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frezik, do games w Amid EA's unpopular $55 billion buyout, Baldur's Gate 3 director takes time "to remind people that making games faster and cheaper while charging more has never worked before"

How many times do the developers of Baldur’s Gate 3 need to explain the basics of how to make a popular game and we all treat it like deep wisdom?

Not that there’s anything wrong with what they’re saying. I just feel like it only sounds like deep wisdom because the industry is so fucking broken.

7355608,

“Not that there’s anything wrong with what they’re saying. I just feel like it only sounds like deep wisdom because the industry is so fucking broken.”

-Competent soldiers commenting on the Art of War.

frezik,

Truth. A big chunk of that book is explaining to nobels that war is expensive, and maybe you just shouldn’t.

ameancow,

How many times do the developers of Baldur’s Gate 3 need to explain the basics of how to make a popular game and we all treat it like deep wisdom?

I mean, I grew up basically raised by PBS and even saturday morning cartoons and thought that it would be basic, fundamental knowledge in the world today that reason and knowledge are power, that con-men will tell you what you want to hear, and not to believe people who say they’re “the best” and instead look at empirical evidence of all claims.

I thought “wow the future is going to be amazing, we have all these programs that are telling us kids how to live, how to navigate a complex world, we will have a future of starships and science and wonders!”

Now I’m here every day talking to the team I manage when they share obviously AI-generated “news articles” about scientists discovering mermaid cities and trying to get permission to spread their essential oil pyramid scheme through the company.

As a species, we are far, far stupider than we want to admit. As individuals, sure we each have great potential, but when you get more than one person in any kind of situation, the intelligence levels drop to the lowest common-denominator, and the more people, the lower that level drops.

eronth,

Gonna have to do it forever until businesses figure out that half of what makes a game good is that it needs to be a literal passion/art project, and not just a checklist of shit that needs to get done.

killerscene,

thats exactly why, if it wasn’t broken no one would be saying anything.

its like a bunch of people running a marathon and a few take the bridge across while most others jump into the river because its moving faster

SaharaMaleikuhm,

I believe Sven Vincke just likes to dunk on them. Can’t really blame him for it either. I’d do the same.

Melonpoly, do games w Sony boss admits forcing PC gamers into PlayStation accounts can "invite pushback," but insists they have to keep games safe – which doesn't really track in single-player

Yes, because games without PSN accounts are so unsafe and Sony definitely isn’t susceptible to having their servers hacked.

ByteOnBikes,

Sony has a history of being terrible with security.

They literally built malware two decades ago.

Juvyn00b,

I still have an audio CD with their malware embedded. Ripped it under Linux, no problem.

missingno, do games w Ex PlayStation exec says Sony can't keep "increasing the graphics power" with new consoles after tech plateau, but PS5 has already "made almost every game a better game"
@missingno@fedia.io avatar

I want shorter games with worse graphics made by people who are paid more to work less and I'm not kidding.

its_kim_love,

Generally games where people had fun making them feel better to play.

Ephera,

Yeah, for me it’s not even just the creative freedom, but an actual fuzzy feeling that me and the devs are having fun together. Open-source games also hold a special place in my heart for that reason, no matter how scrungy they are.

Lost_My_Mind,

Have you heard of stardew valley? Made by one guy, 16 bit sprite pixelart, although he does still work his ass off.

Two outta three ain’t bad, right?

mnemonicmonkeys,

TBF, the dude has made millions off the game, and he doesn’t make the updates paid dlc. He just keeps adding to SDV because he loves it

frongt,

But most importantly, more fun!

Ephera,

Yeah, I might be showing my age, but my interpretation of “a better game” was right away “a more fun game”, which got followed up with the thought: Did it make them more fun?

I feel like we had fun figured out pretty well in the last century already. And in many ways, the higher specs are used to add realism and storytelling, which I know many people enjoy in their own way, but they’re often at odds with fun, or at least sit between the fun parts of a game.

Like, man, I watched a video of the newest Pokémon game and they played for more than an hour before the tutorial + plot exposition was over. Practically no fun occurred in that first hour.
Just imagine putting coins into an arcade cabinet and the first hour is an utter waste of time. You’d ask for your money back.

NeilBru, (edited ) do games w Baldur's Gate 3 dev calls Randy Pitchford's $80 Borderlands 4 comments "gross" because it implies the FPS is more important than "making it day to day"
@NeilBru@lemmy.world avatar

Look, you can charge whatever you want.

“Is your game worth $80 to average gamers dealing with (gestures broadly at state of world economy)?”

That is the question every studio executive needs to ask themselves.

Given the recent trends in AAA-funded projects, for the most part, that answer is “Oh, hell no.”

goodeye8,

Exactly. They can charge $200 if they want to but it doesn't mean people are going to buy at that price. The price point needs to be where people are okay paying for it and I don't see it happening at $80. Okay, I lied a bit, I see it happening for some games but not for BL4.

SolidShake,

How do you know for certain without seeing gameplay or trying it? No one knows what’s in the game except the devs.

What if it’s OG borderlands and there’s no battle pass or microtransactions.

