Video Games...Discuss Them

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Originally Posted by Idioteque Stalker

I'm looking forward to the game but it has clearly been mismanaged all to hell. I agree that delays never hurt a game in and of itself, but there is a stigma attached to The Last Guardian and I can understand why. When developers like Bioware and Naughty Dog have each released entire series of hugely ambitious AAA games (plus more) in the time it takes you to release one art house game then something is obviously wrong. I hope it's great, but it will literally have to be one of the best games of the generation by consensus if it is to meet gamers' expectations following a 10+ year development cycle.

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But this suggests that there is an equivalency between Bioware and Naughty Dog's respective teams and their respective projects — not to mention the unique contingencies of each development process — and the very specific instance of The Last Guardian. Uniting these disparate examples by one broad stroke, and suggesting that one team's success with one game is somehow representative of a kind of universal model of game development, from which Ueda and his team have now deviated, seems specious.

I can see how some might believe I'm being too charitable, but it has been noted that he is working with a small team — perhaps 20 people or less — and with a small budget. These are not the blockbuster operations of a Naughty Dog or Bioware. I just think the better way to respond to this, rather than amplifying the stigma, is to consider the vagaries of production (especially cross-generational production), and the limitations of the development staff vis-a-vis the scope of the project. The only unequivocal misstep that I can really feel comfortable speaking to, without delving into assumptions and potentially hasty remarks, is that they should not have revealed this game until…really, this year. That was a PR blunder, and I imagine the reveal in 2007 was symptomatic of an earlier confidence in being able to pull this off much quicker.

Your points are well taken. What I should've focused on in regards to the Bioware/ND comparison is not that it has taken them this long to release the game, but rather that they announced the game so long ago. PR and the development team in the trenches are not in sync, and that's what I mean when I say the game has been mismanaged. I certainly wouldn't claim to know anything about game development, but I do know that had 2016 been the triumphant return of Team Ico after 10 years of silence and rumors then the public would've rejoiced. As it stands now--after announcement, delays on PS3, utter silence, rumors of being cancelled, a re-reveal on PS4, and now more delays--the game's reputation has been tarnished, possibly beyond repair. A few delays are one thing, but honestly this is pretty bogus.

That said, it's still a day one buy for me because reputation has nothing to do with quality, and the game looks cool. :)

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Originally Posted by Idioteque Stalker

PR and the development team in the trenches are not in sync, and that's what I mean when I say the game has been mismanaged.

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Yeah, that's fair. I agree. Like I said above, it would have been ideal for them to make the first announcement this year. It should never have been shown way back in 2007. I guess this is the kind of thing Valve has been trying to avoid by adopting radio silence with regards to Half-Life 3.

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Originally Posted by Idioteque Stalker

As it stands now--after announcement, delays on PS3, utter silence, rumors of being cancelled, a re-reveal on PS4, and now more delays--the game's reputation has been tarnished, possibly beyond repair.

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I've only taken a really cursory glance at some of the reactions outside of this forum, but it seems like the enthusiasm is unabated for some. Long waits can occasionally stoke anticipation (i.e., Shenmue 3, Half-Life) rather than deflate it. It remains to be seen how the optics of this situation will affect Ueda and Sony going forward, though — it might be instructive for them, or the same thing will happen again (Nintendo has been doing this for a while and their hardcore fans have proven resilient; certain beloved games/properties seem to inure themselves against the possibility of alienating fans via delays).

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That said, it's still a day one buy for me because reputation has nothing to do with quality, and the game looks cool. :)

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Just to be clear, I'm not saying it's guaranteed to be perfect or really great. I could totally see it falling short of its aspirations; that's a distinct possibility. I just don't see a lot of inarguable reasons to be leaning in that direction at this point.

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Originally Posted by Idioteque Stalker

Eh, not really, at least for me. There's trophies to get, secrets to find, etc. I played through Limbo once, and it'll probably be the same with Inside. I do think it's a better game, however, so it's possible I'll return to it just to experience it again. At the very least I'll likely try to get one of my friends to play it and just watch them.

It would be the perfect redbox game, but oh well.

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Thanks for this, BTW. Still looking forward to playing Inside. After that, I need to figure out if there's anything else coming out before December that interests me. Maybe Gravity Rush 2.

Oh crap Pinball Arcade feels like the best app ever right now. :cool:

I got it for my Galaxy Note 4 and paid about 7 $ for Terminator 2 Judgment Day since the tables aren't free. But it feels so awesome with all the digitized sounds you could wish for.

