Shame. I remembered the name from Banner Saga, but I was surprised to find out that they also published Pillars of Eternity 2. They had an interesting catalog of games. Still, telling everyone they're being let go right before they leave for Christmas is just twisting the knife isn't it? Then again I guess there isn't really a good time to tell someone they're fired.
I know it’ll be worth the improvements, but I’m allowed to be disappointed all the same. I swear they had a November release, so a week or so ago when I tried to find the release date, I couldn’t find it again, and instead just saw Winter 2023. I was bracing for a delay (still disappointed though).
Going from their existing RED engine to Unreal is basically the same idea. Almost nothing from the original Cyberpunk game is going to be easily translated to the new platform. I think CDPR just set their development timeline back by at least 3 years.
Given how massive their game is, I'm doubtful. So much of what they did in the first game will have to be rebuilt. Compared to just reusing most of the original assets and code, this sounds like a lot more work.
Maybe, it might also be easier to reuse portions of the engine in Unreal Engine while using parts of Unreal (like its rendering engine) than you think though. Assets largely I’d expect to be portable or at least comvertable with a custom asset loader.
I’m talking a little out of my ass though, and neither of us is familiar with the code. Point being though, it’s a little different moving engines than rewriting a complicated web server (a project I have been a part of and would not recommend).
I may be wrong, but I think they completely discounted console updates (and probably will do so with PC too). Ellie in VR was something to behold though. Hours of fun.
Yeah, it was amazing. I still haven’t bought the expansion since I only play the game in VR and there was so much reason not to buy it for VR. They have fixed some of it, but even if the original game isn’t really ruined at all, it’s just tough to play now knowing the expansion is out there. So it kinda tainted the whole game even if technically nothing changed for me.
I still have no idea why they decided not to do VR for the on-foot stuff. I don’t know if it was just a cost cutting measure, or if there was some problem they couldn’t sort out. If it was for motion sickness reasons, like not being able to support teleport to move or something, they should probably know motion sickness susceptible people already couldn’t really play the rest of the game. There were some parts that worked ok, their VR demo was ok for most people, but alot of the actual game wasn’t. And even with all the motion sickness reduction options on, driving the SRV didn’t go well for any people I know with motion sickness issues. If it was motion controls they couldn’t support, we have plenty of games with face aim, sure it’s not ideal, but it’s still an upgrade from flat games.
The lack of VR support for in Odyssey, on top of numerous issues at launch, soured me on the whole thing. I know VR is a niche that did not take off so it likely did not make sense for them to prioritize it ; but Elite was the quintessential early killer app for VR, so it stings. Shame, I spent hundred of hours in Elite and would have liked to spend more.
I suppose PC VR can be said to have not really taken off, but there are over 50 million VR headset sales in general so far, that’s pretty good. VR in general is taking off just fine. And PC VR is mostly only suffering from the technical barrier of wireless streaming. Which is clearing up bit by bit, but could be solved with a wireless dongle instead of needing the user to properly configure their router. But newer routers are more and more being able to support VR streaming with their default settings.
While PCVR was mostly abandoned by the big gaming companies, there is still a ton of support from community modders. In the flat2VR community they are up to about 60% of all games working in VR now, about 30% with full motion controls too. So having a VR headset is still getting more and more popular, and being able to use it for PCVR is still getting more and more possible and popular, at some point it’ll come back to the focus of the actual gaming studios too. But for now they don’t have to cuz modders will just do it for free for them if they don’t.
It certainly sucked when VR switched to prioritizing stand alone over PCVR, but I think long-term it will get us to PCVR being mainstream sooner than we would have got there without a focus on the easy stuff first.
The early times of this wave of VR (which really started with the commercial launch of the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive) were very exciting. Lots of “experiences” back then: sometimes mindblowing, often half-baked, always interesting. After a couple of years people realized there was no money in it and lots of them moved on.
7 years in, I’m pretty much over early access promising prototypes and flat screen games being modded to support VR. I want VR-native games-ass games of the caliber of Half-Life: Alyx, or Moss. I want VR support to be a standard feature of any new cockpit-based driving or flying game, not an afterthought. We are not getting the former, and slowly maybe getting there for the latter.