This is more of a don’t pre order type thing.

whotookkarl,
@whotookkarl@lemmy.world avatar

What if it’s OG borderlands and there’s no battle pass or microtransactions.

Ha, good joke

goodeye8,

I'm willing to eat my words but I doubt I need to. In a world where Clair Obscur costs $50 I don't how see how BL could be $30 better than one of the best games released this year.

nuko147,
@nuko147@lemm.ee avatar

I always trying my games before i buy them.

overload,

IMO If they made a game exactly like BL1/2 with better graphics and updated gameplay, it still wouldn’t be worth $80.

BL just isn’t all that great, but fortunately the price of their games falls to what they’re worth pretty quickly.

Moose,
@Moose@moose.best avatar

If Ubisoft can convince themselves that Skull and Bones was the first “quadruple A game” and worth $70, then I doubt most studio execs can pull their heads out their ass for long enough to properly ask themselves that. Studios have completely lost touch with what people actually want and are willing to pay.

SaharaMaleikuhm,

I just think it’s funny. Big game corpos failing is just hilarious. I’m glad Larian is doing well tho.

But_my_mom_says_im_cool, do games w "You can't just have Geralt for every single game" says his voice actor, and if you think The Witcher 4 making Ciri the protagonist is "woke," then "read the damn books"

How in the heck would Ciri not be the main character after the events of Witcher 3? Did anyone actually think she wouldn’t be?

kinther,
@kinther@lemmy.world avatar

She is the main character toward the end. The story was great and I need to replay it

goodeye8,

She's not just the main character towards the end, she is the main character of the story. We play Geralt, who is a side character in Ciri's story.

kinther,
@kinther@lemmy.world avatar

I never really thought about it like that. Is that how the book series goes? I probably should read those as well

thedirtyknapkin,

kind of, it’s more like it starts a geralt’s story, but becomes ciri’s story. the first two books are all geralt. after that it’s about geralt and ciri’s relationship. then by the last book we barely even see geralt.

then after the series was finished he started writing more little stories from earlier in geralt’s life.

as i said in another comment. it’s downright bizarre that ciri doesn’t get mentioned until the third game. she almost makes more sense as the protag anyway.

wrekone,

Came here to say this. Anyone that’s played Witcher 3 should have already known that Ciri was going to be the protagonist in the next game. I can’t wait. Ciri is badass.

Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In,

Someone who can tame unicorns and jump through time and space is much more interesting than a berserker monster slayer.

Blackmist,

Well, unless you fucked up the choices near the end. Really not fond of CDPR’s habit of that.

wolframhydroxide,

Yeah, there were a couple of tiny decisions, any of which failed you out if you got them wrong, and several of them had deceptive descriptions during the QTE.

thedirtyknapkin, (edited )

anyone who has read the books was likely surprised that ciri wasn’t the main character of any of the games when they first started coming out :::especially since geralt dies at the end of the books :::

ciri was more the mc than geralt for most of the books. she’s the child of destiny. she’s the young character that grows up as we follow their journey. she’s the one that finds herself and shows major character development throughout the books. the only character development geralt goes through is accepting his bond with ciri.

the first two games never mentioning ciri was outright bizarre tbh. only even remotely possibly because geralt lost his memory. like, with where geralt as at by the end of the books the only thing you could possibly expect him to do on regaining his memory is frantically search for signs of his adopted daughter

to a longtime book reader my reaction to ciri being the protag of the next game was “FINALLY”

my only curiosity at this point is how much she’ll be like book ciri. does she know magic? in the books ciri goes to sorceress school and then gets trained in primal magic by unicorns and immortal space elves. can you fuck a horse? that was one of the more… questionable scenes in the book.

tangent: sapkowski’s politics occasionally bleed through in weird ways in the books. like three’s a scene where a woman finds out she’s pregnant mid way through a literal war that our band wades through on their journey to save the world. the party basically needs the woman to proceed. she does not want the child. i believe it was the product of rape. yet for some reason geralt and a literal fucking vampire convince her that abortion is wrong and she should keep it instead of drinking a potion about it. it was so randomly out of character for everyone involved. but hey, that’s catholics for you i guess… /tangent

i think they generally said that ciri lost her elder blood powers after the king of the hunt was killed right? otherwise I’m gonna be really curious how handle that as well. she should be sort of the world’s greatest sorceress otherwise. ooh, i wonder if she’ll make quips about cyberpunk and/or other worlds she’s traveled to. like, she spent Decent bit of time in Arthurian legend. she shows up briefly in Victorian London.

also, what will the world at large look like? they can’t do it like the last time where your previous save could alter the new game based on your decisions. you were simply able to do too much. they’d need to make like 3 entirely separate stories at the very least. like, who rules the north? are you the empress of nilfguard? is the church burning all the nonhumans at record pace? you can basically decide the entire fate of the northern realms and all of its people in multiple ways… unless it just takes place elsewhere. maybe we’ll be in zerrikania this time or some shit. there are many distant lands that the games never take us. it would be much more doable that way. then you’d just have to change dialogue and maybe swap out a few characters.

aaaanyway… yeah, anyone mad about her being the mc is a dumbass that doesn’t know shit about the story.

wolframhydroxide,

I was under the impression that it wasn’t Victorian London, but The Plague Year. IIRC she, canonically, brings a blanket infested with plague lice from here to there, and ends up dropping it next to the ship Catriona, which is how the Catriona plague actually gets started. It was one of those “oh shit, yes, that explains everything” moments for me when I first read the books.

thedirtyknapkin,

oh yeah, it’s been a while. details at foggy.

