I don’t have a problem with the core concept since it can technically be done well (Fortnite, despite it not appealing to me personally) but since everyone wants the “live service” staying power and money without putting in the “live service” effort it’s become a red flag to me to prepare for an unfinished, buggy, likely money-grubbing “game” with a shaky future - case in point, Halo Infinite’s campaign pretty much going nowhere and being Act 1 of what will be pretty much nothing now since all the campaign staff went bye-bye.
Man, Infinite’s campaign was such a disappointment. Halo to me was always about the big set pieces and new locations. Infinite had 2 locations essentially the whole game, not to mention the non story that happens mostly off screen. It’s too bad because the grapple hook was one of the best additions to Halo since Bungie but you don’t have anything fun to actually play with it.
How would you classify Detroit becomes human? Its been in my queue for awhile. The preview looks great, sounds great, but I havent heard anyone bring it up. Which makes me worry if its worth the time.
Am I correct in my understanding that Volition was doing fine but Embracer group fucked around with their money and now has to sacrifice a company that didn’t do anything wrong in order to save themselves?
I‘m not sure if I‘m missing something, but I‘d be really surprised if Volition was doing fine. Agents of Mayhem didn‘t do well at all and the Saints Row reboot was pretty terrible. Their last somewhat successful launch was probably the Saints Row 4 expansion back in 2015.
It‘s always sad to see a developer shut down, especially one with such history. But I can honestly understand closing a studio which hasn‘t had any great release for over eight years.
By “fucked around with their money” is that perhaps a leveraged buyout? That’s what killed Toys R Us, and various other major high street brands, and it’s also what’s been happening to Twitter.
Edit: Apparently not. Embracer acquired Volition in 2013 after THQ went bankrupt and they put it under the Deep Silver subsidiary, then in 2022 Embracer moved moved Volition over to Gearbox, and then recently a multi-billion deal Embracer had lined up fell through so now they’re cutting costs and Volition ended up on the block. So maybe not so sinister, this one - the studio has been in decline since Agents of Mayhem in 2017.
Disclaimer: I also had a lot of fun with this game but I got it for free with a graphics card.
Part of it was getting rid of the old beloved characters. Shaundi, Pierce, etc. were well loved among fans and sorely missed when the game out. People found the new characters boring and generic, but I don’t know if that criticism survived past the release stage.
It also released with quite a few game breaking bugs which had to be ironed out. Par for the course with big budget games these days, frankly.
As a fan of SR3 and SR4, I missed the zaniness of those entries, but that wasn’t a common feeling among fans of SR2.
A lot of people hated it for how “woke” it apparently was by having… people of color in it? Commentary about racism and feminism or something? I don’t know, it’s been a while since I played so I can’t recall any instances in particular of it being “woke” enough to offend people who care about that. As a woke SJW myself, I felt it was pretty good on that front without being overbearing.
For what it is worth. It is implied that this takes place in the Agents of Mayhem timline as you find the 3rd Street Saints symbol in an abandoned church, Johnny Gat is mentioned in the description of one of the weapons as being a famous person, and you can buy an Agents of Mayhem T Shirt.
So the old characters not being present is explained.
Talk to your IT dept. They might have a student version you can get for cheap.
And btw, 3 years is nothing for software like that. All the major features are already in the software. They just have to keep adding crap to it so people will buy the new version. It’s a big cause of software bloat.
I’m playing a gnome druid with dark urge, his troubled background is what causes the urges but deep down he just wants to be a good guy. Although, the urges do sometimes win, he tries to shop with every merchant to help the local economies. While necromancy is typically considered evil, he views it more as a “it’s stopping living people being hurt in battle.”
I only bought it last week and I’m already up to 50 hours, but I feel there’s so much I’ve missed. The amount of content is insane, and speak with animals/speak with dead just seems to increase it even more. I’ve been talking to every animal I came across and the depth of every character surprises me every time. It’s nothing like Bethesda’s “go talk to the boss, I’m a lowly grunt” esque chats, even the children have their own entire arc. I may be slightly enamored with it, I’d go so far to say this should be the gold standard of game releases.
Lol I missed out on speak with animals with the startled boar near the beginning area and I’ve regretted it ever since. Makes me want to reload a save and see what it has to say.
