And I'm looking for excuses to try a game or two. There's a few oldies I want to go back to, but I guess I'll just bide my time for Hades 2 and StS 2.

My son loves Celeste! I find it a bit too hard. You need to put together a string of perfectly timed jumps, leaps and grabs. Fail? Back to the start. Rinse repeat repeat repeat repeat repeat repeat *hour goes by* repeat Ugh.

On Talos 2, I finished all the game (I think) outside of the Gold doors. I've done some of the gold doors but stuck on South 3... I can't figure out the trick.

i like the games where you basically work a spreadsheet but they hide that from you with graphical interfaces

civ 1-4 (5 was so bad that i never played 6)

football manager

crusader kings II & III

europa universalis IV



thoughts on stuff i should look for?

rick,

Have you tried Stellaris? Same Paradox grand strategy goodness, but in space.

I’m really interested in Manor Lords, but always wary of early access.

no i haven't, from my experience going from crusader kings to euiv, it definitely feels like the same game, so much that a few times i've tried to do something only to later realize that's a mechanic in the other one

but will check it out, thanks for the rec


i've too seen the stuff for manor lords, it looks like it could possibly be the perfect game for me, but also looks like it could be absolutely terrible

Loll, exactly how I feel as well.

Mash,

In Talos 2, so far I got golden doors e1, e2, e3, n1, w2

Tried S3 and failed. These things are TOUGH.

I'm on my last two W2 and W3 but I used 3 sparks for the S2 one and not sure if I go back. I retried S3 triangle but also unsuccessfully lol. S3 golden I did fairly quickly I think. Yeah they're tough and awesome. Most of them have a 'clear' solution which won't work because of a reason and you have to figure out how to overcome it.

Damn, I'm impressed.

S3 is the two reflectors and the moving giant brick. I've spend several hours and decided to work on the other puzzles first. So I'm using the same order I initially followed. (East -> North -> South -> West)

As mentioned before I take hints from puzzle titles and in this one I immediately knew/felt what I'm supposed to do and spent 10 minutes tinkering a solution around it.

Completed all Golden Doors apart from S2 where I used 3 sparks that I had. S3 triangle remains uncompleted as well, I decided to progress with the story, not sure if I come back to those two to finish them. Completing W2 Golden was something else, what a feeling! I even drew on a piece of paper...

Nice job! I've been slacking the last couple days.

s3g is wayyyyyyyyyyyyy harder than w2g. lol

Add South 2 Golden to the stumped list. Except I think I'm close.

I've Golden Door puzzles: West 1, West 3 and those damn South 2 and South 3 puzzles left.

Bought the Elden Ring expansion without realizing you have to complete tasks in the original to unlock. Very stupid of me to do so. I'm terribad at challenging games and will probably never access the DLC. ****ing waste.

Pretty sure you can refund then?

The games that got me into this genre were KOEI games. They still make Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Nobunaga's Ambition. Don't think the more recent ROTK games are as well received or translated from Japanese as well, but ROTK XI was very good. I like Nobunaga's Ambition: Sphere of Influence, but haven't played the newer Awakening. Appears to be rated higher though.

Recently tried and liked Ozymandias which is a bit like a much faster format Civ.

You might also enjoy Age of Wonders games, Endless Legend or Endless Space 2, Warlock: Master of the Arcane, Total War games (? maybe not the combat, which you can automate, but for most people is the point). Popular ones I haven't played: Shadow Empire, Galactic Civilizations IV, Distant Worlds 2.

thanks for the rec, yeah i played a bunch of total war rome and loved it

also one of my big games as a kid that i forgot about which nobody seems to know ever existed is pax imperia

FYI, they released a remaster of Rome not too long ago and it’s great. Still the best total war game, imo. Mod scene is alive and well.

I'm thinking of picking up something this sale for a change (it's been actually a while) but I'm so torn between Elden Ring, Dave the Diver, Balatro, Brotato and Cult of the Lamb :O

Elden Ring was one of the games I had planned to pick up during this sale, but they're clearly riding the DLC-hype and not giving it much of a discount because of that, so I'll wait a while longer for that one.

Dave the diver is a no-brainer though, even at full price. Fantastic game.

Eve Online - was nicknamed spreadsheets in space! Although I think they've made it more accessible now.

Factorio: Space Age expansion coming Oct 21

Satisfactory 1.0 coming Sept 10

Lol, I finished everything but this one puzzle. But I'm not giving up!

I just retried S2 golden because I felt pressured by you but I noped out after 15 minutes, I'm satisfied despite skipping 2 with sparks Good luck, you'll get it

I bumped up my wishlist and added a few. Maybe I'll just go crazy and buy some and buy a Steamdeck. I just have such little desire to pull out the Switch in comparison.

Tunic
Return of the Obra Dinn
Outer Wilds
Inscryption
Dave the Diver
Dredge
Terra Nil
Cult of the Lamb
Mullet Madjack

Removed a few base builders like Dyson Sphere, Oxygen Not Included, Satisfactory. I really want to get into those games but sometimes they don't hit for me, and they require such a time investment.