J4MES OX4D

If they do, they'll probably demand £39.99 for it! 

Just when you thought Bethesda couldn't sink any further, they've just released Fallout 4 Anniversary for £53/$60 and in the process broken the majority of established mods. They are also now offering 'their' own paid mods for an extra £20. So basically they have repackaged something you could've bought for £14.99 a month ago, butchered every mod in the process - some of which had 6+ years of work on them so they can reintroduce their paid mod fetish which has failed 3 times already. 
 
This company is beyond being creatively and morally bankrupt. I can't see how they will survive beyond 2030 even with a new Elder Scrolls game. Microsoft also need to shoulder a huge portion of the blame as they've done nothing for the studio who still rely on outdated tech and concepts. 

The maps are largely (excuse the pun) bad Battlefield maps but I don't think they are all atrocious MP maps in general. These are what COD maps used to be 15 years ago. After 75 or so hours, here's my final thoughts on them:-
 
Blackwell Fields - now this map is an atrocity. Terrible visibility, way too open, aesthetically nasty and just a hideous layout. 
 
Cairo - decent map and plenty of destruction. Drone glitchers galore though. Works well in several modes.
 
Manhattan Bridge - good layout and decent size. C flag is well-positioned for a good battle. Action on and off the ground and it works well in all modes. 
 
Empire State - really small and frantic. There's very little room for any tactics and squad play is irrelevant. Decent MP map but not a good Battlefield experience.
 
New Sobek City - one of the bigger maps but still really small. Pretty fun in Breakthrough but lacks any scale or complexity like the Gulf of Oman map.
 
Mirak Valley - tries to be a BF1 map but feels mostly like a barren land. Big but not huge. Still fun in breakthrough but hardly feels like a traditional map from this series. 
 
Iberian Offensive - not a very good looking map. It's really basic but has a decent enough flow. Doesn't feel like a Battlefield map.
 
Operation Firestorm - 30% smaller than the older variants and it feels really watered-down. The inflated colours make it look really off too. A horrible remake. 
 
Liberation Peak - A good size and finally a map where vehicles can utilise the landscape. Still feels a bit compact on how the action flows but a good all-rounder. 
 
 
No naval maps in inexcusable and it's clear the developers don't like water because it fragments the action and they are probably worried people will get bored if they don't have a gun fight every 10-15 seconds. I think there is probably only one half-decent Battlefield map in this game and the rest are detrimental to the series although they aren't terrible in MP terms and how the game is designed. One map per season is not good enough either especially if it is as bad as the Blackwell Fields. 
 
Considering how bad the maps were in 2042, there really hasn't been many good maps out of this franchise for a very long time. Most of the maps also negate squad play that made the series so special. You can literally ignore your squad the whole game and still end up top with 45-60 kills and 20 captures. In older BF titles, squads were imperative especially for maintaining territory and pushing objectives. In this game flags change hands so often, if you ain't got double figures of captures come the end of the game, you've barely played the objective. 

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 takes home an absurd 9 wins at The Game Awards, more than Baldur's Gate 3 in 2023 | PC Gamer
WWW.PCGAMER.COM This year's Game Awards GOTY (and almost everything else) is the popular French RPG Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.  

FREE £10/$10 in store credit which you can claim in your in-game messages section. Should be enough to buy a new outfit!

Gears of War: Reloaded

Another of the new games announced at the games awards, looks interesting.
 
 
 

I believe they're giving all players a gift of one thousand raider tokens too, which is nice.

Some more Dark Souls 2






 

FREE £10/$10 in store credit which you can claim in your in-game messages section. Should be enough to buy a new outfit!

Here's a interview and info with Larian devs which may clear some of that up for you 😘
 
 

Hogwarts Legacy FREE on Epic until the 18th
Just a moment...
STORE.EPICGAMES.COM  

I haven't played Arc enough, I can't get myself off Tarkov, particularly now that you can actually escape, which is a massive though very enjoyable grind. EFT actually has a story now and I'm loving it.
 
I'm off work for most of the festive period so I'll finally be able to give some time to Arc hopefully.
 
