The only one of those I really expect to show censorship resistance is Steam. And of that, I’m very curious if they’re going to see repercussions from it.
I’d almost like for more of the control to go the other way. A director could negotiate with a composer about what mood is being asked for a particular moment in a game, leading to the composer making ideas for leitmotifs and buildup. Then, the game gets some number of adjustments or early planning to account for it.
It sounds insane to reconfigure everything to match the music, but honestly, from some of my favorite moments in gaming, it can make a lot of sense. Some of the crescendo periods of Final Fantasy XIV felt incredibly well-earned from the way they had used the expansion’s whole soundtrack as a sort of ballad, repeating a few certain themes both story-wise and in the music.
One example of a game that I think developed this dissonance is Ace Attorney. The main confrontational “gameplay” of those games is when you’re cross-examining a witness. The “Cross Examination” themes are some of the fan favorites - and since the beginning, they’ve had a second theme, Allegro, for when things are getting more intense. The Investigations games decided to put in a third theme, Presto, which goes loony for the sake of a culminating showdown of wits with the murderer, who has one last excuse as to why accusing them is impossible. It feels EPIC.
Only one trouble; Ace Attorney is often a comedic series, and side characters are still acting stupid and making flat-falling jokes during that last cross examination, often breaking the mood of that great track. In my view, a “musically-directed” Ace Attorney would be fine with keeping up its signature silliness at all other points in the game, but keep the tone completely serious when that “Presto” theme is playing, to make it feel like a really personal boss fight.
I think the death run back and the option of exploring for upgrades were always at odds. When you respawn, getting things back is your first task as a form of loss avoidance. But then you’re standing in front of the boss room, maybe after jumping some spike pits, and you might as well just go in. There’s no thought to going other places at that point.
Shovel Knight used a death run to reclaim your lost treasure, and it worked out because it plays as a linear platformer, egging you on into accomplishing the daring feat you just pulled; gating little important behind upgrades.
Soulslike Tunic basically abandoned the death run back, just having you lose 20 gold (which hangs in that spot), and the game didn’t really suffer for it especially because exploration of old areas is so key to that game.
I’d recommend you don’t watch this if you’ve yet to play the first game (either iteration). A few spoiler elements.
It was kind of a given that this would be made, since, while the first has a great set of conclusions, it also sets up a really compelling cliffhanger element. The two games were supposedly written as one originally, and then split to two since it was getting long.
Still, part of me predicts some people will play the upcoming remake, and then get so wrapped up in the ending they’ll just buy the old-fashioned SC so they don’t have to wait for the remake edition.
This often happens to me in RPGs because I’m missing some combat mechanic or fundamental.
It’s made me want to design better optional tutorials for those games to help people discover certain strategies. Eg;
“Hey, you have many different tuning macguffins on this character, but it means their stats aren’t built to any one strength. For an example, try using 8 yellow macguffins to build them for taunting/defense so they can use their self-heal unique, and build up stun on enemies each time they’re attacked.”
Those things feel so witty to discover, but many RPGs now build up and prioritize so many systems it’s understandable people aren’t quickly attuned to them. What often gets me is thinking I’m not making the right decisions mid-combat, when my menu decisions around equipment/abilities are completely wrong.
It might be a fun moment in a soulslike when you’re fighting a same-sized story character that used to be a friend, they display the health bar as “x8”, and then each time one is depleted, they use a healing item inbetween swings.
I never played Remake, but when a YouTuber recently did a comparison video between some of their major scenes, I ended up respecting the original so much more.
A great one was when the plate falls. The original made directorial choices that emphasized the brutality of it all so much better, especially by choosing to cut the music. It just seems like Remake’s director was adding so many things simply because he could, making short and direct scenes so much worse by excess creation.
Of note, another JRPG from that general time period, Trails in the Sky, is being remade soon, and that one seemed quite a bit more faithful to me. Still taking liberties to change dialog, but only where it makes sense - they also greatly retooled the battle system with full respect for classic turntaking style.
Playing an indie mystery game called Dragon Detective. I’m on case 4 so far, it’s definitely held my attention with the story. It manages to do a good job with its worldbuilding.
When listening to the dev commentary of Valve games, they talk about how much work goes into level design planning even just for the sake of optimization, like clearly delineating barriers between major regions (doorways) so the engine can unload objects from other areas.
I get the impression the “First step easy” setup from UE5 may have made it so that more people can give us unoptimized messes, but still only a few rare devs understand proper optimization at all levels of development.
When I run a social media site, it will be a rule to use uncensored terms, and any use of asterisks or alt-words like “unalive” will result in a warning or suspension.
I mean, you changed the topic onto the subject of pricing, which is the main thing driving sentiment that Microsoft is anti-consumer. There are other smaller gaming subscriptions out there, and I don’t call many of them anti-consumer.
It sounds plausible Sony and Microsoft don’t have very fair algorithms to decide what a dev earns for their subscription. That’s an internal element, and we don’t get to see that calculation.
Imagine a guy hears about Game Pass, and sees he can play Spiritfarer on it. “Spiritfarer!? That awesome emotional experience that everyone says they cried at? I’m definitely playing that!” 5-ish hours later, they’ve finished the game, and thoroughly enjoyed it, but the subscription is still going.
At this point, the subscriber decides they may as well play State of Decay 2 mindlessly the rest of the month, often without much interest, but trusts another excellent singleplayer indie darling will arrive next month.
I’d bet the algorithm may pay the SOD2 devs far more in that case because numbers show that’s what “kept them engaged”, not to mention live service games like SOD2 have DLC to entice people into.
Theres absolutely a danger in that thinking, since most people bought a PS5 after seeing Sony’s incredible singleplayer games, and I believe that’s primarily what gets people into Game Pass too.