Looking at the world rn, I dont think things have a tendency to get better on their own. In a decade or two people won't even believe we lived in the wild west era of internet where you could just get stuff for free without a subscription, online connection or drm.
Seems like gaming piracy is really dying this time for sure. Most sites are compromised and untrustworthy, big teams are retiring, the one remaining denuvo cracker that i heard of is apparently psychotic... It doesn't seem like it bodes well
I guess, but the fact they are now laying people off is for sure a sign that things aren't going well enough. CR might live the rest of his life in a mansion but his legacy is in a crapper and he's not gonna get another chance at this (at least I hope people wouldn't fall for it twice).
The only part I believed they might actually deliver on since it isn't boggled down by network issues, but I guess even that was too much to hope for. I still remember the 2018 lie of "it's weeks away from being shown" only for them to not show anything or the next 5 years. If it weren't that troublesome to get it (and it's a small sum anyway) I'd probably fight for a refund out of principle alone.
Well this article is kinda saying that they are barely keeping their head above water as it is, and CIG is vastly mismanaging money and driving development heavily on how many ships they can sell in that year.
So if anything I'd say that this strategy doesn't seem to be working out for them anymore
It is very charming and enjoyable but there's little to do in the endgame, and it kinda starts to get tedious even in midgame tbh. Everything else is pretty much perfect though, good performance, UI, modding support, lots of freedom and creativity when it comes to designing settlements... Just don't expect it to be too complex or demanding at any point.
As I often do, I recommend giving Riftbreaker a try if you want a more action/combat oriented base builder. Good devs, regular updates and streams, mod support, fair pricing and there's an upcoming co-op mode (within a year hopefully?). I've played a long time and I always go back to it for a while when it gets some new updates.
This truly seems like a cursed genre - I was really hoping to get some alternative warframe-adjacent game to play during content droughts but it seems it's not meant to be. Looks like another mmo-lite looter shooter that seems to have missed its mark, both in terms of gameplay, grind and monetization.
It is still in early access (that you have to pay to access) but it's supposed to be released and f2p within a year so we'll see what happens then.
The only way they could be seen as an important part of the game is if you play games to play dressup.
You really shouldn't be but I feel you'd be surprised how many people, especially MMORPG players, care about this. I personally play GW2 a lot and since there's no gear treadmill unlocking cosmetics is one of the main goals you can actually do there, to show off your accomplishments or hard work. Ofc it's not the only thing keeping players engaged but it is a major part of it.
Besides, if it didn't matter to players then it wouldn't be monetized as much in the first place. So whenever I see this argument "well its just cosmetics so it doesnt matter:", I get kinda frustrated because obviously it matters, obviously it works which is why it's still a thing to monetize so much.
It's nice to see Northgard is still going strong, I'm pleasantly surprised it's still being supported so much. At this rate Dune is never going to catch up in terms of content and polish!
Definitely a day 1 purchase for me as well, no other game has the same amount of love and polish as Factorio does, both when it comes to the vanilla game and mods, and I know they will deliver a good experience with the DLC as well.
However, I am worried if it's gonna be enough to stand out among other games in the genre. It has been many years since Factorio last got a substantial content update (maybe too many) and in the meantime we've got a lot of similarly-genred games like DSP or Satisfactory that have raised the bar in areas that Factorio lacked. I hope F:SA has enough meat on its bones to substantially change the core game rather than just more of what we've already played.
Technical issues can be patched afterwards, and in case of andromeda most were. I played it a year or two after it released when they practically gave it away for $5 on a sale or sth like that. The game still remained a shallow husk of an RPG though with few redeeming qualities besides a somewhat fun combat at times, and this is with me going into it with very low expectations. I'm glad you had more fun with it but I wouldn't call it a good game even if it didn't have to compete with its predecessors.