I can usually read anything without having issues, but I just read the tropes page for this and this depressing game lived rent-free in my head for too long. And some of the themes are things I can usually read about no problem but actually seeing? Not sure if the game would show it on-screen, but if it did I know I would handle it poorly. Finally, I usually do not want to engage with fiction that depressing, and I am already familiar with some of the themes in real life so I don’t need a good art game to teach me about it or make some commentary. Dark things are usually not cathartic for me, just another painful reminder about the bad things in the world. So I am going to avoid this series and I think others might have the same reasoning. Of course, I’m aware others can like it and that’s totally fine! For others, it can be a good story or help them work through their own traumas. I understand how this series probably has lots of value. It’s just extremely not for me.
I think the things that make it as good as it is, are the things that also make it really difficult to play and recommend to people.
When I think of sexual violence being handled in video games, I think of True Crime: Streets of LA and the weird gross animation for you to interrupt, or the way that everyone laughs at the Daedra in Morrowind with the necrophilia line. (Or hentai games, but that’s a dark world) Drugs are minor joke items in most games, even with games that have addiction mechanics don’t make your time harder for not doing drugs.
The surrealism and comedic relief break up some of the despair. There is also a lot of catharsis in it. Probably the most important scene in the game is when you confront your father, who is an unspeakable monster, and the player is given a choice whether they want to kill him or not. Regardless of what the player chooses - the character cannot forgive him and will attack. It’s a false choice, which ties so well into the themes of trauma and powerlessness. There’s something about that that is so honest and validating.
Sometimes you get the need to rebel against your better judgment. I didn’t regret it, you can go one short night and still function with with a supply of coffee. You just need to be sure to prioritize sleep the nezt night, because after that you lose all cognitive leniency.
Its been almost 6 years since I first finished dark souls 1, and I still think of its endings and themes.
The age of light and dark. Prolonging the current status quo, or give up and accept the new one. The idea that alone, the chosen undead is weak, but as you get help from others, you can get better/stronger.
Best game ever is… difficult if not impossible to qualify. I’m gonna go with Shadow of War near the top though. Nobody else will, but I really appreciate that game’s ability to keep generating new experiences for you. Perfected the arkham combat, beautiful ragdolls, endless endgame to keep experiencing new orcs.
I still do it from time to time because I like playing them on original hardware, but Sonic 1&2 on Genesis/Mega Drive. The Origins Plus versions may not be 100% accurate gameplay with regards to movement/moveset, but anniversary mode’s retry special stages is real nice when half of the time I get screwed in those. Especially 2’s special stages where I feel I feel like I’m constantly getting screwed over by my favorite character/sidekick being incompetent at the special stages.
Just recently got the 3rd game (still need & Knuckles to complete the set) and while not being able to retry special stages is an issue, I can at least reset the game without having to worry about needing to replay the whole entire game over from the start. So it gets a pass because all I gotta do is replay a stage.
Dark Souls: Prepare to Die Edition is basically worthless if you have Dark Souls: Remastered.
60fps, better graphics, better performance, QOL enhancements, and even better multiplayer features (up to 6 total players instead of 4, just like DS3).
Probably true of most remasters/remakes, outside of speed running. I do know that PTDE is still a popular version to speedrun due to certain glitches that aren’t present in Remastered.
Dark Souls never even needed a remaster. The original could be released today and probably still be the best game of this year. The improved performance is the only thing worth noting, and even that only really matters in Blighttown, which everyone skips after their first playthrough anyway.
If you play enough, pure random chance will eventually get you a game that feels like a fair fight.
But quite often, video game matchmaking systems will fail to accurately estimate player skill correctly, creating teams where one will utterly demolish the other.
Or, as a counter-point, perhaps they are nearly evenly matched, and the slight difference in skill between them is disproportionately reflected in the scoreboard. I’ve seen this happen in fighting games, but admittedly, I haven’t really played a matchmade team game in a long, long time, because they kind of stopped making those games for me.
Not so much a counterpoint. It’s actually a factor that I’ve thought about too, and I think it adds to the problem.
In one of my other comments here, I talk about how it’s an impossible problem, and how I’d solve it by not trying to find a bunch of players of the exact same skill level to begin with. You go for roughly even teams, not precisely even players.
If you have 10 people at almost the same skill level, the tiniest difference in ability gets massively magnified, because that’s the only deciding factor that’s left.
But maybe the meme loses its humor by having less of that kernel of truth that a good joke relies on? Like, if you don’t think the matchmaking is bullshit, it’s not going to be funny, you know?
The only kernel of truth required is that most people have experienced completely unfair matches, and attribute that to the shortcomings of modern skill-based matchmaking.
What exactly the mechanics behind those shortcomings are, matters little.
You also have the team synergy as a factor in a team based game. Even if the match is perfectly balanced if people have any grief with each other in the same team(bad previous interaction, bias against certain characters, the good old racism/bigotry against other player or just difference in playstyles) the match is doomed.
Yeah, taht is more or less where I come down. “AI” upscaling is spectacular. Frame gen is much more hit or miss
The main problem is that, as with most things, people are stupid. They don’t understand that an outlet like Digital Foundry or even Gamers Nexus are going to be harsh on upscaling/frame gen because it actively makes it hard for them to give you guidance on what performance you can expect. So “This is horrible for benchmarking” becomes “This is horrible”
Doing my second play-through of Stalker 2. Really enjoying the game (140 total hours), but it does still have quite a few bugs. Most of the bugs are minor, but a few have been pretty serious.
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