The app features exact recreations of the all-time greatest pinball tables from Williams®, Bally®, Stern®, and Gottlieb®.

http://www.pinballarcade.com/

I took a break from Doom (2016) for about two months, I think. Just returned to it yesterday and beat the Cyberdemon — a very fun boss fight, and precisely the kind of change of pace I wanted. After that, though, I was reminded why I stopped playing for so long: it's just a tad repetitive.

I mean, what they've nailed down here is superb and fine-tuned. But they just keep delivering that particular experience again and again. There are some differences — neat changes in location, some platforming — but it's ultimately all about clearing one room after another. On the one hand, the gameplay is propulsive and exciting and it's unlikely that one would become especially bored during any of the combat. On the other hand, some degree of boredom remains a factor, as there's just not enough here to energize a lengthy gameplay session. At first, I found myself getting absorbed for long stretches of time. Lately, however, after spending a half hour clearing one chamber, and knowing there'll likely be something awfully similar waiting for me around the corner, the experience threatens to become quite dull. So, yeah, it helps to take breaks and wait for the interest to return. With Uncharted 4, I couldn't wait to get back to playing it as soon as possible, but this one isn't quite as involving.

Another related problem is that the roster of enemies expands somewhat slowly, and, despite the new additions that appear as you go along, you continue to encounter many familiar (albeit very well animated and impressively hideous) faces.

Rez in VR next week! You lock on ennemies by moving your head towards them! How crazy is that? I'm dying to give this a shot and see reality evaporate around me. Wish Portal 2 would get a VR remaster too!

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Originally Posted by Morris Schæffer

Rez in VR next week! You lock on ennemies by moving your head towards them! How crazy is that? I'm dying to give this a shot and see reality evaporate around me. Wish Portal 2 would get a VR remaster too!

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I picked the wrong month to give up acid!

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Originally Posted by Morris Schæffer

Rez in VR next week! You lock on ennemies by moving your head towards them! How crazy is that? I'm dying to give this a shot and see reality evaporate around me. Wish Portal 2 would get a VR remaster too!

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I played it. It's fun.

FYI, I am still playing No Man's Sky. I have no idea why. Perhaps it's to mine minerals, sell them, and save enough money for a ship with more cargo space. So I can accumulate more stuff to sell to acquire for a ship with even more space. Which will allow me to store more stuff for a ship with larger space still. Which will...

Meanwhile I'm level 116 in Fallout 4

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Originally Posted by bac0n

FYI, I am still playing No Man's Sky. I have no idea why. Perhaps it's to mine minerals, sell them, and save enough money for a ship with more cargo space. So I can accumulate more stuff to sell to acquire for a ship with even more space. Which will allow me to store more stuff for a ship with larger space still. Which will...

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Ha. A friend of mine got to a planet where he landed his ship on a floating rock of some sort, fell off, and has no possible way of getting back on the ship. If he kills himself, nothing changes, back on the planet with the ship a distance away.

He's pretty deep in, so he doesn't want to restart either. Looks like he's finished.

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Originally Posted by Ezee E

Ha. A friend of mine got to a planet where he landed his ship on a floating rock of some sort, fell off, and has no possible way of getting back on the ship. If he kills himself, nothing changes, back on the planet with the ship a distance away.

He's pretty deep in, so he doesn't want to restart either. Looks like he's finished.

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If he can find an outpost nearby, there's some device that allows you to call your ship to it. Maybe that can unstick him.


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This is a cool thing. I guess there's no turning back now. I hope.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CtZe306XgAAGXvk.jpg:large

I've wandered away from No Mans Sky. I invested a lot of time in it, but just wandered off. Maybe I'll come back when the temps plummet.

I am one trophy away from getting Platinum in No Man's sky, but a glitch will not let me get it.

The trophy is the one for spending time in extreme environments.

I got to level 8 on that challenge, and it has stopped registering time I spend in extreme environments. The countdown won't move.

No better way for a game to make me say "fuck this" and never touch it again.

Here are some illuminating comments about AAA video game development from Amy Hennig (formerly of Naughty Dog, now working with Visceral Games on a Star Wars title that is probably going to be amazing). They're taken from this article. The quotes are taken from a longer podcast interview, which I'm sure is worth a listen.

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While Hennig admitted that she wouldn't change anything that meant she hadn't made games like the Uncharted series, she admitted to having a clearer view of the issue when looking at the experiences of other people. When asked if making AAA games was worth the lifestyle that goes along with it, she replied, "I don't think so."

