What I've Been Playing This Week (aka Pile of Shame Sunday)

Jaal and I are now bros. All it took was saving his family and embarrassing a Roekaar leader.

The following post is part of a series of posts that are published every Sunday to update readers on what Mark G has been up to with respect to finishing off games on his "Pile of Shame". The games to target are picked by Choicest Games contributors Choona, Luke and Lanna. As I'll be talking about my progress through these games, there may be spoilers ahead, especially for games containing a narrative. Consider yourself warned.

Mass Effect: Andromeda

• Picked by Lanna

This week I've focused on finishing off any remaining loyalty quests or side quests I think are worth doing. I managed to do the following:

• Completed Jaal's loyalty quest which had us saving two of his brothers and one of his sisters from joining the Roekaar. It also resulted in Akksul losing a lot of respect from his supporters too thanks to him attempting to kill Jaal in cold blood.
• Played a soccer game on Eos with Liam (coz why not?)
• Fixed Havarl's atmosphere and as a result, the Angarans have welcomed Initiative immigrants to the world (but not a full-blown colony – that's probably asking a bit too much anyway).
• Helped Peebee on her loyalty quest in terms of recovering MOAR Rem-tech (for someone who is so spontaneous and erratic, she is quite predictable when it comes to her appetite for Remnant technology).
• Fixed Kadara's atmosphere and it now has an Initiative outpost. I also had to effectively pick sides between Sloane Kelly's Outcasts and the Charlatan's Collective (the Charlatan actually turning out to be the Angaran Resistance spy I helped earlier called Reyes Vidal! Dun-dun-duuuuun). Through my actions, I ended up siding with Sloane since in a duel she is meant to have with Reyes, I managed to save her life from a hidden sniper (you do get the choice to sit back and do nothing but I chose to save her). Against her wishes though, I didn't kill Reyes afterwards since he fled the scene unarmed. Sloane isn't happy that Reyes is still at large but to thank the Pathfinder for saving her life, she decides to tolerate the settling of Kadara by the Initiative.

All I've really got left now before proceeding on with the main storyline is settling an outpost on Elaaden.

Company of Heroes 2

• Picked by Luke

I'm finding that mortars are my best friend; they were definitely useful on the last mission I completed which involves crossing a river to Leningrad (aka Saint Petersburg). I'm also no longer afraid to use Conscripts since there's really no reason not to when playing as the Soviets as the more you use them, the stronger they get (i.e. you eventually get hard-as-nails Penal Battalions if you call on conscripts enough).

The level introduces you to some light self-propelled guns known as SU-76s. They're actually not too bad but they don't pack much of a punch against German Panzers. During an epic confrontation in the middle of the map, I managed to hold off multiple German attacks using a combination of mortars, snipers, SU-76s and Conscripts. I cautiously finished the rest of the mission using SU-76s to demolish the German strongholds but they were supported by Penal Battalions with AT grenades as well as any other weapons they found lying around (e.g. anti-tank guns, MG42s, etc.).

I'm now onto mission 8 which involves destroying a Tiger tank.

World of Goo

• Picked by Choona

It took me a long time, probably another 30 minutes, but I finally figured out the penultimate level of the first chapter in World of Goo which involves building a bridge. The trick was actually supporting the bridge from the left side of the chasm and resisting the urge to build a suspension bridge (not sure why I thought that would work in the first place). The goo balls stick to the side of the chasm and once you've got that support you can then built struts to make the bridge structurally sound (well, as structurally sound as a bridge made out of goo can be). At the end of this week, I've finally finished the first chapter and I'm a few levels into the second chapter.

LINK:
[ The Pile of Shame ]