Video Games: A Far Cry From E3

[briantw]

6 hours ago, Vin said:

Yeah that's fair . I just feel that a lot of the customization and personal touches (that we should have) go to waste in first person .

Well, if the game is anything like Witcher 3, there will be a metric fuck ton of cinematics that will feature your character in full view.  It's also possible that dialogue sequences with NPCs will cut to third person as well so you can see your character emote.

[Vin]

6 minutes ago, briantw said:

Well, if the game is anything like Witcher 3, there will be a metric fuck ton of cinematics that will feature your character in full view.  It's also possible that dialogue sequences with NPCs will cut to third person as well so you can see your character emote.

Yeah , I have complete faith in cdpr . Their dialogue system was very impressive in witches 3. Put bioware' s little wheel to shame .

[The Anti-Targ]

 

12 hours ago, The Drunkard said:

FPS seems the best option for a couple of reasons in addition to gunplay. It's easier to navigate cramped indoor spaces in first person than in third, and a large part of the game seems like it will be indoors if that comment about most buildings having an internal section is true. Plus if there are a lot of environmental objects like terminals, computers, keypads, etc, around the place it's easier to interact with them in first person.

I do like third person for when I'm roaming the environment but I much prefer first for when I'm actually doing stuff, so the FPS doesn't bother me.

Not really convinced by any of that myself. I've never found any of the elements you list as being a source of frustration in a well made third person game. And I can't say I feel like gunplay in Uncharted, The Last of Us, or Mass Effect were unsatisfying because of 3rd person. But then again, I have so little experience with FPS (because I hate it) that whatever gameplay benefits FPS objectively provides isn't something I miss, because I don't experience them. And even if I did know from first hand experience the benefits of FPS, I think I would still prefer 3rd person, because I like to see my character, not just a gun wobbling around in front of me or weirdly disembodied hands waving about in front of my face. So whatever deficiencies 3rd person has I'd rather put up with them for a better (for me) overall experience. I don't really even like the Gears of War tight over the shoulder TPS style.

I do like that Bethesda has (still?) tried to give people the option of 3rd person or 1st person in TES and Fall out. But the one TES game I tried to play (Oblivion) it felt like they half arsed the 3rd person, so even though it was available, for the amount of time I could stand playing it I mostly played in 1st person. But it does take more work to let people choose which perspective they want to play in, so I can understand why, most games do one or the other.

ETA: I do wonder if FPS is easier / cheaper to make, and possibly easier for hardware to run. You certainly don't need to spend time developing character models with believable and smooth movements, and the hardware doesn't have to use resources rendering the character model and computing the movements. And doing things like puddle splashes, foliage movement, foot prints in sand, snow etc.

[Fiddler]

Love me some E3.  One of my favorite times of the year.

I seem to be in the minority but I like the look of Anthem and look forward to trying it.  Same with Division 2.

As for games this year, I am pumped for Black Ops 4 (still a huge CoD fan) and Fallout 76 (curious how it will work and I love that series so much that I am willing to give it a go). 

Cyberpunk looks sweet and I enjoy CDProjekt games, so interest is high. 

Then there is the new From game, shadows die twice.  I think Soulsbourne games are right up there as my favorite type/genre so this game could be awesome.

Another game that I am looking forward to, even if it is just to figure out what the hell it is, is Deaths Stranding.  That trailer/gameplay they showed was very interesting and it makes me want to play it, badly.

Finally, after the Bethesda conference, I installed Elder Scrolls Legends and have been playing it quite a bit.  It is a collecteble card game that is very similiar to hearthstone from Blizzard.  So far I have been having a lot of fun with it, but I also really enjoyed Hearthstone.

[The Anti-Targ]

I want to be excited about Anthem. But I really didn't like the in game dialogue (probably a mix of script and sub-par voice acting) and the combat didn't impress me much either. And I am not a big fan of damage numbers flashing up on screen.

But, the story and characters could be good and that could make it worth playing. If it has loot boxes I'm out, no matter how good the game is. I want loot boxes to die and I won't be giving any money to any game that has them. But according to some reports it doesn't have loot boxes but there will be micro-transactions for cosmetics, so I might have heard wrong and the micro-transactions could be loot boxes. So I'm on a wait and see.

