The excitement of F1 racing is unattainable to most people, which is why it makes sense as a game, but bikes are pretty tame. However, one thing that makes bikes interesting is their smallness, ease and simplicity. The Yakuza series has started picking up on giving protagonists such small vehicles, including a skateboard and a segway, and they make much more sense within those worlds than full vehicles.
I feel like this could be envisioned as part of a larger open-world game, not as the vehicle itself as a means to fun. Something like: You have an open world game, and it has cars, and they are faster than your bike. But they are far more nimble, can go in tighter areas, and can be stored in larger vehicles used to get around. So, something like picking the Gravity Gun in Half-Life 2, they’re a tool that’s fantastic for making use of the environment for better results, but not a “first-order strategy for movement”. This is even sometimes how they work out in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.
Something I’ve picked up on with my gaming preference is stories that don’t simply focus on one “mood” for the game, but alter it to fit the situation. Players get a relaxed time exploring or diving into combat, and the world is inviting and colorful, but when the story builds, it puts brutal tests of character in front...
I didn’t quite get that feeling with Breath of the Wild, but I’ve certainly had those moments where the theme of a ruined world absolutely ruined my emotional stakes, so I can understand it.
The opening lines of Nier Automata are nihilistic and signal 2B’s desire to just get death over with. Nothing in the whole game’s story brought this feeling back in the other direction, and as a result of an adventure spanning a gray and brown “Abandoned city and death” the optimistic ending absolutely didn’t hit with me. Hard to identify why my response was so different from everyone else’s.
The pointlessness of a fight amid a ruined world is also what makes me not care about a lot of uber-dark Soulslike games. I don’t see much of what I’m saving in most of those, and learning the lore behind all of Dark Souls’ endings reinforces that feeling.
It’s hard to tell which extreme is going to surprise people first with Valiant Hearts.
Like, it’s a WW1 game so of course you’re expecting it to be brutal. Then, it’s cute to have so many stories of soldiers not based around killing people - just adventure, puzzle-solving, making friends across country lines, as well as the heartfelt letters written.
Then it gets to Chemin des Dames, and holy shit, not even the most brutal shooters evoke the unfathomable amounts of death happening in those meat grinders. Neither element would’ve hit so hard without the other giving you that kind of whiplash.
The only real lesson here might be that both Western media as a whole, and the Eastern anime industry, have regressed a lot. Rambo in particular is marked by tragedy with the way sequels warped him into a false image of raw masculinity. Many anime authors have even said as much. But the Eastern gaming scene appears to still have some very dedicated auteurs.
It’s even sort of harmed the feminist movement for Western media to be so simple - often showing women as unemotional, infallible badasses to try to “equal the score”, ultimately just causing people to hate them and even misconstrue women as being the issue with those movies.
But I’m also glad to get more examples of poignant Western media; I felt upset that I could only think of Eastern examples, when I know there are some great ones made more locally.
If you’re able to get a good internet connection, you could run anything on Geforce Now’s list. Not the most optimal gaming experience, but it can be satisfying enough.
To give something more specific I enjoy, try Backpack Hero. It’s a roguelike on the easier side, built around making absurd combos.
That might be underselling how big the series is - not to mention that many of them have been completely re-done in HD so they’re no longer on GBA graphics.
These are generally pretty big games. A lot of “mystery” games are about one mystery, but every AA game has at least 4, the last of each game being a giant epic journey.
I had this exact issue with the first two Dark Souls games. I explored, but did not find the “intended path forward” that would give me a gradual difficulty curve.
This is why I think a better game formula is: Give players some kind of overt objective marker or in-world guidance for their primary destination, but also point out they’re going to start having a very hard time if they never explore for themselves.
I’ve been playing Battlefield-like Wild Assault, and each time I die, the difficulty of reviving me helps me to realize how out of position I was. Other times when I was popping from cover and got hit by a rusher, a teammate quickly retaliates and then revives me.
The game also has some crazy moments with the healer’s ultimate, which revives people they’re standing on while the healer can keep shooting.
I mean, if digital games were always excluded from this form of preservation, and digital game cards are just a step up in terms of store discoverability, I think it did.
