What is you gaming "White Whale"?

That game you really want to try and like, but every time you try it, you just drop it and walk away after a few minutes of play.

- Dark Souls: I am still at the first big monster in the church/temple... you know the one. Been trying for 2 and a half years according to Steam.

The saddest part? - Even though I have never been able to progress, I also got DS2 and 3, because I was able to get them really cheap...and it was inevitable to be able to continue the first one...someday.

I blame it on it being a third person game....yeah...that sounds right.

for me it's the Stalker series and Pacific Storm

tried many times those games but always unistalling them after a couple of hours

I kind of have that with Dragon Age: Inquisition. There are many things I like, many more that I don't understand yet and things I don't care for. Its not a bad looking game by any means but I'm not a fan of the Frostbite engine or at least the latest iteration. I'm not sure why. It still feels kind of shallow to me and not organic like Witcher 3 engine, Red Dead Redemption engine, The Order:1886 engine. However I did like the looks of Battlefield Bad Company 2. I'm also still struggling a bit with the combat. It all hasn't quite clicked for me yet but I hope it does. I'll usually grind an hour or two here and there just hoping it opens up more. I'm sure there are others but that's all I gots right now.

Crusader Kings 2. I've started it at least a dozen times and never been able to last more than 10 minutes.

Hearts of Iron

Rainbow Six: Rogue Spear. The mission where you have to bug the terrorist camp. It's next to impossible because you can't even be seen let alone glanced at. There are no save points. So you can get 40+ minutes into the mission and one slip[ up and it's chutes and ladders all the way back to the beginning again. So annoying. You can't even fire a weapon.

I finally completed the mission once. I was so turned off and frustrated by it that I never finished Rogue Spear. A while later my hard drive crashed which means after re-installation I would have to start the whole campaign all over again, INCLUDING that mission.

I never even bothered to re-install it. I was that fed up.

There's an Arma 3 mission that is that way right now for me. I accomplished "Signal Lost" once before but because some silly update saw my campaign progress as not compatible, it started the campaign over at the last good save point, which is right where that tough mission is again. Grrrr.....!!!!

v6,
boNes

DCS World. It's beautiful, and it has the unusual distinction in simulation gaming of still being supported.

It's just not fun. In the pursuit of fidelity, they completely erased any sense of enjoyment, at least for me.

Try one of the newer A-10C campaigns, "Operation Piercing Fury" or "The Enemy Within". Both of those turn a dry, serious simulator into some serious, kick-ass, gaming fun!

The Witcher 3. Everything about it seems to shout that I will like it. But in practice - meh. Just can't get into it.

Any flight sim. I've lost my mojo baby



Couldn't have said it better myself.

You ask a most excellent question.


For me the game is Assetto Corsa. The feel of the physics engine is nice and the graphics are nice but the actual immersion and gameplay itself I find to be so sterile and bland. I can never play it for more than an hour at any time.

Deus Ex: HR.
And I'm not going to start Mankind Divided before I have finished Human Revolution.

The reality is, whenever I try to muster the energy, I fire up Civilization once more for yet another all-nighter.

DCS flight sim are mine. I would really like to become competent with them but there's just to MANY BUTTON combinations.
I Really want to purchase DCS spitfire but I know it will be used a couple of times then just likes DCS huey and the rest not be played.

Grand Prix Legends.

The sim is supposed to beat you. You're not supposed to be as fast as Clark Hill Gurney Brabham and company.

Been trying off and on since '98. The racing is great fun but real-race length Monaco? Nurburgring? You're lucky to finish, let alone get a top three spot. But "a few minutes" has no place in GPL. Takes longer than that to put in a good qualifying lap.

Yeah, GPL is the epitome of the hardcore racing sim. It kicked my a$$.

I hope to finish my Xmas shopping today. I'm on vacation this week to get things done. Maybe in a few days I can devote some seat time to GPL. After all these years I have a PC that doesn't bat an eye at it at full res and all sorts of mods.

But the images of "Zandvoort DNF. Kyalami DNF. Mosport DNF. Watkins Glen DNF." mock my wakeful dreams.

DCS World for me. It may as well be a job. Just too real.

Hearts of Iron IV too. Different reasons that I can't really describe. I always end up back with War in the Pacific when I try HOI.

