They still average out to be very positive scores, so I don’t think we can say most people don’t want what they’re making, and no viewpoint is universal, so don’t put words in my mouth.
But you’ll see the same people asking for a more sustainable game industry complain about what they find when they see it.
And has mandatory online anyway, so that would be DRM.
Obsidian getting dinged in reviews for making more focused games that don’t waste your time and don’t bet their company’s entire future on its budget and scope has been very frustrating to see.
A game is also more than the aggregate of its review scores. An average of 81 on Open Critic is derived from those who rated it a 6 and those who loved it enough to give it a 9 or a 10.
Yeah, but then you have to sift through the files with Canadian cable channel watermarks in the corner, and if you decide you want subtitles, you might not have them available.
But since you pointed it out, I don’t think there’s any kind of video that can’t be pirated easily, which makes the presence of DRM even dumber.
Man, I didn’t know that about Blu Ray encryption keys. Hollywood deserves the downturn it’s going through right now. Give me the GOG of movies and TV shows. That it doesn’t already exist is stupid.
The article we’re commenting on, after someone said Avowed was missing from this discussion, even though it wasn’t.
It’s been worth every penny at $70 to me, and I’ve still probably got about half of it left to go.
They don’t seem interested in detailing why they feel that way. They’re just going to give BG3 backhanded compliments and list games they feel are better without explaining anything. And you know, I’ve played a number of those games too. They aren’t deeper RPGs, because being deeper than BG3 is a high bar to clear.
I don’t think FF7 is one of those games.
There are challenge runners who’ve beaten the entire game with only salami for weapons. Oil puddles are just a small part of it. There was a part in act 3 where I was denied entry to a place by failing a speech check. I could have possibly brute forced my way in and murdered everyone, but instead I found a back door that was three stories up on a balcony, cast flight on my rogue, and had him stealth in to achieve the objective. That’s emergent design. Solutions to problems that weren’t explicitly programmed in but work because the rules are loose and can be applied intuitively. There’s a part in the game where you have to cross a bridge blocked off by some high level enemies, and there are a ton of ways to get across the bridge that I know of, several of which the developers didn’t intend for, and probably dozens more that I’ve never even seen before, because the game just lets you run loose with its systems.
That’s depth.
I have. I don’t know which options you’re referring to. Materia selection? I guess, but there are fewer permutations of those than there are spells/feats/stats in D&D 5e, and that’s before we even get to all the stuff that makes BG3 stand out, like its emergent design. FF7 is a great game, but it is not emergent, and emergent design will nearly always be deeper than the finite stuff.
You’re going to have to elaborate on those first two sentences, because that’s a wild thing to say.
With its nuanced characters, wonderfully layered world, and incredible depth of interactions, it was natural to feel the game had set a new bar for the whole genre—but it was pointed out that declaring it the new standard was unreasonable and unsustainable given how few other developers could possibly rise to meet it.
You could make a game a third of the size of BG3, and it would still be excellent value for BG3’s asking price. And no, you shouldn’t attempt to make a competitor with BG3 on your first try. Nor should you try to make a competitor to Elden Ring on your first try; FromSoft had been making those games for the better part of 15 years, building and iterating on what came before. I do think more RPG developers should strive to follow the systems-driven approach that Larian has and be cognizant of what it is that we all like about BG3, but it can be sustainable if you don’t try to hit a home run on the first pitch.
The patents on the Game Boy hardware expired years ago, so that’s what gives Analogue the right to do what they do. As for these Switch emulators, I have no idea, but I’ll guess it’s just Nintendo trying to scare people without their own legal departments into complying.
Game preservationists have long argued that a move to a digital-only future will cause games to be lost forever if proper preservation measures aren’t put in place.
There are already scores of online-only titles that can no longer be played either due to their delisting or servers being shut down. In some cases, game discs serve only as physical entitlement keys to be able to play the digital version of the game, meaning if the digital store itself shuts down in the future the disc will become useless.
Once again, the key to preservation is DRM-free, not physical media. We were already headed toward a future with no physical media for games, and these tariffs will only accelerate that. They may be a similar accelerant in the death of consoles.
Given the things I’d like to see GOG investing in, it sounds irresponsible to buy Times Square ad space, but that’s just a gut reaction that’s not based on any real numbers.
Which of those issues you criticised are highlighted in the game trailers and ads that were run?
The stronghold, at the very least. It was a major problem in the first game to have your base of operations be a thing that you had to return to with travel time, so it’s a significant course correction to have it come with you.
It’s way too reductive to say that people bought this one or not based on trailers and impressions. That’s absolutely a part of it, but everyone I spoke to, admittedly a small sample size, who played the first game and not the second, even people who really liked that first game, was because that first game is such an endurance test. There’s little else besides combat, and there’s so much of it. Eventually it leads to decision fatigue. Even the people who really wanted to play the second game were daunted by having to start it, and they felt that they needed a breather before starting it, which in most cases led to them not getting around to it.
It’s also quite likely that people just don’t want more RtwP. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that PoE2 got that turn-based mode post-release, or that the Torment follow-up went turn-based, or that Larian ultimately stuck to turn-based for BG3 after their previous two games were turn-based. RtwP is why it took me so long to get around to playing either PoE game.
Speaking of BG3, and unintentionally sticking with the Deadfire theme, a rising tide lifts all boats, and that game made people hungry for more. I disagree with Sawyer that the difference between PoE and BG3 is simply “budget”, but I do think there’s reason for Microsoft to want “one of those”, if they’re so inclined, and it’s now been made cheaper to produce since Avowed exists and can be iterated upon.
If I can’t host the server myself, it’s still too expensive. What a shame this game turned out to be, man.
It’s the only method of game development that ever made sense to me.