Random Gaming Talk

[Nintex]

Like many things in the west, labour costs are just too high to make video game development viable and there is much better pay in corporate software.

So the game industry will be in the endless cycle of burning through young talent that ships shitty code and moves on after because they can't offer any long term perspective to anyone.

Outsourcing will only solve the problem for so long. Because at this rate places like Poland are getting more expensive and the real cheap places like Russia are no longer accessible or like in India they fuck things up too much even for gaming standards.

But as long as the money keeps rolling in and folks want their dopamine shots the wheels will continue to grind.

What is a new development though is the games in 'eternal' development just to keep the studio funded I guess. There is Mass Effect, GTA, Perfect Dark. Just money sinks with no end of development in sight. Will GTA ship in 2026, 2027, 2028? Everyone working on it knows, their job is gone when it ships. So why bother shipping.

[benji]

https://classic-offensive.net/

[who is ted danson?]

It's crazy how we simultaneously live in the best and the worst time for gaming

I just got Homeworld 3 (I know), Aliens Dark Descent and Tomb Raider 1-3 remastered all for less than the price of 1 month of PC gamepass

[Eric Cartman]

https://classic-offensive.net/

Most news stories about this have very interesting comments threads implying these guys are full of shit as to not knowing exactly why they've been refused, amongst the usual "I always knew valve were bad guys ever since they made me install steam to play 1.6" type longterm haters.

AFAICS from people who have been following this, these guys are tinkering with 'black box' stuff that Valve repeatedly told them not to tinker with by referencing leaked source code for an earlier version of source which has been deprecated (and as a result are unpatching known and potential security vulnerabilities), and they're also fucking with proprietary netcode stuff which inherently has to be a black box to stop cheating, and they were told to knock it off prior to submission but went ahead anyway.

I legitimately believe valve do not consider this mod an existential thread to their CS:GO revenue or are trying to fuck 'the little guy' over because they're Evil Corporation

[benji]

On the website they deny doing any of that and claim that Valve is allowing others to do it.

[DavidCroquet]

I'm reading that the new SNK joint is a total bomba. Era is of course blaming Ronaldo, but I wonder why no one ever points out the obvious: SNK just never really transitioned to 3D all that well?

City of the Wolves is just "welp, good enough" 3D you'd see in any random medium-good game. 

This seems like an especially serious problem if you're SNK, and your ancient reputation was built on having the best of the best of the best of the best 2D graphics and animation. Feels like when they transitioned to 3D they just threw up their hands and said fuck it. I mean, look at these comparisons:




It's not bad looking, but it certainly isn't remarkable in the way SNK 2D games have almost universally been. Which seems like an obvious historical appeal of the franchise.

[chronovore]

SNK - no, seriously, name anything in the last 10 years that made a mark on the industry. 

…anything in the last 20 years.

[Eric Cartman]

On the website they deny doing any of that and claim that Valve is allowing others to do it.

I dunno, their statement(s) (I'm including the stuff they themselves chose to put on their website, and their prior statement from january) have big "Sure, I have aimbots and wallhacks installed, but I never used them on this account so its bullshit you banned me" energy.

Putting aside the weird timeline of project dead -> leaked source code -> huge updates massively extending what mod does beyond available modding tools, they got told by valve that they couldnt distribute on steam due to breaching TOS, then decided they would distribute 5GB of actual CS content as part of their mod on other sites, and got C&Ded for doing that... but like... wtf did they think would happen?
Doom mods don't redistribute doom1.wad, TES mods don't redistribute base game assets... c'mon breh.

[bork]

I'm reading that the new SNK joint is a total bomba. Era is of course blaming Ronaldo, but I wonder why no one ever points out the obvious: SNK just never really transitioned to 3D all that well?

City of the Wolves is just "welp, good enough" 3D you'd see in any random medium-good game. 

This seems like an especially serious problem if you're SNK, and your ancient reputation was built on having the best of the best of the best of the best 2D graphics and animation. Feels like when they transitioned to 3D they just threw up their hands and said fuck it. I mean, look at these comparisons:




It's not bad looking, but it certainly isn't remarkable in the way SNK 2D games have almost universally been. Which seems like an obvious historical appeal of the franchise.

There's a few things about this.

-The SNK CEO is stepping down.  People are speculating that it's because of the game doing badly, but we don't know if that's true and we don't know much about the sales.

-The doom n' gloom comes from a Steam active player count list and Japanese physical sales numbers.

-As it turns out, the game was among the top 12 best selling Steam games for April and for Japanese digital sales it was #9 last month.  

All I can say is that when I go to play the game, I have no trouble getting a match in seconds.  None of their previous games from the past decade had that kind of activity.  Whether or not this lasts is another story.

