Sadly emulation is seemingly non-existent for newer consoles like PS4 and Xbox one (PS3 is pretty emulatable but fairly demanding, Xbox 360 emulation is last I checked still pretty poor) Luckily most of the games on newer consoles are released on PC.
I remember ps3 emulation a few years ago was determined too hardware intensive, nowadays it can be done on mid level hardware. PS4 and Xbox One is going to happen, just depends on when.
Yep. The PS4 and Xbone are both very close to off-the-shelf AMD APU’s as far as I remember; you could buy very similar processors for desktop use. Emulation would require a ton more power than the original chips, and the original chips are so close to desktop processors that it’s more efficient and feasible to reverse-engineer the proprietary API’s those console chips use.
We always hear about shit companies like embracer, but who are the actual people in charge? Who are the people who are very bad at their jobs and should be publically ostracized for damaging not only their ips but the lives of hundreds to thousands of working developers? Like what are their names? Who are these faceless scumbags?
Embracer is just a name to hide behind, the people involved in the decisionmaking here should be known by name, like Bobby “incredible piece of human filth” Kotick
I honestly do believe Lars Wingefors is passionate about games and the industry, he’s been trying to find a place in it his whole career, but I do not think he’s a good business man nor worthy of stewardship for these IPs.
Very well could be. I didn’t research their backgrounds. I just know from first hand experience of people who get jobs who graduated with business degrees who don’t care about the stuff they sell.
they would have done these layoffs regardless for what it’s worth. Apples privacy stance for advertising companies (what unity wanted to be) and the lack of easy access to additional investment this past year meant that it’s not been a sustainable business for a while
While Epic has been pouring money from Fortnite into Unreal Engine and making significant progress in updating the engine.
Unity has been sitting on its ass for years doing absolutely nothing in the way of R&D.
As a result, Unity is now left behind.
Valve has given up on being an Engine developer.
Epic with the Unreal Engine will have a monopoly soon if it doesn't already.
Anyone attempting to make their own modern game engine these days are way behind the ball. All the big players are switching to Unreal.
And it's not only Game Engine, but movie making engine as well.
The only company I could see that would have the $$$ and talent to compete against Epic for a Graphics Engine would be nVidia.
AMD doesn't have the R&D and Scientists specializing in Graphics/Physics/Rendering/Simulation/InformationLoading like nVidia does.
Valve has the $$$ and talent, but they are focused on hardware now, and are even farther behind than Unity.
Having a single Game Engine monopoly will be bad for all of us in the end.
The only Video Game engine that I could see someone develop that could compete against Unreal, is if the engine was built from the ground up 100% focused on anti-cheat. Libraries that are designed from the start to be multiplayer focused with un-necessary data scrubbed properly from the clients so they can't sniff out data. Something designed to be hack proof.
That game engine, even if not graphically intense would be highly sought after in a wide genre range of games.
…which is why Godot now is quickly slipping into the niche that Unity largely used to be for.
And since Godot is FOSS, there is no going back for Unity once Indie game devs have shifted, since - like with Blender being free to use - it destroys the competition by becoming the defacto king when it comes to things like video tutorials on places like YouTube.
Popular tutorial channels on YouTube know their viewer audience is less likely to be large enough to be profitable via ad revenue, premium subscriptions, etc. if they are limited niche of people only willing to pay thousands for a license to an application they don’t yet have any professional reason to pay for.
Being open source in any way also usually then leads to a snowball effect of an application gaining popularity and then people extending its functionality.
This is also what I think will soon happen to Plex with Jellyfin since the Plex bigwigs have decided they want to be Netflix more than people’s personal media server frontend.
All it will take is one big mistake and the ground will fall beneath their feet just like with Unity.
All fascinating and frustrating to watch as I used to work with Unity a ton since its early days.
Never really thought about the popularity of FOSS starting with youtube-tutorials. But completely reasonable that when everybody starts with Godot (or other FOSS like Blender), even bigger Studios might just use that one since there are just more guys already proficient with it.
Students and amateurs want to learn how to do something. Their choices are either - (sometimes) get an EDU address, fill out a form, apply for a discount or free version, see the watermark or lose a ton of functionality, and only see tutorials via classes or other a-la-carte method (how many folks are doing Houdini lessons online out there - probably not many if I had to guess considering Houdini’s price), or start paying $20/month for a program that they someday hope will allow them to earn money - knowing that if they stop paying, they lose access to files… OR…
They can download a program for free, that anyone can add stuff to, with thousands of really well done tutorials online on free places like YouTube, that studios will love because there’s no licensing fee or if there is - it’s only when they are really profitable or whatever.
The more that people use it, the more there are people doing tutorials, expanding functionality, etc.