Trainguyrom,

She does also extremely briefly travel to Edwardian or Victorian London (I forget exactly what year it was). It’s mostly depicted through a newspaper clipping from The Sun and a rebuttle from another newspaper calling out their quoted witness for trespassing and strongly implying he was inebriated at the time and being an unreliable source. It’s quite comically written really

cactusupyourbutt,

hold up… ciri fucked a horse?

thedirtyknapkin, (edited )

no, but she kind of wanted to… but it’s also way more fucked than that. please don’t make me type it out here. I’ll just say it involves violent rape while she’s still under age. it could be construed as a trauma response, but it’s debatable… I’m not convinced that sapkowski would have known what a trauma response was when he wrote that scene in the… 90s?

can’t actuality remember which book that happened in.

Trainguyrom,

By thedirtyknapkin@lemmy.world’s description I know what scene they’re talking about. It’s not great but it’s not as bad as they make out. Basically she ends up traveling for a bit with this really smarmy dude. Think incel used car salesman. He’s described as having greasy hair, he’s clearly not trustworthy and acts only in his own best interest, and is constantly trying to get into Ciri’s pants. But, he’s riding this incredible horse the likes of which Ciri has never seen before (and it turns out to in fact be a magical horse) and Ciri is just entranced by this incredible and majestic horse, and smarmy dude can tell, so he makes sure to use the horse to get Ciri to interact with him even though they both know she wants nothing to do with him and only gives him the light of day to see his horse.

Anyways smarmy dude and Ciri end up running from some bandits, smarmy dude is injured but plays down how badly, and basically uses this plus gifting her the horse she’s so entranced by to manipulate and guilt her into agreeing to sleep with him (from her perspective it’s been made clear how curious but nervous she is about sex, so she’s not entirely opposed, but it’s also implied up to this point that she’s far more into women than men) and then just as she’s starting to potentially enjoy the pity sex with the asshole but before either of them can actually get their pants off, he fucking dies!

Trainguyrom, (edited )

can you fuck a horse? that was one of the more… questionable scenes in the book.

Uhhh which book is that? If it’s the section I’m thinking of with Kelpie the horse, she’s entranced by its beauty and it’s rider/owner tries to use that to get into her pants (and ultimately died before he was successful) but I don’t believe she ever expressed sexual attraction at all to it by my memory from reading the books a couple of months ago.

the party basically needs the woman to proceed. she does not want the child. i believe it was the product of rape. yet for some reason geralt and a literal fucking vampire convince her that abortion is wrong and she should keep it instead of drinking a potion about it

The party is trying to find Ciri after her disappearance. Geralt and Cahir are having visions indicating that she’s presently in great danger and suffering (and at that she was!). Finding out while practically at the front lines of the great war that their incredible archer, Milva is pregnant completely derails their entire journey because she can’t ride, shouldn’t travel, and will need to rest in a safe area for a while (which they are at this point constantly far from anywhere safe), plus they can’t exactly bring a baby onto the battlefield they’re actively crossing. It’s one moral quandry wrapped in another. Ultimately Geralt and Cahir leave it to Milva’s decision, as does Regis the barber-surgeon/vampire who created the abortion potion.

Also it wasn’t rape. While guiding a group of elves to safety, they hid in a thicket for a night with Nilfgaurdians surrounding them and searching for them. The elves decided that since they were likely to die a horrible death at any moment that they should take the time they have to find what enjoyment they can, and Milva decided to join in. It just so happened they did not die that night and now Milva is carring a halfling for whom she does not know the fathers name (for safety no names were shared with the elves she guided)

i think they generally said that ciri lost her elder blood powers after the king of the hunt was killed right? otherwise I’m gonna be really curious how handle that as well. she should be sort of the world’s greatest sorceress otherwise.

She gave up her magic after trying to use fire as a source of power out of desperation while navigating out of the “Frying Pan” desert. She wanted to save Little Horse the unicorn after an unfortunate battle with a monster she hadn’t yet learned of, but no other sources were available. My understanding is fire as a magical source is all consuming so it is forbidden to pull from for safety reasons, but that was largely left up to interpretation.

Upon pulling from fire, she saw the imense power that presented her, the ability to rule the entire world, but also how that would hurt those she cared so deeply about, so she instead gave up her sourceress’ powers.

If you want anything to complain about in the books it should be Milva’s winging about being an illiterate farm girl that honestly was out of character and just seemed written in so she wouldn’t outshine the others

Edit: Cahir’s attraction to Ciri is also creepy as hell the way it’s written, but that might be intentional, since that’s at a point where she’s coming to realize that everyone wants something from her, everyone will tell her why she should want to give them what they want from her but nobody ever seems to care or ask what she actually wants.