I discovered speak with animals last night and my friends and I were having a riot hearing what the animals had to say. A cow talked shit at me, a rat led me to treasure. Fantastic
I love to boot up Red Dead Redemption 2 and go on little hunting / fishing trips as Arthur. I play it as close to real life as I can, meaning I don’t just sprint across the map on horseback and get to my destination in five minutes or less. I have Arthur eat breakfast, ride the trails for a few in game hours, eat lunch, ride until dark, set up camp, eat dinner, brush / feed the horse, sleep, repeat. If I go through a town on my way, I’ll usually stop for a day to experience some entertainment or do a bit of gambling. It can take multiple in game days to reach a hunting / fishing spot. I’ll set up a camp once there, do some hunting / fishing for a few days, and then ride back home. It’s just super relaxing for me and helps me appreciate the little details in the game even more.
I never got anywhere near finishing the story due to this. Its a beautifully relaxing game if you just drink it all in and immerse yourself. I’m a big fan of the daily routine at the camp and if I don’t make it back one night, spend the return catching up with everyone and doing some chores.
You can press the power button on the Deck while in the middle of a game and it’ll suspend. Pick it up hours/days later and hit the power button and it’ll instantly resume your game. I don’t believe the Ally can do that.
I am a collector, and inventory management is always the thing that makes or breaks an RPG for me. Unlimited inventory is just completely unrealistic, but on the other hand, making an RPG inventory completely realistic is just no fun. Of course I want to be able to lug all that sweet loot home, including battle axes, broadswords, several full armor sets, myriad other weapons, potions, etc. Having an encumbrance such as Skyrim has makes total sense to me. I love the idea of being able to sort and filter my inventory, and store items in whatever container I own. I also like to be able to compare the stats of new items with ones I own so I know if something is a trade up.
I hate storage block inventories, where items physically take up one, or a few “squares”. I don’t want to play a tile puzzle with my items.
RDR2 has one of, if not my favorite, inventory systems. Your own 'backpack' that had a weight limit and could only carry smaller things. Big things you'd have to lug onto the back of your horse or find a cart. All of your equipped weapons are displayed on your person. If you want to swap weapons you have to run back to your horse and exchange weapons at your saddle bags
I often find mechanics that only exist to waste time incredibly annoying. In the case of loot, a limited inventory is kind of that. You could absolutely just portal/teleport to town, sell your stuff, and then get back to playing. There’s no challenge involved, EXCEPT that it wastes your real-world time.
I liked the pets in Torchlight for this reason. You could send them off to sell loot, while you kept playing the part of the game that’s actually fun.
One exception is something like Resident Evil, where the choice is relevant to the gameplay directly. But even then, I would’ve preferred limits on individual elements (Only X weapons, only X healing items, etc.) and having extras automatically stored.
He’ll gladly tell you about how he was hacker/dev whizkid at Blizzard for 7 years. Of course, he’ll leave out the fact that he was only a QA tester and a web security drone who got the job because his father is a big wig there.
I’ve always avoided games based “journalism” (and all journalism really) as in my experience it tends to be full of over opinionated bullshit however your posts are different.
I genuinely enjoy your posts, they are well written, clear and succinct. You offer your opinion on things you genuinely enjoy but usually as a side note rather than baking it into the news or subject you are writing about and it is generally clear you are just passionate about the things you are writing about.
I tens to post there daily, and I’m trying to force myself to take a break on my regular long-form gaming news posts on Lemmy, and instead focus on my health. I have a important appointment with my specialist on the 17th so, its 50/50 odds whether I’ll make another news post here before then or not
But, again, daily on Mastodon!
And thank you so much for your kind, kind words. I feel like an imposter so often when I share these, so your words are really appreciated!
I realise you are having health issues from reading your other posts and you should always prioritise that!
I really have so little interest in that short form twitter esque posting that I actively reject it so if I’m being completely honest I doubt I will go there.
Don’t push yourself to post the long form posts, get better and the best of luck with your upcoming appointments. I will look forward to your return to the long form post and hopefully with accompanying info of how well you are doing physically in the future :D
You are not an imposter, you are the fediverses premier gaming journalist and I’ll fight anyone that says different xD
About my lowest threshold for success is that this at least makes disclosures about what you’re buying more prominent and restricts the ability for software licenses to just alter the deal and pray that they don’t alter them further. Even better disclosures would make the raw deal you’re getting become more poisonous before the point of sale. Especially as an American, I’m going to have wait a few years after any legislation goes through before I can trust online multiplayer games again.
The problem isn’t mobile games, and it’s not console games, and it’s not PC games. It’s the profit motive and corporations and enshittification. And there’s plenty of that going on in games for mobile, console, and PC. (And, for that matter, TTRPGs. And it’s not like the 300 different collectors editions of Monopoly released every year aren’t enshittification at play.)
