Given the swathes of posts about bad behavior from big companies, I figure we could counterbalance that with some positivity about stuff the smaller guys made that often costs us less too.
Oh, haha, a souls game but with crabs, funny parody haha!
Except, no, while it does seem like it would be compared to SpongeBob humor, and it does self censor “shit” to “ship”, the themes of the story go well beyond just “Crab must find his stolen shell!”
It takes time to ramp up but in some ways it feels like a better-written game than most Soulslikes (to me, that’s not a high bar given the way many of them wrap their lore in many layers of obfuscation that you don’t get to enjoy in the moment)
Watching speedruns and trying NG+ is also a lot of fun.
I have an idea for a game: It’s the usual “a princess is kidnapped by a dragon and a brave knight is on a quest to rescue her” story. But you (the player) plays as the princess, who is somehow helping the knight on his quest....
This is a problem a lot of VR games have to work with. They work best when you’re not adventuring around, so many of them prescribe a long set of challenges in a small space.
If the Princess gets any kind of ranged ability, you could make it like a sniping “puzzle” game across a wide parapet. And, if trying to elongate the game, come up with story reasons why just as the Knight opens the gate to her keep, he’s discovered and an evil dragon/Baron whisks her to a different tower. (Kinda like what Super Meat Boy does every level)
Seems like a goldmine of content for them to work on for the next decade+. Plenty of people will never experience these worlds or stories due to the turn-based combat, so giving them the Remake treatment could be the only way an audience ever finds them....
I still don’t understand the sentiment that turn-based doesn’t sell. We just got Clair Obscur breaking expectations.
Part of it is, you have to make the combat interesting visually, tactically, and sometimes even tactilely. Some games get that right: Persona 5, Like a Dragon, etc.
I would also go on a limb and say that 99.9% of strategy in turn taking games is terribly designed. Buff attack, use strongest attack. The one that I really wanted to see more of is a system like Cosmic Star Heroine’s.
Recently, Clair Obscur told another story of ex-publisher success. So far, we only know of the review success and I don’t actually know if it’s a financial success.
If it is, I can only hope it leads to some investor understanding in just how done the world is of lottery-planning in the game world; seeing one victory, and having every single publisher chase it.
I’m mostly PC. I have a PlayStation, and I just like the rental tryout system of PS+. I still think it’s a nicely cost effective way for someone new to gaming to try a lot of stuff.
But yes, even then you can often get much of the same through Steam key bundles.
Based on the article text, it’s only citing things like how long you play. I thought most games collected telemetry like this?
Don’t get me wrong, if it was scanning your drive to sell data to harvesters, I’d be extremely unnerved. And you should definitely be able to turn this off. But I feel like even Valve has recorded things like “60% of players quit after losing to this boss”
That’s the thing, though. I respect the analogy, but the equivalent here would be if the game was also checking your drive for other games, for financial apps, scanning your browser’s cookies to see which sites you visit, etc.
If, while playing a singleplayer game, they’re recording what actions you take within that singleplayer game, it’s understandable some people wouldn’t even want that - but I also don’t see that as nearly so invasive as other data travesties. Worse, highlighting it here feels like a “cry wolf” situation where you’d desensitize people to the most harmful privacy breaches.
I mean, there’s a fair reason most exclusivity is dead.
There’s a lot of cool PS4 games that just don’t run well on the PS4. So, it’s a much nicer experience to get them on PS5, at 60fps, full resolution, with instant load times.
It’s also honestly kinda nice that someone with low income can buy a used PS4 and still join for most of those games online.
If something that would normally be copyrightable is leaked, then the only people who have legal rights to that work are still the original owners. Anyone taking/sharing it is breaching copyright.
Different case for something someone recorded/created themselves, ex recording police abuse on their phone.
I know some people have a misguided view of “But you didn’t register copyright, it’s not copyrighted”. That’s the opposite of how it works. Rights are granted at time of creation; copyright is a “granted” right as part of sale/viewing managing how something can be shared.
Otherwise, a photographer that takes a picture of a rare Snipe can have that photo “legally” stolen before they make it to a lawyer.
If you’re trying to say that a recording of a video game is not considered fair use under copyright law, then I give you the existence of Youtube and Twitch as counter evidence.
