If you made it this far, you probably only read this text because BG1 is you favorite game anyways.

I actually did it because I love reading other people’s experiences with old games, even if I don’t particularly care about them. So, thank you a lot for this post, it was very entertaining!

I’m a bit sad I didn’t play BG1 or many other CRPGs back in the days, because I probably would’ve loved them. Nowadays I don’t have enough time to play big ass games, and games without a compelling storyline just don’t attract me the same. But as a kid, I loved wandering around in huge worlds, taking in the sights and finding hidden content/easter eggs.

I’ve played an old veteran warrior for 14 levels. The only time I rolled above the average was before the last session.

Then he died.

I was wondering if Rex’s death would just be summarized in the intro cutscene or further developed down the line. According to the “favourite mission” question, looks like we’ll play a prequel mission where we get to see how he died during a last stand to protect his teammates (or at least, that’s the impression I got from his answer).

Very cool stuff. From the preview videos, the trailers and the developer interviews, it looks like this game will be a complete return to form after the disappointing streak following Assault Horizon and the middling Ace Combat 7. Looking forward for both the single player campaign and the online mode.

Appreciate the heads-up.

For those new to the store: as always, GoG giveaway require the user to subscribe to their newsletter, but you can simply get the game, then go to your profile -> Orders and Settings -> Subscriptions, and turn it off again.

Gosh, I was SO into Blind Guardian when I was younger. That’s going to be a trip to the past for me.

I can’t say the game has aged gracefully, but I replayed it a few years back and I had quite some fun exploring the world and finding all the nooks and crannies that I couldn’t find as a kid.

Btw, you also sold me on Sacred 2 lol
I had it in my wishlist for quite some time, but I never pulled the trigger. But knowing that it retains the colorful world of its predecessor, makes me quite interested indeed. It could be a fun time sink.

Sacred: Last Pixel of Ancaria

The WHAT. I had no idea it even existed. Keeping my eyes close on that one! Thank you for letting me know!

Never played Sacred 2, but spent my entire childhood on Sacred 1. A huge game with tons of places to explore, a lot of easter eggs, but most importantly, it’s one of the few Diablo-esque games that isn’t afraid of showing a colorful world with tons of personality and humor. Diablo and all its clones are always so drab and bloody and run-down and make me feel exhausted after a few hours. Sacred on the other hand was like a themed park - Hey, that island looks cool! Let’s see if I can reach it. Oh, hey, there’s a fun quest on it! Oh, I got sunglasses out of it! :D

That’s Square Enix/Deck Nine. Dontnod haven’t been involved with LiS since LiS2.

Their latest titles were Jusant, Lost Records, Banishers: Ghosts of Eden, and Aphelion. They also published The Lonesome Guild that I know of, which unfortunately didn’t sell well either.

He loves food, attention, and people.

Don’t we all? <3

Stay amazing, Teeko, and thank you for rescuing such a good boy!

This is something straight out of a parody movie, and even then, it would sound absurd.

What the heck is even going on in the US right now.

Just download the most recent/updated for each of the regions (JP, EU, USA), although you’ll almost certainly only need the US one.

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I skipped the PS2 gen entirely when I was a kid (went from PS1 to X360), so I don’t have fond memories either, but I have a few titles in my bucket list that I’ve played/been wanting to play for a while now.

• Since you liked Shadow of the Colossus, you should try Ueda’s other PS2 game, Ico. It’s very sweet.

• As a huge Ace Combat nerd, I also recommend the PS2 trilogy (Ace Combat 04, 5 and Zero). My favourite of the three is 04, which has a more grounded and somber story and consistently good gameplay. 5 is like a Tom Cruise action movie, but I find the gameplay subpar compared to the others. Zero is like the MGR: Revengeance of Ace Combat lol

• Zone of the Enders 2 is my favourite mecha game ever, with exhilarating battles, an awesome soundtrack and great set pieces (the Crevasse battle is absolutely humongous and I still can’t believe that nothing similar was ever replicated on consoles that are thousands of times more powerful than a PS2).
  The game’s got a re-release on modern consoles and Steam, and you can mod it to have Jap dub (which you probably want, the Eng dub is atrocious) with Eng subs, which for some reason is still not an option in the official release.

• If you like mascotte platformers, I’ve heard great things about Ratchet and Clank, Sly Cooper, Jax. I’ve only played a few levels of the former and it gave me huge motion sickness, though :/
  There’s also Klonoa, but i think that one’s got a remastered version on modern platforms nowadays.