Elite Dangerous is the perfect illustration of this cycle: Frontier started supporting VR very early. My first VR experience was Elite Dangerous on a loaned Oculus DK1. It was mind-blowing ! It was also very very puke-inducing ! Then proper hardware came with the Rift and Vive, Elite had full VR support, and it was fucking great. And now, well VR support is still there, but it’s no longer first class, and slowly decaying.
It’s kind of a nebulous definition, but typically they’re games in which you have a variety of options and systems to complete objectives. So things like Deus Ex where you can stealth, fight or hack your way through the plot. Usually the games will have a robust amount of physics or interaction with various objects so there’s always a variety of things to do in a level.
Typically, the thing that sets ImmSims apart is that they have a number of interlocking systems that allow the player to solve objectives in different ways.
Stealth, Speech, and Shooting are the usual suspects, with hacking, gunplay and conversation trees well represented in the genre.
But generally, it’s a philosophy about designing for extreme player agency.
On one end you have something like, say, Tetris. As the player, you can direct blocks, but you can’t stop them from falling. The game gives the player little autonomy to direct. Blocks arrive and the player places them (or doesn’t) until the game ends.
On the other, you have something like Dishonored, where you can choose to kill everyone or no one. You can choose to accept and make use of the magical powers available to you - or reject them all and fight with only human strength and your own wits. The world itself then reacts to these choices and the flow of the game changes accordingly.
I think Larian’s Baldur’s Gate 3 can arguably be called an ImmSim thanks to its insane level of player reactivity.
Basically, if your choices as a player can actually alter the game world and your path through the story, thanks to the emergent interactions of interrelated systems… It’s probably an ImmSim.
The part that makes it confusing is that all of that also applies to a stiffer open-world western RPG like Fallout or Elder Scrolls. Nobody’s calling Skyrim (or more recently Starfield) an immersive sim. Half-Life often gets included and that game is completely linear and your three interaction choices for combat are “shoot with gun (including wacky woohoo gravity gun)”, “whack with crowbar”, or “sneak/run past”.
Is Elden Ring an immersive sim?
Honestly, the defining thing that modern “immersive sims” have that “rpg shooters” don’t is usually just “physics gun”. Gravity gun from HL, goo gun from prey, telekinesis in Dishonored. Sure it lets you “use the environment” instead of just shooting the zombie with a bullet, but you’re often just using the environment as a bullet.
Some games don’t even have fucking KEYBINDS, which the most basic of accessibility features.
This will only change when stores (like Steam) start cataloguing these types of features and letting people setup default filters to hide all games without them.
The users have to make them hear that releasing any game without basic accessibility options is unacceptable. This will only happen when the majority is pushing for it, not just those that need the options.
Until then, make sure you leave a negative review and get a refund when you see this kind of thing, even if the game is otherwise good. Pirate the game instead if you still want to play it anyway. They have to be told that this is unacceptable.
I would fucking love to get Nintendo shit off of the switch. And trash every single line of code that run Nintendos online service. Fuck, can Nintendo do even a single decent multiplayer experience?
🙄 screaming monopoly in gaming while stream is a thing is an absurd proposition. Game development has an absurdly low barrier to entry and is easily one of the most competitive markets on the planet. Citing a B tier player who is the most open of the console makers as a monopoly when players like Steam, Nintendo, and Sony exist is insane. Gamepass is a fantastic value, MS is a big reason cross play exists, and people lose their shit if a game isn’t available through steam.
Microsoft is one of the companies innovating TBH and I have no issues getting more games on streaming, console, and my PC for effectively $2.50/month once you convert gold. Easily the best value in gaming I’ve had in 30+ years of gaming.
Not having to buy a$300 outdated phone to enjoy the 5 things I enjoy on Nintendo would be a godsend.
Competition is what causes innovation, the only reason Microsoft does innovate is because of its competition with companies like Sony and Nintendo. You really think game pass would be here to stay without competition? That shits only a good deal because it has to be.
You aren't really giving anyone anything to work with. Plus you call everyone copium for...some reason, so we might as well call you out on fanboyism since you actually remember that Microsoft gold exists
Tell me you couldn’t be less informed lol. Microsoft will let you convert gold into game pass ultimate allowing you to rack up 3 years for like $70. It’s an absurd value and you just want to hand waive it away because it doesn’t support you🤣
But yeah no, I just don't buy any of it to begin with and let the points rot. No interest in getting locked into a system that they'll eventually try to raise the prices on once they muscle out their competitors.