So, funny you should say that…
This happened to Persona 5. Atlus felt that they had a legal basis to make copyright claims on the game - in their case, circumstantially around spoilers (I guess because they wanted people to pay $50 to experience the late-game story)
And they walked back, not because lawyers were dismantling their case, but because of public outcry. That basis of public preference is what has encouraged game studios to be friendly with Twitch / YouTube, not because judges would rubber-stamp any fair use “transformative work” argument. That is also why many games have given explicit notices to say “Content notice: Please feel free to share videos of this game wherever you’d like!” etc - as it is a non-default judgment.
So, as strange as it is to say, most uploaded videos of a game is in some murky legal territory. Obviously, most studios don’t care and even prefer them to be shared for visibility - or took the time to include those notices to make it 100% legal. But when the recording came from an internal build, the game itself is “stolen”, in that the person playing it breached either terms of viewing or terms of employment, and then the person re-uploading it is breaching copyright as they had no permission.
If you want to work it through the other way, permission to upload a work is non-default. You need to provide a basis it’s legal, not a basis it’s illegal. In many cases, it’s “I made this”. For 99.9% of video game content, it’s “the developer is okay with it”.
I think every few years I’m reminded this game exists, and go in to try to check it out - and I still have some account issue where my email is in use but it also won’t send a reset code.
I’m undoubtedly kind of frustrated about this “proving tariffs right” - but it remains to be shown whether this works. Very likely, even if/when they achieve scale, prices won’t come down for a very long time.
And it skips over the fact that there were so many ways to achieve this end without causing so much harm to so many industries that can’t do the same.
So in a lot of ways, it’s just the Asian term for loot box games, something that western games shied away from a bit after the Battlefront 2 controversy and EU attention, which Disney got embroiled in.
When that’s characters, I just accept it. Like, “Oh, I guess I don’t get to try out this character? I’ll level up others instead and see how well I can do.”
Given the tariff position, I’m curious if this will be the first time Nintendo decides to eat the loss on console hardware sales; something usually only other console makers have done.
Perhaps they think Trump will be on his way out. Or they’re eating into their cash reserves to prevent discussion of their consoles from getting political.
I just picked up the highly hyped Blue Prince. On the other hand reviews have also called it a very niche game. I like puzzle games to a certain extent and roguelikes, but these are subjective experiences....
Two hours is the length of some high-budget media; eg, movies and plays.
I know that some games are slow-burn, but that’s something people have to weigh themselves. Ideally, you’d enjoy the slow burn itself. When I tried to “force myself through to the Good Part of Nier Automata”, I ended up hating the whole thing.
I’m not even mad that we didn’t get the multiplanetary open world new-tech live-experience cooperative second coming. I’m mad we didn’t even get a simple, short singleplayer experience living off of the charm of the first one.
That’s the thing though; it has most definitely entered Duke Nukem Forever / No Man’s Sky levels of development hell wherein the result will never be satisfying. The best we can hope for is a Halo Infinite result where it’s “kinda fun” but inevitably comes nowhere near the hype.
My understanding is this has been the price of thousands of gaming communities enacting a “No politics” rule - people want to keep it external.
“This fucking piece of actual trash! He’s using the most broken character this game has ever put out, and trash talking over it like he’s ever fucked a woman. Literally eat a dick. What do you think, chat?…Oh. Holy shit. Sorry, I just saw some stuff about Trump, listen, I’m sorry, but we don’t talk politics here. It can get really toxic.”
Although we still number consoles, in a lot of ways we did get our “tiered” console structure.
Take most people’s daily plays, and I’d say about 90% of them or more have an edition available on the prior gen console. And it makes sense when so many of those games have relatively basic graphics - and when game engines have gotten better at scalability.
So, those consoles are neatly serving as a low budget option for a lot of gamers that can’t follow all the latest and most expensive games. Yes, some newer releases will be fully excluded; but even then, getting a brand new or used Switch or PS4 can introduce someone to a huge number of games if they haven’t been exploring options.
I have been avoiding multiplayer Valve games like Counter-Strike 2 and Team Fortress 2, due to their in-game economies that have created an underage gambling gray market, which Valve has done little about. However, I am on Linux, and the choices for multiplayer shooters are few. Besides, my small boycott is not stopping...