They’re obviously incredibly inferior to full game cards. They’re not much better than digital games, but they’re better than “We’re not releasing on Nintendo Switch because no one will see us in the eshop and since the game sells for $10 we can’t afford game cartridges.”
“And at least part of that plan involves AI”, reads the subtitle. To be clear, not an endorsement from me. Some of this reads very strangely to me, but this is boots on the ground reporting from Gamescom of developer sentiment....
I definitely want to see more publisher-driven “game experiments”. Imagine a studio putting out a 3-hour vertical slice of a PS2-era-style experimental game idea for $5. Now imagine, a publisher puts out about 20 of these such games a year (and mostly loses money on them - since $5 isn’t a lot and those 3-hour segments need polish) but then, occasionally one of them hits it big - and then the publisher grants them a greenlight to make a trilogy of 14-hour games after figuring out that people enjoy it.
To clarify, the idea would be to have smaller studios each independently making games. So for half a year, one studio may only have the responsibility of a single 3-hour demo.
I might’ve tried out Nikki if it’d been okay with some amount of “sexy” outfits - like, I know not to expect any bikini-model type of garb, but there’s still a midpoint that could feel appealing but also classy.
Either way - still a gacha game with a pretty incomprehensible story.
While I’m not a furry, Steam has some interesting titles on offer from Anthrocon, even if you just find animals to be a unique aesthetic choice for characters. I’m an Ace Attorney fan, so I got the demo for “Dragon Detective” which just released yesterday.
In other gaming news, the demo for Trails in the Sky’s remake is out. In typical JRPG fashion, reports say the demo covers about 6 hours of content.
So many people online seem to already complain about Silent Hill f out of a few details coming out of trailers. I honestly think the game looks sick and I can’t wait to play it, expecially considering the writer’s good reputation....
Damn man, I love Resident Evil and have never finished an SH game, but we have so many of the former (especially considering the indie scene) this seems like an excessively presumptuous comment.
The MISSING: J J Macfield and the Island of Memories is a great one.
EndingPsyche. Though much of the dialog and written messages could lead you, like myself, to believe Macfield is a closeted lesbian undergoing community/family abuse for her quiet obsessions with a girl…it’s actually the less common form of LGBT. Macfield is a closet trans woman; much of the game’s horrific bodily mutilation themes take a stand-in for the dysphoria of being uncomfortable in her own masculine body. Of course, many of the same types who’d retch at a gay protagonist would throw up at the idea of being someone they didn’t identify with - which ironically is exactly what the game is teaching you.
I remember when dinoflask did YTPs of Overwatch’s lead designer, he poked fun at how, whenever the game needed a progressive image boost, they would retcon a character to be gay at random. He sentence-mixed something like “Our fans are always wondering who’s going to be gay on our next update.”
I’m in a perspective of hoping for more romantic subplots of any kind. I never played through any generation of RPGs that made those popular, and when they were there, they were hastily written in, or just optional.
It’s why I’m excited for a certain JRPG remake that puts one such relation (between a guy and a girl) front and center, so much so that it becomes a driving element of the story. Those who know, know I suppose.
One thing that helps in its case is, it doesn’t advertise on the box “Romance 1-1000 characters!!” IMO, a good romantic plot sneaks up on you after you’ve invested in the characters.
Honestly, I suppose FF7 is another great example, but I was thinking of the Trails in the Sky remake due out in a month or two.
Sorry if that’s a vague spoiler. It wasn’t even something I knew about the game playing through, but the slow-impact delivery of it worked fantastically.
Perfect for reviews like “Game is great, visuals are great, no bugs, it’s very fun, but the developer was not polite enough to the glorious Chinese Communist Party, and was a week late on providing a Chinese translation. Never support these xenophobes.”
God I wish I was exaggerating. Chinese gamers seem to have a huge victim complex.
Wtf, Azure was the worst of those issues. Crossbell gets attacked by about a dozen villains, and your police squadron never gets to actually “defeat” any of them until the very last chapter.
I’m interested in this one, but honestly a bit worried about increased realism effects.
The original was surprisingly VERY detailed about things like facial expressions in 2D character portraits - a good thing when the game has so many moments of growth and heartbreak. I’m a little worried about how well they’ll imitate a lot of that with increased graphics.