This is probably going to sound like heresy, but for me it's Civ 5. I never played any of the Civ games except Civ revolution on the PS3. That was sort of like a Civ light I guess, and it kept my interest enough to make it through one or two campaigns. They really had to simplify it to get it to run on a console and even then it taxed the system
with choppy performance.

Then some time late last year when Steam had a sale on Civ 5 with all of its various DLC for one lump sum, I gave in and bought it. In a year, I have put in exactly 6 hours and most of that has been playing the tutorials. I just get bored with it and stop after an hour or so.

I guess it's the fact that I got spoiled by the Total War type RTS's, which have a more of a gritty historically authentic tactical element and less of an overall fantasy world aspect.


Cheers

DCS dropped off from my radar several months ago. It definitively has to do with the sterile nature of the maps, workload, and overall lack of "consistency" or "synergy" between the simulated platforms. It has some of the elements I disliked about civilian flight simulators, and very few of the ones I loved about military simulations.

I will try to get one of the A-10 campaigns this Christmas and see if that changes my perceptions a bit, but I am not confident it can.

On the other side of the coin, I still fly regularly and love F4 BMS, and I never feel it gets tiresome for me.

This right here is the exact reason why I skipped on getting TW: Warhammer. A huge part of the appeal to me with the Total War series are the historical settings and the fact that I'm a big military history buff.

I keep hoping that Creative Assembly is working on either an Empire 2 or Napoleon 2.

Total War Shogun 2
The X games (X3 and expansions etc)
Dangerous Waters

I'd love to immerse myself in these games, but just can't stay with them for long before getting frustrated.

What was it about Shogun 2 that frustrated you? As for Dangerous Waters, that definitely had a very steep learning curve.

Battletoads, 28 years and still cannot beat that game.
X3 games, Everything felt crowded in sectors and was spoiled by Independence War 2 open space feel.
Total war games after medieval 1, something felt lost and cannot keep playing.
Battlefront games, can't handle the cheating on those games.

I have a lot. For every game I've poured a ton of time into, there are others that I've not.

Dangerous Waters, only played it for MP but the lack of saves and time compression made it too frustrating. Too sterile.

Most current flight sims--DCS, ROF, BoS/BoM--I sit down and fly, then I go a week or two or four before I touch it again, preferring to do something else instead.

Assetto Corsa, Project Cars, and Dirt Rally--pretty much the same thing. pCars gets the most thanks to MP, but when I'm playing offline I tend to gravitate towards other games instead.

Witcher and Witcher 2. I like the games when I play them, but I find myself usually choosing to play something else rather than play them.


Past games that have done this to me:
Deus Ex, the original. A great game once you're about 5 hours in, but that opening just is so tedious to me.
Deus Ex Invisible War. The only FPS I've only played once. I tried and failed to play a 2nd time over and over again, never get past an hour or two and give up.

I tried a couple of the X games, X2 I had I think, gave up.



The Jedi Master

Oh, I forgot about Galactic Civ III. The story-driven campaign was somewhat fun but after that it's mostly a snoozefest.

Quite a lot of RPGs - Divinity 2, Dragons Age Origins, Mafia 2, Jade Empire, Witcher 1&2. Even HalfLife2 E1 & E2. I think it's just the investment needed to remember the lore and the plot, as well as the mechanisms. Not the sort of games to dip into for casual play - with a family I just can't sit down with a game for six hours straight

Skyrim, Fallout 3 and the GTAIV addons (Lost and Damned, and Gay Tony) bucked the trend, but funnily enough I can't get into GTAIV proper having had the run of the city with all the cool toys.

Borderlands 2. I enjoyed the first one a good bit, but I've now tried three times to play BL2. I am 10 hours in. I suppose the repetitive nature of going back and fourth, not so fun shooting mechanics, and re-clearing outposts again and again gets old. Now I feel like restarting because I have no idea where to go and the like, but I don't want to re-do 10 hours of it.

This is odd as when I play a story/campaign based game I finish it as quickly as possible. I even put aside my MP and replayable games (DCS, ArmA, ect.) to finish something. But not for BL2.

If it weren't for the cooperative mode I would have never bothered with the BL games. I tried playing them in single player a few times and I always got bored pretty quickly. They really aren't meant to be played by a single player.