Coelacanth,
@Coelacanth@feddit.nu avatar

I mean, I prayed to the nether gods that we’d get a Letho game. He’s the perfect protagonist if they wanted to move away from the books and more firmly into their own OC. Always had huge main character energy, and would be perfectly suited for exploring the morally grey areas of the Witcher world.

imecth,

If anything, Ciri's the character whose story is wrapped up by the end of Witcher 3, she saved the world and fulfilled her destiny. Unlike Geralt or the sorceresses, she does get old too.

It's definitely understandable that a lot of players would feel betrayed at having Ciri becoming the MC after 3 games of Geralt. People would riot if you made someone else than Lara Croft the MC of tomb raider. A better solution would probably be a character creator for a new generation of witchers. Ciri is too powerful to be the MC.

But_my_mom_says_im_cool,

Isn’t the good ending geralt giving her a Witcher blade and calling her an official witcher? That to me sets up part 4. End of the day im glad geralt gets a rest. Besides they’re remaking 1 and 2 so the geralt fix will come

imecth, (edited )

There's plenty of different endings, but yeah that's probably the one they'll make canon.

The thing is Geralt is The Witcher, making Ciri the protagonist is a bastardization of the saga. Imagine that J.K rowling came up with a new book, titled it Harry Potter 8, and made the protagonist Hermione. To me this shows a real lack of understanding of their audience, people play The Witcher for the fantasy of being Geralt, of being a monster killer, of hooking up with every sorceress. But obviously IP sells, and they aren't gonna change the title of the saga to something like "child of the elder blood".

I wish them the best of luck, maybe they'll pull off a fallout 3 and reinvent themselves. But I personally will be passing on this spinoff.

Banzai51, do gaming w Starfield design lead says players are "disconnected" from how games are actually made: "Don't fool yourself into thinking you know why it is the way it is"
@Banzai51@midwest.social avatar

I may not know how the sausage is made, but I do know if it tastes good or not.

sukhmel,

No-o-o, you must offer a solution to be eligible for criticism111

!Man, this is such a lame argument 😅 can’t believe people use it!<

dillekant,

100% this. The whole process of creation and critique goes way back to the dawn of film and probably before. The entire construction of positions and job titles (creative director, design lead, etc) all draw from these theories. This requires the critique to be separate from the process of creation.

SnotFlickerman, do games w Deep Rock Galactic roguelike dev says innovation for innovation's sake is too expensive to survive: "We're a studio of 50 people with bills to pay"

If space dwarves drinking, burping, and dancing isn’t innovation then who needs innovation?

For Karl!

middlemanSI,

Damn, there’s a pebble in my boot.

Gradually_Adjusting, do games w Ken Levine says BioShock nearly went nowhere and was almost canceled: "We can't make those games because they don't sell"
@Gradually_Adjusting@lemmy.world avatar

We overpay executives, who overpay consultants, who tell companies to churn out cash grabs that test well.

This doesn’t pain me. I have enough indie games to occupy my time.

ms_lane,

The cancellation of Deus Ex Mankind Divided Part 2, pained me quite a lot.

But I’m sure the executives that got a fat bonus were happier than I was upset. (insert meme happiness comic)

grrgyle,

I contend that the next great Deus Ex game will not come out of Ubi, and it won’t be under the name Deus Ex, but it will be a new kind of immersive sim made with love by developers who grew up on the originals.

I contend this for a lot of the classic franchises tbh

BroBot9000,
@BroBot9000@lemmy.world avatar

This is what should happen. You like the game, make one that’s inspired by it, grow the concept and give it new life.

No. We get franchises and wallowing in profits of milked IPs

grrgyle,

Worse, you’ve even got some copyrighting gameplay concepts, Shadow of Mordor with their “nemesis system.”

Imagine if the concept of the “first person shooter” was locked down by Atari after their employees made Battlezone.

yamanii,
@yamanii@lemmy.world avatar

Just like how Thief lives on as Gloomwood.

slazer2au,

Whoh there mate, you are forgetting shareholders. They are the ones you truly need to please as they are the ones that can actually fire a board.

mrfriki, do games w Doom: The Dark Ages is introducing big changes to combat because id Software came to one core realization: "Every projectile mattered in the original Doom"

What I didn’t like about Eternal was being forced to use specific weapons to kill certain enemies. For me this kind of shooters are all about use “the right tool for the job”. If I fancy using the two barrels shotgun from start to finish, just let me do so.

Katana314,

I guarantee you that would be boring as fuck.

Might as well play with cheats on if you just don’t want to think at all. Thankfully, Doom Eternal has them in the game, you just need to unlock them.

Zahille7,

Nah. Go try out Enchain, you only have one gun for the game but it works pretty damn well.

fsxylo,

Nah, the only times I want to play doom are when I want to turn my brain off. Shoot moving thing. Great success.

