That’s the thing I find amusing in this thread. Consoles are a known quantity and it needs to either compete or undercut them. I have a Steam Deck that I paid £320 for (brought up to £400 by the SSD I added). I would most definitely not pay more than £450 for a Steam Box. It may well cost more than that but it is a luxury and I would seriously struggle to justify more than that.
They can set the asking price to whatever they like but a lot of us cannot justify those amounts for what amounts to a toy. By this stage in a console generation I would expect a lot more games and a lot cheaper hardware. The reasons that haven’t happened aren’t of interest to me as a consumer (they’re of interest to me as a nerd!).
Because hardware, software, culture, incomes, demand, supply, and many, many other factors have all changed since the 1980s. It’s not a straight comparison. Inflation is a factor but it is not the only factor.
Today’s game is some Mario Kart 64. I had a long day and wanted to take it easy, so i did a few races. It was easy up until Banshee boardwalk. Still, it was nice. I’ve always had a soft spot for DK Jungle Parkway especially (i have a soft spot for like all the tracks though) because of this bridge + waterfall. For some...
I’ve not played a newer or older Mario Kart game with better fundamentals. I’d like more tracks for it but other than that it’s perfect. The newer ones are pretty but there’s too much going on in many of the tracks (and I’m really not fond of the flying/water thing they do either).
Whilst I didn’t enjoy the mechanics of Control, I was very impressed at the settings it offered. I could essentially turn off combat if I wanted. Yes, it won’t be the same game experience, but if I choose to play that way - let me!
In the old days we had cheat codes for this stuff. I cheated my way through a lot of games and then revisited later without cheats. Some of those became my favourite games of all time (Theme Hospital and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 both spring to mind).
I never encountered a single Windows 9x game that wouldn’t run on Windows 2000 Pro. It was my primary OS in 2003 or so, having moved from Windows 98 SE.
I think I’m the only person who played through the entire game and didn’t like it. Yes, yes, I should probably have quit but I’m a bit of an optimist and hoped it would get better.
It felt to me like the game really didn’t want me to kill anyone. However it had any number of fun ways to kill people and then scolded me when I was naughty enough to (gasp) use them!
Also the rats were bizarrely low poly compared to everything else. Odd gripe, perhaps, but given how crucial they are to the setting it felt strangely shit.
I grew up playing Fallout 1/2, Deus Ex, stuff like that. Dishonored framed its morality system as “chaos” rather than good vs. bad but ultimately I had characters complaining about my methods. You brought in someone to specifically be an assassin and then you’re outraged that he kills people? I shot the damn traiterous boatman in the head at the end of the game.
I’m reminded of a show I was watching and lampshading. One of the characters is exhausting to watch and the other characters comment on how much the character sucks. That’s great an’ all but I’m still stuck watching this character suck. Commenting on it doesn’t make it go away.
Similarly I could not use the tools the game gives me but they’re there for me to use. If I’m not supposed to use them then I might as well instead play something that wants me to play it!
Much like in Spec Ops: The Line the player can just stop playing. I mean, you’re not wrong, but it seems silly to me.
Some games handle this by making it the ultra-violent approach essentially non-viable but that’s not how Dishonored decided to roll.
the narrative framing sets you up to be a highly-trained stealthy assassin
I quietly took out guards rather than avoiding them. No alarms were raised, etc.. Seems pretty stealthy to me.
Ultimately I just didn’t appreciate the mixed messaging of “here are tools for extreme violence” and “why did you commit extreme violence?”. If non-lethal means were such a priority why was I given tools that heavily favour lethality?
A better equivalent would be a GTA game giving you a mission with a tank and then the mission givers seriously, not for comedy, giving the player shit for doing anything but driving on the road avoiding all cars.
My problem is with the tonal dissonance of giving the player weapons designed to be fun only for the game to complain when they’re used.
The opposite being a Bond game. Really he should only be using sneaky spy weapons but he’s given a ridiculous arsenal and expected to use it. If you give me a machine gun then why would you expect me not to use it?
Let me put it another way then:
They made the creative choice to build the game that way. I think it was a bad choice and hurt the narrative experience significantly and can think of multiple better options that would have made it a better game. Evidently I am very much in the minority on this but my experience playing the game is just as valid as anyone else’s.
I’m not some strange creature that has emerged from an undersea cave with no understanding of narrative conventions or game structures. I’ve been playing games since the early ‘90s, including plenty from the ‘80s, and have continued playing since, across many genres.
I think the way they chose to structure their game could have been better and I was actively annoyed by the way they went about handling “high chaos”. Other games before and since did it better.