Blender used to be garbage in like 2010, but now - you’d be an idiot not to grab a copy and teach yourself if you used to regular in apps like 3DS Max, Maya, or other premium closed application now requiring a bunch of DRM installers, license tiers, and subscriptions…
Same goes for Adobe’s stuff. I imagine there are more and more people sick of Creative Cloud’s garbage and are ready to find and learn and contribute to FOSS services… All that needs to happen is critical stupid event by bigwig, and suddenly a mass exodus begins.
This is also why languages like R and Python are supplanting SPSS and Matlab. Open source is just better in some ways, particularly once it gets over the initial usability barrier, which Jellyfin seems to now be achieving.
Hello I work for Unity (for now lol, we’ll see)! I’d like to just say from my end of things we do actually do a solid amount of R&D. Just that a depressing amount of it either never sees the light of day, takes so long to release it has already been done better by someone else, or is unannounced with little to no documentation on release so it never gets visibility. The other thing to note is that Unity does a lot of non-game things that might not be that noticeable if you’re just looking at it from a game making perspective, like our publicly known contracts we have to help train the military to “totally not kill people you guys”!
this is on-top of all the lost sales from no one buying their first-party games.
Gamepass is not financially viable, it’s funded by microsoft office and azure. It never will be unless they get a huge majority of the market /and/ raise praises massively. Which is of course their goal as soon as they kill the concept of game ownership.
Yup, it’s obvious once you connect everything why Microsoft is doing this. They’re monopolizing the game market - and most gamers couldn’t be more excited. When I was on Reddit I called out how competition was good and this was bad and was always met with the majority of people saying “nuh uh, they’re going to put them all on game pass for only $9 a month!”
Netflix at least didn’t plan to be what it became from the start, they even experimented with releasing some of its originals on Blu-ray for a bit. But when every shitty heavy hitter in the entertainment industry comes after you, you’re gonna learn to be shitty real fast.
Microsoft is a whole different brand of monster. They have a long, long history of terrible anti-competitve practices, fucking over their own consumers, flagrantly ignoring complaints, and making deeply underhanded moves. In many different markets, for decades. The Xbox One release was almost literally a thesis statement. They could not possibly have broadcast any clearer who the fuck they are and what the goal is.
And still, still, people defend them. They downplay everything and fall head over heels for their marketing bullshit.
That’s why we’re truly fucked without regulations. It’s not just because corporations are terrible and will do incredibly underhanded shit at the drop of a hat to raise profits, it’s also because the vast majority of the consumer base is fucking stupid. Incapable of pattern recognition and imagination, and unwilling to change their patterns even slightly. It’s really, really, really easy to see the negative effects of a Microsoft dominated gaming market. And the consumers can’t see it.
Counterpoint: both of those ideas being patented meant no competitor could use them while the ideas were relevant. And in both cases, the patenting company made like one promising example of the patented idea and then barely used it after that. Wouldn’t it have been better for consumers if we could have had loading screen minigames back when long loading screens were still relevant?
it’s like the first person invent a way to make the pop cap for your travel coffee mug. Like, anyone could have come up with that idea, right? compare to screw cap we used to have. We do have plenty of examples where the patent aren’t really popular until after it is expired or irrelevant.
Like, yeah, in a heatlhy competition env, it is way better for consumer in the beginning. But because of how capital works, eventually without patent it all goes to the bigger corps.
For the consumer, obviously.
Patents exist to protect the profit of the inventor, specifically because once you have spent the RnD money to make something, someone else can take your finished idea and create your thing without having to cover those costs. Their entire point is to make sure stuff stays more expensive and exclusive for longer.
But the issue isn’t that patents or even software patents exist as a thing, they are important to protect against copying, it’s that seemingly almost anything no matter how simple, vague or universal it is can apply and get patented, and whoever owns those patents then doesn’t have to use or license them, instead they just sit on them waiting to strike with a lawsuit.
I think software patents should really only apply to extremely tricky algorithmic “discoveries” (which I would consider inventions, as someone that’s written a SHA256 implementation from reference material, nobody is “just coming up with that”).
“Ingenuity patents” like that loading screen game are everything that’s wrong with software patents. It’s not all that crazy of an idea to add a game while waiting to play the main game. There’s no radical research required there, just an idea.
I don’t think vague ideas like “a game in a loading screen” are sufficiently creative to warrant a patent.
The thing is, many physical patents are also describing extremely simple mechanisms or mere ideas for them. I don’t think your criteria reflect reality, as much as I wish they did.
for practical physical good, some times a patent just means I did this first doesn’t mean it’s hard to do or replicate. ie. like the umbrella wedge/spring to make it open automatically. That’s the part of ingenuity. And why I think the mini game during loading screen worth the patent.