Renacles,

It’s a good thing Doom 2016 exists then.

fsxylo,

When you want to win an internet argument so badly that you miss the point on purpose.

verdigris, (edited )

For me Doom 2016 was a hugely more enjoyable experience than Eternal. 2016 is arguably one of the greatest linear single player shooters ever made. Eternal felt like a chore once you had all the tools unlocked and I lost interest shortly after. I could have lowered the difficulty so weapon selection didn’t matter, but that was clearly not the design intent.

Ultrakill does the “swap between weapons quickly for interesting combos” much better IMO – it’s not necessary but it’s a value add and it’s super fun to pull off.

leave_it_blank,

I lowered the difficulty, and I were able to kill bigger enemies with the weapon of my choice. But they became bullet sponges. There’s no fun in that. I too prefer 2016, I like my shotgun.

morphballganon,

Sounds more like an “easy mode” thing. Have certain enemies immune to certain guns on the harder difficulties. Want to just use the shotgun? Play easy mode. Want to be more strategic? Play a harder difficulty.

LunarLoony,
@LunarLoony@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

Doom II wasn’t boring.

grrgyle,

The Super Shotgun game

gaylord_fartmaster,

If you could play through all of Doom II using only the super shotgun without constantly running out of ammo you were playing on easy.

LunarLoony,
@LunarLoony@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

Okay, so while you can’t literally use nothing but the SSG for the entirety of Doom II (especially since you don’t get it until MAP02), you can comfortably use it at least 90% of the time on UV. Shells are plentiful throughout the game.

rob_t_firefly,
@rob_t_firefly@lemmy.world avatar

<span style="color:#323232;">  Doesn't suck - GM
</span>
otp,

Some guns are better for different situations, but most guns are useful in any situation.

Why’s that boring? It sounds better than rock-paper-scissors with different guns

PresidentCamacho,
@PresidentCamacho@lemm.ee avatar

That isn’t the point. The point is you shouldn’t feel shoehorned into playing a specific intended route. Doom is about turning off your brain and slaying.

BrotherL0v3,

I’m glad I’m not the only one with that criticism. I enjoyed the first game so much more because of that.

Stern, do games w Ubisoft says you "cannot complain" it shut down The Crew because you never actually owned it, and you weren't "deceived" by the lack of an offline version
@Stern@lemmy.world avatar

If you never actually own a Ubisoft game that logically pirating them isn’t theft right? Right?

Sauciness6413,

Yes sir 100% correct.

supersquirrel,

You are joking, but I am 100% serious, I don’t see the contradiction in this.

clay_pidgin,

It’s a license to play the game, so when you pirate it is like sneaking into the movie theater. There’s no additional cost to the producer, but theoretically a loss of revenue from the license (movie ticket) you didn’t buy.

All that ignores the fact that they sure do pretend they are SELLING the game when it’s convenient.

Cataphract,

I think a better comparison would be a “Drive-In Theater”, because with pirating you’re just seeing the film, not using their seats/venue (servers) so it’s like you’re sitting in the neighbors yard watching it from their porch. Still costing them what would be considered a “viewing purchase” for the data but you’re really not putting a strain on the theater itself by “attending or sneaking in”.

clay_pidgin,

I mean you’re still using the Drive-In’s gravel and taking up space, but I see what you mean.

TheOakTree,

…you’re using the drive-in’s gravel and space from the neighbor’s yard?

clay_pidgin,

Ah I missed that. Thanks.

TwoSteps,
@TwoSteps@programming.dev avatar

I agree with this point, and it’s also why I think the class action suit makes sense. Some of the people who bought The Crew got a physical copy, which is now just a useless disc. It’s still just a license like you said, and I agree that it feels like they’re selling the game.

It’s like if the movie theater sold a DVD for a movie, but the disc will only work while you’re in the theatre. Pirating might still be a crime legally but I don’t think anyone should feel bad about doing it here, Ubisoft absolutely does not deserve your money over slimy business practices like this.

clay_pidgin,

Agree top to bottom.

aeternum,

the fact is, that most people who pirate, wouldn’t pay for it if they couldn’t pirate. It’s not a loss of revenue in most cases. I sure as shit wouldn’t pay for media if i couldn’t pirate. I’m poor as fuck.

A_Random_Idiot,

No one should own an Ubisoft game. Its a company thats at the top of the list with Nintendo as far as the level of hatred and vitriol they have for their own paying customers goes.

joel_feila,
@joel_feila@lemmy.world avatar

Logic checks out

Rakonat,

Problem is Ubisoft games are so shit now days it’s not even worth the effort to pirate them.

Arcane2077,

You’re correct, and this goes for ALL steam games

SaharaMaleikuhm,

Half Life 2 works offline just fine. You can even run the exe directly without Steam open. You just cannot compare the two. But yes, if Steam get shut down you obviously cannot download them again. Same goes for games on GOG. You could archive them, but you can also archive games from Steam, it’s all the same.

Arcane2077, (edited )

I wasn’t saying you can’t play them, just that you don’t own them. This is still true with DRM free games. GOG’s agreement is different to Steam’s in that you own your purchase

You don’t think you own every house with an unlocked front door, do you?

Korhaka,

You don’t really own a house at all. Gotta pay eternal rent to the government to keep it

Arcane2077,

Damn.

