Kolanaki

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

The protagonist V was without any compassion, just a loud asshole.

Would this not be mostly up to the player, since you control what V says when you pick dialogue options like any other RPG? If you play him without any compassion, of course he will sound that way.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

Progress Quest.

It’s certainly funny but it is not a fun game. It plays itself. Literally. That’s the point. It was something you ran along side with your mIRC client to show your uptime in a fun way.

I don’t find any of those kinds of games fun. From Cookie Clicker to most mobile games, “idle games” are just the most unfun, un-game-like games ever made.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

I would say it was the grandaddy of idle games. It was made as a joke, but actual games have followed its model seriously. And it sucks. It parodies JRPGs, many of which had an auto-battle option. But that was still just an option, and they typically had stories and other fun things about them.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

There are tools that you can use to grab mp3’s by feeding it a Spotify playlist though.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

The one place I need a map is the confusing ass labyrinths that are the dungeons. My only complaint about the gameplay so far is the dungeon layouts are nonsensical and confusing. I actually have to use the scanner to find a way through everything.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

By what metrics do they use to even tell a player is a smurf to be able to take action against them?

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

I haven’t followed professional outlets for a long time. It’s pretty obvious most of them do not have enough time to give a proper review to these massive, 120+ hour long games. I used to read Computer Gaming World. Their reviewers would often mention that their rules required them to complete the game. Most of the reviews I see today, they don’t even necessarily get the whole fuckin’ game in their review copy. Just look at BG3.

Phenomenal game, with a solid story, incredible characters, fun game play, and just… Bugs. Lotta bugs. Especially after the first act. You might not even realize you are getting them because so many are that things that should happen, don’t. The reviews for it clearly only covered the first, most polished act. And even then, they didn’t actually mention bugs there and while it’s the most polished, it is still far from perfect. As time goes on and more people push further into the game, now those same review outlets put out editorials reporting on players bitching about the bugs on social media. Things that should have been covered in their own official reviews in the first damn place.

If all they’re going to do is write a bunch of bullshit they were likely paid to say, and then rely on users to generate more “news” content for them, I’m just going to stick with going straight to other players. There are still plenty that think for themselves and give honest, detailed descriptions of the game while trying to limit their personal opinions and bias. I want to be told how the thing actually is and make my own mind up based on my opinions; reviews can be objective.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu (edited 9 miesięcy temu)

Only multiplayer games, since a single player game is usually available forever someway or another. Multiplayer games live and die based on popularity. No players = no game. And the longer the game is around, the fewer players it generally has so I like to get in right when they come out if I’m interested at all.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu (edited 9 miesięcy temu)

What friends?

Seriously: I’ve had friends talk me into getting stuff; but not from a fear of missing out. My friends were never really gamers. Half the shit they recommended to me I was already into or didn’t give a single fuck about lol

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

It’s just that people who paid less need to wait.

I paid $0 and I’m playing it too 😉

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu (edited 9 miesięcy temu)

Well… Confirmed what I had feared. They heavily rely on dynamic resolution and DLSS/FSR instead of real optimization. Meet most of the recommended specs, except the GPU. I’ve got a 1660 Super and even on low settings @1080p, the game runs anywhere between 25 and 60 fps. And it’s like… Backwards from what I would expect. Indoor areas are the slower areas, while outdoors is nice and snappy. But it looks blurry as fuck with the resolution scale at anything other than 100%, and even ultra settings do not put it that high.

That said, it is still playable without having to mod in lower textures and reducing clutter. Which is more than I can say about Fallout 4 at release, and I had the exact recommended specs for that one back then.

First game since I built this machine to run this poorly with settings this low. Even Baldur’s Gate 3, which looks way better, runs so much better at Ultra settings than Starfield does at the minimum.