I got Rocket League before it had loot boxes. But ever since it brought in loot boxes I stopped buying anything in that game. So they get no more money from me until they ditch the loot boxes.

[Rhom]

26 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I want to be excited about Anthem. But I really didn't like the in game dialogue (probably a mix of script and sub-par voice acting) and the combat didn't impress me much either. And I am not a big fan of damage numbers flashing up on screen.

But, the story and characters could be good and that could make it worth playing. If it has loot boxes I'm out, no matter how good the game is. I want loot boxes to die and I won't be giving any money to any game that has them. But according to some reports it doesn't have loot boxes but there will be micro-transactions for cosmetics, so I might have heard wrong and the micro-transactions could be loot boxes. So I'm on a wait and see.

I got Rocket League before it had loot boxes. But ever since it brought in loot boxes I stopped buying anything in that game. So they get no more money from me until they ditch the loot boxes.

EA has said no loot boxes in the article I read.  As you note, there will be cosmetics available for micro transactions; but you will always know what you are buying in advance.

If that is what they stick to, I’m okay with that.

[The Anti-Targ]

3 minutes ago, Rhom said:

EA has said no loot boxes in the article I read.  As you note, there will be cosmetics available for micro transactions; but you will always know what you are buying in advance.

If that is what they stick to, I’m okay with that.

Good to know. That's one potential barrier taken down.

[Jace, Extat]

1 hour ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I want to be excited about Anthem. But I really didn't like the in game dialogue (probably a mix of script and sub-par voice acting) and the combat didn't impress me much either. And I am not a big fan of damage numbers flashing up on screen.

But, the story and characters could be good and that could make it worth playing. If it has loot boxes I'm out, no matter how good the game is. I want loot boxes to die and I won't be giving any money to any game that has them. But according to some reports it doesn't have loot boxes but there will be micro-transactions for cosmetics, so I might have heard wrong and the micro-transactions could be loot boxes. So I'm on a wait and see.

I got Rocket League before it had loot boxes. But ever since it brought in loot boxes I stopped buying anything in that game. So they get no more money from me until they ditch the loot boxes.

 

1 hour ago, Rhom said:

EA has said no loot boxes in the article I read.  As you note, there will be cosmetics available for micro transactions; but you will always know what you are buying in advance.

If that is what they stick to, I’m okay with that.

Rubes, the both of you.

[Jace, Extat]

So Jace has been putting the time in on X-com 2 the last few weeks. I got pretty far in my first-ish playthrough before the missions became basically impossible because I took too long to upgrade armor and weapons, allowing the aliens to far outstrip my offensive and defensive capacity. It got so bad that during routine intervention missions with my A team I was having to reload constantly to avoid squad wiping.

So I restarted and I'm doing much better now that I understand the mechanics and -more importantly- the campaign logistics side of things. The Avatar Project has gotten pretty far along and I've only taken out one site (the one with the vial of goo) but my team is strong.

I just inadvertently sent an all-female deadly viper assassination squad to take out our second Advent base. Fingers crossed.

[Vin]

Xcom vanilla is not that difficult at all actually but definitely requires you to plan out your research route and base expansion for maximum efficiency in advance . I always prioritize armor research since the survivablity of your operatives is way more crucial to success than even completing missions ,which leads to another thing about xcom , you have to accept that you're not gonna win em all , sometimes your best move is just extracting your operatives alive . I didn't like the avatar project addition because it just forces you to take stupid risks that you didn't have to take in the first one and the way every mission has some time limit on it now ,which I get is to add tension and force people to act more (like clocked chess I guess) but for me personally that wasn't what I enjoyed the most about xcom , I loved coming up with perfect strategies that have my team riding home without a single scratch (didn't happen as often as I liked ) .

However for anyone who enjoys this methodical drawn out approach to xcom I definitely recommend the Long War mod . It's awesome and I've sunk a lot of time into it in both iterations.

 

Anthem looks disappointing imo

[The Anti-Targ]

5 hours ago, Jace, The Sugarcube said:

 

Rubes, the both of you.

Jaded, the Sugarcube.

But it is EA.

