Video Games

yes - its phenomenal if you're into the somewhat meditative style of the gameplay.

Just spent two awful days of grinding my face off trying to get the final 200 RP in apex legends ranked to move up. taking one step forwards then 10 steps back as every good game was followed by 10 miserable ones with awful awful teammates doing the most stupid shit imaginable

but finally got paired with what seemed like an awful team.first player jumps solo and second jumps but we both land on the loot train anyways thankfully. jumpmaster literally hoovers up the whole train of loot with a legendary backpack and I'm left jumping off one step behind her with a mozambique and no shields. they they proceed to hoover up every bit of ammo next to any weapon I might pick up and toss what they dont need in the middle of nowhere while rotating. luckily we manage to gear up fully incl a trip to a vault, the circle ends up moving back to where we started so we double back and run into a group who down the loot goblin immediately so all that gear is wasted. I knock 2 but the third sneaks up on me. solo jumper guy had legged it but doubled back to get our banners and kill the last member of their team. we respawn with 6 or 7 teams left and fuck all gear for the final fight, we pick over the area we'd already been through and get a mishmash of basic shit, I manage to eliminate the third on an attacking team who ambushed us and get both my teammates back up, we prepare for the final push and loot goblin takes ALL the health items from the 3 death boxes, we get to where the final ring will be, take out another team, who posiitioned badly leaving three left, we trap one guy until the ring moves and reposition, he jump pads into the middle of us and downs the loot goblin fully and knocks the solo jumper. I elimiinate him, pick up solo jumper, scan the building and there's one guy in a building with one door not outside the ring. he comes to the door to exchange fire, pings my gold body shield and says fuck this back inside. I loot a deathbox behind some cover and solo jumper runs into the building but loses his nerve and comes back out, I toss the grenade I just picked up into the back of the building by the ring and hit some gas from another teams caustic just as the ring moves, I scan and the gas knocked him and he's stuck behind it. we wait for someone else to pop their head up but nope CHAMP-I-ON for full points to get me all the way over the line .

Now I dont have to step foot into ranked or world's fucking edge for a long while by choice (seriously hate that map now).

For having done it in solo queue with no mic I've got to be happy with that.

What's the weighting like for wins and loses in Apex? I've never bothered with ranked on it because Overwatch scarred me for life after a lose removed 3x as many points as you gain from a win.

based on the rank you have a per game cost to enter (some exceptions exist to forgive the cost if you dont have a full squad) the chart in top right shows how many points you get in matches.

the trouble is you dont get kills or assists until a player is fully eliminated so no points if you manage to knock down people and subsequently die because they didn't die before you did or get revived. meaning when people drop you in the shit and you can't kill literally every other cunt in sight you are going to lose your entire cost of entry.

so a full points win will see you get 225 points (-24 entry in gold) but more likely you'll earn between 0 and 60 points for an "ok" performance. it means good teams can fly up the ranks logging wins all over but in solo a couple of bad games can slide you back so much you suddenly are back where you started.

the one saving grace is you can't drop ranks only tiers within a rank. so once you're up you're up. which is what has made sniffing at platinum for 2 days straight so annoying, because being matched with tier 4 gold players who have nothing to lose can be a major issue if you need to play it straight as an arrow.

watched a video on youtube this morning about better console settings for playing apex, adjusted FoV and look sensitivity and got 8 kills and a win across my first 2 games and i'm much more laser like in gunfights, feels like I've been playing hard mode up until now, guns actually aim where I want and stay there now and my reticle doesn't move like trying to steer a battleship anymore. Also, it's probably (definitely) just a trick of the brain but I'm moving around as fast as the guys you watch on youtube and not running like my trousers have fallen down anymore.

so yeah the default settings are garbage, probably a major duh moment for me but as I dont play many shooters I'll excuse my own ignorance. feel even more happy with my ranking now.

Default settings are rarely adequate for competitive play.

I remember editing config files in CoD4 to drop the graphics way below the what menu settings were able to do. It looked like shit but bushes and grass were basically non-existent and smoke effects were almost negated.

Got a link?

this one i think... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmPvudkUSx4

Oh yes - got to crank that look sensitivity!
On a similar note I'd love to know how many people are playing the current CoD/WZ on colour blind mode!

I always adjust look sensitivity in games, especially fps ones, but I've not played with the FOV. I'll try it out.

Lots of pros/streamers are playing with colour blind mode in Apex too.

now i'm back to playing in pubs i forgot how ridiculous the matchmaking is. either dont get a full team off the bat or some crybabay will leave because they feel they're too good for the squad or you took their character

any thoughts on ubisoft's hyper scape yet? open beta is pc only for now. be interesting to see how it plays.

Gonna see if I can get in the Beta today.

I downloaded Valorant to see what the hype is about and it's mainly disappointing, it plays like a CS: Source mod.

Installing it now actually

Prey. Fuck me that was a slog. All the excitement of watching skin form on a bowl of custard. I'll watch the alternate endings on youtube.

off.

Thought that had good reviews. Has always been lurking in my maybe list. Por que no?

What's your opinion on the Dishonored/Bioshock/modern Deus Ex games? Seemed like an amalgamation of all those.

it's just lots of tedious puzzle solving of the "find the keycard on the dead person to open the door so you can get the next forgettable exposition dump" sort. combat is optional and when you do fancy a dust up it's all "shoot ayleeyon that stands still in front of you with gun until it is deaded".

oh and loading screens 4 days.

if you can pick it up for under a fiver, maybe.

played Bioshock and that was fun. Deus Ex had a good story and tricky shooty bits. Don't think FPS's are my cup o soup.

"find the keycard on the dead person to open the door so you can get the next forgettable exposition dump"

Oh. Every PFS ever then. OK den.

I didn't realise it was in apex legends too - I did play that quite a bit but have always been a CoD guy so lost interest when modern warfare came out.

Except without the enjoyable combat, stealth, loot or skill mechanics.

It felt mostly like an exercise in the writers being smug about how clever they were.

Its "what if bioshock but space" thing combined elements of environmental storytelling that were notably worse than Bioshock, Deus Ex and Portal, with annoying-yet-unsatisfying enemies, rubbish crafting, rubbish guns, crap stealth, and appalling intrusive sound design.

deletes from Steam wish list

Thank you.

To counter the negativity, I thought it was really good, probably enjoyed it more than any of the bioshock games and way more than the modern Deus ex games. Thought it had a good clever story, very good atmosphere and excellent world building of mini stories, people etc.

Not sure how you can say rubbish guns with the Gloo gun? That thing was fantastic, make your own ladders on any surface etc.

Found the shoot the aliens until they're dead comment funny, shot them until they're Alive? Shoot them till they're nearly dead then make them a coffee? What are the alternatives?

The alien upgrades are also excellent, turning into objects never gets old.

Just my thoughts. It's up there with the better games I've played in recent times. It's actually something a bit different and slower paced.