You are more than welcome to disagree with my opinion! Most people seem to!
…but it is not me being some idiot who doesn’t understand gaming and I’m frankly rather tired of being told I’m the problem here.
I’m sorry that I don’t remember many story specifics from thirteen years ago. I remember the group I was working on behalf of seemed utterly awful so I very much didn’t feel like I was on the side of “the good guys”. The whole system seemed rotten on all sides and I didn’t feel like I was doing anything positive regardless. I recall the boatman just being an arse towards me throughout and having the opportunity to off him at the end was at least satisfying. He does straight up betray the player in high chaos, so traitorous is an apt description.
As I said, my complaint was more with framing that the specific consequences.
When I played Dishonored it felt like I was given tools like that and then reprimanded for my lack of subtlety. If I’d been told “Use these only as a last resort as subtletly is the priority” and I’d used them then I’d have felt like I’d just barely scraped through a mission. Instead I did a thorough job, from my perspective, eliminating threats to the group I was working for, avoiding raising any alarms, and then being told I did a shitty job. You gave me a toolset geared towards extreme violence, why the shocked Pikachu face?
I think it’s really cool that the game is setup so that it can be traversed non-violently (I can’t recall whether there are any targets that absolutely must be killed, but I remember most, if not all, had non lethal options). Given the tools I had though, I didn’t feel like going that route, and I really didn’t appreciate the mission givers acting like I was doing a bad job when I used the tools I was given. It felt very much like “Well the proper way to play this is the sneaky sneaky way - but I suppose deep begrudging sigh we’ll allow you to do things this way” was the message the game communicated to me.
I wasn’t cheesing the systems presented, messing with pathfinding bugs, that kind of thing. I used the tools given in a canonically acceptable way. Don’t give me a loaded gun and then complain about a loud bang!
“This person is a problem. We’ve left some tools for you."
(events transpire)
“Oh my gods, what did you do?! They’re dead!”
Sorry, was I supposed to have a little chat with them, convince them to mend their ways? Was the collapsible sword for cutting cake? The gun for firing into the air in celebration of an understanding? Those exploding knife mine things for… uhhh.
These are my perceptions and recollections, over a decade later. They may not be entirely accurate, but it’s what I remember. The game left me with a lasting impression that it disapproved of my approach and I found its mixed messages deeply irritating. I didn’t feel I was being mechanically punished and I was aware that being more violent would increase “chaos”, but I felt that should be my choice for tackling the problems and the mission givers should treat it Corvo making decisions in the field that he felt were appropriate. He wasn’t there to just be a triggerman, as far as he was concerned, but to make decisions in his area of expertise.
If you disagree with my experiences I can’t stop you, but that was what I took away from the game. If it failed to communicate things to me it’s certainly not because I lack media savvy or gaming experience. I’m annoyed that I didn’t have more fun with it - I played to the end because throughout I hoped that I would enjoy the next bit more. Then it was the end of the game and a bunch of people were telling me that my opinion was wrong.
I’m really not interested in dragging this out further.
…because I knew that if you continued to engage I would feel compelled to do so, rather than going to bed or whatever. Dishonored annoys me to this day. I do not get the love for it. I’m glad the rest of you had such a good time with it and annoyed that I didn’t get that enjoyment. I put the effort in, where’s my fun?!
Today’s game is some more Assassin’s Creed III. I got to the first modern section. These sections make me wish we got more of them. I honestly wouldn’t mind a game fully in modern times. Though Watchdogs kind of felt like that....
Sounds like another console generation I’m skipping in that case. The middle of its lifespan means it’s on the way to life support in the near future. Never really went anywhere, which is a bit of a shame.
Today’s game is some Assassin’s Creed III. This was what i had lined up to play after Max Payne 2, and initially i was going to play some more of that. But i had decided to set this up ahead of time. Then… i decided to make sure it works… and i kind of lost track of time. These games are kind of my Guilty pleasure. I...
I played this one purely for Desmond’s story. I found everything about Connor’s story utterly tedious and the setting meant that the buildings were awful for traversal.
There are already some huge maps out there, Just Cause 2 and 3 both have maps at around 1000km^2^, and those games are beloved by their players. But if the next Cyberpunk game was announced with Night City now being the size of an actual large metropolis, say like New York, would you say that’s too big? What determines what...
A wasteland that one can throw a stone across doesn’t feel like much of a wasteland to me. I don’t want realism, just big enough that I can suspend my disbelief. I want to get immersed but a “town” with six people isn’t a godsdamned town.
I’m confused by your first sentence - the last machines they made that used PPC were in 2005. To me it reads like you’re correcting me but saying exactly the same thing..?
