Small and Meaningful

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Every morning at work, I look at my coffee cup with the words:

There’s no such thing as quality time.  There’s just time.

The point here is that people often wait for events, or put a lot of effort into a thing, while ignoring everything else around them.  It can be seen as a lack of appreciation for the simple things, but it’s often more related to an effort/reward mindset.    I’ll give some examples.

A successful relationship is not at all defined by the number of times you go out for dinner, or how expensive it is.  It’s defined by doing the dishes, telling them you care on a regular basis, actually wanting to spend time with them.  I can’t think of any marriage that ended in divorce because they didn’t get a new car, or take a trip.  Nearly all were chipped away over the years because they didn’t appreciate the small things.

My greatest memories with my dad have nothing to do with trips to the cottage as a kid (which was still amazing mind you), it was spending entire days at the rink, either skating or helping out other people.  My kids smile way more when we’re doing Legos, a puzzle, or a board game.

My best MMO memories are from EQ, farming experience with a friend in OoT til the wee hours, talking about life.  I did every raid for the first 2 expansions, yet this is what sticks most with me.

Even the best games today are not about the large payoffs, but the ridiculous refinement of the seemingly mundane.  Horizon’s best moments are outside of dungeons and bosses, and simply related to taking down a T-Rex that can shoot lazers.  The Last of Us excels at the quiet moments.

 

As I’m looking forward into 2020 and the messages I want to share with my family, the general theme is going to be on appreciating all the moments, not just the “big” ones.  That 2 minute chat in the car ride, telling my daughters that I think they’re beautiful every day, helping my wife without her needing to ask.   Even the smallest of gestures can make a mountain of difference.

What Remains of Edith Finch

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In the ever expanding catalog of games I’ve had the chance to play, few ever come across as art without feeling artsy.   It takes a special kind of blend to present game mechanics wrapped up in such a fashion that it plays more like a movie.  Shadow of the Colossus has been at the top of that list for a long time.  What Remains of Edith Finch is pretty darn close to that level.

Presented as an anthology of short gaming segments relating to the Finch family, and the possible curse that has caused all family members to pass away, you play the teen Edith looking for the root cause to all the story.  The actual Finch house is something to behold, as it’s not presented as a set piece but feels like it’s an actual house.  All the various bits and bobs look like they belong to someone, and were placed for a specific reason.

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As you progress through each short story, you get to understand that individual person and a very stylized telling of their passing.  There are some simple enough game mechanics to be had, but the point here is more about the interpretation of the story and how the game mechanics reflect the state of mind of the person in question.

Personally, when I finished most segments, I needed to take a breather in order to collect my thoughts.  I needed to digest the person, the message, the medium, and how it all fit into the larger picture.  I’d scour their room for some additional personal tidbits.  I’d imagine how the rest of the family felt at the loss, and how it motivated them in their stories.  The point here isn’t so much how they died (everyone dies eventually) but how their lives were beforehand, and the trickle effect unto others.

The game is only a couple hours to go through, and you will only get out of it what you want to.  My wife took a stride through the game after I did, and you could see the wheels turning when it was all over.  Highly recommended.

Rise of Skywalker

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I’m a fair bit conflicted about this movie.  The Last Jedi had some major plot holes and infuriating character developments, but it was generally consistent on its message – the past does not dictate your future.  Rise of Skywalker pulls a massive 180, and instead says that your past entirely defines your future.  Aside from Luke being a Force Ghost, you can pretty much ignore the entirety of The Last Jedi… every “major” development is ignored/retconned.

*Spoiler inbound*

Rose Tico

I’ll be the first to say that the Finn/Rose arc in TLJ was weak.  Rogue One did the whole “shades of grey” thing a lot better.  But to have her have a minute of screen time, and the Finn relationship entirely ignored, is plain absurd.

Finn’s Secret

There are 2 major plot beats that focus on Finn having a secret to tell.  Never gets a chance, never comes back into the conversation.  He’s also made general, by another general (Poe) who stays general himself.

