Earlier this year I finished Dave the Diver. Well the main story line, it’s just long enough to not get annoying. It is a great game but after 30 plus hours I had seen enough.
Sushi bar in dave the diver
I assume everyone knows the game by now, but in short, you start taking care of a sushi restaurant, but the catch is that you have to catch the fish for the restaurant yourself. And by doing so a whole story line unfolds where you meet an array of characters. The main game play loop is diving in the sea and catch fish, do some bosses and upgrade your gear so you can dive deeper and catch better fish (as in more valuable for the restaurant).
Final celebration in dave the diver, sushi bar
There are multiple mini games, even new ones are introduced well into the game. The boss fights are not too bad, a few were annoying or I had to look up what to do exactly but nothing I got stuck on.
Kronosaurus Boss Fight in Dave the Diver
All in all a very enjoyable experience, that I would recommend to anyone. There is still some stuff to do, upgrade the restaurant, finish catching all fish etc, but since I finished the main story line I haven’t had the urge to go back to be honest. There is more content coming soon, so I’ll keep an eye on that.
Dave the Diver – Thank you for playingIt sure was a fun adventure!
According to Steam I played Starfield for over 70 hours! And basically in a time span of about 6 weeks or so, until I moved on. Which wasn’t even a conscious decision, the interest waned and I had seen enough of the game. Although I’ll still pop in every now and then and at least finish the main quest.
So what did I think of the game ? Well it’s definitely entertaining for what it is. It played a little sluggish performance wise, I had to turn off most features even on a 3060 and a modern cpu. Sadly the ‘performance’ patch that was released recently (nov 2023) was way too late, this should have been in the game all along. Especially since they’ve been working for years on this. Although that doesn’t really show to be honest.
I loved the Akila (wild west) and the UC story lines. Especially the UC story, that should have been the main quest. The way it builds up, the scary first part of the mission in the dark with the horrible Terramorph that scared the shit out of you! Then some interesting decisions by the end of the quest line. It was really well done.
A lot of side quests were entertaining or at least fun to do as well. The shooting part of the game and the collecting of various weapons I liked the most. Didn’t really care much for the space combat. The outpost building was completely pointless and frankly quite annoying, so I didn’t bother with that anymore after trying a few times. The shipbuilding is pretty cool, although also here the interface is a bit of a let down.
What I didn’t like was the main quest and the whole restarting again in NG+. I assume everyone by now knows what the main story is about, and I don’t like a multiverse story. I doubt I’ll ever try a NG+, all the stuff you collected and decorated, all gone after a new game, no, thank you very much.
I didn’t encounter any game breaking bugs, my main annoyance was with the companions. The only one I kind of liked was Andreja, the rest I didn’t care much about, Sam was especially annoying and whining with that weird kid of his. Sadly he died at the Lodge (cough cough). They were also very buggy. They started shooting at everything that moved, wandered off doing their own thing and then warped back to me, if they weren’t standing in the direct line of fire.
So all in all it was a little disappointing, since it was a highly awaited Bethesda title, but some design choices were really weird. So many cut scenes in between traveling, or just warp from one part of the universe to the other end if you already discovered a city / town. And the weird bugs where you think, did anyone actually test this ? You’d expect better from a large studio after that much development time.
But I got a good 70 hrs out of it, and it was pretty entertaining. Next year when mods will be supported, it’ll be interesting what the community will come up with. I’ll keep an eye on that and maybe play the game again ;).
Instead of posting this at the end of the year, or as of now, the start of a new one, I should just make a post when I am really enjoying, or have enjoyed a game. My new year’s resolution will be to do just that I guess this ;). Or at least try to.
Anyway, I’ll mention a few games that kept me busy in 2020. And what stood out for me.
Animal Crossings New Horizon
This was probably the game I put the most hours in, in 2020. Especially the start was a lot of fun. Getting a bigger house, more animals living on the island. Decorating the place … etc. Then it got a little stale and the events so far were not much to write home about. I still check in every now and then though, but it lost the initial sense of wonder. Maybe a future expansion or DLC can breathe some new life into it.
New Year’s eve in Animal CrossingFishing in Animal Crossing. I cough a large Sunfish :).
Snow Runner
I was watching a few streamers on Twitch play this and wondered what the fun was in this game and it seemed like an annoying version of Euro truck sim, but once I tried it myself, I really got into this. It’s a lof of fun, especially unlocking new trucks and new equipment for your trucks. Although I enjoyed the initial maps more than the later (Russian and Alaska) ones.
I haven’t checked out too much of the new ones released later in the year, but what I saw so far, they tried to add some new gameplay elements, which is nice.