But hey, maybe I should play the demo to find out.
EDIT: Just learned that they’ve replaced the iconic line “Why is my present a BOY!??” with the generic “Who is this BOY!??” in the name of translation accuracy.
I know it’s a silly line but I have always feared interfacing with religious “translation accuracy” folks. Without translation liberties, we’d have Naruhodo Ryuichi declaring an “Igyari!” which is Japanese for Contradiction, instead of Phoenix Wright famously shouting Objection. That makes me very worried about the enjoyability of the rest of the script. We’re definitely not going to get any empty-chest messages.
How well they reproduce some of those key drama stings is definitely key to the game’s rating imo.
A lot of game directors don’t quite appreciate just how short scenes like FF7’s death of Aeris are; or what made them compelling even with poor visuals on a struggling console. I’m a little bit worried some of these scenes will get over-acted, and leave players kind of “done with the scene” before they’ve wrapped up. Trails has way too much dialogue overall, but it ends up working well when it gives you a series of huge “WHAM” moments, and the credits are rolling before you’ve fully parsed it.
spoilerBut now that I think about it, they could likely wind down some of Weissman’s speech during his reveal.
I mean, I kind of guessed this way back when Collective Shout pushed their action.
I actually had a comment removed here on Lemmy when I brought up how this was “US politics/elections affecting your life as gamers”, because the mods insisted it was purely an Australian action, and my comment was off-topic. But we live in a global online world. There’s no way that US politics wouldn’t have a huge effect on this type of censorship.
What I gather from the linked conversation: (In regards to a joke where a boy turns out to have a polygamous dad)
Sure, but that’s universal. Most of the Islamic theocratic have this problem, and it’s a point of general focus… but Islam is their excuse, not a functional cause. It’s not like Mormons did it any better.
Islamic theocratics are not the same as muslims. Theocracy is where the law of one’s god is seen as the ruling body, and tend to be more of the extremists of a religion - in Islam’s case, the ones more likely to use religion as a weapon of power to have multiple wives. Nothing in that conversation came across as “Being pro-Islam is being anti-feminism”.
I’d also point out, the user made several efforts to ask for better explanation from those disagreeing, but everyone was just digging for more words from him instead of discussing openly. This is how disagreement is manufactured.
You’re claiming a pattern, but so far I’ve only been pointed to one example. On the other hand, the other participant in that conversation, you, has been posting giant screengrabs of this individual where they are claiming…that we shouldn’t generalize evil groups?
I’m all too aware of how people can “Sealion” the energy out of a discussion. But even your choice examples aren’t painting yourself in the best light here, nor a very strong impression towards Zorque. I could yet be convinced, but not so far.
That’s fine, just have the AIs book random meetings with each other, while the humans meet for human meetings. Then bill the AI companies a full convention ticket for each AI that attended the other AIs’ meetings.
Spoilers for Alyx for all those without VR headsetsHonestly, all it’s doing is retconning the ending of Episode 2 in a slightly different way while still presenting that cliffhanger. It made me lose a lot of faith in their writers, and it will be hell to explain such a janky twist to non-VR players.
I would hope most of the industry learned a big lesson from Apex Legends. The day before its release, no one knew of its existence. The sole reason that it blew up was because it was fun.
Viral sharing of interactivity is likely the most cost effective way to run a marketing campaign for games - not bus ads, pre-order hype, etc. In other words, Make good games.
I negative-one that recommendation. Game is very hard to play well when you’re new; I’m used to lots of games in that style and GTFO was impossible; always hard to tell what players should be doing and is very unforgiving. Unless both players are hardcore gamers I wouldn’t recommend it.
I would say it’s no coincidence we’ve seen a drought of good singleplayer games around the same time as a drought of console exclusives.
Technology-wise, there’s no “reason” to buy any particular console. They’re all PCs. So, console makers have to invent that reason; and little things like a screenshot button, or family features, don’t pull people into the store. Exclusive games do.
And one key thing is, those exclusive games can’t be F2P microtransactions-laden casinos or live-service games. No one is spending $500 just to play something free; they’ll try to install that on a device they have. The exclusives have to be full, complete, well-voice-acted, well-written masterpieces respected by the gaming public - making anyone without that console envious.