[Werthead]

18 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Not really convinced by any of that myself. I've never found any of the elements you list as being a source of frustration in a well made third person game. And I can't say I feel like gunplay in Uncharted, The Last of Us, or Mass Effect were unsatisfying because of 3rd person. But then again, I have so little experience with FPS (because I hate it) that whatever gameplay benefits FPS objectively provides isn't something I miss, because I don't experience them. And even if I did know from first hand experience the benefits of FPS, I think I would still prefer 3rd person, because I like to see my character, not just a gun wobbling around in front of me or weirdly disembodied hands waving about in front of my face. So whatever deficiencies 3rd person has I'd rather put up with them for a better (for me) overall experience. I don't really even like the Gears of War tight over the shoulder TPS style.

I do like that Bethesda has (still?) tried to give people the option of 3rd person or 1st person in TES and Fall out. But the one TES game I tried to play (Oblivion) it felt like they half arsed the 3rd person, so even though it was available, for the amount of time I could stand playing it I mostly played in 1st person. But it does take more work to let people choose which perspective they want to play in, so I can understand why, most games do one or the other.

ETA: I do wonder if FPS is easier / cheaper to make, and possibly easier for hardware to run. You certainly don't need to spend time developing character models with believable and smooth movements, and the hardware doesn't have to use resources rendering the character model and computing the movements. And doing things like puddle splashes, foliage movement, foot prints in sand, snow etc.

Did Oblivion have 3rd person? I thought it only had it in mods, and Fallout 3 was the first time they included it? It was still terrible, and was only decent in Fallout 4 on the fourth attempt (after FO3, New Vegas and Skyrim). 

Apparently CDPR said a massive issue cropped up when they started development with the idea of 1st person/3rd person switching, which is the amount of cramped spaces in CP2077, which is far higher than in W3, and also the verticality of interactions and combat. A lot of action in the game takes place whilst ascending or descending skyscrapers and buildings, and there's a lot more ranged combat at different heights (unlike W3 where 99.9% of combat takes place on the same plane, in melee). Being able to "look up" or "look down" in 3rd person games is always a massive arseache and it got to the point where they decided the 3rd person view was almost unusable because of this. Add in the complexity of model-switching (which is almost never seemless) and the design decisions for space in the game, where you have to have wider corridors/alleys to allow the camera some free movement, and they decided it wasn't really worth it.

Meanwhile, here's Cyberpunk creator Mike Pondsmith hanging out with Deus Ex creator Warren Spector at E3. This is like the cyberpunk singularity right here.

Quote

I want to be excited about Anthem

The utter apathy over Anthem is impressive to behold. BioWare's first new franchise in nine years? People should be really intrigued, but there's just zero appetite for it that I can see.

Quote

Xcom vanilla is not that difficult at all actually but definitely requires you to plan out your research route and base expansion for maximum efficiency in advance . I always prioritize armor research since the survivablity of your operatives is way more crucial to success than even completing missions ,which leads to another thing about xcom , you have to accept that you're not gonna win em all , sometimes your best move is just extracting your operatives alive . I didn't like the avatar project addition because it just forces you to take stupid risks that you didn't have to take in the first one and the way every mission has some time limit on it now ,which I get is to add tension and force people to act more (like clocked chess I guess) but for me personally that wasn't what I enjoyed the most about xcom , I loved coming up with perfect strategies that have my team riding home without a single scratch (didn't happen as often as I liked ) .

They reduced the time limits in War of the Chosen (which I'm still waiting to come down in price) and there's a fantastic mod which means they don't start counting down until your squad breaks cover. That makes a lot of sense.

[briantw]

Vampyr has been a lot of fun.  The reviews are mostly accurate, in that the combat is a chore but the RPG elements are great.  It's very enjoyable talking to all the citizens in London and slowly learning their stories.  I also love the way the game's systems interact.  You can get massive experience gains from drinking the blood of and killing citizens, but that permanently removes them from the game, meaning any side quests they may have offered will disappear with them.  Further, you get more experience depending on how well you know someone, so you're encouraged to unlock all their secrets first.  But, of course, the better you get to know someone, the more you may discover you don't want to kill them, and most of the characters do a great job of walking the line between doing some bad things and still being likable.  

