Just want to chime in as someone that has played both:

Both games have a nostalgic longing for games of the 90s, but that is about the only similarity between them!

Sea of Stars is charming, but I'd say it doesn't hold a candle to Tunic. Still worth checking out as it's on Game Pass, but I just wanted to bring another opinion to the table

Controller is just fine for our 4-player party. Having played Divinity on PC, I know kb+m will be easier but I didn't think controller was particularly restrictive.

One thing to consider is how does the topper secure to the table, if at all? Mine has a set of rubber legs at each end that sits within the well above the legs which keeps it from moving around when in place.

This also leads to my second point, but I think this is more in the carpenter: tolerancing. Wood moves and settles - our rubber lugs currently don't make into those recesses any longer because the wood has settled.

My table has a small groove cut into the top of the 'armrest' area when the topper is off. This allows you to hold cards without actually holding them! Might be worth a consideration for you.

Finally, consider if you want the table in an oil finish, or varnished. What colour stain would you like on it? Is the vaulted area going to have a felt bottom? If so, what colour would that be?

I've got the exact same. My hardest challenge is to complete 8 matches. Given the increase in specificity of challenges in recent weeks, I wonder if this is a reversion for the holiday period so folks can just hop on, enjoy some Halo and unlock the goods from the Ops Pass

The tutorial segment is very weird for Remnant. My partner died before the 'final stand' segment of it (and before she had even seen all the control prompts) and she was shown the cutscene and dropped off at the Ward!

The game is definitely Souls-lite, and some of the bosses can be brutal (I have not finished my first run of the game, for reference), but I found it to be a fun time with friends. And it appears number 2 dials things up and addresses some of my issues with the game.

This batch of games feels so incredibly specific for me. I've just got through the bulk of Starfield and I'm looking forwards to playing other games alongside it, so this is the perfect batch to get lost in for the next few weeks!

6 weeks to complete 20 free tiers? Think the fomo angle is dead in the water.

343 has been killing it this last couple of seasons and I'm glad to see the general discourse around the game changing for the better!

We got Love Letter: Jabba's Palace to the table! We didn't actually play though as we were busy talking, oops!

Haha I came to post this after doing this at work on a VM.

Losing the challenge slot is dumb, but you didn't mention that.

There are half the tiers in the BP than previous months, and you've bought it which means you can complete it at your own pace. Focus on the timed Operations and when they're inevitably completed in a couple of weeks (because they are only 20 tiers), then go back and finish the BP. You legit don't need to think about paying for the Operation - so don't fret about it.

You're making it seem like a bigger deal than it is, but the truth is they've watered down the BP + Operation progression anyway that you can so much as fart near the game and gain a level.

And if you don't have the 3 hours a week it takes to keep on top of these, then I'm gonna tell you now, you're spending too much time worrying about something that doesn't need to be a concern for you.

Play the game, enjoy it. These systems have no impact on the gameplay or the fun to be had with it.

But you'll have 4 to 6 weeks to unlock 20 tiers of content.

There is no grind to the game and this is just giving more active progression throughout the season.

In fact, paying for an Operation pass only gets you 1 additional reward. Hardly fomo.

Our usual players were moving house this week, so they were pretty occupied! I was worried this meant that no games at all this week, but some other friends came round for Bonfire Night, and they brought Cascadia.

I haven't played before, but I have heard of parallels to Calico, and I can see why! I think Cascadia has another layer of gameplay to it that made it a more enjoyable experience for me. Whilst the interactivity was very low (hate drafting being the only way to do anything), it was interesting watching the other players shoot for different objective sets.

Fun time, but took us longer than it should because we kept getting distracted!

Depending on the end user though, it isn't just a band-aid. DLSS can help add new life to aging cards and prolong their life for a user that may not be in a position to drop money on a new card.

Not everyone is coming to the table with the latest hot and fresh systems to hit the most technically demanding games and DLSS helps them get those most out of their rigs.

I love how broken all the civilisations are in CE!

And absolutely love Radlands! A very tightly designed game without much overhead!

Thank you!

A smaller, more focused group this week! This meant Gloomhaven: JOTL again! My partner and I got engaged earlier in the week, so we chatted too much to finish it in one session - so our friends came back on Saturday to finish it off!

It didn't actually take us too long to finish the encounter, so we played a game of Mondo. This is a ridiculous real-time tile laying game in which you're trying to 'close out' biomes on your board. Always good fun and super accessible!

I had a brief panic that I had booked a hotel for the wrong weekend, but I've just checked and I'm okay!

This'll be my first UKGE! Very excited!

Simple games for us this week!

We played Nacho Stack, a small little dexterity game. We manage to stack some of these in some pretty clever ways that made the second phase of remove the cards hilariously difficult. Silly, simple fun!

And then we played a few rounds of Skull to see the evening out!

It was a week of lighter games for us this week.

We started with 2 plays of Tsuro with 6 players, each of which resulted in 3 players winning! We were surprised how avoidant of conflict most of us were in this.

Secondly, we then played a game of Roll for It! to see the night out. I've never played this, but really felt like it needed some rerolls as in Yahtzee or Poker Dice. I spent far too many rounds rolling 1 die waiting for my number to come up only to have to wait for 5 other players to do their thing!

Looks great!

My only complaint is the bonus being another Bulldog model change considering S4s BP ended with getting one!