ShreddieMercury

@Biggie Thank you so much!! I really appreciate it.  Was planning to get the NSO expansion as long as I could get the controller too.  Waiting for payday but I'll hop on this next week.

Thanks again!

3 minutes ago, Biggie said:

It appears available. But I haven’t actually signed in and added it to my cart. 
 

https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/nintendo-64-controller/

I see that you can sign in and add it to your cart, but I'm wondering if it's gonna be "out of stock" once I sign up for NSO and actually am granted the ability to purchase.  Weird that it won't at least indicate that it's available, subscription or not.

I want to sign up for NSO so I can play the N64 games on offer, but ideally I'd want the N64 controller as well.  But it doesn't appear to let you buy it from Nintendo without already being a member of that service.  So I also can't see if it's in stock or not.  Incredibly annoying Nintendo thing to do here.  I recall these being really tough to get, but maybe they've manufactured enough to meet demand at this point?  Does anybody know, or have NSO so that they can take a look?

I think I would only trust the Coen Brothers with an adaptation given how effectively they understand and are able to transmit what is transcendent about McCarthy's writing.  No Country For Old Men is the best adaption of his work, and one of the century's best movies.

That said, while Blood Meridian is my all time favorite book, I've said before here that I cannot see how this is adaptable in any way that retains the power of the novel.  It is biblical and cosmic in a way that is impossible to translate to film.  I've read the Steve Tesich script from 1995, which is interesting, but it convinced me that this is simply not possible, unless liberties are taken and it's essentially a completely different approach to the story.  But I also think that would likely lead to disappointment.

All I need to hear is that there is a good single player career mode, and that the MTX are unobtrusive.  If so I'm gonna get this.  Love tennis and miss sports games so much.

I'm going 3.

Can you guys let me know which indie games have the type of vision, polish, music, and emergent game design of Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom??  Will rush to buy immediately.  Already played Outer Wilds btw.

On 3/31/2024 at 4:05 AM, Xbob42 said:

I dunno, Game Pass seems to have done alright, as has moving their games to more platforms. Dude's only been in charge for a single console launch.

 

Hard for me to look at their "main" competition in Sony and think any better. They've gutted their most creative teams and most of their AAA releases are third-person Sony sludge that all feel very samey.

 

Only big boy out there still trying new and interesting shit is Nintendo, and we all know neither company would dare copy Nintendo on any more than a superficial, corporate "I don't really understand why this is successful but it looks similar" level.

This is all from my personal perspective of what I want to play and actually care about. Don't give two shits about what is successful in terms of business, that ain't my problem. But yes, in general, our bizarre stock-market-centric world is very antithetical to creative endeavors, or doing anything but seeking growth for all eternity, at the cost of literally anything else.

This is accurate.

If people want interesting games, play what Nintendo puts out.  Tears of the Kingdom is more radical from a design perspective than anything from the last two generations of AAA gaming, and it's on a console that gamers yell constantly about being underpowered.

@best3444 the graphics are out of control, and I know you enjoy that.  It's up there with the best I've ever seen in games.

4 minutes ago, best3444 said:

 

I was busy with many other games and I currently do not have a job so I have all the time in the world to play it. I didn't HATE it and I have played and beat all Remedy games up to this point (minus dlc). I was following along with the story just fine about 10 hours in. Does it stay ok from a story perspective that I will enjoy the 10 other hours to complete this? 

 

I just don't want it to go off the rails story wise with its super natural stuff. 

Yeah I think the story stays pretty consistent.  It's very interesting, but it's also less impactful than the first because it gets so twisted up in its own mythology that eventually the rules don't make sense and as a result the stakes get lowered.  This is the problem with all multiverse stories in my opinion.

7 minutes ago, best3444 said:

Ok. I might try this again lol. Is the story difficult to follow? I got about 10 hours in but dropped it like a hot potato. 🥔 

Haven't you waffled back and forth on this game like two or three times already?  I'd say just give it up at this point.  If you weren't enjoying it after 10 hours, then the next 10 aren't going to change your mind.

