me to watch Honey I Shrunk the Kids with my daughter who has never seen it (Although we watched the sequel a year ago). My brother has been playing and told me it's pretty cool.

Also it's weird what game pass said about it, left me not really sure what it meant in terms of the game. It might be the full thing and I am just misinterpreting it. It wasn't under game pass games but it was featured at the top of the game pass page as having a free look or something along those lines.

 

[Mole HD]

Not my cup of tea but looks cool. Seeing it inspired me to watch Honey I Shrunk the Kids with my daughter who has never seen it (Although we watched the sequel a year ago). My brother has been playing and told me it's pretty cool.

Also it's weird what game pass said about it, left me not really sure what it meant in terms of the game. It might be the full thing and I am just misinterpreting it. It wasn't under game pass games but it was featured at the top of the game pass page as having a free look or something along those lines.

I see folk going on about 'Honey, I shrunk the kids'...I'm a good bit older and still remember 'The incredible shrinking man' from the late 50's...loved that film as a kid growing up in the 60's, maybe that's why Grounded appeals.

I'm downloading the PC preview from Gamepass right now... 3.73Gb so it's not huge. Gamepass describes the game preview from an Xbox players perspective...not very helpful on the MS store for PC players...perhaps that's why the confusion.

 

[Lowbee]

My trip back from Salomes Reach is taking a lot longer than I anticipated due to

1) Taking the time to explore geological and biological stuff I can't find closer to the bubble, and
2) Being TREMENDOUSLY distracted by Surviving Mars. Love the Japanese drones. LOL

 

[Navigare Necesse Est]

I looked at Grounded - it's featured in Steam now. Apparently it need an XBox account to work, lol. No thanks.

 

[Mole HD]

I looked at Grounded - it's featured in Steam now. Apparently it need an XBox account to work, lol. No thanks.

A registered Microsoft account...not necessarily an Xbox account. I have both so it's not really an issue...I game share on Xbox with my son so have an Xbox Live account that I've had since 2005... even though I rarely fire up the Xbox these days. Since I switched to Gamepass ultimate, it covers both PC and Xbox for the gamepass games, the Xbox live subs are included in that for no extra charge.

 

[Chris Simon]

https://imgur.com/s4DkZmT

GoT looks like so much fun.

 

[Juniper]

I looked at Grounded - it's featured in Steam now. Apparently it need an XBox account to work, lol. No thanks.

Only for online play. It's annoying that they don't support Steam multiplayer (since I bought the game, even though I have a basic Game Pass, and no Xbox Live) but you can play offline just by skipping the sign-in page on load.

It's EA, so it may come later. But they're probably under an exclusivity agreement with Microsoft.

 

[Chris Simon]

Only for online play. It's annoying that they don't support Steam multiplayer (since I bought the game, even though I have a basic Game Pass, and no Xbox Live) but you can play offline just by skipping the sign-in page on load.

It's EA, so it may come later. But they're probably under an exclusivity agreement with Microsoft.

A cake problem.
If they supported Steam, people would complain that there's no crossplay. Unwinnable situation.

 

[Juniper]

A cake problem.
If they supported Steam, people would complain that there's no crossplay. Unwinnable situation.

Oh, people are already moaning about that... it's a separate friends list on Xbox to Steam, and Grounded uses the Xbox version...

TBH, "cross play" wouldn't be an issue for this, since it's local multiplayer co-op. There's no server access at all besides the initial DRM sign-in, as far as I can tell.

 

[Darkfyre99]

My trip back from Salomes Reach is taking a lot longer than I anticipated due to

1) Taking the time to explore geological and biological stuff I can't find closer to the bubble, and
2) Being TREMENDOUSLY distracted by Surviving Mars. Love the Japanese drones. LOL

A kindred spirit!

Surviving Mars (love the music) is one of the few games where I've ever chased achievements. I've only got two left IIRC, "Dream of a Green Mars" (the vegan one), and "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep."

 

[Stigbob]

IMO this may be for 2 reasons:
1. Microsoft is their new publisher
2. what Obsidian said in the game title description. Direct cut and paste from Grounded's Steam page:



To paraphrase: We've insightfully learned from our experiences (and mistakes) in developing our game titles in the past. This most likely included a front seat ticket witnessing Bugthesda's ongoing dumpster fire that is F76. Finally given that M$ is our new official publisher, we now have the potential to expand our PC based franchises to the highly profitable console gamer market. So it would be prudent business sense to build in an innate multi player capability of the game in alpha phase. So the fan base, YTer influencers and professional industry critics the likes of IGN etc. alike will have tons of time to audit, excoriate, champion or shame online features of said multiplayer mode. But unlike Bugthesda, we're not going to divorce and abandon our core PC gaming fan base for the micro transaction infested, multi billion dollar, glitzy Golden Goose that is the console gaming market.

Or something like that.

Anyways, if they maintain this level of transparency that other alpha titles (the likes of EGS and SubNautica) have to date, then this strategy will definitely benefit them financially in the long run when the game releases. Especially since they're NOT taking hundred of millions in backer funding. Like a certain game that-will-not-be-mentioned-here which has been in alpha phase/Early Release for the past 7+ years. And which now appears to be shifting 100% of its dev focus to producing the perfect road map to reboot the game's now abandoned road map....

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpyYxqEe--o&feature=emb_logo


You simply. CANNOT. Make. Any. Of. This. Up.

Thank God for industry devs like Obsidian and CDProjekt Red. At least they've produced actual GOTY single player games. Regardless of what production schedule slips or setbacks they've experienced during game development, they've always managed to release their past games within the finite human lifetime of their fan bases.

I'm a bit burned out on the whole early access thing. Subnautica as you said was a great example of it done right but in retrospect all I did was spoil most of the game for myself while it was still pretty wonky. When it actually released I was already some sort of superhuman water ninja and knew where all the good stuff was. More fun not to bother I think.

 

[Garix]

I'm a bit burned out on the whole early access thing. Subnautica as you said was a great example of it done right but in retrospect all I did was spoil most of the game for myself while it was still pretty wonky. When it actually released I was already some sort of superhuman water ninja and knew where all the good stuff was. More fun not to bother I think.

That's why I still haven't touched Below Zero yet. Picked it up ages ago to show some support but it's still sat there uninstalled and unplayed. Just playing through the first one again at the moment and it's making me itch to install the second. Resisting so far......