Just never really knew what was going on. Didn't seem to be any good explanation about how to play it, overwhelmed with the different types of troops, how to attack on the main map, never really figured out the intro tutorial battle. I've played it some and gotten through a bit but just didn't really know what I was doing. I've never had a TW game before, but plenty of RTS. Just didn't click as much as I wanted it to. I need to revisit with a youtube walkthrough to get me going.

Witcher. I just could not get into it at all, and I generally like RPGs

DCS. No life at all. My go-to modern sim is still F4, followed by JF18.

GPL is epic. It's the top of the pyramid. Like F4, a sim you have to devote lots of time to in order to be good. I still remember winning my first race, at Monza in the Eagle Weslake. What a sim!

Yep, DCS as well, for the same reasons already mentioned by others.

Here's a link to a great guide for Shogun II and one of the best player written guides I've ever seen for any game. A member at the Total War. Org site made it and she did a fantastic job that looks almost commercial with nice graphics, maps, and screen shots. If you scroll down to just under the table of contents there is a link to a PDF copy that you can download to your hard drive and/or print out. It's 93 pages in all---kind of like what one might expect a thinking developer to provide.

http://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?137395-Frogbeastegg-s-Guide-to-Total-War-Shogun-II

Creative Assembly has never been strong on any kind of printed or even downloadable guides for their games. Oddly as their games got more content and more complex controls, the less they printed to go with the game. I personally feel this is one reason that their games get some unfavorable criticism---especially if a new player grows frustrated just trying to learn to play. Developers are their own worst enemies sometimes.

Cheers

Thanks, I'll check it out! I've got a lot of the dlc from when I'd get excited about giving it another go. I need to get used to it.

SHE? If I wasn't married I would ask her out on a date!


Females probably comprise less than 1% of all TW players.

Thanks F.O.,,Just put Shogun 2 on my machine having bought it right after it came out.haven't had machine enough to run it until now,,I was working the tutorial but more questions than answers I like what i have discovered so far and having plaed the first Shogun been looking forward to playing this pup.

The second one really doesn't play that differently from the original as far as the standard 16th century campaign goes. The "Fall of the Samurai" campaign is very different since you have firearms and ironclad ships involved.


My only major complaint with Shogun 2 is that CA never remade the "Mongol Invasion" DLC for it. I would have loved that.

Shogun 2 is still my absolute favorite installment of the TW series (well, of it's "second generation", anyway).

Yeah PM they are pretty close but to admit I succumbed to the flashier graphics and I would like to see Mongol Invasion also maybe a later DLC

Isn't that called Total War Attila?

http://store.steampowered.com/app/325610/

Well, the Huns were different from the Mongols in many ways and Attila does not have Japan in its playable strategic map area. You're also talking about two different time periods that are about 800 years apart.

Never met the guy...he was popular before my time.


Yeah... I'm a doofus...

Fot me it`s currently Tomb Raider.

I really hate these "cutscenes" where you hectically have to click th mouse, or hit the keys on the right micro-second.

Currently stuck in this cutscene, where you are flying a para-glider through a forest. Can`t tell how many times I died.

Would love to see the game with all settings ramped up on my new system.

I understand kilosierra. I love the new Tomb Raider reboots but the first one especially has some bad QTE moments. Its altogether not as bad as some folks made it out to be. Overall there isn't that many. I'm struggling with Tom Clancy's Future Soldier and I'm telling you that has some reaaaaally badly implemented QTEs. I can't get through the freaking third mission because of one.

I play games using both m&k and a wireless Xbox 360 controller. I have a feeling if you were able to play the game with a controller even if for just that sequence you could get passed it no problem. Sometimes that happens. Some gimmicky game play conventions that aren't very good to begin with translate poorly to PC controls sometimes. Try playing that mission with a controller and see if you can get passed it.

Use a controller on any Tomb Raider game.

Tomb Raider lost my interest due to the platformer feel to it. I know it's supposed to be that kind of game, but it just got old.
I don't mind QTE's unless it's strict about the timing. Ryse is packed with them for your executions, but it's not necessary if you screw them up. Shadow of Mordor had some too, but not that bad.
I don't remember it in GRFS, what part is that in?

Yeah, those QTEs where they put a sliver of interactivity into what is essentially a cutscene always frustrate me.

I feel little accomplishment, might as well just make it a cutscene and be done with it.



