Because I want people to be interested, but that requires knowing what a thing is.
From FAQ:
Is Luanti a clone of Minecraft? # No. Luanti has very different goals from Minecraft, and doesn’t aim to compete with or replace Minecraft. Luanti is an engine and a platform for many different voxel games, rather than one cohesive gaming experience.
When Luanti was initially created in 2010 it intended to replicate what Minecraft Alpha had been shown to do at the time, but it has later diverged into becoming more akin to a game engine.
So… Roblox, but with Minecraft’s graphical style and general mechanics, an open source project, and not a greedy corporation? Cool. I think I’m bookmarking this.
Oh man. When I was in the Navy, I had the game boy advance. Advance wars had this sick turn based mode, where you could get your moves in, and then stick it in your pocket and wait to hand it off. We’d have four players playing games that might take all day, sometimes days. Just make your moves, stick it in your pocket, and whenever you find your shipmate, pass it along.
We did that at our lunch hour in high school. We had a super strategic friend that took the entire lunch hour. That pass-around mode was peak early 2000’s multiplayer.
How did the battery last that much? AFAIK the GBA didn’t have any sleep mechanics… Or was one pack of batteries able to hold 12-24 hrs running the game non stop?
I’m trying to recall. I know we always had a solid supply of rechargeables underway. I also distinctly remember that there is a kind of blanked out hand off screen between players because of fog if war. I don’t recall it having any kind of sleep function. But I know it could run for several hours no issue. I don’t recall having to mind the batteries in particular.
On top of that, I was always really impressed by the GBA’s battery life but maybe I’m just old.
Same, I just don’t remember ever bothering about the battery life (unless it turned red) but with that long gaming sessions it would be a concern for kid me probably.
While there’s nothing wrong with a game being declared complete and stopping updates, the way this went down doesn’t sit right. Evil Empire (the studio that split off from Motion Twin specifically to maintain Dead Cells) had longer-term plans and the resources to make them happen, but Motion Twin then ordered Evil Empire to stop development because they thought an actively developed Dead Cells would be a competitor to Windblown that they could preemptively kill off.
I get what you mean, but Dead Cells was already a completed roguelike on launch. The DLC’s add variety and additional story, but you can still get the full gameplay experience with just the base game.
It’s like saying you won’t support the Elden Ring because it has DLC.
Also, the Castlevania DLC is just fucking cool. The soundtrack for those levels alone are just -chef’s kiss-, and probably the closest we’ll get to a new 2D Castlevania 🥲
Yeah, it does, but what are you missing exactly? Can you not get to the final boss without the DLC? No, you can get to the boss no problem, and in fact going to DLC biomes sometimes means you can’t get to the final biome/boss. Is your playtime reduced to less chambers/run? Nope, the number of chambers and biome-bosses remain the same. Is the gameplay altered? Nope, all runes and weapons that you need to finish the game is there in the base game and unlockable.
I know, because I played the base game only until the Dead Cells Castlevania PS5 collection came out.
You’re being disingenuous in making it seem like they purposefully cut content and then added it back for $$$, when Evil Empire has been adding a lot of free updates to the base game since 2019.
I would doubt you'd hit a progression dead end in that game. you'd have to be god cracked at it and enjoy it enough to play that much and milk what's already there, and at that point you'd probably want to buy the DLC to extend the variety and experience, because it's that good to begin with.
I started playing this game before there was DLC. You know what? It was fucking fun.
Doors don't control my enjoyment. I played it at times without DLC installed. I can handle some inaccessible doors being around without letting it control my enjoyment.
Definitely not trying to do that. To speak on the idea of visible, inaccessible DLC in a game, it is bad, full stop. I think it's certainly cynical of the developers to put the doors there and not completely remove them unless you have the DLC installed.
Seeing those seams is something you can't help but notice, and it absolutely does impact your perception of the game to have them there. What I am saying is that Dead Cells is so thoroughly well made and considered that I was able to tell myself "these doors are locked until I beat the game on a certain boss cell and feel justified to pay for an 'expansion' and access new content".
