26th September

Hello and welcome back to our regular feature where we write a little about the games we’ve been playing. This week, Bertie’s still pretending to be a vampire, Kelsey’s been breeding an army of cats, Mat’s been melting mounted warriors, Marie’s been a willing accomplice, and Connor’s been smitten all over again.

But enough of that: what have you been playing this week?

And don’t forget we have an entire dusty archive of previous What We’ve Been Playings, just in case you don’t trust your memory any more and want to check which games you’ve played and see what you thought of them.

Blood of Dawnwalker, PC

I’m still playing Dawnwalker in any spare moment I get, which I think is an encouraging sign – that I still want to play a game after reviewing it. I loaded an old save so I could continue exploring the world and find new things. And I am finding new things – I’ve come across some brilliantly bizarre quests and encounters.

But the most bizarre moments have been unintended – from bugs. One quest broke during review and it locked two NPCs in never-ending combat, so the quest related to them was never completed. I tried everything to budge it but nothing worked. However, when I played the other day, it was fixed. The problem was, the game yanked me from another quest in order to resolve it, which nearly broke the other quest for me.

I had to painstakingly retrace my steps to find the route to the underground area I’d been in, then slightly exploit the game using a vampire blink ability to get behind a bookshelf now blocking my way. It took hours of work; I was strangely elated when I managed it. Now to fix a broken Sacred Stone ritual that’s rendered a chunk of my world impassable because of a magical storm permanently raging there…

-Bertie

Mewgenics, Switch 2

Mewgenics arrived on consoles a few weeks ago, and given that I play Edmund McMillen’s The Binding of Isaac mostly handheld, I figured it a good idea to give Mewgenics a whirl handheld too.

I can confirm I have zero regrets. As soon as I realised Mewgenics supported the Switch 2’s touch screen, any spare time that I did have has since gone out the window entirely while I curl up on my sofa and breed my army of battle cats. Between that and playing Silent Hill Townfall for work – which has been an absolute blast – I’ve been having a great time with games lately. At the cost of my social life, that is.

-Kelsey

Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave, Switch 2

The best bits of Fire Emblem games are so good. Min-maxing your characters stats for extremely specific, but oddly common events. I’ve got a heavily defensive unit with a sword that melts through mounted units, so they take no damage on the enemy turn but wreck them all before even needing to move again. I’ve given one of my archers a ring that increases dodge-chance against units using bows themselves, imagining some kind of string-weaponry version of Enemy at the Gates every time I put him in their domain.

Everything else feels like padding. The social link stuff is lovely, just a little break in-between combat for a cute little chat, reminding you about the sort of humanity that all this conflict is in the necessity of protecting. It’s just all the wandering around. Yes, you can fast-travel to points of interest, but not to every quest-dealer. It’s the sort of thing I bounced off Marvel’s Midnight Sons for, not wanting to plod in a castle that could just be a menu, and it’s something that’s clearly a consideration in Star Wars Zero Company, which contains as much of it as you feel up to.The variety of stuff on offer is lovely. I just wish my play-sessions had more of the stuff I’m actually there to do.

-Mat J

Untitled Goose Game, Switch 2

Sometimes you need to just sit down and help a goose on its mission to spread fear. Stealing toys off a table, locking a small child in a phone booth, honking at the gardener to get them out of your way while you move a welly-boot as a distraction before stealing something else. Come to think of it, this goose is a criminal genius and I’m definitely enjoying being a chaos-helping accomplice.

-Marie

World of Warcraft: Forever beta, PC

I have been captured by World of Warcraft yet again, despite my best efforts. What started as a brief exploration into what all the fuss was about has become a fixture of my evenings. Evenings meant for going outside are now spent killing boars and running dungeons.

It’s only a brief window into the full game at this time, a level one-to-20 slice of the full journey, but it has made a strong first impression on me. I’m a big fan of the new Skyborne starting zone Zephras Isle as well. Its flowing grasslands and towering celestial pillars make for dramatic framing, especially with the new lighting effects.

I cannot wait until November when Forever fully comes out. I do believe it may eat my life entirely. But that’s okay; nothing else is coming out in November anyway.

-Connor