This is how I feel about the majority of modern AAA games.  It's hard not to be blinded by the production values and visuals of some of these titles, and initially I have a great time.  But it's not long before I start to see the cracks and realize that the production values are coming at the expense of interesting and fun game design.  Lots of Sony stuff falls into this category for me.  Alan Wake II is a more recent example - I do still think it's a great experience, but the way it's designed makes me unlikely to ever revisit it like I do Remedy's other games.

GTA 6 Production Reportedly Falling Behind, Rockstar Urges Staff To Return To Office To Avoid Delay

KOTAKU.COM

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The open-world sequel is set to launch next year, but leadership is worried it could get delayed until 2026

What kind of horse-testicle-physics are they hiding up their sleeves this time?  Gotta get everything right, this game isn't coming until 2026.

19 hours ago, AbsolutSurgen said:

I did.

I haven't played the remake, but I hated the controls in the original game when it was released, and caused me to stop playing the game fairly early on.

I understand that my opinion is not universal, but I also think there is now a pretty broad consensus in that the controls were bad.

In terms of being one of the best games of all time -- if you're saying it's one of the top 2-300 games -- sure.  If you're saying it is top 10 or 20 -- I don't think its close.

If the controls were your main issue, I would encourage you to try the remake, because they've updated it to play like modern games but it still retains the same kind of encounter design and mechanics that made the original so beloved.  If RE is not your thing then go ahead and skip it, but the controls shouldn't give you any issues at this point.

I would also absolutely put it in the top 10 games ever made.  Everything is subjective, but I think you can easily make the argument that it's up there given the game's widespread influence in the industry.

1 minute ago, AbsolutSurgen said:

I think there are a lot of people who think the controls of the original RE4 really held it back from being a "great" game.

I'm sure there are, but it's an opinion that only seems popular in retrospect now that control schemes are almost completely homogeneous.  And that opinion doesn't seem to have affected the game's reputation.  The controls of RE4 are the game, because the core mechanics are all balanced around them.  More restricted movement increases the importance of positioning and the tension involved in the encounters.  I think the remake did an exceptional job of still retaining the risk/reward aspect of the first game's limited movement by making you wait for critical hits (brought over from RE2 Remake), while also changing the enemy behavior to account for your increased mobility and the knife parry.

It's fine to not like it, but I think people forget that tons of games used to have unique control schemes, and these differences allowed for unique approaches to game design.  If you don't like the controls of the original, the remake updates them to be in line with what all games use now, so you can enjoy it either way if you're inclined.

2 minutes ago, skillzdadirecta said:

I always thought the ranking systems in the RE games were to add replayability and to challenge your self on replays. Never appealed to me but I got it.

I agree and I think that's the point of all ranking/scoring systems, I just find it bizarre that RE's ranking is based almost single-handedly on speed, when I don't think that being fast is the most fun way to play the games.  Rewarding the player by tracking accuracy, hits taken, healing items used, etc. I would think makes more sense, because that's what playing "well" feels like.  I don't understand the structure they have in place that rewards the player for actively ignoring the core gameplay.

2 hours ago, best3444 said:

I never pay attention to any ranking or anything in this realm. I play games how I see fit. That being said, RE4 is not as good as people say it is. I beat it twice in the last year to confirm this. 

You played a game you don't like twice through to completion?  Taste and enjoyment being completely subjective, RE4 is widely recognized as one of the best and most influential games of all time, and I would say the remake is nearly as good as the original. 

Totally respect your opinion, but it's one of my favorite games in the last 5-10 years.  I find it to be mechanically nearly perfect.  The game design is still shockingly sophisticated today, which is crazy to say for a remake of a nearly 20 year old game.

