Pointless Venture's Best Games of the Year

 

Let's start this off with a list of titles played (an asterisk denotes a title not played to completion):

God of War

Cyberpunk 2077

Guardians of the Galaxy

Elden Ring*

Halo 5

Trek to Yomi*

Assassin's Creed Odyssey*

The Outer Wilds*

Quake 2 RTX

Quake

Portal RTX

Spider-man Remastered

Metal Hellsinger

Vermintide 2

Warhammer:Darktide

Plague Tail:Requiem

Tunic*

So this was a year of Gamepass. There were a couple more titles that I played such as Scorn and Pentiment that I haven't played enough of to really count, but such is the beauty of Gamepass--you can try before you commit. Guardians of the Galaxy, Halo 5, Metal Hellsinger, Plague Tail:Requiem, and Darktide justified the fifteen bucks a month I spent on Gamepass Ultimate. It's a great deal even at that price.

Best Singleplayer Game of the Year: God of War

God of War is a 2018 release, but it came out in January 2022 for PC. Even after four years, it's a stunning title that's probably the penultimate Dad Game. Its story is compelling, its world is beautiful, and its combat loop is great. My only complaints are a lack of enemy variety in the late game, and a slow mid-game section. Hopefully Ragnarok comes to PC in less than four years.

Best Multiplayer Game: Warhammer:Darktide

Darktide could use more maps and perhaps the promised crafting system, but it's a fun Left 4 Dead style romp through the Warhammer universe, featuring excellent graphics and meaty kinaesthetics that make heretic-slaying a good time.

Best game I didn't finish: Elden Ring

I've spent 74 hours making my way through Elden Ring's dense open world. It's a deeper, better designed take on Dark Souls, but it's just too damn big. I'm in the Mountaintop of Giants, and the difficulty curve has taken a sharp increase upward, and something else always seizes my attention. There's oodles of lore in here, but not much of a story, and I find that I typically lose interest in RPGs that aren't focused on their story as much as their mechanics. Will Elden Ring be my next Divinity Original Sin 2, a great game that I just couldn't finish? We will see.

More Plague Tail: Requiem Screenshots

 

I will say that tears streamed down my checks at the end of Plague Tail: Requiem. I had problems with the game's bleakness and the contrived nature of some of its story, but I did relate to Amicia and her struggle to let go. Requiem is one of the prettiest games I've ever played, so I'm sharing screenshots of its ending. Spoilers, of course.

Weightlifting: Running the Hill

 

I googled Running the Hill and Kate Bush came up, hah.

So I burned out on Juggernaut AI after running it nearly the entire year. Despite recommending the program several times on Pointless Venture, I'm now doing my own thing again. The mental freedom to decide what to do in the gym was the impetus that I needed to keep weightlifting. Focusing on the powerlifts gets boring; I'm overhead pressing a lot more now, along with doing power cleans.

I made this routine up yesterday to avoid doing sets of eight or ten, which I loathe. I call it Running the Hill. Simply, you start with a light weight, do a rep, add weight, do a rep, rinse and repeat until you get to a near max and twenty reps, with no rest in between singles other than the time it takes to change plates. So this was my squat workout:

135, 155, 175, 185, 195, 205, 215, 225, 235, 245, 255, 265, 275, 285, 295, 305, 315, 320, 295, 300. 

Once I got to 320, I decided to take a little weigh off, since 320 felt pretty heavy, but I added weight again for my last set. After doing the initial run, you need to get a little more volume, and start on a hill that's not as high, but just as long. So I did 225 for five, 230 for five, 235 for five, and finally 240 for five, completing the workout. I'm sore as hell today, and I managed to do forty reps of squats. I think this little routine is good for the squat and bench, but might be a little too much for the deadlift. Maybe decreasing the hills to ten reps instead of twenty would be a manageable modification.

Plague Tail: Requiem Review

 

I had to make myself finish Plague Tail: Requiem. Usually, I would say that’s a damning indictment of a game’s quality; however, in this case, it’s because Requiem is emotionally draining. Nearly unrelenting trauma is inflicted on teenage Amicia and five-year-old Hugo de Rune as they traverse medieval France, searching for a cure to Hugo's supernatural affliction. Hugo suffers from the Prima Macula, a symbiotic illness that spawns and attracts hordes of plague rats, which often burst through the ground or walls in writhing heaps to consume any nearby humans alive. In addition to the rats, the de Rune family must contend with non-stop violence. From angry beekeepers to soldiers just following orders, nearly every adult male in 14th century France is willing to skewer a teenage girl and her little brother. Requiem's heavy bleakness reminds me of the work of Cormac McCarthy, who often fixates on the senseless violence of existence. Hugo and Amicia are convincing characters, who grow increasingly damaged from their exploits, from Amicia having panic attacks to Hugo eventually succumbing to his illness, which is sentient and hungry. Moments to breathe come fleetingly and perhaps not often enough. I felt bad for powering Amicia through all of her torture, to the point where I wondered whether or not I was complicit in it. Ultimately, I was unsatisfied with how Requiem concludes its story. Don't Hugo and Amicia deserve better than this? I asked. To quote Clint Eastwood, "Deservin' ain't got nothing to do with it." Sometimes, you have to let go and surrender to circumstances. Amicia refuses to do so and admirably fights to the bitter end, but by refusing to accept reality, she continues to put her brother and herself through more suffering than any people deserve. So while I didn't necessarily like Requiem's story, I appreciate its thematic elements while wishing it had just a little more compassion at its core.