• People mostly remember the Final Fantasy titles, but there are a LOT of JRPG games on PS2, although I haven’t played them myself and I can’t attest to their quality (sometimes people’s nostalgia is just… Off the charts lol).
  Star Ocean: Till the end of times is consistently praised among both the Star Ocean community and the larger JRPG crowd. I can’t attest to that as I don’t have nearly enough time to play a JRPG title nowadays, but I liked the PS1 title (2nd story), and I’ve always heard people putting it above or slightly below that one, so it looks like I’m missing out.
  I’ve also heard good things about other titles such as Rogue Galaxy, Ar Tonelico, Grandia 3, Legaia 2 (I’m very fond of the first one, although the story was nothing to write home about), Wild Arms, a few Tales Of titles, and probably many more I’m forgetting about. Maybe look out for some of those if you’re into the genre.

Both Duckstation (PS1 emulator) and PCSX2 (PS2 emulator) are quick and easy to set up nowadays, but you have to download the bios file, which I guess is the “super illegal” file you were talking about.

It’s as easy as typing “ps1 bios download” on Google though.

Oh yeah, that makes sense.

Same in Italy. I’ve seen police/army booths in all gaming conventions I’ve took part in, even years before the the Ukraine war.

Maybe it’s an unpopular opinion, but I’m not particularly offended by it. I think it makes sense for cyber security/high tech jobs to look for recruits in a place that’s full of nerds that could fit the criteria. And I also know that there are many train/aviation/weapons enthusiasts in the gaming world who could do that shit for a living.

That being said, I don’t think that a recruitment booth in a gaming convention is particularly effective at reaching potential candidates. If somebody wanted to join the army, they probably already did. I don’t know anyone who was on the fence, and decided to enlist after visiting the army booth in a gaming convention lol
I suppose, if they keep doing it, that it’s somehow more effective than I think it is?

Following gaming news has become increasingly exhausting in the last decade. GamerGate has never truly ended, its shadow’s been pervasive of the entire discourse on videogames for years. Every AAA game is an excuse to rant about the (perceived) political agenda of its writers or the art team or whatever.

I disagree with the final take of the video, though. While moderation and companies taking a stance is certainly necessary, the main problem is that the social media algorithm feeds on this kind of discourse and amplifies it because it increases engagement. There can never be enough moderation to silence these trolls because you cannot moderate all platforms and all places, and the trolls outnumber the developers (and with AI on the rise, the numbers are even more stacked in favour of online trolls).
There will be no solution to this problem for as long as social media is run the way it is at the moment.

I got the base game for free on GoG after playing it once on Gamepass a few years back, now I get the two expansions + remastered as well lol

Child me would be amazed at how easy it is to play AAA games without spending a dime nowadays. I grew up with a dozen or so games and that was it because my father didn’t want to spend more money on videogames lol

A huge and influential name in the gaming industry.

But the game business has changed and it’s just not as much fun for me anymore. Plus there’s a new generation of developers coming up who deserve their time in the sun.

I recently had the opportunity and honor to talk to another name from my childhood (Martin Edmondson), and he told me the same thing: the gaming industry is too alien to him now than what he experienced a few decades ago. More complex, less wiggle room, a lot to take in account for even for smaller scope games.

I like the hopeful tone at the end of the message, though.

To all of you reading this I want you to remember that games are not a solved problem yet – there is, I hope, plenty of experimentation and innovation to come. And to all you young developers out there, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, your job is to make people forget people like me ever existed.

I don’t think I’ll ever forget him and many like him, but I hope the new generation of developers will be up to the task to experiment and innovate even in an industry that has been suffering so much in the last few years.

To the people who want to buy a game on GoG that is included in the 2nd class citizen list, it’s worth messaging the game’s publisher. I did that when I wanted to buy I was a teenage exocolonist, and the publisher responded almost immediately, and in less than a week it was updated on the store to the same version as Steam.

YMMV of course, but it’s worth the try.

Also, the GoG team is aware of the issue, and they started an effort in August (EDIT: May) 2026 to tackle it and reduce the length of the list. It’s a shame that’s not been included in the article, because they’ve been making bi-weekly updates since and they’ve been pretty consistent so far.
https://www.gog.com/forum/general/from_good_to_great_improving_our_games_together