Damn

lolcatnip,

Or, ownership itself is a service. Rights mean nothing if nobody enforces them, and that includes property rights.

squidspinachfootball,

It’s a nice sentiment but seriously - the whole “if buying isn’t owning then pirating isn’t stealing” thing is both overused and has always annoyed me. How are the two related? You can still be stealing regardless of if you have an option to buy or not. You could still steal an item that isn’t for sale.

What we really should be focusing on is whether pirating in and of itself is stealing, and whether it should be a crime. This overused phrase is distracting from the issue at hand, imo.

p03locke,
@p03locke@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

How are the two related?

A user obtains the game through legitimate means by “buying” the game. However, they do not own the game, and are in fact, just renting something. This is despite decades and decades of game buying, especially pre-Internet, equating to owning the game and being able to play the game forever, even 100 years from now.

By pirating the game, a user has clawed back the implied social construct that existed for decades past: Acquiring a game through piracy means that you own the game. You have it in a static form that cannot be taken away from you. There’s still the case of server shutdowns, like this legal case is arguing. But, unlike the “buyer”, the game cannot suddenly disappear from a game’s store or be forcefully uninstalled from your PC. You own it. You have the files. They cannot take that away from you.

The phrase essentially means: You have removed my means of owning software, therefore piracy is the only choice I have to own this game. It’s not stealing because it’s the only way to hold on to it forever. You know, because that’s what fucking “buying” was supposed to mean.

lolcatnip,

I think Ubisoft is clearly in the wrong, but you’re not making a good case. You’re conflating very different meanings of the word “own”.

In terms of legal ownership, only the copyright holder owns the intellectual property, including the right to distribute and license it. When a consumer “buys” a piece of media, they’re really just buying a perpetual license for their personal use of it. With physical media, the license is typically tied to whatever physical object (disc, book, ROM, etc.) is used to deliver the content, and you can transfer your license by transferring the physical media, but the license is still the important part that separates legal use from piracy.

When you pirate something, you own the means to access it without the legal right to do so. So, in the case at hand, players still “own” the game in the same sense they would if they had pirated it. Ubisoft hasn’t revoked anyone’s physical access to the bits that comprise the game; what they’ve done is made that kind of access useless because the game relies on a service that Ubisoft used to operate.

The real issue here is that Ubisoft didn’t make it clear what they were selling, and they may even have deliberately misrepresented it. Consumers were either not aware that playing the game required Ubisoft to operate servers for it, or they were misled regarding how long Ubisoft would operate the servers.

Ultimately I think what consumers are looking for is less like ownership and more like a warranty, i.e. a promise that what they buy will continue to work for some period of time after they’ve bought it, and an obligation from the manufacturer to provide whatever services are necessary to keep that promise. Game publishers generally don’t offer any kind of warranty, and consumers don’t demand warranties, but consumers also tend to expect punishers to act as if their products come with a warranty. Publishers, of course, don’t want to draw attention to their lack of warranty, and will sometimes actively exploit that false perception that their products come with a perpetual warranty.

I think what’s really needed is a very clear indication, at the point of purchase, of whether a game requires ongoing support from the publisher to be playable, along with a legally binding statement of how long they’ll provide support. And there should be a default warranty if none is clearly specified, like say 10 years from the point of purchase.

p03locke,
@p03locke@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

I’m not trying to frame this in the context of the lawsuit, even though that’s the point of the original article. The Crew’s nonfunctionality is just a consequence of our lack of ownership.

Perhaps this article would explain things better than I could.

Ultimately I think what consumers are looking for is less like ownership and more like a warranty

No. That’s not true. Otherwise people wouldn’t be reciting this phrase over and over again.

Consumers want to fucking own shit again! Renting everything is the entire fucking problem.

lolcatnip,

My point is they never have and never will.

ampersandrew, do games w Valve "followed" 1.7 million Steam users for over a year, and now reports those gamers spent $20 million on microtransactions and another $73 million on games and DLC
@ampersandrew@lemmy.world avatar

Valve says the data proves “Steam isn’t just a storefront—it provides social community, game discoverability, interactive events, and a deep set of game-enhancing features to attract and retain players who will be checking out new games in the future.”

I think it proves that Steam is the largest storefront on PC and that PC is growing and replacing other platforms.

Kolanaki,
@Kolanaki@pawb.social avatar

I haven’t seen an interactive event on Steam for, like, a decade. Unless they’re counting sales as interactive events. 🤔

They used to have, like, gamified events where you’re earning things (like maybe trading cards or badges or other Steam profile items) by playing a small little browser game inside the store page. Those were always fun.

ampersandrew,
@ampersandrew@lemmy.world avatar

The Next Fests might count. They kind of fill the role that something like PAX does, encouraging you to try out demos.