I also like the leveling up system a lot.  The game doesn't level with you, which means you can easily stumble into fights you have no chance of winning.  This adds some nice tension to exploration.  You gain experience by doing all the things you'd expect...killing enemies, advancing quests, and feeding off of citizens.  However, you can't use that experience until you sleep, which advances the game a day.  Advancing the game a day enacts the consequences of anything you did the previous day.  Sometimes that's good, like when you heal several citizens and they are feeling better the next day, which has a positive impact on district health.  Sometimes it's bad, like when you kill a citizen and it has unintended or devastating consequences.  Sleeping also allows you to spend your experience to level up your character.  Since you can only level up by sleeping, but sleeping has consequences, you're encouraged to push as far as you can each day, really testing the limits of your current power level compared to the increasing power of enemies as you move forward in the game.  It's a really good set-up.

Unfortunately, the combat just isn't fun.  One on one fights aren't bad, but if there are three or more enemies, it's just annoying.  The game has a very inadequate targeting system that just isn't designed for fights with multiple enemies.  The combat system itself isn't bad in principle, though.  I like the design of whittling down an enemy's stun meter so that you can drink from them, which gives you blood to power your vampire moves.  The problem is that the combat itself is way too clunky and unresponsive.  Enemies also have an annoying habit of hitting you through your swings.  In most games, hitting an enemy will stun them briefly, breaking their swing animation in the process.  Here, that brief stun often won't register, and they'll just continue their swing and hit you, which unfortunately always fucking stuns you.

I'd still recommend the game highly if you like decision-based RPGs.  I've found that the slog of combat hasn't stopped me from wanting to continue playing and unlock the rest of the mysteries of this world.  It's also probably a must-play if you like Anne Rice style vampire fiction.

---

Also started Mafia III because I got it in the Humble monthly bundle.  The beginning of the game is great.  It's fast-paced and action-packed and does a good job of teaching you all the mechanics while telling an interesting story.  I just got to what I would call the end of the prologue, which features a huge plot moment followed by the game opening up more.  

From what I've read, sadly, I've already played the best part of the game.  We'll see if that's true or not, but the first act of Mafia III was really enjoyable.

[Vin]

35 minutes ago, Werthead said:

 

The utter apathy over Anthem is impressive to behold. BioWare's first new franchise in nine years? People should be really intrigued, but there's just zero appetite for it that I can see.

They reduced the time limits in War of the Chosen (which I'm still waiting to come down in price) and there's a fantastic mod which means they don't start counting down until your squad breaks cover. That makes a lot of sense.

It's just that bioware is known for RPG games and that's what it's fans want and crave and Anthem is looking to be some destiny clone .which isn't really gonna excite a lot of people. 

 

I used the mod , BTW it's a good expansion, definitely get it if it's on sale . 

[l2 0 5 5]

44 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Did Oblivion have 3rd person? I thought it only had it in mods, and Fallout 3 was the first time they included it? It was still terrible, and was only decent in Fallout 4 on the fourth attempt (after FO3, New Vegas and Skyrim). 

Oblivion had third person. I often played that way. Can't really explain it, but I've always played the Bethesda games in third. Appeals to me more. Can't explain it. 

 

18 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I got Rocket League before it had loot boxes. But ever since it brought in loot boxes I stopped buying anything in that game. So they get no more money from me until they ditch the loot boxes.

I got Rocket League when it was a PS free game of the month in Summer '15 and have put a dumb amount of hours in it so I don't feel too bad about throwing them some money here and there. But yeah, there are an absurd amount of loot boxes/decryptors, etc.

[The Anti-Targ]

32 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Did Oblivion have 3rd person? I thought it only had it in mods, and Fallout 3 was the first time they included it? It was still terrible, and was only decent in Fallout 4 on the fourth attempt (after FO3, New Vegas and Skyrim). 

Apparently CDPR said a massive issue cropped up when they started development with the idea of 1st person/3rd person switching, which is the amount of cramped spaces in CP2077, which is far higher than in W3, and also the verticality of interactions and combat. A lot of action in the game takes place whilst ascending or descending skyscrapers and buildings, and there's a lot more ranged combat at different heights (unlike W3 where 99.9% of combat takes place on the same plane, in melee). Being able to "look up" or "look down" in 3rd person games is always a massive arseache and it got to the point where they decided the 3rd person view was almost unusable because of this. Add in the complexity of model-switching (which is almost never seemless) and the design decisions for space in the game, where you have to have wider corridors/alleys to allow the camera some free movement, and they decided it wasn't really worth it.

I got Oblivion on PS3, and I believe it came out on PS3 some time after the Xbox 360/PC release. So perhaps they incorporated the 3rd person mod into the PS3 release.