I think your voice could actually be better than your wallet on this.
For one, these games are free. So, are you harming the world by playing them and just not buying loot boxes? Minimally, at best. I also advise people enacting boycotts to represent vocal action around them. For instance, I called Target directly about my boycott when they ended DEI hiring.
You can also help lobby politicians to make clear how you feel on the issue. That can put a lot more panic on publishers. Politicians don’t have a strong reason to defend them - often it only gets ignored because they don’t think voters find it a significant issue. Even if you don’t get a federal ban, sometimes you can get state laws like limiting physical advertising; which can also sometimes spread to other states.
Basically, boycotting as a form of inaction, especially when it makes your days boring, isn’t necessarily an effective approach.
I agree that, on paper, that is a reason for game prices to go up. However, I also think that on paper, there are reasons for it to go down at the same time.
For one, game budgets really should be controlled. A great many indie developers have put out superior products using the better technologies available. This often coincides with longer development time using a smaller team. You even see a disjointedness in AAA games now where it very much feels like 8 teams lumping their portions together.
Two, minimum wage has not gone up in the USA; and the reach of these games has expanded to many countries that (in part due to import laws) can’t even pay what were considered normal prices elsewhere. Many of these games they’re selling only hit viral growth when a lot of people are playing and talking about them, and we’re in real danger of big, expensive productions being completely out of people’s reach and thus dropping entirely off the radar.
You misunderstand the relation of minimum wage to game prices. Video games, compared to other things like theatre, cool cars, fancy restaurants, are relatively cheap and high-longevity entertainment to be consumed at all income brackets; even if that means a single mom buying a used PS4, and one 140-hour Assassin’s Creed game a year for her son.
So raising the price in a country with such a HUGE low-income population can price out far more people than you realize. Even if inflation has grown, the budget has not changed for many of these people. It’s a broken financial system, yes, but that’s the situation.
TL;DR: Nintendo of America president Doug Bowser discussed with Wired the impact of new tariffs on the Nintendo Switch 2, which may increase its price from $449 to $600. The tariffs affect manufacturing in Vietnam, Cambodia, and China. Nintendo is assessing the situation, having already moved some production out of China.
Between trains and large ships, I love the feeling of operating large vehicles with multiple rooms. Bonus points if one large vehicle can carry a smaller vehicle.
Examples: Sea of Thieves, Subnautica, many JRPGs with airships, even something like The Last Express.
This whole thing has erupted on my radar in the past month ever since they abducted the girl from Tufts.
HOW does this genocidal state have such an insane stranglehold on our country?
Now I’m getting YouTube ads to demonize Hamas; apparently their effort to “pull people back” and get people sympathetic for October 7 hostages. I AM sympathetic to the hostages!…So why is Israel bombing them??
I know of that site, but in many ways I can’t stomach following trial-and-error debugging steps to try to get a perfect experience. Very rarely has it been one command line option and then the game runs as perfectly as Windows.
I mean, if they find actual artwork, audio, or code stolen, much of which goes into UI development, that would definitely make for a fair case. I’d presume that Schedule 1 devs would never do something so stupid though.
The game pricing argument goes back and forth for me. Yes, on paper, you could say that inflation suggests games should go up in price, especially considering how many more developers are needed to put out high-fidelity games. BUT, on the other hand, the minimum wage has not raised significantly in all of that time. As a result, a significant number of gamers genuinely can’t pay more for games than they could 20+ years ago. The reason these larger studios exist is because of gaming’s expanded reach in that time; and many of these new target territories similarly can’t pay for the equivalent of $80USD.
There’s maybe only about 1-2 games I’ve ever even paid the $70 price tag for.
120 and 4K are often claimed on console specs but are rarely achieved within games. At best it will be capable of that when playing Netflix or streaming.
I’m curious what other people’s main gripe is (likely emulation fights?) For my own, it’s when they enacted an assault on Garry’s Mod assets.
That domain never did anything to harm their brand and was a source for tons of fan content. Emulation has its murky arguments about capitalism, but going after GMod was just litigation and harm for its own sake.