Contemporarium,

Yeah I’d say that counts. It definitely feels like a community event to me and doesn’t cost money to participate

Dudewitbow,

one example of a steam onteractive event was when valve was actively giving viewers who were watching the game awards through steam a raffle to get a free one.

warm,

No, that's just a raffle. They had mini games during the sales.

warm,

They kinda died along side the flash deals. I miss the crazy sales, but I understand why they removed them.

warm,

PC is the fastest growing market. Consoles are slumping and I think the return of Steam Machines done right would accelerate the market shift.

octobob,

They’d be a shoe-in now that Valve developed Proton so well

AbsolutelyNotAVelociraptor, do games w Battlefield 6's beta has only been running for a day, but it's already suffering from a FPS curse with cheaters breaking out the wallhacks

But… but… the secureboot requirement and the anticheat were supposed to make the game free of cheaters!!i

KiwiTB,

It can help prevent various methods commonly used, but nothing can stop cheating. All you can do is minimise it.

apprehensively_human,

Counterpoint: you could not have TPM and secure boot requirements that needlessly alienates a large player base of Linux users.

KiwiTB,

That’s true. My machine doesn’t have a TPM. I understand they are trying to make things easier for their team, but I agree I’d rather have wider support.

Ugurcan, (edited )

Counter-counterpoint: Linux users are no users if a game is brimming with cheaters. Who the fuck plays a competitive multiplayer game full of cheaters only because it runs on Linux?

ampersandrew,
@ampersandrew@lemmy.world avatar

Every game has cheaters. If we could run our own servers, we could decide who we play with.

Ugurcan,

So you’re not asking for Linux support, but custom dedicated server support?

ampersandrew,
@ampersandrew@lemmy.world avatar

If we had private dedicated servers and the ability to play without anti-cheat, Linux support would be a non-issue. But because we don’t have that, anti-cheat is seen as a necessity, and we don’t have Linux support.

wizzim,

I don’t understand this point.

Linux does support TPM and secure boot: wiki.debian.org/SecureBoot#What_is_UEFI_Secure_Bo…

I thought the problem for Linux players was “just” the kernel anticheat ?

Tar_alcaran,

Let people run their own servers, allow blacklists and whitelists.

Problem solved.

ms_lane,

But won’t you think of the profits!

KiwiTB,

That’s not going to solve cheating either, but I do prefer dedicated servers in general.

echodot,

It will result in cheaters getting instantly identified and banned so then it’ll be less fun for them, and they’re less likely to do it.

KiwiTB,

I wish it was that simple but it’s not.

echodot,

There’s lots they could do to minimise cheaters that they’re not doing. The main one being not sending the cheaters information in the first place.

The wall hack cheat works because for some bizarre reason the server sends players information about the position of other players they can’t possibly see, players on the other side of the map for example, there’s no reason for the client to have that information. The cheaters cannot access information that isn’t given to them.

KiwiTB,

I agree that only sending absolute needed data is a great policy for stopping all sorts of cheating. I could see them skipping this step if they don’t have a way of doing it fast enough that won’t cause other issues like player pop in. That’s what it’s have to assume.

nostalgicgamerz,

Hopefully this beta is the feedback they need to plug these holes and block that kind of data for the full release

KombatWombat,

Yeah it’s not supported for my system so I can’t even launch it. But I was watching some friends stream it and it crashed for three out of four of them within two games. I don’t think any of us will be getting it after release.

Kir, do gaming w Starfield design lead says players are "disconnected" from how games are actually made: "Don't fool yourself into thinking you know why it is the way it is"
@Kir@feddit.it avatar

While this is true, it is a terrible way of debating with the public.

And while users may not be able to understand game design decision and background, they can well be aware that those decisions brought to a really bad game.

andrewrgross,

Not only that, but their blindness is the result of developers choices on what they share. If you don’t want people making incorrect assumptions, give them more info. Don’t tell them to just forego having any opinion on the matter.

If it looks like a decision was made cynically, prove otherwise, don’t just say ‘No, you’re wrong, you just don’t know!’

MudMan,
@MudMan@kbin.social avatar

I don't love how this is phrased, but it's not wrong.

The harsh reality of creative industries is that people are gonna be uninformed, dickish smartasses on social media (and... you know, traditional media, too), but they don't owe the creators anything, so if they don't like a thing they don't need to be right about why they like it.

But hey, I also don't resent any creator for venting reasonably on social media about this stuff every now and then. I think it's a dumb, potentially career-ending thing to do, but I get it.

BruceTwarzen,

You don't have to be a chef to realise that a shit sandwich tases bad.

Poggervania,
@Poggervania@kbin.social avatar

But gamers don’t actually need to understand game design or why a certain choice was made.

I said this in another thread: if it’s a shit design, it’s a shit design. Knowing why the shit design was made does not suddenly make it not shit. In fact, I do not care to know why you made that decision in the first place - if it’s bad, then just own up to it and either try to fix the issue or actually resolve to do better next time.

teuast,

To borrow a phrase from Steve Hofstetter, I’ve never flown a helicopter, but if I saw one in a tree, I could still be like “dude fucked up.”

simple, do games w Hideo Kojima seems to be testing Death Stranding 2, but it's not going well: "I fell asleep twice while on a delivery and ran the vehicle into a cliff"

This has to be the dumbest clickbait I’ve seen in a while.