But couldn’t devs just sell those games without making them exclusive? Perhaps not. Look at the credits for the latest God of War and you get a sense of how much they’re spending to make those types of games.
Yes, the game alone is still profitable. But A) It’s paying for a dozen failures Sony has also put out - no-name experiments they greenlit, and B) It might not be as profitable as many other reliable industries investors could put their money into. Why not just buy an index fund?
Thankfully, the equation works out better for indie studios; their games aren’t so massive as to need to account for millions in costs. So we’ll keep getting those. But big-budget singleplayer arrangements aren’t as likely when they’re not pushing some bigger product like a game console.
FedNow is an option within the USA that uses a government-provided system to cheaply transfer money, and a number of banks have signed on. It’s not in use because it’s not as universally available yet.
I enjoyed this one a lot, but I eventually got stuck on a yeti boss, and quit.
It felt like his next move was somewhat randomized, and you needed to react in much less than a second to the type of move he was doing. While a lot of bosses develop patterns you can get used to, I couldn’t form any rules in my mind that could account for my reflexes not improving.
I could also point out: If the main sales race was for the gold-plated base copy of a game, instead of nickel and dining people who only have nickels and dimes, then it’s possible we would have a gaming world entirely focused on churning out AAAA singleplayer experiences, back to putting out trilogies of obscure gaming experiences.
This is not blaming gamers for not accepting higher prices for incomplete games; publishers moved where the money was, and I don’t blame them. I blame the rest of OTHER industries for not updating their wages so the world is livable and people have extra for entertainment.
That’s the thing, a lot of investors almost don’t like the idea that video games are low budget. They want to be able to double their funding and quadruple their success, like with a lot of growth properties.
According to a recent fan poll on Rankiwiki, gamers voted on their favorite titles among the highest-grossing video games. The results put “Minecraft” at the top, followed by “Fortnite” and “Grand Theft Auto V”....
I’ve heard that there’s a huge market for Hidden Object games. Like, double-digit percentage of the market.
Often the “mainstream, hardcore soulslike” gamer section of the market that’s targeted for discussion only ends up being a part of it. Most people who have a family member with a PlayStation are more likely to have a row of the latest sports games than anything else popular.
What sucks on my end is that this has only been the latest in a long chain of reasons to boycott Microsoft - so I can’t exactly claim, if they take a step back from “Systematically murdering innocent people” then I’ll go back to giving them money.
Battledield now throwing an error because Valorant is already sitting in kernel memory. Time to buy your EA Battlefield PC but don’t forget your Valorant PC
I mean, it’s like saying Pentagon security can’t work because some skilled hackers can someday find a way to spoof / steal credentials. Security always happens on a sliding scale based on the value of the contents.
I think at the very least, they can take steps that inconvenience hackers sufficiently each update without harming players - they can’t make it impossible to hack on the client side, but they can’t make it feel not worth it for them.
The reason I sort of insist on it is that even with serverside checks for game logic like teleportation and instant kills, game engines still load the data for player positions which allow for wallhacks and aimhacks. Those checks can only happen clientside; you can’t even send mouse positions often enough to look for “snaps”.
At the least, I agree that modern coders have gotten very lazy about having the server verify basic actions. “Okay, player 22 deals 8000 damage to every other player in the server simultaneously? Okay.”
What did James Gunn say about superhero movies? It’s not that the trend is over and people hate these games. It’s that they hate BAD games.
Plus, I’ve been buying plenty of indies that likely don’t feed into these statistics. It’s not even a hipster thing now - a lot of streamers just like playing the newest indie coop like REPO, Peak, Phasmophobia or Lethal Company.
Four wheels good, two wheels bad: why are there no exciting cycling games? (www.theguardian.com) angielski
What games have mastered "Both emotional extremes"? angielski
Something I’ve picked up on with my gaming preference is stories that don’t simply focus on one “mood” for the game, but alter it to fit the situation. Players get a relaxed time exploring or diving into combat, and the world is inviting and colorful, but when the story builds, it puts brutal tests of character in front...
Suggest some games according to my laptop's hardware angielski
Title says it all.