"There's people who never go home and see their families. They have children who are growing up without seeing them," she said. "I didn't have my own kids. I chose my career in lots of ways, and I could be single-minded like that. When I was making sacrifices, did it affect my family? Yes, but it was primarily affecting me and I could make that choice. But when I look at other people... I mean, my health really declined, and I had to take care of myself, because it was, like, bad. And there were people who, y'know, collapsed, or had to go and check themselves in somewhere when one of these games were done. Or they got divorced. That's not okay, any of that. None of this is worth that.

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The question, then, is: "How can we still make games like this in a way that is sane and responsible and ethical? Because we're not doing it right now."

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I also really like her point, near the end of the article, about wanting to move away from a demanding focus on making enormous games that try to scratch every itch. Her proposed alternative of making "the best fucking six hour game you've ever seen" has a ready appeal. I mean, imagine the talent of Naughty Dog being poured into a six hour game — there are so many reasons why everyone would win in that situation. I would be thrilled if Naughty Dog announced that the sequel to The Last of Us was going to be a solid six hours. I read about games like The Witcher 3 and I'm exhausted just thinking about them — it sounds awesome, but also unwieldy, sprawling, perhaps even sloppy. I don't want to throw all expansive games under the bus, as I think they can be done really well, and I'm a fan of them. But I love the idea of major studios leveraging their skills for the sake of something more low-key.

I haven't played Left Behind, so I can't speak to Naughty Dog's short-form efforts. I suspect that the upcoming single-player DLC for Uncharted 4 will bear these points out, though. We'll see a kind of concision there, and maybe even something that is sometimes absent from these games — the sense of having experienced something without gorging yourself on it. I'd like to feel…not so full (or gluttonous, even) at the end of a game. The idea should be to make gamers want a little more of a certain thing at the end, and to encourage them to treasure what has been provided.

I like both.

But the single player games I fall in love with tend to be the long games. Mass Effect, Uncharted, Dead Space, Fallout.... These games I have fond memories of.

Then there's the short games, Limbo, Games that hit the perfect note or tone, Resident Evil, or multiplayer games that I can't put down, and don't require a lot of people to work on massive different set pieces, Left 4 Dead.

PS- I hear Naught Dog is working on Uncharted 5.

I decided to take a break from No Man's Sky - needed to do something other than mine/sell Emeril for a change - so I fired up Witcher 3 and played the latest DLC, Blood & Wine. Ahhhhh, after the loneliness that is NMS, it is SO refreshing to see worlds that look alive with things you can actually interact with in a meaningful way.

So far, the DLC is pretty solid. A huge new region about 2/3 the size of Velen, and much more interesting scenery-wise. Has a very camelot-y feel to it, the terrain invoking south east France. I think this is going to be a welcome change from the monotony of NMS. Oooh, and there's a new armor set to build!

Nearing the end of BioShock. Still holds up 100%. Brilliant game.

The fireworks in Just Cause 3 is just soooo deliciously awesome!!!!!!!!! I can't even begin to fathom the ridiculous exploderama that lies ahead!

Duke, 5 stars for Alien: Isolation?

I liked the game a ton when I was hiding away from the actual Xenomorph, and figuring out how to trap it or use it to attack the soldiers.

But then come the androids, and it got so repetitive and boring that I didn't even finish. It felt like you should've had to have had a different tactic against them in my opinion.

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Originally Posted by Ezee E

Duke, 5 stars for Alien: Isolation?

I liked the game a ton when I was hiding away from the actual Xenomorph, and figuring out how to trap it or use it to attack the soldiers.

But then come the androids, and it got so repetitive and boring that I didn't even finish. It felt like you should've had to have had a different tactic against them in my opinion.

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Yeh I loved it.

I should disclose that I also loved Outlast too.

Just played the demo of Outlast 2, and it's going to be more of the same... which is awesome.

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Originally Posted by Dukefrukem

Yeh I loved it.

I should disclose that I also loved Outlast too.

Just played the demo of Outlast 2, and it's going to be more of the same... which is awesome.

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Never played Outlast. Will 2 be out for PS4? Looks creepy.

By the way, best parts in the Alien game is hiding in the locker and trying to not breathe as the Xenomorph walks around.

I have next to no interest in Final Fantasy XV, but the Chocobo aspects are really impressive. Fluid, well-animated, open-world traversal via Chocobo is not quite enough to warrant a purchase, but it's neat.

https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media...8125475624.gif

https://media.giphy.com/media/3o72EV...7EFa/giphy.gif

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