Holdo Manoeuver

The big plot hole of TLJ, where a lightspeed ship can destroy another, is called a one-in-a-million chance.  Which either makes Holdo a force weilder (since Luke used the force to destroy death star 1), or the luckiest person alive.

If you’re watching the end of ROS, over the moon of Endor, you see another First Order ship destroyed by the Holdo manoeuver.  Least it sure looks like it.

Spaceships

A big plot point is that to destroy a nav beacon (exposed to the elements) you need to attack on the ground.  While a really neat set piece, it’s beyond dumb when you consider all the aerial acrobatics in episodes 1-8.  Two shots and this thing is down… next.  Also dumb that the enemy would leave this entirely out in the open.

Final Order Resources

A planet that no one can get to.  Hidden for at least 30 years.  Has the resources to build a modern fleet, with ships that each have a planet destroying weapon onboard.  Must have some amazing clone facilities on this planet to staff these ships…a plot point the First Order deals with by kidnapping people from planets.

The Magic Trick / Deux Ex Machina

Apparently Rey and Kylo can teleport things with their mind across planets.  Which looks frikkin’ cool, granted.  But the whole dyad in the force gimmick reeks of plot device to make things look cool.

What I mean here is that Star Wars succeeded because it was small people in a large world, trying to find their place in it all.  In these last 3, we have superhuman people that are able to conjure miracles, which dramatically lowers any sense of risk.

Ben’s Redemption

It had to happen, and the trigger for it is ok.  He apparently loses the ability to talk from that point forward.  From the start, the sequel trilogy had him set up as the ultimate bad guy who would redeem himself.  Which he does, but the really bad guy cheapens it.

Knights of Ren

Silent monks to walk slow, carry a big stick, have no force powers, no guns, no lightsabers.  With the buildup around these folks… major disappointment.

Palpatine

He makes for an intimidating bad guy, I’ll grant that.  But there’s no explanation of how he survived, this new dark magic where all the Sith live in one emperor, how he can summon lightning to disable an armada.  How he somehow let his kids (?!) become good (?!) people and take away his grandchild.  How pretty much everything about Rey is because she’s his grandkid.

Also, Snoke was apparently a hand puppet.  True story.

The Good Bits

The photography is well done, as are the set pieces.  The lightsaber battle over a raging sea is impressive.  The escape from the capital ship even more so.  Music is still top notch and gets you into the space.  Zori Bliss is a neat addition that adds some larger impact to the ongoing events.  Exegol is straight out of Knights of the Old Republic and it looks amazing.

TLDR;

The movie feels like pandering, and a general lack of understanding of the issues with TLJ.  Rogue One was an amazing movie, set in the same world, constrained by the plot and timeframe.  It still did an amazing job at character building and consistency.

I’d go into a tangent about how George Lucas’ success is almost entirely due to an amazing editor (his ex-wife), and how the lack of editing here is apparent… but this post is long enough.

ROS is an ok movie.    Could have used another 6 months to a year in the bacta tank.

 

 

Control

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When a game reaches multiple top 10 lists, my eyes tend to shift over.  When said game blends X-files, Lost, Fringe, Twilight Zone, Metroid, and Zombies… I’m doubly in.

Built in a New Weird setting, you play as Jesse who’s trying to find her brother within a secret government organization.  As you finally get through the front doors, you realize everything is going sideways, with a small war underway.

Cue the various exploration bits, and additional powers.  You have a weapon that can transform to other styles (full auto, sniper, shotgun, grenade launcher, handgun).  Powers are relatively simple.  Dodge and shield for defense.  Seize to convert low-health enemies.  Levitation to explore a pile of areas and make combat go full 3D.  And Launch – which is the bread and butter skill that picks up almost anything to throw it at targets.    The variety of items that can be thrown, and the distance… it makes for some extremely satisfying combat.