Other than that, the setting feels pretty bland, which is not what I expected considering the passionate way they talked at lengths about it. It’s all very generic and very obviously just trying to make every fun sci-fi trope they like stick. I am not playing for the story or the writing, but the world building is usually one of their best features… This one is pretty lackluster with the world building, and so far has not really drawn me in.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu (edited 9 miesięcy temu)

I mean… Yes, but I would have expected it to not run at all. It runs playable. Which is crazy for it not only being an unsupported GPU, but also a BGS game. It wasn’t meant as a bash, other than it probably could have been supported if they didn’t use DLSS/FSR as a crutch. It was praise for the stability actually being fucking solid for once.

Complaints about the looks still stand (don’t need to have high fps to see the world looking nice in a still frame lol). At its best, it looks 5 years old. I’ve seen better recently, so it’s kind of disappointing.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

They would be identical, assuming they are both actually modified to allow for the proper airspeed, since they are still both in the Source engine. You couldn’t surf in either with the default movement settings.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

Does this mean I can pirate it early? 😮

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

I got nothing to care about. I can nuke my drives at any time and not feel the loss. Plus Dauphong has never let me down.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu (edited 9 miesięcy temu)

Nothing popped up when scanning it. Not even the crack being flagged as a crack.

Game runs like ass tho. Everything but my GPU meets recommended. I still have a 1660 Super. Get anywhere between 30 and 60 with low settings, depending on where I am and what’s going on. First game in a while to just cripple my shit. 😩

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

It’s weird how being in a small room gets me about 32 fps, but then going outside into a forest I get 60. Usually it’s the other way around, with interiors being the faster zone. 🤷🏻‍♂️

I’ve seen some others getting similar results on a 3080 with the same CPU (Rysen 5 3600X) I have though, so now I’m not even sure upgrading my hardware would make a difference and it’s probably just classic Bethesda optimizations.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

Baldur’s Gate 3 is currently taking up all the storage space I would give to Bethesda’s sci-fi RPG.

Damn dude. You only have ~200GB of storage space? Upgrade your HDD/SSD, for real. I don’t even review games for a living and I have 2.5TB. I can definitely fit both games. And then some.

This artificial battle of the VASTLY DIFFERENT STYLE RPGs is fucking bizarre and just a made up issue to get clicks, I swear to Christ.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

Lmao

It was already cracked 2 days ago when the early access for the big pre-order set went live. I’ve been playing it the whole time.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

It’s “free” on PS+ right now. I would wager that’s how OP is playing it.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

Damn. Lost an imaginary bet 🤣

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

if I had the 2k for a gaming PC, that would almost last a console generation

I paid ~$850 total for my rig, in 2018, and it’s still going strong. Might not have RTX, but from what I’ve seen on my PS5, not only do games barely use RTX, very few of those that do use it in a way that makes a visual difference.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

You could get literally any current generation card, or even a previous gen card, and not only will it last 4-5 years, you probably won’t even have to lower settings over time. Big leaps in graphics aren’t happening like they used to. The only new tech that came out between getting my GPU and now is raytracing. Pretty much every brand new game still defaults to Ultra settings, and I get pretty and high fps in everything I can throw at it, save for a few games that perform horribly on everything (like ARMA 3).

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

How the heck does the engine break down after level 12? What the fuck even is this engine?

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

Lmao

I still haven’t played 5e on paper. Just BG3. I am a 3.5/Pathfinder lover. I know those rules and lore way more since I’ve played it for years. Feels weird to stop now.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

I’ve heard that high level D&D sucks ever since I got into D&D back in 2e, so I don’t know if 5e truly sucks, or it’s just continued player sentiment toward something that’s always been, IMO, misunderstood.