Ronaldo the rapist was a horrible addition, but I doubt that his inclusion had any effect on the sales numbers.  Fatal Fury was never as popular as some of SNK's other games and it has been 25 years since the last game came out.  I'm not surprised that it's not setting the world on fire, but at the same time, what fighting game not named Street Fighter does?  Even Tekken and Mortal Kombat have fallen off.

Lastly, visually this game looks very nice.  SNK's games keep looking better with each new release.  The difference between CoTW and KOF IV (their "comeback" game) are night and day.  

Props to them for including music tracks from other games, color edit, and the entire first season of DLC characters for free, plus being quick to release updates addressing character balance and bugs.  They're doing things that people bitch and complain that the other fighting game developers don't do and sadly it seems like most people don't care.

[HardcoreRetro]

Have been putting a bunch of emulators on my Rog Ally. Finishing some games from my backlog. Finished GTA Liberty City Stories a few days back. Now going through Vice City Stories.

Apparently it can run a bunch of PS3 games pretty well as well. Gonna see if I can get Demon's Souls to be a portable game.

[chronovore]

I have frequently wondered why Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories have been left behind, while Chinatown Wars was ported to every system under the sun, and all three original GTA PS2 games have been revisited with updates both for iOS/Android as well as a more complete remastering.

[Polident]

Have been putting a bunch of emulators on my Rog Ally. Finishing some games from my backlog. Finished GTA Liberty City Stories a few days back. Now going through Vice City Stories.

Apparently it can run a bunch of PS3 games pretty well as well. Gonna see if I can get Demon's Souls to be a portable game.

PS3 and 360 emulation on those windows handhelds is quite good. Remember tests of Demons Souls with the 60 FPS patches, no issues.

[HardcoreRetro]

I have frequently wondered why Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories have been left behind, while Chinatown Wars was ported to every system under the sun, and all three original GTA PS2 games have been revisited with updates both for iOS/Android as well as a more complete remastering.

Seems Liberty City Stories is at least on android.

Vice City Stories not getting ported probably has to do with the Phil Collins missions and the great soundtrack.

[Polident]

I’m curious about which version of VCS you played? PSP or PS2?

Been thinking about replaying it and I never really looked into those PS2 ports of PSP games. I imagine they’re all better. Those Syphon Filter PSP games I enjoyed despite the aiming with face buttons. PS2 has that second analog going for it. I remember that Resistance PSP had a whole rigmarole to play with dual analogs. Needed a PS3, Resistance 2, and the PSP component cables. Tried it once and it wasn’t worth the effort.

[HardcoreRetro]

The PSP ones, since it's the ones I own.

I actually enjoy weird control schemes since almost everything uses the same control setup nowadays.

[chronovore]

I played the PS2 ports of them. 

I didn’t get a PSP until much later.

[who is ted danson?]

is it all over for bungie?

will sony close them?

[who is ted danson?]

Could it be the next Fuse / Anthem / Concord

[HardcoreRetro]

I'm hoping the entire AAA side of the industry implodes.

[Polident]

Didn't realize I owned Stranglehold on PC so I'm playing it. Last I did was whenever it came out on PS3. 2007, I'm guessing.

Very Xbox 360 game. UE3 brown+extra brown mode during slow mo. A ten minute turret section with flashing red explosive barrels. Cutscenes are low resolution with horrible compression artifacts. A multiplayer mode nobody has ever played.

It's fun!

[benji]

It's regularly down to $2 on GOG, as it is currently: https://www.gog.com/en/game/stranglehold

[chronovore]

Didn't realize I owned Stranglehold on PC so I'm playing it. Last I did was whenever it came out on PS3. 2007, I'm guessing.

Very Xbox 360 game. UE3 brown+extra brown mode during slow mo. A ten minute turret section with flashing red explosive barrels. Cutscenes are low resolution with horrible compression artifacts. A multiplayer mode nobody has ever played.

It's fun!

What's amazing about that color palette is that it's a Midway game. Midway never met at #0000FF or #00FF00 or #FF0000 it didn't like. Fuck, it never met a #FF00FF it didn't like, for that matter. The point is that Midway adopting any kind of subtlety in their visual approach is noteworthy.

[books]

I have the 360 version of Stranglehold but never beat it. Not sure why as it was super fun. I think i just always disliked the xbox controller. I wanted the ps3 version that came with a copy of Hard Boiled.

I've been playing an older edition of Out of the Park baseball and it's tempting me to buy the latest version and join an online league but remembering the last time I joined a league (a decade ago), the commitment is way too much amd so I'll stay single player simulating.

