homepage Forums SimHQ Community Community Hall What are you currently playing these days?

I started playing Elden Ring again, this time using the seamless-Co-op mod, so I can play in 32:9 and still be invaded. Using SpecialK with the game, which dramatically enhances and improves HDR support. The difference is astonishing.

Doing a Glintstone Sorceror run and... talk about easy mode. I beat the first Elden Lord at level 26, and his gatekeeper boss at level 14. Just silly. I don't sweat at all versus most bosses, as the sorcery is simply overpowered beyond belief. I have zero respect for any player who invades with a sorceror build. Easy mode.


Funniest part is I'm using my shortsword more often than not. Elden Ring is so much easier than the other 'Souls games, but here, one thing I like, is the shorter swords are quite useful and have reasonable range.

If it is it has eluded me. The antagonists are a family of religious zealots, the Seed Family, and you have to take them out to finish the game. They are a cult, an extremist one at that. There's some anti-Christian imagery I suppose. None of it bothered me. But I probably have a high tolerance for it. If anything I'd say it's more anti-religion, than anti-Christian. There are no references to Jesus and that sort of thing I can recall. More like it shows how extreme religion can be, and they're the bad guys here.

I'm usually clued in to this sort of thing, seeing the bias, but in FC5 I have not felt like hey, wait a minute here. Some NPCs are caricatures of rural bumpkins and so on, but that's what I would expect. And honestly I mostly focus on shooting things, blowing things up and jumping out of helicopters to deploy the wing suit.

I'm probably not the right one to assess this, I dunno.

FC 5 is set in Montana so having a Christian cult in the story makes sense instead of having a Muslim or Jewish cult. The game was very obviously influenced by the whole David Koresh and Branch Davidians cult and the showdown at Waco.

I haven't played FC5, but people and comments tell me that it pokes at the caricatured left as much as the caricatured right.

It's not, and imo it's a solid game, give it a shot.

LE: I just started Far Cry 6, hopefully I'll enjoy it as much as the rest of the franchise.

Giancarlo Esposito makes a GREAT villain in FC 6

As good comedians should.

I've become a Sudoku nut-case lately. I play it when not playing Fallout 3 goty.

I consider myself very mediocre at Sudoku -- a relative newcomer. Still doing relatively easy puzzles (the game calls them medium difficulty). The whole point of my playing is to "climb the mountain" and improve.

I realize there are different ways to play. I just look at the numbers, don't make notes/etc, and only enter a number when intuitively sure -- an all or none mental approach. If I screw up an entry I delete the whole chart and start over.

If they make a fully remastered Fallout 3 then I’ll buy it. The remastered Oblivion has been awesome so far.

QUESTION: In BG3, does the game give one a chance to "reset" ones character after playing a while? Or, are you stuck with your original character design? Depending on the reply, I may have to rethink my "character build" before proceeding.

FWIW: I'm in a Period of Change in my life. As part of that, I may head in a new gaming direction "for me".

Part of it is to "maybe" start playing high rated modern RPG games I've been putting off -- for years.

My first real RPG was the original Baldur's Gate. I'm giving Baldur's Gate 3 a real look (I've had it installed since before it came out). In the current version, I've created a character and am in the first scene.

Grand daughters just came over to my place, so " Playing " that. Before they just arrived was playing DCS.

The remaster was awesome until the 1.1 update broke keyboard mapping for the X key and a few others. I use X for backwards in FPS, thus, this is a non-starter, will not budge issue.


Try as much as you want, you can bind X to stuff, but X will not produce results when pressed, after saving config.

This has been confirmed by many folks. Bethesda: "Humm... yeah.. Not fixing in the 1.2 update!"

Yes, but you must recruit Withers to your camp

Thank you! That makes the game much more playable for a "beginner".

I’ve finished BG 3 three times but I’ve actually recently been tempted to reinstall and play it a fourth time.

I started BG3. But, got to thinking. Maybe I should start over with the original BG1 that got me started in RPGs.

So, I'll start BG1 and, for a change, I'll be the Hero (my wife has always been the Heroine in RPGs -- she's the heroine in BG3 so far as I've gotten in it). I may only play a bit and get on with BG3. We'll see.

The BG1 hero is 20. I have used a picture of me at 19 to create my in game Hero Picture. I play a Paladin -- a good guy.

I died twice in the first few clock hours of BG play. I spent most of yesterday (morning to night) playing..

I normally restart an RPG game if I die twice -- no matter when it happens. But, I was relearning the "old fashioned" RPG methods and kept on. Now the hero is doing okay 4 game-days into the plot.

Playing at the "full experience" level setting (enemies are not gimped). I cheat as usual by modding the game with "my own hands" (not with downloads). It's time consuming but fun because I'm doing it the old fashioned way by Hex Editing save games.

Thanks again for the helps and comments above. They really matter to me.

No problem. You can respec all party members too, as often as you like.

Some time has passed -- though not much -- and this is what has been in my rotation

-- RaceRoom Racing Experience. Love this sim. Hotlapping for ranked leaderboards. I wish their were more gearheads here at SimHQ to have some competition. Sim racing is rather dead around here. But I turn laps every day. Have dropped 500 hours in to this one.

-- Football Manager 2024. Managing Leeds in the year 2031

-- Le Mans Ultimate. Recently got a big update. Superb driving in this one, fantastic simulation, but still in EA, even though they are selling DLC. That's burns me bottom

-- Automobilista Motorsports Simulator 2. Hadn't driven this one much recently, but fired it up the other day to check out what is new. Sim racers are spoiled at the moment. Yet another fantastic sim.

-- F1 25. Running concurrent careers in standard career and My Team, plus F1 World content. Hit license level A!

-- Red Dead Redemption. The OG. This is a really good game. It's not as good as RDR 2 for me, and I'm stuck in third person, but I'm having a blast with it nonetheless. The RDR games have the best poker on PC

-- Everspace 2. This looked like a fun space themed looter shooter and it probably is, but I'm not comfortable with the controls, the flying isn't as fun and seamless as I need it to be. Thought about refunding it. On the fence. If anyone's played this and has advice for control setup I'm all ears

-- Far Cry 5. Nearly done now, just have to finish up the last region, and catch a few more fish. About 60 hours in. A good FarCry game.

-- Stalker 2. Recent big update brought me back. On my second run, and playing what I call hobo or drifter mode. Only one rule, I cannot put anything in to a stash, which makes inventory a different sort of thing altogether. I either need to carry it, sell it or discard it. No saving it for later.

-- Ultimate Fishing Simulator. It's a pretty good fishing game. I like the fishing and fighting mechanics. But 'ultimate' it is not, as it is missing a ton of things I think the 'ultimate' fishing simulator should have. But it's fun to catch 'em.

#%&*$#, that's a lot

I made a big mistake in buying Elden Ring Nightreign but it’s my fault for not reading the in-depth details about how different the gameplay would be. I simply don’t like being rushed from objective to objective while at the same time hoping and praying that my coop team mates know what they are doing. This is definitely not recommended for players who prefer a single player experience.

At the other end of the spectrum I’m enjoying the heck out of F1 25. This is the best in the F1 Codemasters series.

Thats sad to hear PM but tbh it's what I feared.

I'd like nothing else than get my teeth into another ER type of game but all the signs told me I wouldn't enjoy this. As you said, as a single player person this just isn't what I'd enjoy.

The whole thingof the map getting smaller and smaller, funneling you to specifec objectives, maybe not of your chosing and the fact that paired up with randoms who may or may not get the "gist" just was a big red flag for me, I cancelled my pre-order.

Mick.