Ashtear
@Ashtear@lemm.ee
- ‘Less Star Wars – more Blade Runner’: the making of Mass Effect 2’s Bafta-nominated soundtrackwww.theguardian.com ↗Submitted 4 days ago to games@lemmy.world | 2 comments
- Comment on Thoughts on Final Fantasy VII Remake 6 days ago:
If it makes any difference, I don’t have major compulsions/FOMO to do open world content. I even regret doing as much of the Enemy Skill farming as I did. So it felt well and truly optional to me. I set most of it aside.
- Comment on Thoughts on Final Fantasy VII Remake 1 week ago:
I had major problems with Remake myself, mostly stemming from punishing encounter design and them padding out a 6+ hour section into a full game. The catwalk lights, the lab, and other stuff obliterated the pacing, and it was painfully obvious how much better the dungeon design based on the original content was when compared to the new stuff.
The good news is, in Rebirth, that 1:1 remake feeling is front and center if you want it, instead supplemented this time by optional content. I felt like I had much more room to put together materia builds, and it has one of the best video game soundtracks I’ve ever heard. I’d be over the moon if they did a version of Final Fantasy VI that felt like most of Rebirth did.
Except for the limit breaks. Why they didn’t give those full target tracking and allowed them to whiff is an outright bizarre design decision (along with the constant splitting of the party).
- Comment on Sid Meier's Civilization VII | Review Thread 2 weeks ago:
Had the same thought. Plus, according to some of these reviews, there’s no information age units, so that gives them a possible fourth era to work with in upcoming DLC.
- Comment on Sid Meier's Civilization VII | Review Thread 2 weeks ago:
Civ7 does indeed use Denuvo. Concerning for a game like this with far more CPU usage than your typical game.
For me, Civ6 at launch felt like a couple steps forward and a couple steps back. I really appreciated the increased transparency with diplomacy, but the AI was aggressively bad in mid and late-game, something they never ended up getting right.
- Comment on Sid Meier's Civilization VII | Review Thread 2 weeks ago:
Just like they wouldn’t the last time…and the time before that…and the time before that…
It’s not a thing at outlets like these. Paid promo from influencers and independent reviews are not the same thing.
- Comment on EA lost $6 billion in market value, following FC 25 & Dragon Age underperformance news 3 weeks ago:
FC 24 did well even after they lost the FIFA license. Something else going on here.
- Comment on GTA VI Might Inspire Other AAA Developers to Price Their Games at $100 4 weeks ago:
We still have a ways to go before reaching the inflation-adjusted, $150-per-game peak of mass market games in the 1990’s. A key difference is games back then had way higher marginal cost (it’s near zero now).
The interesting thing is that the market is becoming a lot more like it was back then, full of people that only buy one or two games a year and only play those. Of course now, the model is retaining players with DLC and MTX, whereas in 1995 it was more because people could only afford one or two games a year.
- Comment on Genshin Impact Game Developer Will be Banned from Selling Lootboxes to Teens Under 16 without Parental Consent, Pay a $20 Million Fine to Settle FTC Charges. 4 weeks ago:
Ughh. The selective enforcement is maddening, both with this and TikTok. So much of the filed complaint especially applies to Roblox, but it’s clear that we’re only interested in protecting our consumers when it really means chipping away at a foreign rival’s burgeoning soft power.
- Comment on Best City Builder 2024: Manor Lords [as per PCGamer] 1 month ago:
Following up on this conversation since I just saw this PC Gamer article:
I played a whopping 23 city builders in 2024, and here are my 5 favorites
- Comment on Age of Empires designer believes RTS games need to finally evolve after decades of stagnation 1 month ago:
How is Stormgate innovating? Genuine question–I’ve been avoiding it largely because it looks so much like StarCraft (and Pottinger even calls it out specifically in the article as something not innovative).
- Comment on Age of Empires designer believes RTS games need to finally evolve after decades of stagnation 1 month ago:
I’d add They are Billions as another evolutionary branch that’s doing something different. Starting to see some clones of this formula.
That said, I don’t think Against the Storm or Manor Lords are the kind of games Pottinger is talking about. Against the Storm doesn’t even have combat. Those are more in the city builder realm.
- Comment on Have JRPG battles become a sub-system? 1 month ago:
I think there are too many JRPGs that still use their battle system in support of their narrative for it to be considered anything other than a core system in those games. That’s especially the case in lower budget games in the genre.
Larger budget projects are branching more and more into side content/worldbuilding, but I’d argue it’s still highly underdeveloped in the genre when compared with western RPGs, in quality if not also in quantity. Persona and Yakuza are exceptions, rather than the rule. Persona is doing something entirely different (and well enough that it’s being emulated now) while Yakuza, as you say, carry a lot of that over from prior development into its RPGs from the series’ action games.
- Comment on Best City Builder 2024: Manor Lords [as per PCGamer] 1 month ago:
This is what I was wondering. Was the genre that quiet this year? Manor Lords isn’t just early access, it’s early early access. So many outright unfinished systems.
- Comment on Video Games Can’t Afford to Look This Good 1 month ago:
Unfortunately, Cyberpunk is exactly the kind of product that is going to keep driving the realistic approach. It’s four years later now and the game’s visuals are still state-of-the-art in many areas. Even after earning as much backlash on release as any game in recent memory, it was a massively profitable project in the end.
This is why Sony, Microsoft, and the big third parties like Ubisoft keep taking shots in this realm.
- Comment on Against the Storm looks charming and cosy, but it's actually the best and most fiendish city builder I've played in years 1 month ago:
They showed up
minor spoiler maybe?
after the fourth seal. From what I gather, yeah, there’s no ending/story mode or anything.