Still not sure I buy these reasons. Demon's Souls is 3rd person and it had quite a few tight spaces, some that felt downright claustrophobic, which arguably felt more oppressive and constricting (adding to the atmosphere of the game) because it was in 3rd person. The inFamous games are all very 3 dimensional with lots of sky-scraper and other tall structure traversal while in combat. The Batman Arkham games also had some tight-ish spaces and 3 dimensional action, and it only went 1st person when you went into ducts and covered drains. And Spider Man is going to release soon, and if any game has lot's of going up and down sky scrapers it's going to be Spider Man

It's OK that CDPR lacks the experienced talent to create a 3rd person game with these particular challenges. But they don't necessitate 1st person, since there are highly regarded and well made 3rd person games with these elements. If they are talking area traversal where you would be swapping between 3rd and 1st person several times within a short timespan (like when Batman goes into ducts and covered drains in the Arkham games), for significant portions of the game then sure that would necessitate being entirely 1st person, because frequent swapping between perspectives would not be fun.

[The Anti-Targ]

6 minutes ago, l2 0 5 5 said:

Oblivion had third person. I often played that way. Can't really explain it, but I've always played the Bethesda games in third. Appeals to me more. Can't explain it. 

 

I got Rocket League when it was a PS free game of the month in Summer '15 and have put a dumb amount of hours in it so I don't feel too bad about throwing them some money here and there. But yeah, there are an absurd amount of loot boxes/decryptors, etc.

I hope you watched the latest RLCS world championships. I know Esports isn't embraced even by long time video game players. But Rocket League is a genuine spectator sport, that happens to be a video game. And the skill of the top players is insane.

I dunno if I would be too down on Bioware because of apathy over Anthem. It's not a good that there is mostly apathy or ambivalence, but before Mass Effect was released people were probably looking at it rather cautiously. I don't really recall a great deal of hype for Mass Effect until after it came out. Also I am eagerly anticipating Dragon Age 4.

[l2 0 5 5]

1 hour ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I hope you watched the latest RLCS world championships. I know Esports isn't embraced even by long time video game players. But Rocket League is a genuine spectator sport, that happens to be a video game. And the skill of the top players is insane.

I've watched it before. The player skill is insane! The aerials on attack defense are most impressive.

 

So i got myself a free Gamefly account for a month and got Detroit. All was going well...

The first test was Stormy Night with Kara. Managed to get Alice out of the house away from her piece of shit dad unscathed. After that, I faced a test with Markus. I knew when we got back to the old man's mansion the son would be there at some point to threaten us. 30 seconds later my prediction came true. Like an idiot I went into the painting room with Carl (I think that's the old man's name?) and Leo was there. I did the same thing I did with Kara and broke through the system and made my own choices. Of course I opted to defend myself like a fool and a shove, A SHOVE, ended that little twerp and the police came in and blew my ass away... broken. Next chapter with Connor seemed simple enough... till I pushed the android too far and the cops came in and he raged out. He eventually broke free, blew my ass away again and he killed himself. What the fuck? Just like that, roughly 2-3 hours into the game and 2/3 characters are dead. I'm assuming their storylines are over which leaves only Kara. Damn.

[Rhom]

2 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I dunno if I would be too down on Bioware because of apathy over Anthem. It's not a good that there is mostly apathy or ambivalence, but before Mass Effect was released people were probably looking at it rather cautiously. I don't really recall a great deal of hype for Mass Effect until after it came out. Also I am eagerly anticipating Dragon Age 4.

Then you better be cheering for Anthem, or else BioWare may go the way of Maxis and Visceral.

[The Anti-Targ]

1 hour ago, Rhom said:

Then you better be cheering for Anthem, or else BioWare may go the way of Maxis and Visceral.

I dunno. I feel like with how well Dragon Age Inquisition did with critics and in sales EA would probably not shut down Bioware unless DA4 pulled a DA2 and flopped hard. Though I do think Anthem coming out before DA4 is a bit risky. One Sci-fi failure from a once popular franchise to be followed up by another new Sci-fi venture with a bit of doubt and scepticism. Releasing a solid DA4 in between might have restored some faith in Bioware. Though I guess in their scheduling prior to ME:A coming out they were anticipating ME:A being more successful and more liked than it was.