2023 VIDEO GAME CATCH ALL THREAD

[Death From Above]

I second enjoying Tomb Raider Anniversary. The gunplay parts all suck ass because, well, it's a PS1 game, but the rest of it was actually quite enjoyable.

[Travis Sheldon]

Anybody else digging the style of Boltgun?

Thinking about picking it up on PS5.

 

[RIPPA]

https://kotaku.com/embracer-microsoft-sony-game-pass-tomb-raider-netflix-1850471167

Quote

Embracer Group CEO Lars Wingefors looked dejected during his gaming conglomerate’s latest earnings presentation. Despite recently acquiring the gaming studios behind Deus Ex and Tomb Raider at a bargain, Dead Island 2 releasing to strong sales and good reviews, and now owning the rights to The Lord of the Rings, Embracer’s stock is in the tank today after it was revealed the company lost out on a $2 billion game development deal at the last minute last night.

“Up until late last night, we had an amazing cash flow because of that transaction,” Wingefors said amid heavy sighs and pregnant pauses during a May 24 Q&A session. Without ever naming the company who backed out of the $2 billion partnership, he said Embracer had a “really strong commitment” from someone it trusted. In a press release he wrote that the agreement would have been transformative for the company and “set a new benchmark for the gaming industry.”

For years now, Embracer has been snatching up every small publisher and game studio it could find. In 2020 it was Saber Interactive (World War Z). In 2021 it was Gearbox Entertainment (Borderlands). And in 2022 it was Crystal Dynamics (Tomb Raider) and Eidos Montreal (Deus Ex, Thief). Sometimes the results have been mixed. Last year’s Saints Row reboot had its moments but launched in a sorry state. Sometimes it’s worked out. Dead Island 2, which spent years in development hell getting traded from one studio to the next, came out last month and was actually quite decent.

The big question now is who Embracer was planning on partnering with and for what. Wingefors said the company had been working on the deal since last fall, with hundreds of specialists involved on both sides, and a strong belief it would all work out despite some logistical challenges. The list of companies that could likely even afford a $2 billion commitment is quite small.

 

[Kevin Wilson]

Finally getting to play Beat Saber, to see what all the fuss is about. I'm a fan of rhythm games anyway so I really enjoy it, it makes the action part easy (swinging the sabers requires no thinking) so I can concentrate on what I'm swinging at. My right knee after about an hour started complaining about the crouching (not a motion I've done regularly since I stocked shelves about ten years ago) but an hour is probably a long enough session at a time anyway. But I can see myself playing the hell out of it and I like a lot of the singers/bands they've added recently.

[odessasteps]

I just did the Faro's tomb stuff with the CEO in Horizon Forbidden West and enjoyed that quite a bit. 

[Kevin Wilson]

The Lord of the Rings game that no one asked for is apparently incredibly shitty. But its ok, the developer has apologized.

 

[RIPPA]

People are speculating that the apology might have been AI generated since they got the name of their own game wrong (to be fair - it was only once so more likely it was a typo.... that still should have been caught)

[Contentious C]

HEYYYYYY System Shock remake actually released when they said it would!!!

Too bad I'm going to be hip-deep in TOTK until 2024 at minimum.

[RIPPA]

Thread has the bullet points

Edit

non-paywall link

 

[elizium]

Blaseball is dead. Rest in Violence.

I’m going to miss the Los Angeles Unlimited Tacos 

[SirFozzie]

Hey kids! It's the new Overwatch2 Math, featuring the currently overbuffed Junker Queen!

 

Question: Junker Queen has 500 health. In the space of about 10 seconds, she takes three exploding orbs from Sigma and a rock to the face. It does approximately 1000 damage. How much health does Junker Queen have left?

Answer: 650! She used her shout and her "DoTs she does to otherss do heals to her" to remain immortal and somehow end up with even MORE health.

 

So freaking annoying.

[Ramo2653]

Anyone played Street Fighter 6? I haven't seen anything bad about it, which is a big change from the SF5 rollout. I'm debating getting it.