The fact that Macs stopped using the architecture twenty years ago makes it bit of an odd connection, I would argue. As you say, the 360 used the architecture far more recently and over 84 million of those were sold. It’s not like it was some obscure device.
But the Switch and beyond use ARM, the architecture Macs have used for the last five years?
It just seemed an odd thing to mention given how long it’s been since Macs used PPC. I know they used to, but I’m old enough to have used 68000k Macs too so of course I remember that time.
Which is fair enough and totally reasonable - it was purely in the context of that comment it seemed odd. You had a device that actually uses the architecture that Macs use and one that used an architecture that they don’t but… yeah. It’s not important, it just made me chuckle.
I think the thing I miss most about this game is how much it did with hardware from 2005. It looked great, played well, had a decent length but also didn’t outstay its welcome.
I’ve played through it at least twice. I doubt I’ll ever replay City or Knight as they were amazing but far far too long.
They’re trying to soften the blow by adding new features to each tier, but it’s still just to disguise a price hike. More games are coming to the $15 tier, but it still won’t be day and date releases. First party games come to the $15 tier “within a year”, but that’s even excluding Call of Duty.
Valve confirms Steam Machine will be priced ‘like a PC with the same level of performance’ (www.videogameschronicle.com) angielski
Day 494 of posting a Daily Screenshot from the games I've been playing angielski
Today’s game is some Mario Kart 64. I had a long day and wanted to take it easy, so i did a few races. It was easy up until Banshee boardwalk. Still, it was nice. I’ve always had a soft spot for DK Jungle Parkway especially (i have a soft spot for like all the tracks though) because of this bridge + waterfall. For some...
Gaming Pet Peeves angielski
What are some things that just get under your skin about games?...
Return to the year 2000 with classic multiplayer DOS games in your browser (arstechnica.com) angielski
Years later, Arkane’s Dishonored is still a modern stealth classic (arstechnica.com) angielski
Day 484 of posting a Daily Screenshot from the games I've been playing angielski
Today’s game is some more Assassin’s Creed III. I got to the first modern section. These sections make me wish we got more of them. I honestly wouldn’t mind a game fully in modern times. Though Watchdogs kind of felt like that....
'The PS5 is only in the middle of [it's lifespan],' says Sony CFO (www.polygon.com) angielski
Day 481 of posting a Daily Screenshot from the games I've been playing angielski
Today’s game is some Assassin’s Creed III. This was what i had lined up to play after Max Payne 2, and initially i was going to play some more of that. But i had decided to set this up ahead of time. Then… i decided to make sure it works… and i kind of lost track of time. These games are kind of my Guilty pleasure. I...
For those of you who enjoy open-world games, how big of a world is too big? angielski
There are already some huge maps out there, Just Cause 2 and 3 both have maps at around 1000km^2^, and those games are beloved by their players. But if the next Cyberpunk game was announced with Night City now being the size of an actual large metropolis, say like New York, would you say that’s too big? What determines what...
Mexican Government To Tax Violent Video Games It Says Make Kids Violent (www.techdirt.com) angielski
When was the last time you actually laughed while playing a game? angielski
cross-posted from: lemmy.world/post/37932218...
Xbox ditching hardware and exclusive games "makes sense," former Microsoft exec and Blizzard boss says, as "only a moron would continue" making consoles as games go third party (www.gamesradar.com) angielski
Name a game that you found SO FUN, but no one talks about it anymore.
For me it’s Unreal Tournament 3
this level is amazing angielski
Updates to Xbox Game Pass: Introducing Essential, Premium, and Ultimate Plans - Xbox Wire [prices going up] (news.xbox.com) angielski
They’re trying to soften the blow by adding new features to each tier, but it’s still just to disguise a price hike. More games are coming to the $15 tier, but it still won’t be day and date releases. First party games come to the $15 tier “within a year”, but that’s even excluding Call of Duty.
Steam Autumn Sale 2025 Has Begun (store.steampowered.com) angielski
What are you buying?
Microsoft is raising Xbox console prices in the US again, five months after its last price increase | VGC (www.videogameschronicle.com) angielski
The new changes in full are as follows:...
GTA V was released on this day, 12 years ago angielski
Randy Pitchford Snaps Back at Borderlands 4 Criticism: 'Code Your Own Engine' (insider-gaming.com) angielski
'Borderlands 4 is a premium game made for premium gamers' is Randy Pitchford's tone deaf retort to the performance backlash: 'If you're trying to drive a monster truck with a leaf blower's motor, you're going to be disappointed' (www.pcgamer.com) angielski