Age of Decadence was fun but super hard. Pretty sure I only managed to scratch the surface of it. Colony Ship looks interesting, but I fear it might be similarly hard.

I see on Steam you can download a demo, so will probably try that.

Yeah, I was killed in the first fight which prompted the post lol.

Really late to the party on this, but Hades was added to Gamepass and it's incredible.

lol

I just came here to post the exact same thing.

Always heard how good it was, but the videos never did anything for me.

It's weird cause Hades is obviously incredible but I just got so bored by it...

I was just really bad it, so quit. I don't have much patience...

Surprised Loop Hero didn't get more love here. Feels like a game I think a lot of people in this thread would be well in to.

once I see deckbuilding I ignore, sadly. :<

Fair enough, I bail on anything 'Souls-like'. It's a bit different to your standard deck-building though, as in you don't directly influence your little man (except changing his gear), he just walks around in circles and fights things. Your cards are to build the world around him to generate creatures/resources/etc.

Also, I like it because I get nostalgia as it looks like the type of game I used to play on my Gran's old BBC Micro, back when floppy disks were actually floppy!

little update on this: I did end up buying it on release, I am now roughly half way through I think and enjoying it a lot, but man, this game is HARD.

I think I've beaten every major entry in this genre so far and I believe that this is the hardest, by a pretty large margin (maybe except for Unworthy, which I haven't beaten yet, but it was a small game).

The bosses are rather managable, with one exception that is clearly optional and Im gonna come back to it later, but the levels, while very creative, are taking a lot out of me. There are a lot of combat options - the game is centered around the parry mechanic, but in many cases it won't work, so you are expected to use your entire arsenal, especially since almost all non-boss enounters are against multiple enemies. Then there's platforming, I tend to suck at it, so I am dangerously close to unfun level of difficulty in that regard.

One fun sidenote, I recently heard Yathzee from Escapist talking about how pretty much every soulslike metroidvania can be trivialised with one strat, namely dodging/dashing behind the enemy and hitting them from there. Well, it does not work here - pretty much all enemies have either insane tracking, or attacks designed specifically to cover the area behind them as well.

So, yeah, I can definitely recommend the game, but only if you have experience in the genre and enjoy hardcore challenge

I loved Loop Hero, fantastic game. I gave up on tier IV however. I should get back to it at some point. I wouldn't put much stock in the "deckbuilding", it's nothing like Slay the Spire in this regard.

What I like about is that it's got the Binding of Isaac game structure, but it adds story between runs and also gives players (like me) who aren't as skilled a chance to make the game a bit easier as they play it.

You don't get as many game-breaking combos as in Isaac, but I like the flexibility of the permanent upgrade system and trinkets allowing new players get better.

At 1st I was taking trinkets and powers that gave me as much life as possible, this allowed me to learn the patterns of the 1st level area enemies until i got to the point where I felt if I took damage in the 1st few rooms it was because I made a dumb mistake. That allowed me to take trinkets that will improve the boons I get allowing me to get stronger for the 2nd or 3rd bosses.

I took about 8 tries at Meg before I finally turned on God Mode.

No shame.

Spamming some of the weapons does a number on the thumb.

Yeah, I am getting old when I can't play for more than 30 minutes at a time a game like Celeste or Super Meat Boy because my fingers/thumb starts to hurt.

I really enjoyed Loop Hero at first, but found it got repetitive in a non-fun way around Tier 3. I was absolutely hooked by that point though and had to beat it. I think the game probably has the distinction of having the most hours played when I wasn't actually enjoying it.

I am usually really good at uninstalling a game once it's no longer fun, and had I done that with Loop Hero I definitely would've gotten my money's worth. I have no idea why I was compelled to continue playing despite no longer enjoying the game.

My thoughts exactly. The game starts out very strong, but when you get into it after a while, it certainly loses its luster.

Anyone play Twelve Minutes yet?

Looks interesting.

Apparently there was a release of a mod for FTL that is almost considered either a sequel to the original game or at least a Long War style mod.

Awesome! A new reason to dump another 50 hours into the game. Let's goooooooooo!

I love FTL. I hate FTL. I have never beaten the flagship on normal...

Not Steam related but could be interesting to some - Open Beta of Diablo 2 Resurrected is on this weekend. I use this opportunity to decide if it's buy on release or in a year or so once they polish things. Opinions are it could be really unfinished as they're not teasing all that much and first two acts (which are also available now in the beta) are filled with bugs.

Installing now. I think it starts in 2 hours.

I'm playing it now. It's fun, seems like the same game I remembered playing years ago but with better graphics and some QoL additions. I was never super into these games though.

After you've beaten it and you've experienced the story, the atmosphere, the gist of the gameplay, etc. you go to the "endgame" where you're replaying the same areas over and over to farm for rare loot. At that point you're not playing a game, you're playing a slot machine that requires you to click a lot. I guess it's better than throwing all your money away in a real slot machine.

But to me it's not a game anymore. And as the story portion of the game usually only takes 5-10 hours to beat, once I'm done with that, I'm basically done with the game. Maybe I'll replay it once or twice with another character but I never saw the fascination in replaying these games endlessly as a slot machine for loot.

Lol. I hear you, but you just described a large portion of video games in general.

FYI it will be on game pass day 1(at least on console), too lazy to confirm it's PC as well.

I don't think that's the case.