Enemies generally look the same, humanoids.  They are quite a bit different though.  Some are basic grunts, others launch grenades, some fly, some explode on death, some stealth and then shoot you at close range.  Then you have various elite enemies, and some exceptional boss fights.

Which does bring me to likely the largest hurdle for many gamers… this thing is hard.  Not to the level of Dark Souls… but enough that I died a solid 50 times before the end.  Sometimes it’s just bad luck and you end up between two grenades.  Sometimes you miss an important jump.  Most of them were the boss fights, in particular the last one and the few optional fights.  Levitation, dodging, launching, shooting.  It feels like pure chaos, but then you look back and go “holy shit”.

In fact, there’s one sequence near the tail end where Jesse says “that was awesome” and I cannot recall any game sequence that actually felt that awesome to get through.

There’s some RPG-ish elements here.  You get skill points to increase various powers/health/energy.  You get mod to modify yourself (better throws, less energy per use, more health, etc..) and your weapons (accuracy, rate of fire, ammo return, etc..)  There’s a huge amount of RNG here, and a massive difference between rank 1 and 5 items.  If you like min-maxing, there are some options here.

All of that stuff works, and generally works well.  But you’ve seen that before.  The extra bits here are the lore/setting.  There are dozens of lore items to pick up and read, listen to, or watch.  Some of it is absurd, like a rubber duck that teleports on it’s own, or a traffic light that teleports users when it’s red.  Some is freaky, like mold that takes like candy and transforms people.  There are various hidden puzzles too, like one where you cheat on a roulette table.  Piles of side quests that add extra flavor and bring you to the weirdest of places.  An extra dimension phone line.  The amount of effort and quality world building here is stunning.  You want to explore every nook and cranny.

And I want more Ahti.

Long story short, yeah, Control is one of the best games I’ve played this year.  That was awesome.

Looking Back at 2019

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Still quite a few days left, but since the holidays are just around the corner, I’d be surprised if much else pops up.  Or that I properly digest it in time.

Macro

2019 at the macro level has been a new level of insanity.  Society seems to be going off the deep end, with the simple idea of respecting another person considered taboo.  Social media is a ridiculous enabler of the worst facets of humanity.  And when our global leaders focus on lying, ridiculing, insulting and just plain being poor role models… we’re not going to go far.  It’s depressing.

And that’s inclusive of the “woke culture” of finding fault with everything from behind a keyboard.  It’s a sad day when someone’s personal value is measured in the number of re-tweets they get.  Just focusing on problems instead of working on solutions doesn’t help anyone.  And “cancelling” is not a solution.

On the flipside, it’s making me much more conscious of my behaviour and the one I want my kids to emulate.  It’s a very strong driver for the extra volunteering load I’ve taken on.  We can all do better.

Micro

My year’s been solid.  Love my wife more and more every day.  Kids are growing up to be people I want to spend time with, and so far want to spend time with me.  Our social circles are all undergoing major mid-life crises (which I guess is normal at this age), making for some serious wake up calls.  I still have a lot of friends who are having trouble coming to terms with the fact that they are adults.  Both my wife and I are making extra time to support as many people as we can fit.  It’s impressive what a small gesture can mean to someone.  Sometimes just a 5 minute phone call can turn around a person’s day.

Career wise things have been going along at a breakneck pace.  There are days where I wish I was still a code monkey, but on the whole I am enjoying what I do.  Some day I’ll explain it, but for now let’s just say that it’s high enough to have global impact, yet direct enough that I can talk to the amazing people doing the work.  And I’ve entered a career development program that will both open new opportunities, and help me grow as a leader.  Lots (and lots) of work to get here.  I’m glad I can recognise it, and the support along the way.

Summer at the cottage was great this year, but went by a tad too fast.  Next year I’ll take some more time off and spend more with the fam.  There’s something special in seeing your kid’s face light up when you’re out on the water, or around the fire.  Something like that can make my week.

I blogged more than I thought I would, which is good.