Gameplay mostly consists of stealth-action, with neither the stealth nor the action being particularly smooth. There were a few sections that I had to replay several times, either due to the game swarming you with too many enemies or requiring more sneaking than I was able to manage. Amicia has a slingshot that she'll upgrade, but most enemies are armored, which necessitates sneaking, distraction, or the crossbow, which only has a few bolts and therefore must be sparingly used. Often, you'll have to manage huge hordes of rats as an environmental puzzle, utilizing torches, flame pots, tar, or some other feature to clear a path. The gameplay, therefore, is similar to a big-budget cinematic game, a la The Last of Us, with a bit more jank and probably a fraction of the budget. Still, Asobo studios does well, especially in crafting their authentic-appearing version of medieval France. This is a stunning title, one that will have you reaching for the screenshot key. Performance was decent on my high-end system, with a few frame drops experienced during wide vistas or rat swarms. Admire the screenshots below.

I recommend Plague Tail: Requiem with hesitation. It will get you invested in its characters, but you'll feel their pain, and whether the experience is worth it depends on your interpretation of their suffering. I can't help but feel as though it would've been a better game had the trauma been reined in substantially.

 

Warhammer:Darktide Impressions

 

Darktide is a visually impressive game, if you have the hardware.

Warhammer:Darktide is a co-op shooter heavily influenced by Left 4 Dead, albeit with several differences, such as playable classes, loot mechanics, and an unlockable skill tree. Oh yeah, and instead of zombies, you're killing heretics and mutants, enemies of the Imperium or some such. Honestly, I know next to nothing about the Warhammer license, but it seems cool. The techno-gothic empire you serve has a sweet taste in architecture, favoring immense cathedrals and cobbled together apocalyptic shanty-towns brimming with orange skies, their labyrinthine corridors filled with spikes, skulls, and other heavy-metal shit. Darktide is a nice-looking game, featuring a level of detail uncommon in multiplayer-focused titles, and the contents of my screenshot folder increase every time I play. The ray-traced illumination of its industrial factories and sewers comes with a heavy cost, however. With all the graphical options set to High or Extreme, and ray-tracing set to low, I get a frame rate that fluctuates between 100 and 60, with a few drops below, with DLSS upscaling set to Balanced. Bump the ray-tracing up to High, and the framerate drops into the 40s and 30s. Just keep in mind that this is a game that can't be maxed out unless you possess an RTX 4090. 

Gameplay consists of working with your four-man team to slaughter hundreds of zombies (heretics, I mean) while traversing the map, working toward the completion of some objective (replace the powercells on a giant chemical dispersion unit, for example), after which you'll beat it like hell to the extraction zone. There are missions that further the story, but I'm not far enough to write about that. My Sharpshooter, a ranged lasergun expert, is at level ten, so I'm still grinding the lower level pickup missions until my gear is good enough for the harder levels. There's something immensely satisfying about slaying hordes of enemies, and although you're limited to two weapons (melee and ranged), the sight of a mutant's head exploding in a shower of giblets is just what I need after a hard day's work to relax. Also, the soundtrack is great, reminding me of Vangelis's Blade Runner score run through an industrial filter.

I would recommend Darktide to any fans of Left 4 Dead or anyone who likes co-op shooters. People with low-end pcs might want to stay away, however, since it's a beefy title. Screenshots below.

 

New Music: I'm Still Thinking Of You

This is a song that actually predates Theme Park Mistress. I believe I wrote it in Texas while going to UTA. A power-pop special, with maybe a little eighties hard rock influence. I had trouble with clipping on the vocals during the chorus, so I just distorted them through Reason. Recording vocals is always the hardest thing for me, since I'm not a natural singer, and my recording methods have hardly evolved over the last decade (I'm still using microphones I bought from the Arlington Guitar Center). I tried my best on this mix though. Spent about half a week knob-fiddling (hah). Probably one of my best pop songs.

Random Observations: Intermittent Fasting; Juggernaut AI; LG B2 OLED Review

 

Yeah, it's nice.

--So I've been doing intermittent fasting for a couple of months now, and I really recommend it to just about anyone. I've lost maybe a pound or so around my waist, which is nice, but the real benefit for me is better mental health. I don't seem to suffer from the manic moods I've been struggling with for the last couple of years anymore; my over-all mentality is similar to the peace of mind one receives after a meditation session. There are all sorts of dopamine receptors in your gut, and perhaps having a good sixteen to eighteen hours where those receptors aren't being stimulated is good for not just your body but your mind. My energy levels are improved as well, so I think I'll continue skipping breakfast for the considerable future.

--I've been on Juggernaut AI for almost an entire year, and it is, quite simply, the best way to train for me. I can switch around exercises if I wish, but the main lift volume is never changed (although you have the option) and all those sets of eight and ten during your hypertrophy blocks build some dense muscle. Volume doesn't scare me anymore. I do five sets of ten to eight reps all the time, sometimes after doing an RPE set of 10. I really don't see how anyone could fuck up on the AI unless they didn't push themselves or they just gave up. It's nothing fancy, and you could figure it all out on a spreadsheet (block periodization with autoregulation mixed in) but I'll take the app, thank you, and save my time. 

--I've never been a tv guy. I used a 42 inch Hitachi for a decade before replacing it with a ONN (Walmart brand) 55 inch 4k. However, the latent consumer whore in my soul has awoken recently, and I purchased an LG B2 55 inch OLED on Cyber-Monday for the sweet price of 999. OLED is a new technology that features great contrast and brilliant color reproduction not capable on your average LED set. Rings of Power looks great; I can see phenomenal detail in the dark scenes. Even 1080p content looks awesome, since the color reproduction is so beautiful. This set also has Freesync compatibility and a 120 Hz refresh rate, although I couldn't find an HDMI 2.1 cable long enough to reach my pc at Walmart, so I settled with a fifteen footer that maxed out at 4k 60 Hz. Even so, Elden Ring looks rich and vibrant and the input lag is almost as good as my monitor. So yeah, good purchase, I guess.