Honestly I haven’t seen the video but it looks like something I was wondering about recently so let me explain.
We’re more and more confused as to how mainstream games look like, as if gameplay was not a consideration at all. One could argue that this is due to lack of direction and trying to satisfy as many market needs as possible.
At the same time I also think that there could be an issue where there is no constructive feedback in the discussion because all of the reviews were either paid for (with a game copy and maybe some other goodies too) or have an interest in creating an outrage (culture wars or being negative all the time). There’s no middle ground so everyone works in the dark. Honest reviewers are rare and you need to find someone matching your taste which is beyond most people so it’s kind of irrelevant for how things look in general.
According to pcgamingwiki it has frame pacing and stutter issues even on high end systems. I’m okay with how it runs on current PCs and Xbox Series X but that’s because I can stomach 40 fps with inconsistent frame pacing - many people can’t and at this point it’s probably best to hope for some updated version.
I didn’t think that gimmicky game where you run over lines of people (monks? cadets?) would become that popular. Never figured what they were exactly but it was fun. Quest system was a dealbreaker for me. I didn’t know English that well and timed missions suck.
I skipped 2 based on experience with the first. I think I missed more colourful lighting but not much more than that.
Couldn’t ignore 3 which was technically impressive but was kind of boring otherwise. Played it to kill time but Tony Hawk was still better at that.
4 ran like shit but the story kept me playing. This thing needs a proper remaster to evaluate.
5 was an all around achievement and a landmark in a video game history. It’s probably the closest thing to a modern Blizzard game - not exactly innovative but really polished and treated reasonably well for years.
Never touched a game with predatory monetisation so I never touched multiplayer. Heard it sucks but somehow it’s making a bank.
The CPC Network, coordinated by the European Commission, is publishing a set of guidelines today to promote transparency and fairness in the online gaming industry’s use of virtual currencies.
Yeah, as a resident Valve hater I agree it’s a weird thing to get angry over.
If there was anything to get angry over is that I bought this game in a box (stand alone because I was too broke for Orange Box!) with an understanding that it’s an online multiplayer shooter. Meaning, there are servers you join manually from a list, shoot at other guys for a bit and return to that server or not based on how good time it was. This functionality has been ripped out of the game and replaced with some weird algorithm. Before that Valve broke their own design promises of clear silhouettes which made the game less accessible. The game has been dead, riddled with bots farming in-game items that can be traded for real money that Valve added to the game because they could. If it was any other game I wouldn’t care but TF2 started out as an amazing game that was mangled beyond recognition by Valve greed.
They should have released TF2 source code this way 10 years ago. They’re probably doing this now because income from TF2 related items on Marketplace is laughably small compared to their other titles.
I started playing on a PC in the 90s so as long as it’s above 40 with consistent frame pacing it’s fine. Those VRR displays and games targeting 40 are a game changer for me and why I play on Xbox with a modern LG OLED.
I want to learn about it either through an independent journalist or from a space dedicated to self promotion. Small developers are not saints and ads are poison, haven’t we all learnt?
It becomes a problem once others see this is permissible. It’s not that much now but once everyone realises they can put ads here for free how do you imagine it goes from there?
You’re mostly here to self promote from what I can tell. It shows in your post history and the fact that you though it’d be more important to link to Steam and not the article itself.
MS prevented you from using other browsers by using vendor lock-in. It was a prime example example of now misunderstood concept of embrace, extend, extinguish. You could download Mozilla Phoenix but you couldn’t use it for everything because CSS rendering in IE was so detached from standards. On top of that you had ActiveX which meant you HAD to use Windows for some websites.
Adding gambling to video games without verifying user age is targeting children with gambling. There’s a lot of convenient combinations of circumstances that Valve is fully aware of and profiting from. I don’t care about plausible deniability because Valve employees were visibly smug and amused when questioned about it. There is no absolving Valve after this.
You blame others for Valve monopoly. Yeah, I said they missed the ship. We have a private monopoly in PC gaming storefronts now and that’s not good. It doesn’t matter if they won fair - they are a parasitic middle-man that makes everyone lose.
Ask yourself and be honest about it: if Valve had a true competitor would their cut be as high as it is now? This is the only thing you should be concerned about, not that they engage in Linux philanthropy or that they make cool games.
Pressure on their web browser monopoly was necessary because IE6 was stifling entire industry. From a legal point of view it’s not illegal to be a monopoly but to abuse that position so there isn’t that much you can do about it, especially in the US. Going after operating system or office suite monopoly should have been done but matters less and less these days.
Valve runs a couple of online casinos that target children specifically, not sure we should be arguing who’s worse here. I think Steam is a clunky piece of software that’s popular mostly because everyone else missed the moment to start competing and Valve gained monopoly unopposed. Other viable competitors tried and failed at even gaining a foothold and are relegated to small niches because it’s impossible to move people who amassed content libraries over the years. Valve skims 10-30% of an insanely large volume of transactions and should be held to a much higher standard. You’re ignoring all of the warning signs because they didn’t screw you over yet.
Probably same reason Sony keeps releasing their games on PC before they release their sequels on PS5. They’re no longer getting sales on original platform so they’re not losing much and they build up the taste of the franchise because someone might like it enough to buy their hardware. It feels very weird to do in this case though.