Games

If I was to look at 2019, it would be the year of less is more.  The best games this year were able to focus on key aspects and deliver amazing experiences.  It didn’t take 40 hours to get through a slog of repetitive content.  Most were in the 8-16 hour range.

  • I started the year with a buch of indies.  Celeste, Frostpunk, Return of the Obra Dinn, Dead Cells.
  • I picked up Outer Wilds in the late spring and was amazed at what was presented (my personal GotY winner).
  • Bloodstained scratched that Castlevania itch, but didn’t really go beyond.
  • Outer Worlds showed everyone what can be done with a clear vision and a smaller set of resources – I’m looking forward to more adventures in that setting.
  • Jedi Fallen Order is an actually good Star Wars game from EA, and no loot boxes.  Call me pleasantly surprised.
  • I bit back into SWTOR to see what content I’ve missed over the years.  I do like what’s presented, and I’m going back with a Republic Shadow to compare both ends.  Won’t sugar coat it… it’s rough.  But that just means the game has progressed.
  • Lots of Dauntless, which has been a pleasant surprise.  Their official launch was in the fall, and their release structure should be applauded.  There’s tons of content here, it’s entirely cross-platform (Switch too!), and bite sized enough to make Monster Hunter look like paint drying.  Oh, their F2P model is impressive to boot.
  • Warframe has been an on/off thing for a while now.  It still has one of the craziest on-ramps I’ve ever seen, next only to EvE.  The depth here is stupifying.  Like if you went to a buffet, and found out there were 30 other buffets all linked together.  There are times where it feels like staring into the Abyss.

 

Overall

In terms of things that directly impact me, it’s been a really good year.  One of my best.  A year of reducing the complexities and at the same time spreading out to help more people.  I prefer to spend my energy on people who are positive, or are making attempts to be.  I try to let the negativity just slide off, and it makes for more enjoyable days.

As I get older (and hopefully wiser), I guess I’m just more appreciative.  Thanks for reading.

Warframe Update

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Goals.  I need to set more of them.

Progress in Warframe is an odd measure, since it’s like saying you’re done with the soup section of a buffet and moving to seafood.  Ain’t no measuring stick for that!  But Warframe has a conceptual value called Mastery Rank, and it’s based on the rank of various pieces of loot.  Get a sword to rank 30, get some MR.  Same with companions, pets, main weapons, side weapons, and archwings.  Right now, I’m at MR7.  The max is MR28, though MR16 is where the final content is unlocked (Riven).

That makes one set of goals of getting more stuff.  There are 42 main line Warframes.  27 of them have Prime variants (better stats, much harder to obtain).  I’ve gotten all the ones that drop from planets up to Neptune.  I’ve got the main blueprints for Chroma and Octavia as well.  That also means I have a fair chunk of main weapons, secondaries, and melee choices.  I’ve leveled a fair chunk of them, though it bears note that leveling them is not the simplest of things.

From 1-30 takes just under an hour.  You can level multiple items at the same time, though most weapons level faster if you use them.  Helene on Saturn is a defense mission against Grineer, and is the go-to place for people to level everything.  Easy groups, generally small room, plenty of drops.  It can get repetitive though, so I try to interlay some other missions to break the monotony.

Upgrading items is done with mods, which work like points-based bonuses you can slot into gear.  You can upgrade mods, which increases their point value, but each piece of gear has a max amount, so it turns into this interesting (?!) puzzle at times.  Many mods are useful, though the best are quite hard to come by.  A full leveling run (from 1-30) can get me ~250 or so mods, though 99.9% of them are sold.

If I was to set myself some goals for the next month or so, they would be as follows:

  • Get to MR10
  • Complete all nodes up to Neptune
  • Complete Octavia & Chroma
  • Acquire Titania & Grendel
  • Complete Pluto missions (which should unlock lots of quests)
  • Get into a Dojo (guild)

Some of those are more achievable than others.  Octavia in particular requires a random drop from a 20 minute mission, which are level 25-35.  Guess that will depend on luck for groups.  Even completing all nodes can be a major pain.  Archwing missions aren’t all that muchr fun, and I have a large dislike for Mobile Defense missions.