I don’t like algorithm patent because ultimately, it was there, if original sha hash wasn’t developed, someone would come up with a different method that doing roughly the same. It’s the math and other prior foundation in computer hasing/data processing provides the idea and how you can process and get the hash fast. so your newer arrangement of faster version(like different sorting algorithm) would not be possible without those other research.
ie. for my own example, my thesis involves doing polygon culling strategy, my base algorithm is totally base on math prediction as to what’s the optimum I can achieve minimum culling checks. BUT, that algorithm is actually slower than when you implement the checks base on how GPU is doing the render plus cache efficiency. If I did not know or not aware how computer works from prior study, I can’t figure out why my “optimum” algorithm is actually slower than sub-optimum checking strategy.
Say, what if SHA or whatever algorithms is implemented, and is actually very impactful to other application, which can be proven that anyone can naturally come to this conclusion by doing their own research, simply grant that patent impedes future development. Another computer graphic patent is the Joe Alter hair distribution, it has nothing to do with ingenuity and just because his dad is a good patent lawyer, it blocks any healthy competition from selling CG hair grooming product in US. If you check the patent itself, that was like trying to patent a math distribution over surface.
like the umbrella wedge/spring to make it open automatically.
That to me is a very specific algorithm. It’s a simple mechanism but putting it together might be a bit tricky.
That’s very similar to SHA, it’s a fairly simple set of mechanisms but the actual composure of those ideas into something that works as well as SHA does takes very specific research experience. It’s not at all an abstract idea, it’s a very concrete and specific set of operations that you invented first.
Imagine if the patent was “an umbrella can open itself with the push of button” no further details. That’s close to the level of detail some software patents are argued at and effectively what the “put a game in your loading screen” patent was awarded on.
You can’t patent the idea that “an umbrella should be able to open [somehow]” so I likewise think it’s ridiculous that someone was able to parent “your game [somehow] runs another simpler game before it runs.”
Patents should be to protect very specific research so that the private sector can do said research and profit from it. Patents should not block out broad concepts. The patent in the video game situation was and should’ve been ruled as bogus. It’s not the type of thing anyone needed to research or think about, you just literally go “what if I added a game to my loading screen” and you’re in violation.
The Namco(which I wrongly attribute to Konami) thing “is” very specific. Remember during that time there are not a lot multi core processors. It requires clever scheduling to allow running both the mini-game AND checking loading status to seamlessly transition into game. It’s really not just a simple “concept” but ingenuity to arrange your loading I/O wait time into running their past game at the same time. That’s in PS1 era where loading wait time because of CD-ROM and later DVD was very significant.
Algorithmic patents amount to patenting maths which, by very longstanding precedence, is not a thing, for good reason.
In the EU there’s only one way to patent software and that’s if you’re using it to achieve direct physical ends. E.g. you can patent washing machine firmware in so far as you patent a particular way to combine sensor data to achieve a particular washing result. Rule of thumb: If, 30 years ago, you’d have an electromechanical mechanism to do the task then you can patent the software that’s now replacing it.
Oh: It’s also possible to patent silicon, that is, you can patent your hardware acceleration methods for video decoding. That doesn’t extend to decoders running on general-purpose hardware, though.
If you want to monopolise your brand-new hash algorithm there’s a simple way: Don’t publish the source, use copyright to collect royalties… though that doesn’t mean that reverse engineering is outlawed, especially if necessary for interoperability. Practically speaking nope hash algorithms just can’t be protected which is fair and square because it’s academia who comes up with that kind of stuff and we paid for it with taxpayer money. Want to make money off it? Get tenure.
The problem is a hash algorithm is exactly the sort of thing that copyright would be horrible at protecting. The source code is hardly relevant at all, it’s the operations that matter.
A big part of patents is to allow private sector research to occur. RCA failed and maybe patents should just fail too.
Algorithmic patents amount to patenting maths which, by very longstanding precedence, is not a thing, for good reason.
You absolutely can patent “math” (well, more like physics) IRL. What matters though is that the invention actually has to be novel and non-obvious, and IMO it should also be harder to patent if it’s in a segment like software where costs of development, iteration and “research” are generally extremely cheap. Like, it should have a way higher bar for the “novelness”.
And I would not allow any kind of software design patent (use copyright or trademark to protect that).
I was part of the first big wave and they hard warned us maybe potentially there might perhaps be restructing and “resizing”. We agonized for months waiting to know if it was our teams or no, if we had to look (this was before Unity nosedived and buddy quit).
