DRG Survivors is innovative enough for what it is. More importantly it’s well-made and a fun addition to the world of DRG. Does it reinvent the genre? No, but it does some interesting things with its different challenges so it stays fresh for longer than most bullet heavens.
I know it’s not the old school version they’re after (I believe they’re going for RuneScape 1?) but 2009scape exists for anyone else interested. Fully playable offline in single player mode, with bots as other “players”, plenty of options like GE buying and selling for the bots, and others. You can also play with other real players by using the launcher too, but I’ve only tried it in single player due to me just trying to scratch that RuneScape itch! Haha!
I would pay $10 a month (ongoing, MRR) to be able to fly their home base ship to different asteroids and occasionally have the bugs invade it. I would play the fuck out of that game.
Honestly “it’s this game but with that.” could be a pretty good way to innovate unless you’re totally phoning it in IMO.
Metroid was created when people at Nintendo wanted to combine the skill-based platforming of Super Mario Bros with the exploration of a Zelda game. That ended up being one of the two founding games in the Metroidvania genre.
System Shock was created by people who wanted to make a game with the same “emergent gameplay systems as a puzzle/playground” aspect of dungeon crawling RPGs like Ultima, but in a SciFi rather than fantasy setting. What we ended up with was something that combined fast paced shooter gameplay and a tight narrative presentation on the one hand, with letting the player make their own solutions to levels by manipulating open-ended gameplay systems on the other. This is very similar to the situation with metroid IMO, in how it tried to combine two very differnt styles of gameplay. Today we have an entire genre of games inspired by System Shock called immersive sims (though its more of a design ethos than a genre IMO).
The famous level design and exploration of Dark Souls was inspired by the 3D Zelda games, and while I don’t have a source for this its hard for me to believe that the lock-on mechanics and basic idea for the movement weren’t at least a little inspired by Zelda too. Or, in other words, Dark Souls is basically a 3D Zelda game but with the tone and difficulty of their earlier King’s Field series.
Now, I don’t mean to imply that combing two good things is a guaranteed way to get something good. Or even that, if you do hit upon a good combination, that that’s the only thing you need to put into your work. The games I’ve just talked about are all absolute classics and obviously a lot went into that. For example, the genesis of the iconic multiplayer aspect of Fromsoft’s games came about during the development of Demon’s Souls, when Miyazaki was trying to drive up hill in a bad snow storm. There was a line of cars, and when one began to spin it’s tires then ones behind it would intentionly push on it to help it up. This all happened without the drivers being able to talk to each other, and, seeing this, Miyazaki wondered what became of the last car in the line, but knew he would never get an answer since he would never see these people again. It was this experience that inspired the creation of phantoms.
However, what I am trying to say is that taking something you like and understanding what makes it tick, then making it work in a new context, can end up creating something that then seems wildly innovative in that context.
As an aside, both Zelda and King’s Field were inspired by a dungeon crawling game called “Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord”. Both Wizardry and Ultima were derived from earlier games that were basically “Dungeons and Dragons, but on a computer”. Some of them were even named “DND” on the early computer systems they ran on.
DnD itself was created when people wanted to do wargames with a greater emphasis on unconventional warfare (such as spying, diplomacy/intrigue, propaganda, etc) that by necessity required roleplay. After one of these kinds of games was set in a half Conan the Barbarian half Gothic horror medieval fantasy setting with a spooky underground labyrinth beneath a town we got the trope of dungeon delving and returning with treasure to a (relatively) safe town just outside the dungeon entrance.
time for all of us to volunteer at your garbage dump like that dude who offered to buy his local garbage dump because his Bitcoin hard drive might be there
This is why I think it’s funny people still believe ‘the Internet is forever’. Data disappears all the time. If you really start paying attention it’s scary how ephemeral the Internet truly is and how much is lost all the time.
I think it’s a good way for most people to think of things when posting to social media, etc. as you might not know how long what you put out there might be out there, and you might not be able to take down or modify it without someone capturing it before you have done so.
Similar to the early Blizzard approach in some ways. A focus on delivering a vibe done to a very high level of quality and visual coolness, while leaving risky innovation in game mechanics to others.
IMO, “it’s this game, but with X” is innovation. It’s certainly more innovative than “it’s this game, again, with absolutely nothing new” like Ubisoft basically does with every sequel to every IP they handle.
Absolutely. I think most of us are excited for incremental evolution.
And conversely a lack of that is the chief source of my frustration with games. Bethesda is another dev that comes to mind with the loading screen debacle that was Starfield.
Starfield was just weird. Like, I expected the load screens and all the other GameBryo/Creation jank. But that’s not what made it disappointing. It was just… Boring. I couldn’t get immersed in the world because nothing about it was interesting once you scratched deeper than the surface. Even the twist ending/NG+ system which is actually kind of a neat idea wasn’t done well (like you might have to go through the entire, boring-ass game up to 7 times before you even see a difference).
I don’t know anything about the NG+ system because I steered way clear of Starfield, but it sounds like somebody at Bethesda saw people playing Skyrim over and over and thought “How can we monetize that”, hence the grind you’re alluding to. They expected you to encounter it organically because of course the game was such hot shit everyone was gonna play it forever. Oops.
Call me a cynic if you want but these are the guys who invented paid cosmetics.
I honestly did not expect Starfield to have actual flyable spaceships and vehicles. That was a pleasant surprise, so Bethesda evidently has not stagnated completely. The problem is Starfield has issues with many other game elements (like loading screens, mediocre worldbuilding, etc). Also the fact that it was simply a game in a different genre than previous Bethesda games didn’t help. People expected a handcrafted open world a la Fallout 4 but got a kind-of-procedurally generated sandbox.