Personally, I fucking love epic level shit. Starting at 20 and using the epic level book to go further is awesome. The problem I see, though, is DMs quite often don’t think epic enough. They think too small scale and it sucks for everyone because

1. There’s a lot to keep track of on a single character. So many spells and abilities at that point, and if you’ve never really played a lot of high level stuff, you can get choice paralysis or just not know how some of your stuff really works.
2. Strength. What’s a challenge? Quite often when I see what others are using in their high level campaigns, they are just poorly balanced large scale battles or a single big monster and not really thought out. If your party has close to God like powers, they should be fighting actual gods.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

In that respect I get it. I wouldn’t even expect Wish it many other spells to be in a CRPG or if it was, it would be way more limited (as they would obviously only program so many actions you could even make). The rules always break down in a CRPG when the PnP game has next to no limits with imagination. A computer game has to be thought about in advance, with limited ability to flex on things that might make sense in the moment that can be ruled on the fly. Not to mention different interpretations of vaguer/not well written rules.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

I feel like the only one who still remembers that DLC simply means “DownLoadable Content” and can apply equally to big expansions as it does to MTX. The name comes from the delivery method more than the content itself. Keep in mind, it was first coined when the primary method of content delivery was selling shit on a disc, so easily distinguished from things you could buy in the store irl vs what only was available as a download.

The infrastructure of the Internet at the time made it easier for this to be smaller things. But now? Dude, we are downloading 120GB games and sometimes updates off Steam and nobody is batting an eye anymore. lol

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

Don’t even need to be a specific rule player to know that. The actual PnP games are limitless. You literally can do anything you can imagine. You can easily make a new rule to handle stuff the books don’t cover. Video games can’t. Not with the same fluidity, anyway. I would expect the simple mathematics to be handled, along with spells and abilities that work in a CRPG. It’s amazing they even have Speak to Animals. I mean, it’s a simple concept, but you have to then also write dialogue for every animal you place in the game. Otherwise, the spell becomes worthless. That’s a lot of work I don’t usually expect from video games, despite it being something I love to see.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

Is that not the point? To go from struggling against the lowest foes to being equal to the toughest? Sometimes I wonder if the disconnect is between the game and the narrative. I’m in the, seemingly, minority camp of favoring the game side. The narrative is merely the vessel allows the game to flow and not the other way around. I construct sandboxes rather than linear stories. The stories come from the players and how they want to interact with the world, the consequences of their actions, and so on. As a DM, I provide the world at large, what’s currently happening in that world, and the moderation of the rules to facilitate the players telling their own stories, instead of having one I am merely telling them. I personally think this brings more life to the game. Players can become immersed more easily when they are thinking about what they are trying to do, and the dynamics of multiple players pulling the story this way and that just makes for a more compelling narrative.

It sounds like 5e is also just not balanced on the game side. Which was my problem with 4e, too and why I haven’t really tried 5.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu (edited 10 miesięcy temu)

I don’t blame the lack of good shooters on consoles. Consoles never interfered with that before. I blame the popularity of Battle Royale. Everything is a fucking BR now. And it’s not like they just took the gameplay style; they also took the jank.

All the best new shooters are indy developed boomer shooters with retro aesthetics. And I’m getting kinda over that, too. The genre needs some new ideas.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

It’s not exactly isometric considering you can tilt and zoom the camera and get it all the way down to over the shoulder adventure style, allowing you to see off into those beautiful vistas. It has some performance issues even on PC in some places like the mountains and the namesake city.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

It’s been a while since I went through the whole of Skyrim.and Fallout 4, but I could have sworn they still played the credits and just spit you back out in the game world afterward. Fallout 4 I usually stop doing the MQ once I have all the factions appearing in random patrols. Finishing it means one or more stop spawning, and I like the chaos.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

Kinda hard to update discs you’ve already printed.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu (edited 10 miesięcy temu)

I think it’s kind of just an archaic holdover. They have a deadline for publishing the game physically, and while it usually extends to digitally as well, you can update the digital thing. If you get the game directly on Steam or something, you probably won’t even notice the day 1 patch being installed on top of the game, since in many cases it is integrated with the main download and not separate patches you get sequentially.