I’ve somehow survived all the firings and restructurings so far. It’s a shit show over here. I’m trying to get through a few more months then I’m off to another country to go back to school
The agonizing hasn’t stopped for me I’ve just gotten used to it as a part of my day to day. It’s wild what they’ve been putting us through we need to unionize
I mean, their requirements are still more strict than steam. GabeN basically says as long as you don’t break the law or cause us to lose significant business from bad press (aka “straight up trolling”) with your game, and have $100 cash handy, you are welcome to shill your school project quality, my first Unity game shovelware here
Gee these men-children are going to be awfully sad when there’s no one left to make their games for them anymore and they have nothing left to do but face the shitty reality they’ve created.
All of those are due to the drastic increase in jobs during covid. This is happening in many, many tech related careers. It is not because of inclusivity. Get your head out of your ass.
That’s a factor, but it’s not the only reason, jackass. Look at the games that failed and how they were backed by activists, which led to studio closures.
Ubisoft is mostly subsidized in Quebec by taxpayers, and they have their lowest profits ever because of activists as well.
It’s because of their shitty horrible business practices, nobody wants to pay $100 for a rushed game and nobody wants to invest time into their 500th live service game that they’ll stop supporting in a year.
You would have to jump through a lot of hoops to conclude that activism makes you a bad game developer. If they’re exploiting their customers constantly to try to increase profit margins, they are more than likely exploiting their workers, who they have much more control over.
You’re telling me that a bland and generic Overwatch clone with character designs that were reductive to the groups they were supposed to represent failed because of activists? The games you listed didn’t fail because of activism, they failed because their “activism” was a marketing stunt instead of being actually progressive. There are plenty of games developed by people that care about those issues where they’re represented accurately and appropriately. Those games usually do well and win awards. Making a game where you meaninglessly and inaccurately pander to minority groups is not the result of activism, it’s trying to leech off of actual activism.
Um… Yes? You’re proving my own point based on what you just wrote.
The people that made Dustborn, Concord, etc, all wanted to push a narrative instead of making a good fun game.
Activists, woke people, etc, are more than welcome in the game industry… As long as they keep that shit to themselves. Leave that idiotic nonsense at home.
You get to work, you work to make a good product, and that’s it.
You’re missing the point of what I said. Concord and Dustborn did not try to send a message, they tried to get the profits they thought would come from associating with the message, and implemented it horribly. This is not activism. That would be like saying Instagram changing their logo to rainbow for a month is activism.
As for true activism, video games are both entertainment and an art form. Saying to “leave that shit at home” is missing the point of artistic mediums in their entirety.
Please point out where I implied that corporations got greedy “only now”. Hint: i said “since forever”, the implication is that they were always shit. Then again, can’t expect much from you.
It’s more about the messaging. The mere presence of a POC or trans character isn’t bothersome to most people. But when that character comes with dialogue lines that make the political messaging obvious, then they’re no longer a character that happens to be non-White or trans; they’re a political prop inserted into a game to send a political message, and that can be quite irksome when all you’re trying to do is play a fantasy RPG and escape from the world for a bit, even if you actually agree with the message.
Exactly. Don’t lecture us about being trans or etc.
We honestly don’t care. (Yes, a small percentage of people are actually bigots and hate gays/trans for being who they are). The rest of us just don’t want it shoved down our throats.
It’s like making a game and having the main character proclaiming: “look how straight I am! Wow I sure do love women! I’m so straight and anyone who isn’t should do pushups”.
And yet, from the downvoting here and everywhere else this comes up, it’s clear: some people can’t take nuanced opinions on topics like this. If you object in any capacity, you’re the worst possible objector.
A bad written character is a bad written character, their dialogue could be about candies and is still a bad written character. This argument is bullshit, bad case of confirmatory bias.
There are plenty of record breaking games that have released while the industry has been “filled with activists.” Many of them are even about politics, like Helldivers 2.
Just down vote and move on. She’s just a troll with no facts or figures, she just wants your attention that Daddy never gave her growing up. It was either the pole or the troll for her.
You don’t even want to look. You think games are failing just because or capitalism which is the dumbest, leftist excuse that you always all give when you don’t have the knowledge to see what’s truly happening.
Enjoy living in your angry little leftist bubble echo chamber.
Did you also know that marvel rivals, that somehow idiots think it’s woke earned 130 million in it’s first month. I mean that’s a whole other capitalism conversation but still.
The difference between each generation of consoles is getting less and less. The latest jump doesn’t really give you anything the previous gen didn’t give you, it just has sharper graphics. The graphics aren’t even that much better.
I felt that way going from a 360 to XB1. More of the same, just shinier. I don’t think I’ve used my XB1 for anything except Rock Band in over a year. And the only reason I felt the urge to get a Series is that so RB loads in less than 10 minutes. (Well, that and Flight Simulator.)
Nintendo and indies are the only things keeping my interest in console gaming.
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