This might be a dumb idea, but I may buy this game just to make up for all the baseless hate it’s been hit by. Maybe just to avoid shareholder claims of “See, people prefer historical accuracy. Hence black people are banned in all future games.”
I haven’t really even tracked much of Ubisoft games for a while, and I recognize usually they’re pretty mindless open world fun - personally I’m often fine with that.
I’ve even wanted to bring up Valve in some recent political discussions on corporate governance. With the blatant exception of CSGO child-focused gambling, it is otherwise the “shining ideal” of a good company: They invented a product that people like and enjoy, maintain it well to please their customers, and pay their employees well without growing excessively or finding ways to cheat customers out of their money.
From Jez Corden. Further supporting the idea that the next Xbox is just a PC with a custom shell, which is about the only way a new Xbox makes sense anyway....
If we got a Gyroscope on Xbox, then all major controllers would have it - allowing for the possibility of cross platform games where people can use gyro ironsights to aim. That would be awesome.
I’ve tried watching videos about it, but they are not analysing the reasons. Instead it’s just whining about the symptoms and hypocrisy of rich CEOs firing employees then buying a yacht. We all know it’s terrible, but my question is “why”. “herp derp, capitalism” and “omg, it’s the fucking CEOs” doesn’t...
I would really really encourage spreading this frustration past the edge of the gaming industry.
No one likes talking about politics, until it affects their lives. Well, the ruling of the gaming industry by shareholders and MBAs affects you now.
There’s also internet providers, food supply companies, energy companies, and all types that are inflating their value and mass firing workers to make the world terrible and their CEO pay higher. If you can suggest a better way to curb that than government regulation, I’m all for it, but until then, vote in people that will force accountability. I have my own thoughts on who that means but will end the soapbox there since I’m sure we’d rather be gaming.
What is your favorite indie game? angielski
Given the swathes of posts about bad behavior from big companies, I figure we could counterbalance that with some positivity about stuff the smaller guys made that often costs us less too.
Game design question : how to make a "trapped" player character? angielski
I have an idea for a game: It’s the usual “a princess is kidnapped by a dragon and a brave knight is on a quest to rescue her” story. But you (the player) plays as the princess, who is somehow helping the knight on his quest....
Microsoft is raising prices on Xbox consoles, controllers, and games worldwide (www.theverge.com) angielski
Xbox first party titles expected to hit $80 USD this holiday; Game Pass pricing currently unchanged.
Do you think Square Enix should remake other Final Fantasy entries? angielski
Seems like a goldmine of content for them to work on for the next decade+. Plenty of people will never experience these worlds or stories due to the turn-based combat, so giving them the Remake treatment could be the only way an audience ever finds them....
Apex Legends and Star Wars: Jedi Dev Respawn Cancels Another Incubation Project, Lays Off Unknown Number of Individuals (www.ign.com) angielski
Next gen PS and Xbox consoles scheduled for 2027, tipped by cancelled Blade Runner game (www.notebookcheck.net) angielski
Ubisoft Accused of 'Secret Data Collection' in Single-Player Games (insider-gaming.com) angielski
Knock yourself out angielski
Ace Attorney became a hit IP only because Capcom pushed past the “failure” of first game, according to former dev (automaton-media.com) angielski
Well no “Objection!” here for Capcom taking a risk.
Nintendo lawyers want to force Discord to reveal Pokémon Teraleak source (www.eurogamer.net) angielski
Nintendo seeks default judgement and $17,500 in damages from pirated game streamer who ignored court summons (automaton-media.com) angielski
Final clockstasy angielski
OG Guild Wars sees an all-new Steam concurrency high during its anniversary celebration | Massively Overpowered (massivelyop.com) angielski
New Mario on Switch 2? ‘Stay tuned,’ says Nintendo of America president (www.videogameschronicle.com) angielski
And I’m sure it’ll be hit with surge pricing.
AMD’s Lisa Su Breaks Silence on US Chips, TSMC Hikes Pricing (www.ccn.com) angielski
Almost 19% of Japanese people in their 20s have spent so much money on gacha they struggled with covering living expenses, survey reveals - AUTOMATON WEST (automaton-media.com) angielski
Nintendo Maintains Nintendo Switch 2 Pricing, Retail Pre-Orders to Begin April 24 in U.S. (www.nintendo.com) angielski
Prices for accessories will be increasing to compensate for tariffs.
