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Made in us
Shadowy Grot Kommittee Memba






(Apologies to mods, I did not realize there was a separate forum for just Video Games from Geek Media. Just me being blind I guess, feel free to close the other thread if desired.)

Steam does its "Midweek Madness" sale thing and one of the items on sale this week is Pathologic 2, a remake of an old low-budget atmospheric horror game by Russian developer Icepick Lodge.

I cannot recommend this game highly enough to anyone who enjoys video games as an artistic experience. To me, it so thoroughly outperforms the games so often praised as "art pieces" that are generally just a CGI-rendered on rails cinematic experience like Heavy Rain that it feels wrong to compare it.

Despite the "2" in its title, it is a remake, not a sequel. not playing the predecessor makes the game a better experience as you avoid many story spoilers. It is an open world survival sim set in a mid-century Russian/Mongolian inspired soviet era steppe town, in which you primarily scavenge and navigate a barter economy that develops during a period of hyperinflation caused by a plague, as you work as a doctor to try and mitigate the disaster.

If you enjoy intensely challenging games where the primary difficulty comes from strategic resource allocation of your time, your health, and the interplay of power between various political factions and influential people, rather than your reaction time and ability to hit a button at the right time to kill the bad guy, Pathologic 2 is going to be a game that you'll enjoy. If video games are primarily an escape and power fantasy for you (and there is definitely no shame in that at all) then you'll probably want to look elsewhere. You play as a doctor, and the probable outcome of taking on a mugger with a knife with your bare hands is a bit more realistic than in most video games.

"Got you, Yugi! Your Rubric Marines can't fall back because I have declared the tertiary kaptaris ka'tah stance two, after the secondary dacatarai ka'tah last turn!"

"So you think, Kaiba! I declared my Thousand Sons the cult of Duplicity, which means all my psykers have access to the Sorcerous Facade power! Furthermore I will spend 8 Cabal Points to invoke Cabbalistic Focus, causing the rubrics to appear behind your custodes! The Vengeance for the Wronged and Sorcerous Fullisade stratagems along with the Malefic Maelstrom infernal pact evoked earlier in the command phase allows me to double their firepower, letting me wound on 2s and 3s!"

"you think it is you who has gotten me, yugi, but it is I who have gotten you! I declare the ever-vigilant stratagem to attack your rubrics with my custodes' ranged weapons, which with the new codex are now DAMAGE 2!!"

"...which leads you straight into my trap, Kaiba, you see I now declare the stratagem Implacable Automata, reducing all damage from your attacks by 1 and triggering my All is Dust special rule!"  
   
Made in fr
Hallowed Canoness





Hey, I'm the person who told you about the subsection. I'm not a mod and didn't meant it as a reproach, just thought you'd get better result here .

"Our fantasy settings are grim and dark, but that is not a reflection of who we are or how we feel the real world should be. [...] We will continue to diversify the cast of characters we portray [...] so everyone can find representation and heroes they can relate to. [...] If [you don't feel the same way], you will not be missed"
https://twitter.com/WarComTeam/status/1268665798467432449/photo/1 
   
Made in de
Battlefield Tourist






Nuremberg

I watched some stuff about the first game, but I think it looks too heavy for me at the moment. Might try it when the current unpleasantness is over.

   
Made in us
Shadowy Grot Kommittee Memba






 Da Boss wrote:
I watched some stuff about the first game, but I think it looks too heavy for me at the moment. Might try it when the current unpleasantness is over.


Huh. For me, the current unpleasantness is actually kind of making this game a better experience. I think horror has a sort of catharsis to it, where you face the absolute worst-case, hyperbolized version of something that scares you, and you fight through it and win, and it helps some of the real-world paranoia or phobia subside.

it definitely hits different people different ways. This game also does the best job of making you play a particular way without EVER forcing you to do anything, it's honestly kind of fascinating. And it also kind of weasels in little notes to the player that it is doing it to you, and I think that's great.

When the days in the game end, you get a voiceover from your father talking about his experience dealing with the outbreak, and he says something about time becoming non-linear, each night being followed by a shorter day, and each day being followed by a shorter night. I noticed myself that the first day had felt like I had tons of time, the second I felt kind of rushed, and the third there were only a couple of the major quest lines I was able to get through to the conclusion of before I ran out of time, so I set my phone on a timer to see how much the game would constrict me each day.

And three more days have gone by, and it hasn't. I've just started running around like a madman feeling like I've got no time to get anything done.

"Got you, Yugi! Your Rubric Marines can't fall back because I have declared the tertiary kaptaris ka'tah stance two, after the secondary dacatarai ka'tah last turn!"

"So you think, Kaiba! I declared my Thousand Sons the cult of Duplicity, which means all my psykers have access to the Sorcerous Facade power! Furthermore I will spend 8 Cabal Points to invoke Cabbalistic Focus, causing the rubrics to appear behind your custodes! The Vengeance for the Wronged and Sorcerous Fullisade stratagems along with the Malefic Maelstrom infernal pact evoked earlier in the command phase allows me to double their firepower, letting me wound on 2s and 3s!"

"you think it is you who has gotten me, yugi, but it is I who have gotten you! I declare the ever-vigilant stratagem to attack your rubrics with my custodes' ranged weapons, which with the new codex are now DAMAGE 2!!"

"...which leads you straight into my trap, Kaiba, you see I now declare the stratagem Implacable Automata, reducing all damage from your attacks by 1 and triggering my All is Dust special rule!"  
   
 
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