Anyway, let me leave you with these thoughts from a man who is definitely not an unstable grifting wank stain 🤪
 
 

New Larian game, they certainly know how to make em 🤪
 
 

If you want a great game akin to this, the other one I would also recommend is Yakuza Like a dragon, the side quests are great fun, the map isn't too large and there is a lot to do across it. The characters are wacky and memorable and the combat is great. 

Got the lad this for Xmas and I've asked for it too. Really looking forward to giving this a go as I've missed ATB styled systems.

I wonder if this will make any difference....
https://www.sportico.com/leagues/soccer/2025/premier-league-player-spending-rules-1234877403/

Quests all done, rooster maxed out, and only one workbench left to upgrade. @LordBaguette bench-shamed me on Friday so I made a point of doing it this weekend, all done now. Now I'm working on the caravan for the expedition, still on the first page but getting there. I also just blanket sold everything I own to try and make the $5m for the expedition. 
 
So now I'm just rolling free loadouts and channeling my inner @GazzaGarratt by hoarding everything I can to make some extra coin. 
 
I'm not even on $1m yet lol.

This was one hell of a round, crazy amount of huge robots went down and really good to see so many working together. I think there's a few more 'big ones' that defo need more than 3 tbh, we just haven't engaged in them yet!
 
 
Well done mate! I do feel a little bit of the @J4MES OX4D completed it mate vibe. Its extremely good value for money and then December update (that really should be this week) is welcomed at a nice time.
 
@Luseth, yes defo seeing more PvP now in trios but I feel it could be way worse. Apparently there is a free loadout matchmaking element to it which may mean making friends abit could still happen.
 
@phil bottle, whats your thoughts on end game for an extraction shooter, given the pinnacle right now is supposed to be Tarkov?

Glad you enjoyed it! Really hope it cleans up at the GOTY awards as it is deserving of so many categories. Also with the FFVII Remake point - maybe if they cut half the crap in those games, they would've been able to make the whole thing in one package or whereby it doesn't take 9 years to finish the 'whole' game. I was engaged from start to finish and never got bored or felt needlessly side-tracked but some of these padding-filled open world games today are just exhausting to think about let alone play! 

I haven't played this much recently and I'm kinda at the stage where I know what is required to essentially complete the workbenches and then that's the game pretty much 'completed' in its current state. It's been one hell of a game and incredible value for money but there doesn't seem to be much of an endgame. I'm not sure how much legs this game has in its current form and I kinda wish the live event was longer and there was a bit more meat to it. I'm overloaded with gear to the extent, looting has lost a lot of meaning but the stuff I need is almost out of touch with the way PvP is right now and I can't be bothered taking in lots of gear, killing a major ARC and then getting shotted by a free loadout user. It's basically high risk, huge reward but at the same time potential infuriation. If successful, I then have less reason to play the game so I'm damned either way.  The skill tree is just pure bloat and whilst the Raider Deck is good to sift through, it is essentially built off the back of doing generic daily feats. 
 
Another annoying thing is spawning in late when trying to do a task. Free loadout users should be the ones being dropped in late to lobbies and not someone geared up only to have 16 minutes. Better off just heading to the exit and even that's a risk in itself. Longevity is definitely an issue and although I didn't feel this way at 40 hours, once you progress so much and do so many runs, you can really see where this game is at. 

I think that is why we have seen things turn a tide in recent weeks, all of a sudden trios has become a bit of a pvp fest because that is all there is really to end game. People have made a game of fighting each other in it but with stats not being tracked and things not being unlocked I do wonder for how much longer they will persist with the game or will we soon see them all drift away.

Glad you enjoyed it! Really hope it cleans up at the GOTY awards as it is deserving of so many categories. Also with the FFVII Remake point - maybe if they cut half the crap in those games, they would've been able to make the whole thing in one package or whereby it doesn't take 9 years to finish the 'whole' game. I was engaged from start to finish and never got bored or felt needlessly side-tracked but some of these padding-filled open world games today are just exhausting to think about let alone play!