Coelacanth

If all this talk of Bloodlines and Bloodlines 2 is inspiring you to go try out the original, please remember to install the unofficial patch. Seriously. You're more or less incapable of finishing the game otherwise due to multiple potential hard locking bugs. Plus it fixes a ton of other minor stuff.

The game itself is great though and worth your time. It devolves a bit in the second half as you get into the parts that were thrown together by the rushed production, but the writing, OST and atmosphere alone are worth experiencing.

Already pre-ordered the Ultimate edition. Goes against my usual principles but I don't care in this instance. I hope the game is a massive, GotY contending success.

Unity is flawed, but somewhat of an underrated gem. It's such a shame that it released in the state it did and got the reception it did because that's pretty much what caused Ubisoft to pivot into the style of the Origins and onwards style games.

Imagine what could have been if they built on what they had in Unity? The free run up/down system had so much potential and - while janky - the Unity parkour can produce some of the most pleasing, slick and stylish sequences. Just look at the stuff people are pulling off!

Also, revolutionary Paris is the best realised city they've ever made for an Assassin's Creed game.

There is also Red Info which is Robert Kurvitz, Alex Rostov, Helen Hindpere and Martin Luiga. They are apparently working on something and will probably make an announcement next year (according to Martin Luiga on his recent Human Can Opener podcast appearance).

All I want is a final proper send-off Splinter Cell before he dies. Sam Fisher's final job type vibe. I think there is some cool potential there - not that I trust Ubisoft to pull it off, mind.

Back in like middle school or whatever it was around that time we had a portable drive (or was it just on a CD?) with an installed folder of UT99 we used to bring to school. During recess we'd go and copy paste it to the PCs in the computer room and play little LAN tournaments until a teacher would find us and chase us out. Instagib only or course, and I think we also played 120% speed.

Good times indeed.

Same. It depends on the game though, obviously. If I'm playing Deadlock or something similar (fast paced and competitive) I'm not going to go for graphics fidelity. But anything single player? 60 FPS is perfectly fine and ray traced lighting can make a huge visual impact. Both Alan Wake 2 and Cyberpunk looked great with RT and well worth forgoing 100+ FPS.

The only real qualm I have is the lack of Ukrainian and Russian accents on the English dub. I don't really understand the thought process as I felt like it added a lot of character and immersion to both the originals and to the Metro games.

Otherwise I'm optimistic, I think the game looks good and they've been saying all the right things. Game journalists who have played it also report things that make me feel very hopeful, both in terms of micro gameplay (atmosphere, tension and isolation without reliance on jump scares) and macro gameplay (decisions mattering, branching stories and factions).

I pre-ordered the ultimate edition regardless to support the studio after the horrors they've survived over the war, including losing colleagues to the frontline.

Reminds me of Cassidy's foreskin musings in Preacher.

Time is a flat circle eh?

Good, this is a game I will definitely want to try to make work with ray tracing, so I'll need all the tools I can get to make it work.

I'm in a bit of a down period as STALKER 2 is coming out soon so I don't want to pick up a new story campaign from my backlog in the meantime (Metro: Exodus, Bioshock Infinite and Deus Ex: Mankind Divided are on the docket) in case I'm not finished in time for release day.

Still playing lots of Deadlock, but for a single player story game I've gone back to some bits of RDR 2 when I'm not in the competitive mood. I started it earlier this year but abandoned it as I burnt out on it a bit. Coming back to it has been a very mixed experience, there is still so much about it I love - but also some very deep frustrations. And absence hasn't really made the heart grow fonder in that regard. I don't really like the mission structure. I know it's been brought up by others, but I too seem to be among those who are bothered by it. I also find the sheer body count forced on you through main story missions to be so ludicrous as to regularly ruin my immersion. I'm not even that far in and I've already basically committed genocide levels of murder! And then the mission is over and nobody is talking about the massacre of hundreds of lawmen?