I can live with that specifically because the doors are not necessary, you just can't enter them and take a different path, similar to other locked zone doors that are instead locked because of boss cell requirements. The maps are also consistently laid out in terms of direction to get to a certain zone entrance, so once I know it's there I can avoid that path in the future until I decide to stop playing or buy more content.
If Dead Cells were a lesser game I would be much less forgiving about it, and to be clear, again, the fact that you can see DLC doors for DLC you don't have is bad design, full stop. It's just that the game is so good overall, I think it'd be sad for someone to pass it up for that reason, or to think that they're not getting enough because of it. It's a shame, but the game's still awesome.
I don't think you're wrong to feel the way you do, but try not to sleep on the game because of it. Even without the paid DLC the base game and free updates have a lot of mileage.
You’re wrong, some of those doors were always there, the giant was there from the start, the big door he smashes was there since before the DLC released. You just didn’t knew that was a DLC because it hadn’t come out yet.
Dead cells is still a complete game, the DLCs just give you more of the same thing, you can still get hundreds of hours from the base game alone. By your standards no DLC could ever be made.
Very nice. This money will enable them to make it better. One day when I might start learning how to make games I hope that Godot will be one of the best choices out there.
I love what I’m seeing but I’m too blind to use a handheld. I’ve been gaming for 44 years and I’ll probably never get to experience it, at least not well. Still glad to see it though!
Unity’s recent fuck up is a massive boon for them, I really hope they can capitalize on it. This is one of those moments that only happens once, if they push their development and marketing over the next 12 to 18 months they can snag a really significant share of the market and use it to vault themselves to the next go-to engine.
Honestly wild they would close Tango, of all developers, after they delivered maybe Xbox’s only coveted exclusive (though it has since gone multi-platform). Redfall and Starfield were both duds, and I’m not sure if Xbox has had any other exclusives at all (coveted or otherwise).
Having said that, it’s pretty bad that Xbox is closing these studios regardless of if they have put out a hit recently or not. As Arkane Lyon chief Dinga Bakaba points out:
You say we make you proud when we make a good game. Make us proud when times are tough. We know you can, we seen it before.
Microsoft certainly has the money that they don’t need to be making these cuts. This is clearly the result of Line-Go-Up syndrome, and will only hurt them in the long run.
PlayStation is already eating Xbox’s lunch since Xbox has no console selling exclusives. How are they going to make any good exclusives after cutting so much of their staff? (Also as a side note, I find it wild how much Microsoft spent on Bethesda just to cut so many of those studios.)
Overall, a cruel and short-sighted move from Microsoft.
Overall, a cruel and short-sighted move from Microsoft
That depends on who and how many they decide to merge into other developer teams and who is let go.
I mean, I doubt most MS higher-ups would know talent if you threw it at them. But whenever there’s big acquisitions, there’s gonna be some house cleaning. So who gets to stay (if they want to) is likely down to last things they have produced.
Redfalls team is done for sure. But Tango Works I don’t know… I can imagine overseas based companies are a more tricky beast to handle. So that’s probably down to some cost/benefit analysis if they go or stay.
which is wild, because there's clearly a lot of talent there that was just spunked up the wall trying to create a game that any idiot could see right from the outset was conceptually awful
There’s a statement on this ign article that says arkane Austin will have devs go to other studios, but nothing on the tango front. They’re just closing it.
(Also as a side note, I find it wild how much Microsoft spent on Bethesda just to cut so many of those studios.)
It’s easy to understand when you realize that purchase wasn’t about talent, it was about IP.
Now sure, closing these studios and preventing the development of new exclusives is leading to Sony eating their lunch now, but longer/very short term it leads to them developing exclusives with their IP at a cheaper cost. It’s just all about cost cutting to make pretty line go up.
Microsoft has certainly made games based off IP they owned without the original developers. But the only examples of that I can think of is Halo, which I don’t think was highly regarded.
Similarly (though not at Microsoft), when Shu Takumi took a break from the Ace Attorney franchise to do Ghost Trick, the quality of the franchise was widely regarded to have a dip as well (though now he has returned for the Great Ace Attorney Chronicles, the quality is considered to have returned). Ghost Trick was considered to be a very high quality game as well.
While IP is valuable; as an outsider to the industry, the skilled game devs seemed infinitely more bankable. I was certain that Microsoft wanted Bethesda for its quality devs, but clearly I was wrong.