[jaedmc]

10 hours ago, Ramo2653 said:

Anyone played Street Fighter 6? I haven't seen anything bad about it, which is a big change from the SF5 rollout. I'm debating getting it.

I've been dabbling. My youngest wanted it for his birthday for whatever reason and we've been getting ourselves hyped over it the last couple of months. I haven't had time to dig into the various modes, but it plays well. Ran through the Aracade story with Cammy. Watched my son play some of the World Tour and it looks really fun.

The whole vibe of the game feels right to me. I mean, it is "just" a fighting game, and a fun one, but the vibe of it just makes me feel excited to hunker down and get good at it.

[Craig H]

I am far too addicted to Diablo 4. It's so freaking good. It took them long enough, but it seems like they figured out from their time of owning Bungie to looking at what Lost Ark and Path of Exile were doing for how to make a Diablo 4 live service game.

One thing I really like is that you're always vulnerable from the start to just about the end game. Potion management is a must. In Diablo 3 I could basically sleepwalk my way through the entire game. It was just way too easy. Now though, even on the second difficulty level, there are fights that are really tough and I'm relying on the dodge button a lot.

The one thing I don't like is that for whatever reason, it's the only PC game I own and play that makes my PC sound like a vacuum cleaner. Hopefully future patches optimize how it's using resources, but my god, the heat on my CPU and GPU ramp way up while playing it. It hasn't caused a hard shutdown or anything, but I wind up playing D4 with the door to my PC open just to get a ton of ventilation in there. I have one large fan in the back of the case, 2 on top, 2 in the front, and an aftermarket cooler on my CPU. It's really making me consider getting an all in one water cooling kit.

[SirFozzie]

Following up on my OW2 post..

 

Have you ever got a game (in QuickPlay) where not only are you outclassed, but so outclassed that the opponent can show off while outclassing you?

That just happened to me.

Doing my Dailies (I main sigma, but can play Moira/Mercy on supports) and the other team had a Doomfist that quite possibly could 1 v 5 my team. I know he 1v2'd vs me (Moira) and our Mercy flawlessly. I thought that this must be how a pinball feels.  Just smacked all over the place. But the coup de grace was the end of the game, where he legitimately hit something I thought was impossible.. a 360 no-scope doomfist punch.

Watching the replay, the instant before the Rocket Punch fired, he spun in place.

Needless to say, we lost, but my reaction was straight out of Ron Burgundy "I'm not even upset. That's amazing"

Edited June 6, 2023 by SirFozzie

[Kang]

Bootleg cart

 

[SirFozzie]

I remember seeing the video of someone getting caught by the Reverse Kaizo Trap in one of the SNES Bootlegs and the reaction was PRICELESS.

 

edit:

 

edit:

 

 

 

Edited June 6, 2023 by SirFozzie

[RIPPA]

Per IGN - Bioware is moving the Star Wars: The Old Republic to an outside studio (Broadsword Online Games)

Half the development team will be moving with them while some will be reassigned to work on Dragon Age: Dreadwolf or Mass Effect 4

Broadsword also currently runs Ultima Online and Dark Age of Camelot

It is unclear what will happen with Bioware's Austin studio

[JLSigman]

1 hour ago, RIPPA said:

Per IGN - Bioware is moving the Star Wars: The Old Republic to an outside studio (Broadsword Online Games)

Half the development team will be moving with them while some will be reassigned to work on Dragon Age: Dreadwolf or Mass Effect 4

Broadsword also currently runs Ultima Online and Dark Age of Camelot

It is unclear what will happen with Bioware's Austin studio

Translation - it's heading to maintenance mode

And isn't Austin working on that Anthem revamp everyone wanted?

Edited June 6, 2023 by JLSigman

[Death From Above]

I'm glad I jumped in with Old Republic MMO even if I did so late, and I'm also glad I didn't stick around too long. There was an absolute ton of single player content to eat up before I hit the same boring endgame all MMOs have thankfully.