The Jedi Master

The 'Souls games are amazing. I adore them more than any other game of recent history. Don't give up on that first boss, he's cake once you get the hang of it. The games are beyond deep and intensely rewarding. I've played through all three.

Actually I thought of a better one. FarCry 4. I can not get into it. I've tried. I love the setting but I just can't get there. I have exactly ten hours in it. I recently installed it again to give it another try. I made it to the part where you crash in the jeep and you are on your own for the first time. I was bored. Now I've gotten far enough into the game's missions a couple of years ago but I get so bored with it. I can't put my finger on. There is something about it that is just so tedious about it that drives me nuts. I like long games and crafting and leveling up but something isn't right with this one. The main character is less annoying than FarCry3(which I didn't finish either) but there is something about it that zaps the enjoyment out of it for me after only about a half hour. Perhaps part of it is the story that isn't drawing me in as well as some of the other weird things Ubisoft is known for. I want another story like FarCry 1, with an Island of Dr. Moreau type of theme and full of better characters. So many games do characters right but Ubisoft consistently writes as though no one over 25 works there. Absolute rubbish. I wish Crytek still drove the Farcry bus. I liked the original FarCry better than their Crysis 2&3.

Have you considered a mod? I recently played through FC3 again with Ziggy's Mod on Hardcore, put 30 hours in without touching the campaign and had a blast. I can truly say that it is a different game with the mod.

Have a browse on nexus or moddb and see if you can make it your own.

My whale is Dead Island. I've played 5 hours, and everything from the opening track to the mechanics (even modded for more realism) just bugs me. It's off the HDD, but every now and then I take another look at youtube to see if I'm ready, but nope.

I played it in cooperative mode and it was a lot of fun. I would have been bored as well playing it in single player mode.

Many of those games that have coop are really blah in single player.

Dead Island, Dead Rising, Borderlands 1 and 2...

However, Far Cry 4 I did play through both in SP and coop and I found it fine. However, I also finished FC3 and aside from changes to the plot and the main character, they're really the same game in different locations.

If you didn't care for FC3, and that wasn't solely because of the whiny protagonist, FC4 is not an improvement.

I will get FC Primal some day on a cheap sale, as without coop I'm far less interested and not going to pay close to full price.



The Jedi Master

That was really the main drawback of both games. How I wished for a "mute" option for the main character. FC3 was a lot worse, because you also had to deal with the main character's brodude fratboy douchebag friends (BTW, how does one call the female equivalent of a douchebag fratboy? Douchebaguette sorogirl?).

I guess I am firmly out of Ubisoft's target audience range regarding the Far Cry franchise.

Far Cry (and specially Far Cry 3) do not use the character and story elements lightly. They were intentional and forced to elicit an emotional response on the player, not to appeal to a demographic group. The use of cliches, stereotypes and unlikable characters were used as satire elements - from action movies and games.

They were pretty aware on how whiny Jason came across at the start of the game - just to make his transformation on a killer more poignant.

And how equally douchey his friends are, and end up meaning so little to him in the end.

Anyway, this is a good read on the subject by the game's author:

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/12/19/far-cry-3s-jeffrey-yohalem-on-racism-torture-and-satire/


Oh...and don't tell me you did not notice all the satire and comedy in the original Far Cry. It is basically a spoof of any number of 80's B action films.

Regardless of the reason - satire, in this case - the result was, IMO, still rather annoying and mood-breaking.

Satire is not always appropriate, appreciated by everyone and should not serve as a discussion-stopping argument to "get away with murder", figuratively speaking. It may be an explanation, but not an absolution.

For me, the highlights of the game were definitely outside of the main story.

The original Far Cry did it much better. Again, IMO.

That's a good perspective on it. How many tv shows, movies, games use the bit about how they attacked the wrong guy, he's an ex-SEAL, highly decorated and better at everything than anyone else on the planet, only matched by the last opponent he faces. But he's STILL better.
There must be more retired SEAL's in tv/movies/games than were ever in service. LOL

Put me down as another vote "for" DCS, for all the reasons previously listed.

After reading this thread, I uninstalled DCS. I realized today I'm just not going to play it.

My feeling is that most of the people who fly DCS World are playing it online with a small group of friends or they are part of an online squadron. Whenever I go to the multiplayer browser I usually see a pretty long list of servers and many of them are full. I think this is the case because playing DCS World in single player is indeed dull and lifeless most of the time.