You don’t sack the team responsible for your best regarded game in years, if you’re concerned with making good games.
You’re probably right. Microsoft is probably not worried about the quality. People will still buy their favorite IP, even with a notable quality dip
this is opening up patents, so yes, in a world like ours having something be patented, but royalty free and anyone can use is much better than the alternative. which is either one company owning it and licencing it. or a patent troll getting it and making it even worse.
the sarcasm in this case, is not warranted. this is a good thing.
That’s literally not a thing. Once something is publicly disclosed it can’t be patented (unless it is by the discloser during the one year grace period). You can’t take someone else’s invention and patent it. If someone does you can invalidate their patent without even a lawyer. If you want something you invent to be free for everyone the best thing you can do is get it out into the world and not patent it.
You’re not supposed to. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen.
Nobody wants to spend the court costs to get a patent troll stripped of their bad patent. And for a patent troll you’re going to need a lawyer, they’re going to fight tooth and nail to keep it since that’s their source of income.
Once again, this is not true. They do what is called a prior art search as part of issuing a patent. They look worldwide for anything that could be considered your invention before your filing date before issuing a patent. Even after a patent is issued, if prior art is presented to the patent office they can rescind the patent. It’s a form and like $100. You don’t need a lawyer to bring prior art to the patent office’s attention. The legal battle will be between the patent office and the patent troll if they are trying to contest the prior art.
What? There was no polio vaccine patent. The inventor literally did exactly what I suggested. He made his work freely available so that it could not be patented. Volvo made a business decision to make their patent freely usable and we are still talking about it. Their brand has been permanently associated with safety because of it.
Notice how they tried to patent it “to prevent companies from making unlicensed, low-quality versions of the vaccine. There is no sign that the foundation intended to profit from a patent on the polio vaccine.”
…leaving the idea unclaimed for someone else to patent instead? Strange take.
The patent system is far from perfect, but patents themselves are necessary. EA had an idea, they had the right to patent it. They had the right to keep the patent closed, instead they opted to open it.
Doesn’t “opening up patents” means that anyone can use the ideas behind the patent without charge? Which means that it’s actually not locked anymore, so yes it does help?
Oof. Wasn’t this the one that was going to have in-depth object customization? I was looking forward to it from a dollhouse-building perspective. Even if it wasn’t great, having some competition might convince EA to allocate more dev resources to the Sims, which has ruthlessly embraced the “minimum viable product” philosophy for a long time.
Well HECK! I have been advertising this game to every gamer I know, finally a Sims game that’s not EA… :( I was very hopeful when they delayed without a new date, just take your time and get it right. Dang, I was really looking forward to this
They sell you a product at a fair price without putting it behind a loot box, unless I missed something. I don’t think that makes Paradox “just as bad” because they make a lot of DLC that you could choose to not purchase.
Until the next one is an always online live service that means it has an expiration date built into it by design, and that’s not even conjecture; we already know this.
Cities Skylines 2 launch is worse than any EA launch I can remember. Even that sense of accomplishment horseshite. They released a paid DLC 5 months after launch while not dealing with core functionality bugs.
I’m going to rate “exploits addiction to make billions off of legalized gambling for children” as worse than putting out a sub par, broken sequel with DLC 5 months after release.
In a hilariously circular way, EA has this beat still.
The Simcity 2013 launch was so terrible it killed Simcity and the studio Maxis, basically paving the way for City Skylines to take over the genre 2 years later.
It was online only, to the point where if you disconnected from the Internet you were booted out of the game. It also did most game rendering server side to force multiplayer/anti piracy/EA Origin store, and they only had enough infastructure for 1/10th of their player base on launch. That 10% isn’t exaggeration, either. They underestimated server load by 90%.
It was also a severely buggy, local resource hog somehow, even with being mostly remotely rendered. Since only a tiny fraction of the servers needed for the game were online, the game just chocked itself to death.
