Ah, there’s the catch and confusion. Not required for single player but required for multi, I guess? Not sure how others play Civ but that’s not gonna affect me. I’ve only ever played these games solo besides a very rare duo game.

It doesn’t. They mentioned there would be a unique skin for Napoleon if you signed up but it didn’t sound required.

pathfinding

Pathfinders, you could say

I think the distributed nature of Mastodon keeps government control from being an issue. It would be kind of cool as a space for citizens to ask for assistance or air grievances while giving the politicians an officially owned space for things like announcements.

Not really. Most large story DLCs for any Bethesda game require all expansions. I suspect it’s for assets, but I would also just pick the largest use case (and already owning the expansions most certainly is the largest use case) and say it’s a requirement also, so I’m not chasing down edge cases for people all day. Just the rough math of releasing something you have to support afterwards.

Hey, that’s a neat image. I’ve seen other ways of visualizing the popular vote on a map but this one looks wonky as hell and I like it.

I haven’t looked but no way they’re removing perks. They’re too enmeshed into the game design.

They didn’t do one in this case, but I have heard stories of these sorts of malicious actors paying people stateside or elsewhere to take the video interviews. I’ve had to do ID checks on video in recent-ish interviews.

Absolutely! There’s always a tradeoff though and some segment of the gaming population will be turned off, which is fair. I personally love the lonely feeling of NMS.

As someone who felt the same for a long time, it’s partially fixed but partially still that loop. They’ve added a lot of variety to that loop also with the last few updates. It definitely adds a bit of life, not so much on the emotion.

Last year, I did another trilogy playthrough as FemShep while I also happened to be playing Guild Wars 2 as a Sylvari woman. My double take when I realized was pretty funny. Jennifer Hale is supremely talented and she lends an air of gravitas without getting into comical over-acting. She just has a perfect voice for a badass!

This is the second time I’ve seen right wing talking points associated with this game and it’s so pathetic to try and use that to cover over your middling review scores. I mean, you run a business. If you’re not going to self-reflect on why your product didn’t do as well as you thought, not sure you’re being honest with yourself on why your product failed. That same thinking would have been present in the design and development process, preventing their product from ever getting any better. One of those reasons companies even pay lip service to DEI: it genuinely brings fresh perspectives and refines your art and product.

Anyway, I even liked this game. It’s honestly pretty fun and the zombie hordes are relatively unique for the genre. The main character isn’t some right-wing asshole and even comes off as pretty empathetic and kind, if I remember correctly. It just came out at a time of open world oversaturation and played into almost every trope of the time. I think if it came out today, (and they managed to not show their ass online) it would do a lot better. As usual, the right-wing malding is weird on top of being gross and unnecessary.

To be fair, this was the case in my secular(-ish) public school as well and I believe it was there until the early 2000s. The catholic church has many sins (which Squid did a great job laying out above), but I don’t think they, as a group, endorse the concept of corporal punishment like they do with anti-choice practices or the rampant pedophilia. That’s a cultural issue with certain regions of the US.

People really don’t understand how many players there are who just don’t care about this stuff. They get none of the gamer rage, they don’t check reddit or lemmy, they’re not watching Twitter to see what the game journos are pissed about. DLC and MTX make buckets of money, even when compared to the profits from most full games, and they’re magnitudes cheaper and easier to develop. They’re not going away as long as they’re bought and they’re going to be bought, I guarantee it. It’s not even a bad thing, per se, as long as the player feels they’ve gotten their money’s worth.

If anyone is looking to return gaming to a pre-“horse armor” state where big DLCs were the only option, you are looking for a fantasy that will never, ever happen. I’ve seen the numbers for some of the orgs I’ve worked for and it’s hilariously skewed toward that stuff. The real answer is to pivot to different games. Embrace indies and games that don’t have MTX. You’re never gonna get the AAAs back in the bottle.

Give me Donkey Kong Country HD you cowards

Not like we aren’t feasting right now anyway. Baldur’s Gate, Pathfinder, Pillars of Eternity, Skald, Wasteland. I would love a Dragon Age spinoff that went back to its roots though.

Thanks for the info! I might check it out then, seeing as you mentioned FC3/4. Not my favorite games but they can be enjoyable when I want to turn my brain off and stealth kill across the land.

I think you’re in luck on your final point. This trailer is for the steam release this week, I think.

Anyone played this enough to compare it to something else? I’ve never seen the movies but I usually don’t mind a generic open world rpg-lite if there’s plenty to do.

There’s nuance in it, for certain, but there is a large contingent of people who play games that find most open worlds boring. I love a big open world, even a lot of the procedurally-generated ones are fine with me when it’s done correctly (looking at you, Starfield 😒). There are myriad options in between there, where it sounds like you might fall as well.

The key is, as you say, making the world in such a way that it drives the core gameplay loop. This is such a bizarre example, but I just played Animal Well recently and I think it’s actually a fantastic example of this. Every area of this large map that you retread over and over again has hidden, intentional elements that clearly drive at the core gameplay loop of “discover secrets everywhere”. It’s also a 7 year passion project not likely to be replicated. I do think though that the lessons can be learned and applied on less intense projects.

Sit down, consider your loop. Why is the player here, having fun with your game? Is it to discover secrets? Hide secrets everywhere. Is it to drive around in a souped up car? Add more space and interesting driving conditions. Is it to kill big enemies? Add huge roaming bosses. I think after that focus is determined, then you should shrink it as much as possible while still fitting into your design constraints.

This is all layman’s conjecture though.

I also love the Hinterlands, but you and I are in the vast minority based on the initial feedback to Inquisition. It was super common to hear “just push past the Hinterlands, it’s so much better afterwards”. Even more generally, I’ve been hearing “why are all the devs making all their games open world for no reason?”

I’m also an open-world junkie because I love exploration. I’m saddened by this design choice, but I do completely understand where it comes from. It can still be done well and I love the lore of Thedas, so I’ll be there to see, I guess.