[Humble Bundle] Duo of Justice: Ace Attorney and Mega Man (www.humblebundle.com) angielski
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/35092759...
Duality of Gamer angielski
A message from the medic angielski
Nintendo Switch 2 game-key cards not eligible for preservation by Japan’s National Diet Library, officials say (automaton-media.com) angielski
At Gamescom, it felt like the industry now has a plan: make games quicker | Opinion (www.gamesindustry.biz) angielski
“And at least part of that plan involves AI”, reads the subtitle. To be clear, not an endorsement from me. Some of this reads very strangely to me, but this is boots on the ground reporting from Gamescom of developer sentiment....
Random Things that I never expected: Infinity Nikki × Stardew Valley Collab Trailer (www.youtube.com) angielski
Weekly Recommendations Thread: What are you playing this week? angielski
cross-posted from: sh.itjust.works/post/44554525
Why do new Silent Hill entries attract so much negativity? angielski
So many people online seem to already complain about Silent Hill f out of a few details coming out of trailers. I honestly think the game looks sick and I can’t wait to play it, expecially considering the writer’s good reputation....
Whine harder you assholes angielski
Steam: Updates to User Review Scores Based on Language (store.steampowered.com) angielski
I know I’m late to the party but I just found out and didn’t find a post regarding this...
Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter adds Switch 2 version; ‘Prologue’ demo now available for PS5, Switch, and PC (www.gematsu.com) angielski
It Turns Out, Steam’s Adult Content Ban Has Been Plotted For A Year And Is Spearheaded By One Of Project 2025’s Leading Voices (www.thegamer.com) angielski
Anyone know if this is true or not?
AI at the World’s Biggest Games Event(Gamescom) Booked Random Meetings for Attendees angielski
cross-posted from: programming.dev/post/36027977...
LEGO® Batman™: Legacy of the Dark Knight - Official Reveal Trailer (www.youtube.com) angielski
Hollow Knight: Silksong - Special Announcement Stream (starts in 48 hours) (www.youtube.com) angielski
NOT a joke this time. It's happening. It's really happening. SILKSONG IS REAL.
90% of Games Developers Already Using AI in Workflows, According to New Google Cloud Research (www.googlecloudpresscorner.com) angielski
cross-posted from: programming.dev/post/35911830...
Discoverability is the industry’s "Achilles’ heel," marketing survey finds (www.gamesindustry.biz) angielski
Spooky co-op games for me and my girl? angielski
Right now we’re playing “I’m on observation duty” but it’s not “technically” two player, anyone got any good ones, new or classic, we could play?
Fairgame$ Has Been Canceled, Too, According to Michael Pachter, Who Says Sony Has ‘Lost Its Way’ (wccftech.com) angielski
archive.ph/UDHc9
Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy (www.polygon.com) angielski
Weekly Recommendations Thread: What are you playing this week? angielski
cross-posted from: sh.itjust.works/post/43998814
Wuchang: Fallen Feathers Has Made Certain Bosses And NPCs Unkillable Following Backlash In China (www.thegamer.com) angielski
Game prices should have increased with every new generation, former PlayStation US boss says (www.videogameschronicle.com) angielski
[Discussion] Ranking the highest-grossing video games angielski
According to a recent fan poll on Rankiwiki, gamers voted on their favorite titles among the highest-grossing video games. The results put “Minecraft” at the top, followed by “Fortnite” and “Grand Theft Auto V”....
Arkane employees demand Microsoft sever ties with Israeli military: 'We don’t want to be part of this sinister project for Gaza' (www.pcgamer.com) angielski
Final Fantasy X programmer doesn’t get why devs want to replicate low-poly PS1 era games. “We worked so hard to avoid warping, but now they say it’s charming” - AUTOMATON WEST (automaton-media.com) angielski
Begun the kernel wars have angielski
Battledield now throwing an error because Valorant is already sitting in kernel memory. Time to buy your EA Battlefield PC but don’t forget your Valorant PC
18+ Gen Z Is Cutting Back On Video Game Purchases (www.vice.com) angielski
'Consumers are not okay with okay': Take-Two boss says BioShock 4 is taking so long because the company's goal is 'to make the best entertainment, not necessarily the most entertainment' (www.pcgamer.com) angielski