It took months to get it to a “working” state, at which point people had discovered all the insane and dumb behavior by ingame actors like citizens just picking a random house to go to end of day/etc. The tiny city limit size caused by being always online was also a very sore point for players, as you could barely build anything in a city building game. You could finish buillding your “city” in just a few hours, at which point you had to buy another “zone” that was separate from your current one. They didmt seamlessly connect like old SimCity or city skylines, you actually entered another tiny city slice to build on. It was terrible, and the size limit was clearly one of the measures to reduce server costs, as each zone looked like it was a new small server instance.
By the time they actually resolved the server issues, the game was dead, ending a 20+ year legacy in gaming for the brand and the studio. EA hasent made a simcity game in 11 years because of its failure. It was a shitshow and a half.
They sell you 15 minor features for $10 each and then every tutorial/gameplay video you watch has 5-10 features you’ve never seen before. It fills you with fomo and when you do cave you end up spending $80 to make a $40 game slightly more interesting. It’s predatory as fuck, paradox can go fuck themselves.
What am I fearing that I’m missing out on when there are 62 DLCs for Cities: Skylines but I only wanted 3 of them? I wanted Green Cities, After Dark, and Mass Transit, but I really couldn’t care less about Airports. Why does this FOMO apply only to DLC and not the entire library of video games out there that you can opt to buy or not? I really don’t understand it. If you buy one Paradox game, do you have to buy every Paradox game or else miss out on having the entire library? I hope that this doesn’t come off as me being hostile. I just genuinely don’t understand it. Latching on to gambling addiction in EA’s Ultimate Team DLC is a concept that I can easily understand how it’s predatory. Making a bunch of other products that you may not want to buy does not strike me as predatory but as casting a wide net to make the right content for the right customer.
Just because you’re able to spend $60 on 3 DLCs instead of whatever the 62 DLCs cost, doesn’t mean those DLC are worth what you’re spending. I can buy a single banana instead of the full bunch if I want but if they cost $10 each I’m not getting a good deal.
The fomo is because I’ve already invested in the base game. I can ignore content about games I haven’t bought yet but if I want to watch tutorial videos that have every DLC I have to filter out all the content I haven’t paid for. I can’t engage with the community on equal footing unless I spent 4-5x the price of the base game on overpriced content. That is not an enjoyable experience and has left me with a bad taste in my mouth when it comes to Paradox games. I don’t want to navigate the cesspool that is their monetization strategy so I simply don’t buy their games (I pirate them :^) ).
Well, first I’d say that those three DLCs cost a maximum of $45 and not $60, if they were MSRP, with current MSRP being a little less than that, but I don’t know if they ever got a price cut. Second, Steam sales happen like clockwork, for DLC as well, and there’s no way I spent $45. Third, the right feature to the right person might be worth that price, and that’s the benefit of their model. Over the course of so many years, they can keep working on the game and add niche features, some of which might be up your alley, rather than putting out a base game that lacks features important to you and never expanding the game.
I’m not sure why the tutorials for features you don’t have are a problem, because then you wouldn’t be doing the things they’re doing anyway, but I’m sorry that ruined the experience for you. It’s really hard for me to call that a cesspool though. They just put out a lot of product where you can decide what’s important to you, and I’d say that’s exactly what it ought to be.
Realistically, at least for Stellaris, Paradox updates the game for free for everyone that breaks everyone’s in-progress games and breaks key features of the game by fundamentally changing how the mechanics work. Then they sell the DLC that is absolutely necessary to fix whatever they broke for people who don’t own the DLC.
Paradox creates the problem and then sells the solution.
Ck3 with the plague mechanics does this. The base game has some default settings that absolutely wrecks everything once plagues get going and only having the DLC can change those settings.
I only played Stellaris off and on, but I went years without buying an expansion and always thought the new systems were complete and better than what they replaced when I returned. Breaking current saves is frustrating, so I guess you would need to delay an update if you had one you planned on returning to.
If you didn’t know, you can roll back to older versions of steam games with some work. A few games have a built-in system, but most of the tile you have to manually replace files after redownloading the old versions.
Yeah. Pdx went the same shit route as EA by now, even have subscriptions too. Doesn't matter if I have to through hundreds of bucks at EA or Pdx for a single game. It's both the same shitty principle.
Yeah, but having the games in competition would force then to try to win players to their side over the alternative, for both of the games. It would have been nice to have an option when playing this genre.
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