Does the 2 hour refund limit on Steam affect game design? angielski
I just picked up the highly hyped Blue Prince. On the other hand reviews have also called it a very niche game. I like puzzle games to a certain extent and roguelikes, but these are subjective experiences....
What's a cancelled game you really miss? angielski
Nintendo ‘warned to expect 145% tariff on Nintendo Switch 2’ (www.videogameschronicle.com) angielski
Ex-PlayStation exec argues 'only the dog can hear' differences between consoles and gaming PCs: 'They're all quite similar' (www.pcgamer.com) angielski
18+ Games Media Can't Ignore BDS Xbox Boycott. (aftermath.site) angielski
BDS’ call to boycott Microsoft is a call to action for gamers, and an imperative for games media
Can't Afford A Nintendo Switch 2? Buy A Switch 1, Nintendo Says - Insider Gaming (insider-gaming.com) angielski
Nintendo Switch 2 GameCube controller is only compatible with GameCube games, Nintendo says (www.videogameschronicle.com) angielski
Should we boycott games with loot boxes? angielski
I have been avoiding multiplayer Valve games like Counter-Strike 2 and Team Fortress 2, due to their in-game economies that have created an underage gambling gray market, which Valve has done little about. However, I am on Linux, and the choices for multiplayer shooters are few. Besides, my small boycott is not stopping...
Nintendo boss Doug Bowser explains the $80 price for ‘Mario Kart World’ - The Washington Post (www.washingtonpost.com) angielski
web.archive.org/…/mario-kart-world-price-nintendo…...
Nintendo president responds to Switch 2 price increase fears amid Trump tariff fallout (www.tweaktown.com) angielski
TL;DR: Nintendo of America president Doug Bowser discussed with Wired the impact of new tariffs on the Nintendo Switch 2, which may increase its price from $449 to $600. The tariffs affect manufacturing in Vietnam, Cambodia, and China. Nintendo is assessing the situation, having already moved some production out of China.
Quite a Ride: Official Reveal Trailer (youtu.be) angielski
Pacific Ride.
BDS calls for boycott of Microsoft and Xbox gaming products over alleged Israeli military connections (www.rockpapershotgun.com) angielski
cross-posted from: lemmy.ml/post/28202261...
6* months away now. If you're on 10, do you plan to upgrade? Make the jump to Linux? angielski
Drug Dealer Simulator publisher launches an investigation against Schedule 1 creator. The game is supposedly “violating company’s IP” (www.gamepressure.com) angielski
18+ The Switch 2 Rollout Was So Convoluted It Made Us Want A Steam Deck. (aftermath.site) angielski
Important information about compatibility of Nintendo Switch games with Nintendo Switch 2 (www.nintendo.com) angielski
TL;DR there seem to be some games that are not compatible including the Nintendo Labo VR kit. 99% of games seem fine.
Nintendo Switch 2 Launches on June 5th Worldwide; 1080p Screen With 120 FPS and HDR Support, Docked Mode 4K Resolution Support Confirmed (wccftech.com) angielski
The Switch 2 Nintendo Direct Will Be 60 Minutes Long, Nintendo Confirms (www.ign.com) angielski
Assassin's Creed Shadows | Review Thread angielski
Game Information...
Split Fiction Developer Already Started Working On Its Next Title, Calls It An "Exciting Thing" (pkinsight.com) angielski
Steam is a ticking time bomb. (www.spacebar.news) angielski
The decline of the Steam games platform is inevitable, and there are already warning signs.
Next Xbox Rumors Surface; No Devkits Available to Developers Yet (aiming for 2027); EDIT: And new handheld later this year (www.dualshockers.com) angielski
From Jez Corden. Further supporting the idea that the next Xbox is just a PC with a custom shell, which is about the only way a new Xbox makes sense anyway....
Is there an in depth analysis of what's going on in the gaming industry? angielski
I’ve tried watching videos about it, but they are not analysing the reasons. Instead it’s just whining about the symptoms and hypocrisy of rich CEOs firing employees then buying a yacht. We all know it’s terrible, but my question is “why”. “herp derp, capitalism” and “omg, it’s the fucking CEOs” doesn’t...