I actually was thinking about this the other day with soulslikes as I make my way through Bloodborne. This is an entire genre that isn’t even new. They’re Metroidvanias (or whatever you would classify the OG Castlevania as other than just “side scrolling platformer”)! The only real difference is that you don’t get tools as like weapons/accessories to reach new areas, you just get a boring ass key that opens a door, you open a door from only one side, or a trigger automatically opens a new path when you defeat a boss. 🤣
Is it your first playthrough of Bloodborne? If so I’m so jelly. I’d do anything to play that game for the first time again!! Don’t forget to do the dlc :)
while metroidvania is an apt comparison souls-like games and specifically dark souls games feel a lot like classic dungeon crawlers ( but with real time combat instead of grids. Which in the case of fromsoftwares earlier games kingsfield, makes a lot of sense.
I honestly don’t know why they don’t simply make those a subscription service at this point. They change nothing but the stats to try and reflect real life in most iterations. Sports games are the one type of game that because of how they already do them would be perfect for the love service bullshit, and yet, inexplicably, they are the one genre that has next to no live service games. I can literally only think of one of the FIFA games which is free 2 play and live service.
I’ve thought about this before, I think it’s because the devs/publishers want to have their cake and eat it. They release a new game every year at full price for that up front cash then they nickle and dime you all year and then reset with a new full price game.
I’m pretty sure the amount of money EA makes from FIFA or Activision makes from COD would go down dramatically if they just had a single live service game.
These kind of games run on a shit ton of licensing deals, from player likeness, club branding and music. Bet it is much more advantageous for the studios in these licensing deals to just create single releases. With a subscription service the IP holders will demand a deal based on playtime.
For sure. And I’d say most of us who like roguelikes and DRG both would just enjoy a good, faithful treatment of it that understands the genre. I don’t expect innovation within a genre, I just want a solid implementation.
And too much innovation will alienate people anyway. People want something new but at the same time want something familiar. If it’s too out there people can’t relate with it, especially before the purchase, and feel it’s too risky to spend time and money on. And for the people who do try it you still need to convince them to push through the beginning stages of the game. Since very innovative gameplay comes with a steep learning curve and not just skill wise since it breaks conventions there is also a cultural (in the gaming sense) learning curve.
[ For years we’ve seen an encouraging pattern. Hit new releases are excellent at generating new first-time purchasers, and we’ve tried to build many platform features to encourage those new users to stick around, find more great games, and play with friends. To gather data illustrating the effectiveness of that approach, we went all the way back to 2023 and identified the biggest 20 releases of that year. We looked at every new first-time purchaser generated by those products (that is, an account making a purchase, or redeeming a Steam key, for the first time) for a total of 1.7 million new users. Then we followed that cohort of new users. The stats below represent what those players did from January 2024 through early March 2025.
…
That cohort of players has gone on to spend $20 million on in-game transactions across hundreds of other games—plus another $73 million on premium games and DLC across thousands more products. ]
So they are not average gamers, more like new blood in steam, and the numbers are for money they spent additional after the reason they came to steam.
That seems like a lot, but that’s <$12/user in microtransactions and ~$43/user in games. That’s like… 2 microtransaction purchases and a couple indie games each.
Less than 20 dollars per user on “microtransactions” which the article goes on to define as “in-game transactions”. And 73 dollars on direct steam purchases of games/DLC which very well could just be a single newly released game.
So… one “battle pass” or two or three cosmetics for a live game and a new game or a season pass or two of DLC for an older one?
just did the math, I’ve averaged about $165/yr on steam, with very little (though not none) microtransactions. like maybe less than $50 total in 15 years.
I think I probably have a similar average on my 18 yr old account, except the only microtransactions on my account are credits from selling any hats, skins and duplicate weapons I unlocked for free in TF2 and CS 😅
The 1.7 million customers who originated from a top 2023 release
This wording is a bit strange, are they tracking the new steam accounts that signed up to buy a specific 2023 title (like Baldur’s Gate 3, Hogwarts Legacy, or Starfield)?
If so it says more about the specific demographic attracted to that unknown title than it does about Steam in general.
To gather data illustrating the effectiveness of that approach, we went all the way back to 2023 and identified the biggest 20 releases of that year. We looked at every new first-time purchaser generated by those products (that is, an account making a purchase, or redeeming a Steam key, for the first time) for a total of 1.7 million new users.
Yeah, that’s a bit strange. Not everyone starts their account by a big game. My current steam account is quite old and first games were the ones I could afford back then as a student: indie titles, freebies, maybe one big game at some point. My previous account was only for HL / CS.
I realise i must be an edge case but i think my steam account of 10+ years is positive money wise. Got thousands of hours in the same few games and sold my old €100 CS inventory for about €500 PayPal when the market boomed.
The amount of money I’ve spent on my system to play those few games at more fps tho, lets not calculate.
Lmao. I mostly play the free games. I also have the heroic launcher and I’m signed into gog, epic and prime on it and so far, they’ve given me 85 free games. I have a lifetime supply of games.
20 million divided by 1.7 is about $11 per person, which isnt really that high.
I also think theres a distinction to be made between microtransactions in f2p titles and microtransactions in AAA premium titles. I logged something like 4000 hours in Mechwarrior online and I bought mech packs because I wanted to support the devs.
I feel like a lot of the microtransaction revenue is DLC as well. But like someone else said, there are the rare games that are free to play and don’t have super predatory mtx like Path of Exile or The Finals.
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