Still, if I can complete at least MR10 and up to Pluto, I guess I can consider the basic stuff all complete.  Then I can start worrying about factions and whatnot.

 

Building and Maintaining Lore

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World-building is dependent on setting up consistent lore, and then respecting that lore with the stories in that world.  In single stories, that’s certainly of value, but over larger series it’s essential to keep people invested.

Why?  Value.  If the stuff you put out at the start is discarded, then it means it has little value and consumers can easily skip it.  It also instills a level of doubt that the current story will have no links to the world and reduce it’s impact.

Game of Thrones has some serious world building going on in the books.  Even the TV show did a very respectable job of maintaining that world.  The issues with the TV show don’t relate to lore with respect to the world, but in respect to the actions taken by the characters.  Like how you don’t set up a main villain for 6 years and then dispatch him in 1 episode.

Harry Potter had a consistent world up until book 7.  Then the play came out and decided time travel was a good way to impact the main storyline and alternate universes.  The JK decided that twitter was a great way to pad extra content to the original books and throw in some major curveballs.  Now, if you ignored everything that came after book 7, odds are you’re a happy camper.

In the comic book world, there are plenty of retcons.  In some sense this creates larger arcs across multiple volumes.  Superman has undergone multiple versions, depending on the needs of the writers and society as a whole.  Batman has had tons of versions.  The slight difference here is that when a retcon comes along, there’s usually some advanced notice and the break is clean.  Rarely do they every try to blend both stories and worlds together.

Playing through SWTOR brings more of this to mind.  While nearly all of it is considered “Legacy” now, it still bears mind that it’s consistent.  The stuff done in Chapter 1 is not negated by anything in Onslaught.  That there are so many intertwining storylines and that they rarely conflict is quite impressive.  Typically the storylines would branch/fork and then come back to a mainline resolution.  Onslaught is a bit different in that space, as the branches/forks are still present at this point.

This is in conflict with the recent Star Wars trilogy.  The Force Awakens was somewhat consistent, with a few interesting bits.  Finn’s battle with a lightsaber against a shock weapon was a bit odd.  The Last Jedi took a baby & bathwater approach, which kept the setting but ignored most of the lore from prior.  Apparently the Force can help you live in space, it can transmit you across the galaxy, lightspeed can be tracked and can be used as a weapon.  There are a few dozen more examples.  The problem with this isn’t so much that they break the existing lore, but that they negate all tension in the film.  The implications of each of those changes the entire galaxy.  Think of it this way – every Xwing is now a nuclear bomb, capable of taking out a capital ship.

I know there are a lot of people who are more interested in the individual story, and that’s ok.  I’m much more interested in the thought process of the world, and seeing how other stories could add to the base presented.  Wheel of Time had some amazing world building.  Sword of Truth was pretty solid.  Lord of the Rings was only written because a world was built beforehand.  When it works, it means the sum is greater than the parts.  When it doesn’t, you get something like the Terminator franchise, where you burn the audience so badly that even when you do get quality (Dark Fate) no one cares.

I’d like to say I’m hopeful that is not the case with Star Wars, but given Kathleen Kennedy’s comments that there is no source material to draw from… that raises some eyebrows.

SWTOR – Shadow Musings

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I’ve loved stealth classes for a long time.  They work in excellent form for quick combat, but generally get weaker as the combat duration lengthens.  In WoW, Monks have pretty much replaced Rogues in that respect.  But it’s hard to ignore their benefit of group stealth for time-based challenges.

In my Republic playthrough, my current character is a Jedi Shadow.  By level 25, aside from a stealth button, there really isn’t much there that screams “I’m a shadow ninja and you can’t see me.”  I’d have to triple check when my toolkit from stealth actually has a purpose other than bypassing groups of enemies.

