Disco Elysium

I see we have a Gamer in our midst.

Presently it seems to be the Game Awards, but that to me feels less complete than E3 was but I can’t really put my finger on why. I guess E3 was usually more than just game trailers (although that was the majority). A lot of them were big demos so you could really get into a game before release.

I watched the Game Awards for this year a few days ago and a majority of them were just 30 second teasers really. I miss the 45 minute live game & hardware demos. Remember Reggie playing a Wii? That stuff was always awesome.

Best example I can think of was the 2018 E3 Cyberpunk 48 minute walkthrough. Even if Cyberpunk was a big disappointment in the end, that trailer was fucking amazing to see.

Why does “Stardew Valley” get it totally right, and the rest not get it right at all?

I think it’s because Stardew has a lot of RPG elements. Developing relationships with the townspeople (romantic and friendship), figuring out the lore, etc. Lots of games that try to replicate Stardew do the farming / labor stuff and call it quits. I know there are probably some people that go into that game only doing farming, but most people I’ve met who are fans of it like the lore stuff.

How is it compared to 3 - 5? 3 - 5 are some of my faves and I was looking forward to 6 but I heard similar things from other people. If it’s a similar game experience then I might consider giving it a try.

• Intraveneous. Game got a lot of love and as a huge stealth fan I was really into the idea. Got it and hated every second of it. It’s tedious and punishing even by stealth game standards and the story wasn’t great either. Mechanics were poorly explained and it felt like the keymapping was made by a person who had never played a keyboard game before. ugh. I was really disappointed too because it was marketed as a stealth game that didn’t punish you for failing stealth which is true but the issue is that it’s so damn easy to fail stealth that you might as well just go in guns blazing anyway. It wasn’t like MGSV where both options make sense depending on the circumstance. It was more like “stealth is nigh impossible so we made guns-blazing a fail safe for people who aren’t nuts at this game”

• Atomic Heart. Yes I bought this game and I am ashamed of it. No it wasn’t for the robot porn. I thought it looked like an interesting Bioshock / Wolfenstein mashup and both of those are my favorites. Game was just… slow. Combat, stealth, everything felt like you were moving through syrup. The character’s english voice acting is also horrifically cringe. Like, just awful in every sense. Made me hate the MC more than the villains.

• Dying Light 2. I loved the first so I was seriously disappointed by this. Main issue was really with the movement. Gave me motion sickness dozens of times with how the camera is set up, and I was expecting something like Mirror’s Edge (Catalyst) but it felt just awfully floaty. The game also did… fuck all… in terms of explaining what you… do? so I just was super confused. Uninstalled after like 10 hours in frustration.

• Ghostrunner. Played this in December of 2022 but I wanted to add it in as a hot take. Overall great but the boss fights are pretty terribly designed after the first one and pretty much ruined the game for me. Plus there’s useless parkour sections that added nothing. Surprisingly little time spent being a ninja badass for a cyberpunk ninja badass game.

sounds like the steam store already

I can tell from these 6 words the only game with a semblance of sandbox elements you can think of is Minecraft.

Since GTA 3.

GTA is both a narrative series and a sandbox game series but is primarily a sandbox series. In every GTA game you can just do whatever you want once you get past the first 1 or 2 boxed-in missions. I think GTA V is the one that takes the longest to get you going.

Agreed. 3, SA, and VC were so successful that when similar original games came out, most people just called them “GTA clones.” Just like with Doom back in the 90s, where any FPS was a Doom clone.

“degenerates?” Really? Are you 14 years old? We can use other words that aren’t neo nazi rhetoric, thanks.

Also:

GTA doesn’t have that so I made up my own scenarios.

Congrats. You’re playing a sandbox game how it was meant to be played.

There was an article on here a little while ago that said games are getting so massive that a 10 - 12 year development cycle is not only unexpected, but should become the norm soon

GTA V came out when I wasn’t even in secondary school yet and now GTA VI is supposed to release when I should have a degree.

I’d rather they conserve resources to make a finished game on some platforms than an unfinished one on many. Look what happened when CDPR tried to release Cyberpunk on 9 platforms at once.

That is not what all trailers are.

It’s a teaser.

It may not be political but it did seem they leaned into the whole “Florida man” stereotype. Plus the alligator walking into a gas station.

Don’t use slurs.

when you pair finances (a realm filled with scams and con artists) to gamers (people who are notoriously more gullible than the average person) then it’s not a great mix.

“You can make real money by playing this game” is genuinely one of the oldest scams on the internet, like at all. And gamers keep falling for it.

It’s called the challenge. I won’t spoil how you find it, but it’s extremely well hidden and even just getting there can be a pain without looking up a guide. Once you get there you have something like 3 minutes to finish a variety of puzzles, each of which is randomly generated (one of which is randomly generated based on your solution to a previous randomly generated puzzle). They aren’t insanely difficult per se, but you definitely need pretty good mastery of all the mechanics to get them done.

Unfortunately, and sorry for the spoiler, but the reward is disappointing. Mostly worth it for the steam achievement. If you like philosophy videos then it unlocks one of those. If you don’t know about the philosophy videos then there’s a lot about the game you haven’t found yet.

Depp