It’s literally based off a tweet where Kojima said he fell asleep twice trying to test because he hasn’t slept well. This says nothing about the game itself or “testing not going well”.

L0rdMathias,

And these people demand that we take their job seriously while at the same time writing what is essentially just bad fanfiction about popular game developers/studios.

gcheliotis,

Ah and for a moment there I thought it would have been so cool if a developer were to publicly admit they fell asleep during gameplay…

newthrowaway20,

At the same time, this could be your typical Kojima fuckery where he makes it seem like he’s talking about himself, but he’s actually talking about an exhaustion mechanic from Death Stranding.

ms_lane,

He’s ok.

RightHandOfIkaros, do games w $843 million lawsuit against Valve already has its own website: "The Steam Claim" accuses the biggest store in PC gaming of "overcharging" players

This lawsuit build on a false premise. Steam doesnt have a price parity clause for other stores. What this lawsuit alleges applies to Steam keys that the developer generates through Steam. If the developer lists those keys for sale at a price lower than what the game is listed for on Steam, then the price of the Steam Store purchase price must match it, so that people visiting the store page on Steam get the same discount. It doesn’t matter if you list your game on GOG and discount it there.

Its literally helping players.

haui_lemmy,

Just for clarity: how would it do a disservice to players if a dev can sell their steam keys for any price, no matter which platform?

RandomException,

Steam is a service that costs money to keep running - lot’s of money actually in their scale. When you sell a Steam key outside of Steam, they don’t get their cut which goes toward running costs and whatnot. It doesn’t of course matter if it’s just some random few keys but if almost all devs started to do that, it could cause some serious funding problems to Valve. That could then lead to reduced service levels of Steam and that would hurt their customers - the players - the most.

So while it’s not a big problem currently, it could be if it wasn’t prevented properly in contractual level. People who think that is an unfair clause don’t probably understand what it actually takes to run a service like Steam or they are straight competitors trying to run them out of business in any way imaginable.

E: And actually if Steam still allows selling the Steam keys in external services but only requires the price to match the price in Steam, it’s already a quite charitable policy. I guess they count on not too many people buying the key externally for the same price than in Steam store.

OrgunDonor,
@OrgunDonor@lemmy.world avatar

Just think about how this works.

Steam currently allows you to generate keys and sell them for free, only stipulating that they must be sold for the same price as on steam.

Let’s say they are told that stipulation can’t be enforced.

Valve, will probably go with 1 of 2 options.

1 - you can no longer generate keys. So all the great key sites(GMG, Fanatical and so on) no longer exist, because no steam keys.

2 - Valve charge an upfront fee for keys generated. Now smaller pmdevs and publishers can no longer supply keys to sites, because they can’t afford the upfront costs.

What incentive does valve have to continue offering this free service? If it can be exploited for the detriment of steam, they will stop providing it.

haui_lemmy,

Let me try and understand this by altering the product.

Valve now produces cars and the devs are people who make these cars inside factories. Same as is currently the case, these employees get cars cheaper and are asked to not undercut the seller by holding onto the cars for a certain amount of time before selling them used.

It does make sense for me to view it that way. One could argue that the couple cars that get sold by employees doesnt do anything to hurt the brand and that pressuring them to keep the price high manipulates the market.

Also, doesnt the work of steam accumulate to hosting mirrors of a game and hosting a large website they get billions in revenue for?

OrgunDonor,
@OrgunDonor@lemmy.world avatar

This analogy is so bad, it is not even close to what is happening.

I will try and adapt to cars for you(I dont know why), but this is just really really bad.

Say you have designed a car, you can produce them on a very small scale, but you have come to valve(they make cars now) to mass produce. They do so, for a 30% cut(that reduces the more they sell) for everything they sell from their direct sales at the price you have set. There is no material costs or labour costs, just that cut of the price you have set.

Now valve have a sales page and are selling, and you decide that actually I would like more people to see the car, and so you consider selling it at other dealers. Valve says, sure, you can even have the cars for free from us(no 30% cut) and you can have basically an unlimited supply of free fully built cars to sell else where. We only ask that you sell the car at the same price you have set with us if you are selling a car we made.

You want to go sell it new cheaper? You are more than welcome too, but you cant sell the car we produced.

Such a bad analogy, but that is closer to what is actually happening.

haui_lemmy,

First of all, people sometimes use analogies that dont make sense to you. No need to be a dick about it. You could just make a better example.

Staying with cars, I see my mistake. Valve is not producing the cars in this example, valve is doing the car sales for the (small) manufacturer. They dont provide any part of the car, only the exposure and surrounding community. Its not nothing but has zero to do with the product.

What they are asking is „you can sell cars from our showroom, just dont sell them for cheaper than we do“. Which does make sense.

stardust, (edited )

Seems like that’d be hard to track with so many stores selling steam keys just looking at isthereanydeals.

Weird thing is it is the publishers themselves that are able to set the price so they are choosing not to put the game on sale same as it is elsewhere. Probably to not devalue the price of their game like the Nintendo strategy when it comes to certain storefronts.

furikuri,

Probably operates closer to corporate software licensing deals, i.e. “we might not catch you but if we do it’s over”

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