[Kang]

Super Mario Maker 2 Level 砂漠のロイ, TCMん vid

 

 

[Shadow]

23 hours ago, Craig H said:

I am far too addicted to Diablo 4. It's so freaking good. It took them long enough, but it seems like they figured out from their time of owning Bungie to looking at what Lost Ark and Path of Exile were doing for how to make a Diablo 4 live service game.

One thing I really like is that you're always vulnerable from the start to just about the end game. Potion management is a must. In Diablo 3 I could basically sleepwalk my way through the entire game. It was just way too easy. Now though, even on the second difficulty level, there are fights that are really tough and I'm relying on the dodge button a lot.

The one thing I don't like is that for whatever reason, it's the only PC game I own and play that makes my PC sound like a vacuum cleaner. Hopefully future patches optimize how it's using resources, but my god, the heat on my CPU and GPU ramp way up while playing it. It hasn't caused a hard shutdown or anything, but I wind up playing D4 with the door to my PC open just to get a ton of ventilation in there. I have one large fan in the back of the case, 2 on top, 2 in the front, and an aftermarket cooler on my CPU. It's really making me consider getting an all in one water cooling kit.

I struggled a bit with my enjoyment of D4 because I kept trying to play it like it was D3. Once I took a bit of time to think about my itemization and build with my barb plus a few lucky drops, it's gotten a lot more fun. I just hit 50 but I'm still in Act 5 so I'm going to try to blaze through the rest of story tonight The paragon system looks promising and I'm looking forward to it. Kinda wish I could have gotten to glyphs before they were nerfed so hard but such is being an adult.

[Craig H]

I just hit 32 with my Barb and I have no idea what I'm doing, but I'm having fun! Part of the reason I say I don't know what I'm doing is because my YouTube algo has been flooded with, "BEST EARLY BUILD" or "DO THESE THINGS BEFORE DOING ANYTHING ELSE" or "DID YOU PUT 5 POINTS IN ANYTHING? WELL, YOU'RE DUMB" types of videos. 

So far my greatest enjoyment has been when there's a huge swarm of enemies and I jump into them, hit Iron Skin, hit my stomp to stun everyone, and then whirlwind everyone to death.

The thing that has been the most annoying is that as a melee character, there's no way to avoid enemies who drop poison or toxic AOE stuff and it doesn't matter how much protection your gear has, that stuff just melts you. So I've had to play some fights a little carefully by engaging, running away, and trying to kite enemies away from their AOE.

[Chaos]

Has anyone touched Gran Turismo 7 lately and consider it worth playing? I enjoy Forza Horizon series when I think to touch it, and have never enjoyed things getting more technical, but it seems like a game that has come past negative press and updates constantly. 

[twiztor]

4 hours ago, Shadow said:

I struggled a bit with my enjoyment of D4 because I kept trying to play it like it was D3. Once I took a bit of time to think about my itemization and build with my barb plus a few lucky drops, it's gotten a lot more fun. I just hit 50 but I'm still in Act 5 so I'm going to try to blaze through the rest of story tonight The paragon system looks promising and I'm looking forward to it. Kinda wish I could have gotten to glyphs before they were nerfed so hard but such is being an adult.

haven't played D4 yet, but....

i put a boatload of hours into all 3 prior Diablos. now, you gotta know that i basically only play melee. i don't try to find "ideal builds" or look any of that crap up online. hell, i barely use skills at all, really just one or two for clearing out hordes before i go medieval on their asses. i just want to jump in and bludgeon demons. also, i will sit down to play it for 8-10 hours straight and get right drunk while doing so. i got pretty good at d2 with that qualifier. d3 came out and i could sleepwalk through the game. i started a new game at inferno or inferno-2 and had basically no trouble steamrolling the whole thing (some bosses took some time and effort). i've heard d4 is difficult and scales with you, so i've tried to go back and play d2 to mentally get myself back into that mindset. man, it's tough. i got so used to coasting that my reflexes have slowed tremendously (definitely not the alcohol). 

had to order a new PC because my current one won't run d4. pretty sure the current one was bought because the previous one wouldn't run d3. new one should arrive this weekend. i'm psyched. hoping for Friday so i can get it all setup and spend my Saturday eviscerating hellspawn.