It’s a microsoft product, so according to microsoft it absolutely is. It could be the most profitable product on the planet and they’d say it’s still underperforming.
Man, I really wanted to like this game, I love the setting, art, music, and overall aesthetics, but I’m having trouble finding the fun.
When I first heard about it, I was hoping it was basically a linear road down the coast, with a story to experience along the way (kinda like the boat/car sections of HL2). But then it turned out to be a repetitive grind. There are some mechanics I think are novel and add a lot of fun (ex. the Quirks system), but 90% of what I was doing in the game felt unfun and pointless so I could eventually return to the garage and do it all again.
For me, the fun comes, like in some other crafting games (e.g., Subnautica) and roguelikes, from chasing the next upgrades, enjoying the sense of empowerment they bring, and getting to explore new areas.
For that reason, I love the idea of survival crafting games, but I hate the sandbox, perpetual loop format most of them come in (like No Man’s Sky). Subnautica is the gold standard (with Dysmantle being a surprise second place) of having a finite, focused progression path. Pacific Drive scratches that itch.
Although, I will admit that it’s more stressful than I would have liked too. I knew about the procedural generation and run-based loop early on, but I still kind of expected something overall tranquil. But with storms coming on a timer in every junction, anomalies frequently overwhelming every space you need to explore, and the high stakes of potentially losing a lot of critical material, I found myself playing much more anxiously than I would have preferred, which is what I alluded to about the endgame.
I’m fine with stressful, high risk gameplay, it’s when the game asks me to spend a bunch of time doing something I don’t find fun that it loses me.
Subnautica in particular did this to me. All my friends who like Outer Wilds told me to play Subnautica. I loved the exploration and story, but I didn’t care at all about building a fancy base that I would never see again after finishing the game. There was a particular point where I was bottlenecked on finding a single resource type that was located in one single place in a giant ocean, which turned out to be a place I felt I was being told not to go yet (trying to avoid spoilers). I thought i was being dense, just not learning what the game was trying to teach me, so I ended up having to look it up, only to realize the game did an absolutely piss poor job of directing me toward the resource. My entire experience was soured by that.
It was after that that I decided single player survival crafters are not my thing. I like them as a multiplayer experience, because you can amortize busy work across multiple people, and socialize as you do it, but by myself I’d rather do anything else. I get it if someone finds it relaxing to do that kind of thing, but it’s not for me.
Ha, that’s funny, that’s the exact opposite of me. But games are my downtime, and socializing is work (for me), so I am almost exclusively single-player.
Shame about Pacific Drive, but I get it. There is a ton of repetition.
I’m happy to say that I was one of them. Beat the game this past weekend, and have really been enjoying trophy hunting in the endgame. Without the pressure of the main story I’ve actually started to feel a little more freedom to take chances and be less concerned about damage and loss of resources.
All in all, Pacific Drive has been an absolute highlight this year.
Microsoft convinced hardware manufacturers to support UEFI and TPM overnight. If they just said next Windows is going to be ARM only software manufacturers would have to follow.
I’m not sure what games do work, but I’m surprised over half of what they’ve tested are in a good state considering it’s running on an emulation layer with immature drivers. Additionally, anti-cheat can’t really be helped, that’s an issue we’ve been dealing with on Linux for ages as well. I don’t think anyone was really expecting it arm on windows to overtake x86 instantaneously, but from a technical standpoint it’s not a bad start. Of course, things could be better, but they could be much worse.
Initially I had some hope when Embracer bought a bunch of studios from Square Enix, because Square Enix sucks and it could only get better, but once their funding dried up it turned out Emberacer sucks just as much as them.
What the fuck are you on about? They’re talking about using AI to replace the incredibly talented human labour at studios they own. Y’know, like the people who made Valheim, Deep Rock Galactic, Satisfactory, the new Tomb Raider titles, Metro Exodus…
Embracer are shit, but what makes them shit is that they’re fucking murdering a lot of genuinely talented studios that produce great work.
Listen, if AI was replacing executives instead of hardworking creative types, I’d be all for it.
Christ, with how limited the brainpower of your average c-suite is, you wouldn’t need “AI”. I could probably replace most of them with an excel spreadsheet.
Ignore the thousands of employees we’ve laid off, we have AI that is going to QUADRUPLE our productivity. I’m talking AAAA-AAAA games here, folks. The best is yet to come, it’s going to be fantastic.
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