Hey Friends, It’s Been a While… – Hailing Frequencies for 2/2/18

Hello my friends, and welcome both to Friday and February! It’s been ages since I did one of these, but I have a VERY good excuse: I’ve been so busy that I’ve had little time/energy for writing these things. I mean, way busier than usual. It was a crazy big project that took two weeks of my time, but it’s over, and things are returning to normal around here. Thankfully I still had time for videos, so let’s start with the game I played through over the last two weeks: Wing Commander: Privateer.

I shouldn’t have played this. I should’ve let it lie comfortably in the nostalgic part of my brain. Instead, I suffered multiple deaths, a horrid grind, and a difficulty spike that made no sense. It truly, sadly became a chore to play this game after a while, which is not how I wanted to remember Privateer, so I cut out early. I just don’t have the patience for THAT hard-core 90s level of difficulty and grind anymore. I wish I did, but there’s just too much to play right now. Back in 1993, this was THE game I played for months, because I could do that. Now, not so much. It makes me hesitate to revisit any of the other Wing Commander games because this is truly among the best of them, and if I can’t handle this one…

Anyway, much of my other gaming time was, I daresay, EVE Online. While I claim much of it was preparing for this, our super-fun Monthly MMO Meetup:

Truthfully, I’m happy to be back, and am having a great time. Since they added The Agency PVE finder, I’ve been having a ton of fun just finding thing to do in whatever area of space I’m in. The new player experience in the game has improved a LOT, which as made my reentry into that SO MUCH EASIER than I recall it being last time I played so many years ago. I also feel like I’m a slightly different gamer than I was last I played (6-7 years ago). While I kept comparing it to my beloved Jumpgate, I’ve gotten over that, and am playing it for what it is, a massive open world with stuff to do in it, which incidentally uses spaceships. It’s been great to chill out, do some missions and combat areas while listening to podcasts. Just so fun.

Besides EVE, we had a really fun time playing GeneShift last week. This game just keeps getting better and better, and I’m hoping next time we’ll play we’ll have a full four-person crew.

Besides THAT, I spent some time with Hegemony III: Clash of the Ancients. Why this game, you ask? Because I’m realizing I’m not sure I have the patience for Total War games any longer, and in a forum thread, someone mentioned trying Hegemony III, as it has all the fun macro gaming I love while keeping the battles on the larger map. Last time I tried it, I didn’t fully click with it, but this time, going through the same tutorial, things are clicking, and I am having a GREAT time. There seems to be a TON of content in this game, so I can’t wait to play more. I also spent some time with Tesla vs Lovecraft, which might be 10tons’ best game since Crimsonland.

Overall, gaming time has been fairly tight, but that should change a bit soon. In a couple of weeks, Nicole is out of town for four days, so I’m taking those two workdays off and am gonna play ALL THE GAMES. I seriously can’t wait. I might record or stream some stuff during that time, but I dunno, I might focus on some me time, ya know? :)

This coming weekend, I was gonna play Zigfrak for the game of the week, but this new game Scavenger SV-4 just dropped, and it looks like it’s a 1.0 release, so it looks like I’ll be covering that instead. It certainly looks cool, and podcast co-host Spaz says it’s “fantastic” so I’m looking forward to trying it out for myself. I’ll totally also spend some time with Angels Fall First in preparation for next week’s podcast, so that’ll be fun! :)

So friends, there is so much stuff to go over (I have almost 100 news items saved), I’m just gonna distill it all into simple lists for the sake of my own sanity. Here goes!

New Games/Game Releases:

• Galactic Civilizations III: Intrigue
• Endless Space 2 – Vaulters
• Scavenger SV-4
• Star Souls
• Solstice Chronicles: SURVIVORS (I know it’s not a space game but we love the Red Solstice folks, so…)
• Deep Sixed
• Avalon: The Journey Begins Ocean Worlds DLC
• Scrapper
• THE PIT: The Board Game
• Offworld Trading Company Limited Supply DLC

Development Updates:

• Interstellar Space: Genesis
• Stellaris #103, #102, Apocalypse trailer, #101
• Infinity: Battlescape #96, #95, #94
• Star Traders: Frontiers #30, #29, #28, #27, #26, #25, #24
• Hellion
• XO
• Sunless Skies Exploration, Atmosphere
• Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2
• ARM Planetary Prospectors
• Kerbal Space Program
• Executive Assault 2
• Astrox Imperium Devlog 14, 13
• M.O.R.E.
• Galactic Crew Multiplayer Dev Diary, Part III, Part II
• The Spatials: Galactology
• Origin Space and another
• Helium Rain
• Starpoint Gemini Warlords
• Interstellar Rift Development Update 115, 114
• Skywanderers
• Space Engineers
• Interstellar Transport Company
• Elite Dangerous and another
• Battlestar Galactica Deadlock
• Rodina
• Endless Space 2
• Galactic Civilizations III

Patches:

• Endless Space 2
• Sunless Skies
• Interstellar Transport Company
• Space Pirates and Zombies 2
• Stellatum
• Cosmoteer
• Vendetta Online
• JCB Pioneer: Mars
• Wing Commander Saga
• Battlefleet Engineer
• Angels Fall First
• Microsoft Allegiance
• Star Explorers 3.4, 3.4A, 3.3, 3.2
• Stationeers v0.1.1130.5676, 0.1.1143.5721, 0.1.1111.5605
• Endless Space 2
• Astrokill
• Elite Dangerous
• Space Impossible
• Battlevoid: Sector Siege
• Avalon: The Journey Begins
• Thrust & Shoot : Flight School EA.11, EA.10
• Predestination
• Discovery Freelancer
• Universal Combat CE
• StarShip Constructor
• Avorion
• Interstellar Rift ALPHA 0.1.54c, ALPHA 0.1.54
• Origin Space
• Solaroids: Prologue
• StarMade
• Stellar Tactics
• Lightspeed Frontier
• Starship Corporation
• Empyrean Frontier

That’s it my friends! Have a great weekend!