Edit- i need to dust off the Vita and finish Chinatown Wars. The humor in it was what was missing in IV and Lost and the Damned but came back in Ballad of Gay Tony.

[books]

I'm reading that the new SNK joint is a total bomba. Era is of course blaming Ronaldo, but I wonder why no one ever points out the obvious: SNK just never really transitioned to 3D all that well?

City of the Wolves is just "welp, good enough" 3D you'd see in any random medium-good game. 

This seems like an especially serious problem if you're SNK, and your ancient reputation was built on having the best of the best of the best of the best 2D graphics and animation. Feels like when they transitioned to 3D they just threw up their hands and said fuck it. I mean, look at these comparisons:




It's not bad looking, but it certainly isn't remarkable in the way SNK 2D games have almost universally been. Which seems like an obvious historical appeal of the franchise.

They're just way more complicated than Street Fighter. I haven't bought COTW yet and might not because I only just bought KOFXV last year and barely play that enough to get my moneys worth, but the amount of work to be competent in an SNK game compared to SF is enormous. Online, I'll occasionally win a match in SF6 just dicking around. No way I win a match in an SNK game.

[Polident]

It's regularly down to $2 on GOG, as it is currently: https://www.gog.com/en/game/stranglehold

Must’ve bought it on a whim one of those times.

I don’t know if gog “fixes” older games using galaxy. No issues running it at 1440p 165hz, which again, makes those pre-rendered cutscenes look absolutely awful. The only community fix I added was an FOV toggle. That’s the other thing about those early Xbox 360 games. Planning around 4:3 displays was still around and some achieved widescreen by vertically cropping the image to 16:9. 



Maybe I’m getting a little nostalgic for that era. I should play Lost Planet and Dark Sector next.

[benji]

GOG does fix games, though now they're supposed to be the ones tagged "GOOD OLD GAME" on the store they have in the past tweaked all kinds of games. A lot of the games that did that were ones that based their PC resolutions around then monitor standards which weren't 16:9 yet. There's lots of games that will render just fine in any resolution but the game has only certain resolutions listed in the settings. One of the very old NBA Lives can actually be forced up to 1920x1080 and it even does widescreen correctly but the in-game settings assumed nobody would ever have a resolution above 1024x768. I remember that one because even the menus render in the proper size, the games after it were PS2 ports so the menus were always locked at 640x480 and the frame buffer is 4:3 no matter what.

[Polident]

Another game I tried playing through GOG Galaxy was Outlaws. It’s playable-ish. Monitor freaks out and says “are you really playing a 640x480 game?” and even with other video plug ins, menus stay 640x480. Monitor blacking out to switch resolutions. Playing windowed disables mouse controls. Music doesn’t play and there are fixes at pcgamingwiki. Because it’s only Outlaws and Dark Forces, there isn’t a ton of community support like with Build or others. There’s a small team, it seems.

[benji]

Yeah, for most things GOG's fixes are to get them to run not run ideally. But they have fixed certain issues with certain games, I think it says on the store page somewhere what they've fixed. But not all of them are listed, for example the GOG version of Saints Row 2 has a proper CPU limiter on it.

There are lot of games on there that probably aren't any different than the Steam versions, although I don't think GOG would stock games that literally don't launch, there's some on Steam.  

Some stuff they have mentioned can't really be fixed, I think Caesar III was one I read that it's just hard coded to be that resolution and they'd need to recompile the game somehow. This is also why some games on there are the DOS versions, so they can be run in DOSBox. Sim City 2000 is one that comes to mind that has a Windows version but is DOS on there. Even though I'm pretty sure the Windows version renders via regular ass Windows stuff so probably would display perfectly. That may also be EA's fault, I don't know if the version on EA App (Origin) is the same. Usually on the forums or in the reviews you can find someone attempting to explain why the version on the store is the version it is.

GOG Galaxy is just their client, the versions you get from their website the old way are the same.

Even though I'd probably buy digital versions anyway one benefit I've found involving games I actually own on disc is there's way too many PC games from the turn of the century that check what OS you're on before letting you install. "UPGRADE TO AT LEAST WINDOWS 9X" YEAH I KINDA HAVE! So GOG's (and Steam's) custom installers get around this, that probably helps make a number of games compatible.

[Polident]

Very short game. Sub 5 hours. Not a bad thing. It’s funny how the only parts I remember from nearly two decades ago are the boss fights. All are bullet sponges and you use the invulnerability+unlimited ammo rage mode to stand there and shoot them for a good minute.

Now I’m wanting to replay Max Payne 3 again. After 14 years or something, nothing matches up to the shootouts in that.

[Besticus Maximus]

I was quite down on doom at the start but when the game gets going it's really good, stupid story aside.