After the credit roll I took it as a sign I wasn’t getting much more lore or more Aunt Lori. I’d buy a DLC just for more Aunt Lori.
- Comment on Against the Storm looks charming and cosy, but it's actually the best and most fiendish city builder I've played in years 1 month ago:
Looks like it was October, so I’m guessing after? The production controls did help once I figured them out but I realized once I was digging through the UI every time I was making a building or cornerstone decision I wasn’t getting into the flow state I wanted.
- Comment on Against the Storm looks charming and cosy, but it's actually the best and most fiendish city builder I've played in years 1 month ago:
I had an intense love affair with this one earlier in the year that fizzled out quickly once the credits rolled. Solid game, but the only thing that keeps it from being in my collection of 1000-hour games is that it’s a little too dense for my taste. Keeping track of what builds what (and which build I had currently unlocked) was taking up a smidge more brain power than I’d like once the difficulty started demanding it. By the end I’d started layering in how to evaluate cornerstones, the best way to do trade, map modifiers, and it became too much. Ironically, I’d probably get there just by putting more time into the game but it’ll just feel like work.
One of those “almost there” games for me.
- Comment on Frostpunk creators cancel "Project 8" and lay off staff amid concerns that "narrative-driven, story-rich games" don't sell 1 month ago:
Since The Witcher 3 came out, my favorite video game stories have been Disco Elysium, Cyberpunk 2077, 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim, Citizen Sleeper, and Metaphor: ReFantazio. I also really liked Death Stranding, but Kojima’s not for everyone.
- Comment on Valve is fixin' to start some arguments over the holidays because 'All adult members in a Steam Family' can see your Steam Replay page 2 months ago:
I dunno, I might side-eye my partner a lil bit if it turned out they were really good at CK3’s schemes.
- Comment on Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter launches in fall 2025 worldwide for PS5, Switch, and PC 2 months ago:
That’s the original version of the game. It’s had enhanced ports but never a remake previously. From what we know, this is a full remake, with changes to gameplay, a new localization, and some additions for continuity. The game’s 20 years old. Hard to put that anywhere near modern.
Since it’s the first in a continuous series, it’s long seemed necessary to at least bring the game into full 3D for new players to come on board. For long-term Trails fans, the value of this remake (and the inevitable second one, at least) will probably depend on some of the details, especially the localizations for players that don’t read Japanese.
- Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter launches in fall 2025 worldwide for PS5, Switch, and PCwww.gematsu.com ↗Submitted 2 months ago to games@lemmy.world | 10 comments
- Comment on Elden Ring Nightreign Can Only be Played Solo or as a Trio - Insider Gaming 2 months ago:
I don’t know what it is with Japanese devs and arbitrary multiplayer decisions. The way Capcom handles Monster Hunter’s multiplayer continues to baffle me.
From a PC gaming perspective, it feels like Western developers decided to just give players multiple options to play together all the way back in the 1990’s. This sort of thing always feels badly regressive to me.
- Comment on Rumors Of End to Xbox-Only Exclusives Swirl As More Game Studios Embrace Simultaneous Launch Strategy 2 months ago:
I wonder how well the marketing exclusivity is working for them. I’ve come across more than one person that thought Metaphor: ReFantazio wasn’t on PlayStation because of it.
- Comment on Capcom says it’s working on ‘re-activating other dormant IPs’ like Onimusha and Okami 2 months ago:
Don’t mind me, I’ll be sitting here waiting patiently for my Destiny of an Emperor remake.
- Comment on What game surprised you with their length? 2 months ago:
Biggest surprise for length was Dragon Quest VII, the PSX version. Started playing it close to release, dropped it several times and finally finished it years later.
I’d played multiple games in the series before and I think the longest one topped out at 40 hours, so I really was not expecting a 100+ hour marathon like that was (although the very, very long prologue should probably have served as a warning).
- Comment on The Witcher IV — Cinematic Reveal Trailer | The Game Awards 2024 2 months ago:
AHHH this raises so many questions. So ready for this.
- Comment on We need more turn-based RPGs 2 months ago:
It’s a meme at this point.
“Turn based RPGs are dead!”
points at, well, everywhere
“No, I meant turn based JRPGs”
points at Like a Dragon, Persona, Metaphor
“No, I meant turn based JRPGs developed by Square”
points at Bravely Default, Dragon Quest, countless remasters/remakes
“No, I want AAA mainline Final Fantasy to be turn based!”
🤷♀️
I don’t think these people will ever be happy, even if Sakaguchi came back to Square and brought the whole gang back with him.
- Comment on Uncle Chop's Rocket Shop, a space repair shop game with in-depth repair gameplay (manuals, diagnostic devices, parts and workshop appliances), released on Steam 2 months ago:
I played the demo a couple months ago and have only played a few hours since release (the save carried over), but so far this is in the running to be my personal game of the year. I’ve discovered a love for these repetitive problem-solvers like Papers Please and Hardspace: Shipbreaker, and this has been absolutely brilliant so far, with a very solid plot hook and a mature, wacky, occasionally gross vibe that totally fits the setting.
It’s quite difficult, and the gameplay loop is clearly intended to be meta-progression driven, with player knowledge of how to repair the ships being the major factor. Hopefully it doesn’t fall apart once I’ve “solved” it, and also would be nice if the story holds up. It’s damn interesting. It’d be great too if this turned out to be as replayable as something like Papers Please, where a year from now I drop into the game from time to time to do some repairs.
- Submitted 2 months ago to games@lemmy.world | 1 comment