AggroChat #557 – Recovering Antiquities

Featuring: Ace, Ammosart, Ashgar, Belghast, Kodra, Tamrielo, and Thalen
Hey Folks! We have the entire crew this week but have a bit of a rolling start without Tam as he was finishing something up in Star Citizen.  We begin the show with some talk about Relooted a game about recovering antiquities and returning them to their rightful homes.  After that, we discuss Destiny Rising and how it appears to be in maintenance mode lately.  No one had it on their bingo card, but we talked a bit about the drop of the Warlock class in Diablo II Resurrected and how it is also coming to Immortal and Diablo IV.  Tam shares his thoughts about playing Warhammer: The Old World and how it is not exactly the game he thought it was going to be.  We discuss a bunch of rapid-fire topics from the recent Sony State of Play event, and then Kodra dives into Thinky Games and Shape of Dreams.  We discuss the failed state of Highguard and 2XKO and what it means for multiplayer games in general. Finally, a quick blurb that we are all looking forward to Horizon Hunters Gathering, and they should give us all keys to test it.

Topics Discussed:

  • Relooted
  • Destiny Rising Decline
  • Warlock in Diablo II
  • Rank and Flank: An Older Era of Minis Games
  • Sony State of Play
  • Thinky Games
  • Shape of Dreams
  • Failures of Highguard and 2XKO
  • Horizon Hunters Gathering
The post AggroChat #557 – Recovering Antiquities appeared first on Tales of the Aggronaut.

AggroChat #556 – Gaps In Our Gaming

Featuring: Ashgar, Belghast, Kodra, Tamrielo, and Thalen
Hey Folks! We are down a few people this week as we start up our show.  Bel is in the process of trying to reboot “Bel Folks Stuff” and realized that he recorded an episode with Tam that never got released.  We talk about this weird pre-pandemic time capsule.  We discuss building a table for Infinity and how it is a game that wants something more akin to Mordheim.  From there, Ash and Kodra discuss the Rabbit and Steel expansion and unlocking new content. We go down a bit of a continuation of a topic from a month ago as we discuss the games that we did not end up playing, and more specifically, Tam exploring what Ys has to offer. Ashes of Creation was one of the more successful Kickstarter MMORPGs, but that is no more, because the entire project imploded almost overnight.  We talk a bit about that situation and also what goes wrong when trying to build a niche MMORPG for a limited audience.  Finally, Tam shares some of his recent experiences learning to play Star Trek Online and trying to be successful at doing so.

Topics Discussed:

  • Bel Folks Stuff Tam Episode
  • Building an Infinity Table
  • Rabbit and Steel Expansion
  • Ys
  • Games We Didn’t Play
  • Ashes of Creation Implosion
  • Trying to be good at Star Trek Online
The post AggroChat #556 – Gaps In Our Gaming appeared first on Tales of the Aggronaut.

Bel Folks Stuff – Episode 9 – Featuring Tam

Hey Folks! I am in the process of trying to reboot one of my favorite side projects, “Bel Folks Stuff”, and get into the swing of recording new episodes. However, it was in this process that I realized that I recorded a whole episode with Tam and never released it. What is wild about this episode is that it is a timecapsule from before the world changed. I think many of us were irreparably damaged by the isolation and changes to our norms that the pandemic and lockdowns brought forward. However, for some… the isolation of the pandemic completely changed their lives. This version of Tam that I interviewed was before he got into a lockdown relationship, which turned into a marriage, which ultimately led to him becoming a father. The negative of this episode, however, is now that I listen to it… I remember why I never released it. I was trying to figure out how to fix the audio. I was dealing with some really frustrating coil whine happening in my microphone, and it just so happened to plague this episode. I think this might have been the point I realized it was a thing, and it took me months to figure out how to keep it from happening. So this episode was edited and ready to go… but just never got released, and I feel like it is unfair to leave this to the void. Some interesting conversations happen in the middle of this episode, and it is fitting that the broader world finally gets to listen to them.
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AggroChat #555 – MMOs and PSOLikes

Featuring: Ace, Ammosart, Ashgar, Belghast, Kodra, and Thalen
Good Morning Folks! We are down a Tam this week and had some topics that were sitting on our list for a bit.  We start off talking about the official end of Anthem and the Mark Darrah video that effectively provides an autopsy for the game.  Loosely related, we talk about the impending death of New World in January 2027.  This forces us down the path of talking about what the heck even makes an MMO anymore, and how we largely agree that it requires random interaction with other players to count.  We decided that the lobby-based games are PSOLikes since the first game we can remember that was that way was Phantasy Star Online on the Dreamcast.  From there, we talk a bit about Shape of Dream,s another Roguelike that Ash and Kodra have been playing.  Bel shares his thoughts on Legacy of Phrecia 2.0 in Path of Exile, and Kodra shares his endgame thoughts about Path of Exile II. We wrap the show up talking about the impending patch in Guild Wars 2 that is going to add quickplay for raids and the new Fashion Plates adjacent system.

Topics Discussed:

  • Anthem is Offline
  • New World will soon Die
  • What Makes an MMORPG
  • PSOLikes
  • Shape of Dreams
  • Path of Exile Legacy of Phrecia 2.0
  • Path of Exile 2 – Endgame Thoughts
  • Guild Wars 2 Fashion Plates
The post AggroChat #555 – MMOs and PSOLikes appeared first on Tales of the Aggronaut.