Addictive gotcha mechanics are shitty when they’re tied to microtransactions. Even when not tied to microtransactions, I think they can still be shitty depending on the specific circumstances, and it’s definitely wise to responsibly manage your (and/or your children’s) engagement to not cause other problems in your(/their) life. But is addictiveness in a video game inherently a bad thing? I don’t think so. All games cause dopamine squirts whether it’s Pong or a slot machine. That’s kinda the point of games. There are plenty of Open Source games out there that cause big addictive dopamine squirts. (Mindustry, anyone?) And such games aren’t made to milk whales. They’re made because someone wanted to create and play such a game.
Don’t be talking too much smack about shovelware! Low-quality games create their own vibes. Some are accidental masterpieces. Both of my favorite two YouTube gaming content creators do a lot of their content on really low-quality games. This series got me to buy Radiation Island and I had a great time playing it. And here is a great video on all the shitty official games based on the movie Avatar.
“Gaming is as much about socializing as playing” is an awesome outlook to have on gaming! Addictiveness in games can be… concerning. But sometimes particular games are the key by which your kid can be involved in peer group. I’m not saying that automatically trumps any downsides and you should let your kid spend $∞ on Fortnight skins or whatever. But I think probably in most cases a balancing act is superior to a hard “yes” or “no”.
I should probably specify that I’m admittedly an old fart who doesn’t know shit about mobile gaming. (The only mobile games I play are Open Source ones on F-Droid.) And the only modern console I have is a Switch, and I don’t have any plans to get one soon. I’ve played a lot of Breath of the Wild, though. And a fair amount of Tears of the Kingdom.
Some final thoughts:
Open Source gaming is awesome.
The way they’re doing anti-cheat on PC is fucked-up.
But so is the way they lock down consoles and phones.
Hack your games. Hack your consoles. (If you don’t hack it, you don’t own it.) Get your kids interested in hacking stuff.
…responsibly, of course.
Play games with your kids! (And not just the ones you want to play.)
Roughly in order of how much I enjoy them from most to least. (Not that the later ones are bad. Just that they’re more low-key.)
Mindustry is amazing, but as I mentioned above, really really addictive. (The commercial game it’s most often compared to is Factorio.)
Then there’s Shattered Pixel Dungeon. Amazing dungeon crawler.
Endless Sky is a great space mercantile sim.
Luanti is a Minecraft clone.
Unciv is a turn-based civilization development game.
And if you’re wanting to do emulation, there’s Lemuroid. Also, EasyRPG, an engine for playing RPG Maker games like Yume Nikki. Oh, FreeDoom is a great implementation of Doom for Android.
Those are the ones that’ll keep your attention for a good long time. There are tons of much simpler games that are still fun like Frozen Bubble and Hyper Rogue. And plenty of games that I haven’t really gotten into very much but that people really seem to like Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup.
Man. There are a lot now that I’m listing them out. Lol.
I would just like to mention that it is called “gacha” not “gotcha.”
“Gacha” is short for the Japanese term gachapon, which means “capsule toy.” You remember gumball machines? You put a quarter in and twist the handle and a gumball comes out. Gachapon is like that, but with a small plastic ball with a random toy inside. Those are less common than the gumball machines, but there were also some that had sticker/temporary tattoo sheets and those hard candies that looks like fruits(mostly bananas).
Gachapon is a bit different from gambling. Gambling comes with the inherent understanding that you have a chance to lose. With gachapon, you always get exactly what you are paying for: a random capsule toy. You just don’t get to pick which one you get. With gachapon, you always “win,” there is no chance that your money is spent and you get nothing in return. This is why games with gacha mechanics makes duplicates of characters or items useful. Whatever you get is still useful to you, even if you don’t get what you wanted.
I think you already understand the negative aspects of gachapon, but I just wanted to add that little bit of information.
With gachapon, you always "win," there is no chance that your money is spent and you get nothing in return.
Although you're technically getting something, typically the common items are nearly worthless, and may as well be nothing. You only "win" when you actually get the ultra rare 5* SSR Jackpot waifu.
Sometimes, but most of the time duplicates let you level up a character beyond their basic level (Limit Break, most commonly called), or give you materials to pick a new character (sometimes called Pity System, but that is a little different), or materials to forge new weapons.
I have played many gacha games, and I have only ever spent money on NieR Reincarnation because I wanted Square Enix to see that I like Yoko Taros games and want more of them. I am not a whale, dolphin, or a minnow. I am a “barnacle” F2P player, and I have never had a problem with the games I play. They’re not really designed to be constantly played all the time like a “regular” game would be, instead being level or session style games. I don’t compare my game progress with other players, and I play to have fun and pass time. I get exactly what I want from them for whenever I play them.
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