I’ve just finished the Nar Shadaa / Taris grouping, then the tiny ship event that follows.  I’m chasing a Sith that is infecting Jedi with some sort of mental plague, turning them to the darkside.  My secret weapon, which I learned at level 5, is to take their illness for my own – sucking the poison as it were.  I finally found the Sith, and now to chase him…

This is an odd storyline.  Why in the world would the Jedi Council assign one of the largest threats to its existence to an initiate?  When  you’re already short staffed and someone is poaching your team, I think that merits more than the rookie’s attention.

The story beats are all similar too.  Each planet you find a Jedi turned dark, complete some quests to finally meet them, then use the shield ability to cure them.  Feels like I’m a doctor running around giving vaccines.  Aside from the very final part (in the ship), there’s no tangible progress.  If I recall, that is a point for quite a few of the Act 1 class stories, yet in this case it seems really apparent.

I generally liked my companions on the Empire side.  Sure, some annoying ones but it worked.  Qyzen is the whole honorable warrior shtick.  It completely conflicts with the light side Jedi options though.  Tharan Cedrax is meh.  His own companion, Holiday, is where it’s at.  There’s something about the exploration of AI in the Star Wars universe that’s always been interesting.  The whole Iokath/SCORPIO line is where it’s at for me.

I still maintain that the leveling experience is jarring compared to later content.  Planets are large swaths of nothing, with the hub/spoke model that has side quests that are not at all near where your main quest points you.  I’m sure I spend 75% of my time on my mount getting from A to B.  If not for investment in Legacy Quick Travel, the trip from B back to A would be all the more annoying.  It’s more of a gripe though, since I’m able to clear an entire planet’s quest (class & planet) in about 90 minutes.

I’ve thought about doing multiple classes at the same time, enough to allow rested XP to get me to 50.  Good news there is that since every planet scales to my level, that’s not needed.  So off to Tatooine I go.

 

Phoenix Point Quick Impressions

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XCOM of attrition.

I rather enjoy the tactical/strategy squad genre.  I played the heck out of the original XCOM (even wrote my own mouse driver for it).  I’ve played every iteration since.  JAG was decent enough.  Syndicate is a top 20 all time game.  There are a half dozen in that vein every year that seem to pop up.  Sattelite Reign was a recent one.  Hard West.  Phoenix Point is a bit different, in that it’s designed by the same guy that made the first XCOM.  And hooo boy does that show throughout.  Couple thoughts after a few missions.

  • Squads?  Check
  • Alien bay guys?  Check
  • Research & manufacturing?  Check
  • Geoscape? Check
  • Factions?  Check
  • Action points in tactical mode? Check
  • Classes?  Check

The foundational parts are all there, it’s a relatively familiar system.  What Phoenix Point (PP) does differently is apply the concept of time management to equation.  One effective strategy in XCOM is to take a more defensive approach to combat, primarily due to the rather low hit points, and extremely long periods of recovery after damage.  Losing a top-end Sniper for a couple weeks due to really bad luck rolls was super painful.

PP instead puts the clock front and center for a lot of actions.  You need to collect material to build things, and you get more material if you finish a mission quickly.  You are presented with multiple attack choices at the same time, but never really enough soldiers to complete them all on time.   There will be times when you simply run out of ammo.

PP also adds a fair chunk of hit points to every enemy, so that it takes 3-4 attacks to take out even the lowly grunts.  Rather than throw a half dozen enemies at you, there are less of them, but they last longer.  The net effect is that each map is the same time duration, but there’s always something going on, and usually more than 1 active target.

Free Aiming

Everyone has missed a point blank shot in XCOM.  It’s absolutely infuriating when it happens, and often at a key point in battle.  Hip shots still exist in PP, but it also adds a Free Aim mode, which is a much more realistic combat mechanic.