I'm amazed you said these are the best deals you've seen in 30 years. Cause you certainly don't seem to be in my age group. Though maybe you're using the emote spamming to look younger than you are, who knows.
I’ll happily rent most games for absurdly cheap and purchase the few I might play more than once. You can spend significantly more creating a dusty catalog. There is plenty of room for competition 😉
Sims 4 base game is actually already free on steam. I hear from a good friend, not me personally, that it has some great porn mods on the lovers lab site. Some bad mods, too.
Its strange to me that there are so many high budget open world games that fall within the assassin’s creed / far cry / GTA triangle and yet it seems like nobody tried to copy the Bethesda open world formula given the enormous popularity of Skyrim.
I mean, part of that popularity is the modding community (and also re-releasing it a dozen times). It’s not like Elder Scrolls has the best gameplay around. Always been a bit clunky. Narrative is hit or miss, but the lore and worldbuilding is what saves it, along with some great environmental storytelling.
But in general, Bethesda games live and die based on how strong the modding scene is. It’s why a fair portion of people are still playing Skyrim and Fallout 4 instead of Starfield. It has its mods, but the community isn’t as interested in it as they are the others.
That said, I’d say Breath of the Wild has some classic Elder Scrolls moments. The world has a lot of “hey, what’s that over there? Oooh, new unmarked side quest/cool thing to do!” experiences.
Maybe I’m blind, but I can’t see it? The target audience is PC gamers, and even though I rarely browse gaming websites anymore, this type of snark seems to be fairly standard for the last 10+ years.
Minecraft is the best-selling game of all time, but it’s looked pretty much the same for the entirety of its almost 14 year run. There’s an argument to be made that it’s showing its age in places, an argument I won’t make because I don’t think so myself, but all the same, as revealed during today’s Minecraft Live, Mojang announced that the sandbox game is getting a pretty big visual overhaul update called Vibrant Visuals. Now, don’t worry, it’ll still be all blocks and squares ‘n’ that, but it will be changing up how lighting looks.
A blog post explains things in a bit more detail, with one of the big things being that there’ll now be volumetric lighting. What that translates to is things like sunlight shining more naturally across different surfaces, even shining through windows, and every individual block will cast its own shadow. Mobs and items will glow a bit more too, so it’s not just about the overworld lighting.
This update is coming to the Bedrock Edition of the game first, with the post noting that it hopes to bring this “graphics revamp (either fully or partially) to as many devices as possible”, though there’s not even a release window for it yet. There are plans to bring it to Java Edition too.
I might not have much of a horse in this race as someone that only really plays Minecraft once in a blue moon (and normally swiftly puts it down because I’m not that kind of creative and I get too stressed out from survival mode), but honestly, I’m not a fan. Minecraft is inherently not a natural looking game, and this lighting overhaul just adds a touch to much realism for my tastes. Besides, this kind of lighting already exists in countless mods, so for plenty of people it’s not even really needed.
In any case, there were a few other announcements from Minecraft Live too, like the fact you’ll soon be able to fly around on friendly versions of ghasts, which I do quite like the look of. There’s a live event taking place from March 25 to April 7 too where you get to hang out with Jack Black’s version of Steve to defend a village in some mini-games, which’ll net you a cape if you’re successful. Bit less exciting, but to each their own!
Not sure what you’re seeing there. The Bedrock edition is also available on PC and the rest is a direct quote for the reasoning why that version gets it before the Java version.
It’s not like they’re forbidden from acknowledging the existence of other devices either. It’s just not their target audience.
Atomfall is compared to STALKER in the article refernced in the first paragraph. This article is just stating the author disagrees with his coworkers original assessment
It wasn’t intended to be like it, but in a way it did have some of the same ideas. It did have the camp clearing parts with what was supposed to be a pretty sophisticated AI faction system. But the system never really worked as intended without mods, so the whole faction battle system just felt super scripted (like, nobody would come and take back control points after you capped them, even though they were supposed to until you completely destroyed the opposing faction). It’s even more fleshed out (and actually works) in Clear Sky. Which is why CS has been my favorite STALKER since it came out.
rockpapershotgun.com
Ważne