I don’t understand the fascination. From what my son once told me, everyone has the same advantage, you’re just paying for looks and individuality. I see that as a waste of money. Paying out for licensed characters is just a way to keep that going.
The only part I found interesting was when it shut down for a few days to have that major upgrade. All that was left was the black hole. That was quite fun watching everyone react.
I think you’re being disingenuous, you perfectly understand this phenomenon but it doesn’t appeal to you. Paying for pixels will always be dumb anyway.
At the end of the day it’s the same as something like FunkoPop, you are paying for a digital or physical piece of nostalgia. Neither are for me, but it is what it is
Do you wear jewelry? Do you have a nice watch that tells time just as well as a casio? Does your car feature upgraded wheels or upcharged paint? Have you paid more for fancy curtains when basic ones do the same job? Have you repainted a room just because you wanted a different color? Art, collectibles, novelties? Video game cosmetics are valuable to anyone who wants to express themselves the same as any other real life cosmetic. It can be especially important to young people who don’t have other avenues.
That being said, fortnite is predatory as fuck and is one of the worst offenders for addictive design, FOMO engineering, and maximizing DLC purchases. It’s what the annual sports games wish they could do. It’s what CoD started to do. It’s fueled by social media and by glimpses of random players in each match with the latest skins.
a bunch of my retro gaming friends talked me into it awhile back and now I got a CRT hooked up to a mini PC with n64 controllers, I definitely see the appeal
I’ve seen this article 15 fucken times today. They’re children who have never known a world without microtransactions. They also get these games for free, its not like they’re choosing subs over a game. They are choosing a sub for a game. Much like I did with WoW when it was the thing back in the day.
And where was this shit with flash games? “Kids would rather load a webpage than buy games”
I wouldn’t really use this as an indicator. Read your terms of agreements in most games. You do not own any of those virtual items. My D Scimmy is property of Jagex, not Sanctus. Subscription games have existed for as long as there has been dial-up. Phantasy Star Online Episode 1 & 2 made you buy a “Hunter’s License” to play online. Neopets has a term in the TAS that states you do not own anything belonging to your Neopets account.
The minute it gets alarming is when the normal goes from “buying your first home/car” to renting, which we already have one foot through the door on that front. Physical commodities are a much better indicator of our dystopian qualities. Once people stop expecting to own a home, and are just excited to return to their corner of the habblock then we have a problem.
Games as a Service on the other hand, are mostly symptoms of our unregulated technology markets. Its much more profitable to release the license to play your game for free and pack it with predatory microtransactions than it is to release an actual piece work for a game. So we will continue to see more of the shitpacked experiences as they continue to be profitable.
If you want to own digital things, consider finding games on Itch.io whwre you can buy them directly from the creator.
I mean, is it too soon if people are still going to buy it? More seriously, I think one whole console generation is a good standard for remasters. Just so long as you can point to something that looks or plays better than the original did. For a remake, I think you need more time and the game your making needs to feel like it couldn't have been made on the original hardware. Either way three years feels way too soon, especially for what is essentially a next-gen port or a definitive edition.
I don’t see the point of doing a remaster of that game now as it still looks and feels perfect.
But, I also won’t complain about it if it makes other people happy and lets them experience the game while allowing Naughty Dog to maximize their earnings with such a masterpiece.
I just hope a fresh project isn’t pushed back because of that remaster.
I may be an outlier here, but I don’t think remakes should be done at all anymore. They were great when the medium was still new and we made major jumps between generations or when we started to figure 3D out. Nowadays, I can’t even tell the difference between a PS4 and PS5 game. The medium is evolved enough to just go back and play the originals without them feeling dated in a bad way. Take for example the demon souls remake: Yes, it looked nice, but people argue to this day whether or not it’s better. The gameplay is identical. Or even worse: Look at Pokemon. The remake for Gen 4 is worse than the original and didn’t even include Platinum content. Instead of wasting dev time on a full on remake, they could have ported Platinum to the switch and called it a day. A remake probably only makes sense anymore if you can’t port a game at all. Make new games instead.
It’s not just AAA gaming but all over Hollywood too, has been for a while. Nostalgia is a powerful force and churning out sequels or prequels or spinoffs off of recognizable IPs is just less risky an investment than trying to make something new.
Unfortunately you’re right seeing how well the Super Mario RPG remake does. They could have put the original on their online service and worked on a new one instead. That’s something I dislike about pretty much all media.
If I want nostalgia, I go back to the original anyways.
I think the issue is calling a next gen port a remaster. Yea it is technically a remaster but adding that to the title makes it seem like more then that.
If said game was released as definite or something nobody would be talking rn
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