All day 1 patches truly mean is that they continue working on the game even after the deadline to begin printing the physical copies in time for release.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

Before digital was a thing, game companies had to fully test their games before releasing because there was no way to patch it later.

https://media.tenor.com/wIxFiobxxbIAAAAd/john-jonah-jameson-lol.gif

You clearly weren’t actually around back then lol

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

Ah yeah, I guess that is true. I think Nintendo really clamped down on quality assurance due to the fact they rose up from the ashes of the Atari era and the global video game crash of the 80’s, that was directly attributed to a lack of quality assurance in the industry.

PC games, though… Oh boy. They were doing way more cool stuff, taking the tech to its limit, but they also tended to be smaller teams from garage companies, so had less resources for QA. Though it still was pretty rare to get a brand new game that straight up didn’t work. I think the only time that had ever happened to me was with Anarchy Online. I bought it retail the day of launch; that shit didn’t even install correctly. I couldn’t play it for a whole year, at which point they patched it and also put up a digital download cuz the physical media was botched.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

Not for PC games.

I remember things like… Different ammo types in Fallout not actually working correctly. Armor Piercing rounds actually do less damage because the calculation is fucked up in the code. Or the biggest fuck up: The slides playing incorrectly if you manage to solve the Gecko/Vault City issue flawlessly. It still plays the ending cards as if you sided with Vault City, instead of getting them to work together peacefully by replacing the president of VC.

Many infinity engine RPGs have game breaking scripting bugs that needed patching or still haven’t been fixed even through user mods.

Anarchy Online straight up couldn’t be installed because the physical media was screwed up. Bought it day 1; didn’t play it until a full year after release when they finally put a fixed installer up for download.

World of Warcraft: Burning Crusade had an issue much like AO’s, with physical media being printed incorrectly and not working.

Just go and find playthroughs of some of these old classics. They just work around the issues. That’s what you had to do. In some cases, like soloing BG1 and 2, these issues were the only reason challenges were possible. lol

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

The differences in playing at launch vs after patch 1 are insane. My first time through the game, I kept thinking things were a little off and just thought it was simply weird writing that assumed too narrow of a range of player actions. Turns out half of the shit I was doing was accounted for, but the scripts or cutscenes weren’t triggering properly.

I had gotten through the entire game pretty early because of my obsessive way of gaming, and tried to bring up all the broken shit a bunch of times and was downvoted and dismissed as contrarian.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

I had a laugh when everyone had !'s and I go talk to them and they are all commenting on the death of Shadowhart, but every single time, you can see Shadowhart just vibing in the background because I prevented Lae’zel from killing her.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

It happens like an hour into the beginning of the game and the spoiler tags don’t work. Jeez.

Kolanaki, 9 miesięcy temu

Possibly tied to how deep into interactions with them you’ve had. If you keep them together in the party and not just at the camp, they argue a lot. Though with the bugs, it could have simply not been triggering. After patch 1, there are so many scenes I never saw my first 2 times through despite doing pretty much the same exact things in the same exact order until the goblin camp.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

many sandwiches to collect

“You can’t just stick a hunk of mirelurk meat between two slices of bread and call it a sandwich!”

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

I don’t really want to hear my character talk in an RPG where I am making the character and supposedly have my own background, look and sound in mind and am the one selecting what that character says. Unless if they have tons of different voices, like old Bioware RPGs did, I would prefer to just read it myself and give whatever voice I want. It immerses me in the game much more, where I feel like the character I am playing because I am given opportunity to say the dialogue choices my self.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

Alpha Centauri +4.37LY

Man, this is some BULLSHIT. Why do the Alpha Centaurians have to wait so long?

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

And a parsec isn’t a unit of distance but that didn’t stop Han Solo from completing the Kessel run in fewer than 12.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

It’s not a link; i was saying the Internet connection is only even mentioned because of the Bethesda.net service and access to the Steam Workshop; both are for getting mods, and Bethesda.net is also where you’d get paid cosmetics and whatnot if they have them. It’s not required to play, which is why it’s only in recommended.

Kolanaki, 10 miesięcy temu

Knowing you can fuck the bear isn’t the same as knowing what it is like to fuck the bear. I’m glad I know fucking the bear is possible, because now I can go fuck it.