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Dead to sights

In most cases, you can bring up your sights and find 2 concentric circles to assist with aiming.  There’s a 100% chance of it hitting the outer circle and 50% chance of the inner one.  As you get closer or farther from the target (or swap guns) the circles change in size.    Picking a part of the enemy has differing effects.  Maybe it disables an attack, maybe it restricts movement.  For some shielded enemies, maybe you can get by the shield and hit an exposed part.  Or perhaps you just want to take out the wall of the building to get a better shot next time… that works too.

This customized shooting makes a tremendous difference in combat.  XCOM sometimes felt like Excel with graphics, just a pretty pain on top of a number crunching machine.  PP says enough with that, and puts a lot of control in the player’s hand.  Yet with that control comes a suprising amount of challenge.  If you aren’t attacking the right enemies, what seems like a sure win can easily turn into a loss.

It will take some time to come to terms with PP.  There’s a lot to unpack here, and it’s going to take some time to get through it all.  From what I’ve seen so far, it should be a fun ride.

Exploration vs Achievement

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At work, we’ve gone through psych profiles (NOVA, Insight, Myers-Briggs), and for a long time I’ve been super dominant in one aspect.  I am not a cheerleader, I am a trailblazer.  I see broken things, I want to fix them and find more broken things.  We have an annual review of these profiles, and that allows any new staff to better understand the drivers of teammates.  Which then makes for much more pleasant conversations where both people are aiming for common ground.

There are analogies to gaming.  Bartle posits a 4 quadrant player profile, including Social, Killer, Explorer, Acheiver.  Everyone has a bit of each profile within themselves, though there are certainly dominant aspects.  In that space, I am strong in the Achievement section, with some exploration bits included.  I have next to no drive for the Killer persona, and the Social one is fairly weak as well.  In both of those cases, people will play shitty games because either they are dominating other people, or the other people are the reason to log on.  Generally speaking, an FPS is much more about the Killer model, and an old-school MMO (UO, EQ, WoW Classic)  is more about the social aspect.

I tend to strike more in the Exploration & Achievement sections.  Not in the absolute sense of finding every nook and cranny, and the obscure/grindable achievements though.  Both of those have very long tails.  I have little interest in ever getting a 100% complete, or a Platinum only to have a badge show up.  Now, if content is gated behind the activity, then sure, it’s a tad more interesting.  Things like FFX’s Monster Arena is a good example, and WoW’s pet menagerie is a bad example.

When I “finished” Jedi: Fallen Order, the rest of the game was about unlocking new cosmetics.  Meh.  No real interest.  Outer Worlds I had done nearly all the quests and explored all the zones, but only in the context of playing a specific character build.  To get “more” content, I’d need to restart with a different build.  I’m giving myself time to forget my first playthrough to make it more enjoyable the next time.

SWTOR is in an interesting spot.  There’s piles of content I missed (the near entirey of the Republic 1-50 storylines), so there’s a fair chunk there to face through.  I don’t have much interest in the end-game.  There was a time that I used to.  I raided a lot in early WoW.  I was runing dungeons a-plenty until WoD.  WoD’s implementation made me reconsider my gaming choices, and that meant looking at my gaming catalogue.  Instead of spending a few hours dungeoneering for extra gear, I would rather play something like Shadow of Mordor, or Slay the Spire.  I get why people would commit to a single game, and the social bonds therein.  But I’m good with having to go through 5-6 other GotY candidates instead.

Reviewing what I have left on deck game-wise, that leaves:

  • SWTOR Republic class quests to 50.  Maybe, just maybe, get one of them out to Onslaught.
  • Warframe. Not much more do to here until I get a Platinum coupon, allowing for a much larger inventory.  There’s a post here about online pricing…the coupon is the actual price.  Everything else feels like a penalty.
  • Phoenix Point.  The XCOM successor of sorts from Julian Gollop who created the series.  I don’t expect it to be at the same level as XCOM2 at launch, but then again XCOM2 took it to another level with War of the Chosen (DLC) and the Long War (mod).