The only thing that I could think of that would make paying worth anything would be if they had GOG servers for online play from games that their servers shut down. Aka GOG’s KALI
I think if they need an extra income stream, it should be physical manuals, discs/disks, boxes, and feelies. Say that GOG has System Shock, Ultima VII, Thief Gold, and TIE Fighter planned for a limited edition boxed edition, but needs pre-orders. Plonk down $20-40, get those things when the funding goal is reached.
The things I would be ok paying a subscription for:
Rotating free Games that I get to keep. Like epic but only for subscribers. The game should be mine even after I quit the subscription.
Extra insights in preservation, or goodies
voting rights on what games should be free next month for the sunscribers.
discounted price on games.
Things that I feel it shouldnot be locked behind subscription and paywall:
tool for backing up offline installers
ability to install previous versions of game
and definitely not voting rights on games to bring into the preservation program.
If the tooks for backing up offline installers or ability to install previous versions of game are paywalled, that is going to invite more reasons for piracy.
Once they added every modern Lego game to their preservation program I knew the thing was bunk. Harry Potter Lego game = worth preserving, Lego Island = never heard of it. Total BS
Yeah, I found that one weird as well. Lego Island wasn’t just the first Lego game. It was one of the first open world games. Well worth preserving. Much more so than the Lego games that got added.
I think LEGO Island would be hard to license because Mindscape is long gone. Also the source code was lost as I recall. MattKC on YouTube has created lots of patches to get the game running on modern systems. He’s working on decompiling it actually.
I told them I’d like a GOG style humble choice. If they’re not willing to give actual games, I’d be interested in a subscription to help game preservation, but probably only $5 a month max.
A humble choice like subscription service would be pretty great honestly. $10ish a month for maybe 1 AA/AAA modern game and a handful of retro and indie games would have me on board immediately. Starting to charge for things they currently or have previously offered for free is not the way to win people over.
It’s not that bad. They have three difficulty settings: Normal, Black Mesa, and Hard. I played on Normal and I haven’t really struggled anywhere. I think I’ve only died once in my whole gameplay, and it was when I was fighting off waves of Marines flooding a single large space that I couldn’t leave. I’m assuming “Black Mesa” is their suggested difficulty level.
I’ve been curious about Lethal Company, but I’m not a streamer and I don’t have friends to play with.
That said there’s another game almost identical to LC called Murky Divers and instead of going around different research stations on different planets, you’re cleaning out research stations underwater.
You have a sub that you use to go around the ocean, and there’s like a radar to help you navigate, avoid creatures and obstacles, and find locations to actually go into. There are all manner of creepy underwater creatures and anomalies to find/avoid, and I’m sure there’s at least one giant sea creature that can come and fuck you up if you’re not careful.
Tbh I didn’t get very far because as soon as I pulled up to a location and got out of the sub, I freaked out and turned the game off. I ended up refunding it because, again, I don’t have friends to play with and I’m not a streamer lol. But it did seem like an interesting spin on the concept.
I just looked it up. It looks interesting. I’ve had some people recommend me REPO when talking about LC, but never Murky Divers. I’ll have to pick them both up at some point
The best part starts at the train rails all the way to the canyon level and waking up in a processing plant. It’s a huge chunk of the single player mode that was full of action.
Imo (and most other fan’s opinions) you should absolutely start with the OG, if nothing else than to see how gaming has evolved and such.
If you’re feeling it, I’d recommend just jumping into BM. With the original being so fresh in your mind, you’ll really appreciate the work these people put into their remake. It’s so full of love for everything in the original (and a bit of HL2) that it still kinda blows me away with all the little details and such. The scientists and other NPCs all look distinct now and have different personalities and voices, and before shit hits the fan you’ll hear plenty of little banter and idk chat between your coworkers as you make your way to the rest chamber.
There’s also, as a mod for Black Mesa, another team remaking Blue Shift in the new engine and all. They’re not done with the game yet, but what they have is about 3-4 hours worth of story finished (the first 5 or 6 levels I believe), and it’s actually expanded on even more than in Black Mesa or the original Blue Shift. There are more named characters, extra parts added to missions, and it feels like the same care went into remaking Blue Shift as went into making Black Mesa.
There’s also a fun part at the beginning that has an overlap with Black Mesa where you, as Barney, see Gordon go by in the tram, and I think he flips you off in like a teasing playful way.
It absolutely brought me back to the late 90s shooters I grew up with. Lots of fun, but there were also a lot of parts I got stuck on, too. I will need some time before I play again / consider the BM version - maybe after HL2. Thanks for the additional info.
Any of the classic era Tales games. Destiny DC/2 both finally got fantranslations, but Namco keeps teasing that they want to bring over the games the west never got. Eventually. Someday. Maybe. Hopefully by the time I finish the rest of my JRPG backlog.
Re: Super Metroid, it's a short enough game that even if a remake does happen, I'd say it's worth playing the original now and then playing the remake too whenever one happens. Though I'm also hard-pressed to see what a remake could bring to the table honestly, it's pretty much perfect as-is. Not like 1 and 2 which have aged horribly and needed a complete overhaul. I think I'd be concerned if they tried to mess with it.
Still lacking a definitive version in English of the original, Tales of Phantasia, as far as I know. The playstation version with skits and stuff was Japanese only.
The only officially localized version was GBA… and its epic tale of the legendary war :
Interesting, for me TotK felt vastly superior to BotW. I played a lot-ish of BotW but after I was done with the story, I pretty much dropped it. TotK I obsessed over for weeks. The story made me so emotional and immersed at points that I count the whole experience amongst my top five for gaming.
I dropped BotW because of the weird Beast missions, for which I had to use an online guide to beat. I didn’t think the puzzles in them were well-designed at all.
TotK was the first Zelda I actually played to the end credits. It wasn’t perfect, but it was much more fun and better designed—aside from the depths and caves, which were way too monotonous.
But I do get the point about differing atmospheres. I loved what BotW offered, while TotK is at best an echo of it.
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