I can definitely understand with the early games that trying to optimize and speed through could extend the life of the game given that they were short and more about the puzzles than the moment to moment gameplay.  But playing the more recent games, I just enjoy the atmosphere, gameplay and exploration so much that I haven't been compelled to try and speed through them, even when replaying them several times over.

I recently played through RE Village again (fun!) and started RE4 remake again (the best), and for the umpteenth time I'm still confused about why it ranks the player based on speed.  I've always ignored the rankings, but paying more attention now, I just don't understand how it would be fun to speed through these games?  My view would be that the gameplay that feels the best should be what scores highest, and that's how rankings generally work in something like a character action game.  But to achieve high ranks in the RE games, you kind of have to just not play the game at all, and instead commit everything to memory and just run through.  I've never understood the appeal of speedrunning generally, but in these games especially it seems bizarre given how exceptional the gameplay actually is.

Do you all play the RE games like this?

If the consensus is "flawed but interesting", I'll for sure bite.  Like Robocop last year.

Wow I just found out about this, doesn't seem to be much coverage.  AA?  Jazz soundtrack?  Cosmic survival horror??  What I've read doesn't inspire much confidence, but my interest is piqued all the same.

Awesome.  The development costs required to push these specs will surely continue to be sustainable.

21 hours ago, stepee said:

This came out and it’s a very well done package and it’s super super cool they are doing these and I hope they keep it up.

 

That said, I do want to express a little disappointment that besides a new remake of Gridrunner based off the original code - the collection cuts off at 1994 with Tempest 2000. 
 

For the most part, I suppose these older games are more important to have from a preservation standpoint especially since they adapt some pretty obscure controllers to play normally on gamepad here. And I get that in the British personal computer scene he was a legend based off of the output presented here. But for me, and I have a feeling a lot of people, it’s actually in 1994 when his games really started to become timeless classics that aren’t held back by the hardware he was working with. Tempest 2000 kind of established the look going forward as well as the quality, so it’s sad to see it end there. And this style is sort of what I wanted specifically to play on the deck oled.

 

I ended up fixing this by getting Akka Arrh, Polybius, Space Girrafe, Gridrunner Revolution, Tempest 4000, Moose Life, and Minotaur Arcade Volume 1 on Steam. This ended up pushing the price to about a full priced game to get what I wanted here. But more than the price, I would have been happier to pay a full price game that included these all in the same launcher which is what I was hoping for. And still also it’s missing some more lost to time stuff like Tempest 3000 would have been great to have. 

 

But it’s still about 50 games (and some of the older non Tempest 2000 ones are also fun!) for a bit under $70, and three of the games are VR, and of course the interactive documentary so it’s not a bad deal going this route. 
 

Also fyi Tempest 4000 is one of Amazon’s free games of the month. 

Excellent summary of what's great and simultaneously disappointing about this.  Aside from 2-3 titles in this collection, the games do not hold up.  Still, as somebody who wasn't around for this era, and knows very little about the 80's UK computer industry in general, it's fascinating. 

The Jeff Minter games from the late 90's - today are evergreen, and are essentially updates/reworkings of his earliest ideas.  If anything, this collection does confirm to me that he's one of very, very few actual artists working in video games.  Meaning, his games are ultimately a form of pure artistic self-expression that were miraculously able to find an audience.

I will say, I think these Digital Eclipse people are a little high on their own supply.  I don't really understand what they mean by "interactive documentary", because this is literally a museum exhibit.  It's definitely a cool niche that they're carving out, but I think "museum" is a much better term than "documentary".  What's most disappointing about this is how limited it is.  It feels like the first part of a trilogy, but there's absolutely no way that such a niche figure is getting another treatment as handsome as this one in the near future as the industry continues to collapse.

Hold on, a fun looking sports game in 2024?  What's the catch?  Are backhands paywalled or something?

If you like racing games in any way, I can't recommend New Star GP enough.  The full version is out now, and it's probably the most fun racer I've played this generation.