Video Game Chat Thread - Pre-Alpha Experimental Version

[SSj_Ness (Yiffed)]

I can now play it on my Steam Deck.

How's it play on there? If it can run at a steady 30fps at low settings that'd be good enough for me.

 

[EmpGulcasa]

View attachment 7547527
This should've been left buried with the PSP.

Why do you say that? I'm looking forward to playing it on my PC.

 

[McKennai]

Why do you say that? I'm looking forward to playing it on my PC.

A re-release being developed by a studio that has quite a different track record than either Pyramid or Japan Studio is probably the main reason .
Personally I find Patapon was designed around Sonys PSP which just fit right then and there, something that probably won't feel the same on current Platforms.

 

[Rumpled Foreskin]

Can anyone recommend a good mmorpg?

 

[I Know 孤独のせい]

Can anyone recommend a good mmorpg?

Even though it's been a while, I remember enjoying GW2. Liked the structure and question around. Especially with the open events. And it's bit more active gameplay. I played though a good chunk of FF14, somewhere around Endwalker and I thought it was a miserable experience. Godawful story and the gameplay felt boring. And shit community. The only good thing was some of the music and Heavensward. Don't know how WoW is these days, but I can't imagine good.

 

[⋖ cørdion ⋗]

Man, I keep seeing content drop comparisons between new and old entries in IPs like Monster Hunter, WoW and Street Fighter. From a huge patch full of fun shit every 4 months to.. dogshit every 6. What the hell happened to gaming? It's across the board. Games release in worse states and the content drops slower and in smaller scale.

Even though it's been a while, I remember enjoying GW2. Liked the structure and question around. Especially with the open events. And it's bit more active gameplay. I played though a good chunk of FF14, somewhere around Endwalker and I thought it was a miserable experience. Godawful story and the gameplay felt boring. And shit community. The only good thing was some of the music and Heavensward. Don't know how WoW is these days, but I can't imagine good.

As someone who played mmos for fucking ages and noticed how they all died once Discord took over, replacing the social aspect/need to log into an mmorpg to socialize, they're all dead. Like, "ESO is just TES but you see other people run around" is valid, but it's the exact same for every other game, especially WoW which is usually considered the exception to the rule. Sure people talk in /2 but even on EU realms is it LGBTQIZZ and American politics. LFG has become automated matchmaking.

That said, I'll say GW2 too. It's different enough from XIV and WoW that it's worth exploring, it's on Steam, it's F2P and you can get the first 3 expansions at like.. $12 every other large scale sale. It has no real questing so you can simply just run around 100%ing each zone if you so desire, which is quite rewarding I'd say. It does have some really odd quirks that reek of a classic mmorpg, such as having to do daily grinds for a few days to unlock materials for a mount, but you only need to do that once per account, so.

I just subbed 3 months to WoW to keep myself away from entertaining GW2/ESO, inferior in all ways, yet I itch to play GW2 constantly. Once you're in the vibe, it's cozy as fuck. And it attracts a different audience from other mainstream titles. In Europe, it's the german crowd. Like, millions of autistic german singlehandedly keeping alive ESO and GW2 at this point.

 

[EmpGulcasa]

Finishing up with Ixion and thoroughly enjoyed it, though I had to restart once due to the game not explaining things especially well. Next single player game is gonna be Lunar 1 from the PC remaster. Been like 15 years since I last played it.

 

[Brain Power]

Oh cool, if you have the original version of System Shock 2 they give you a 50% discount on the remaster (at least in GOG). My copy is ancient so it's not just for recent buyers.

 

[ZMOT]

Can anyone recommend a good mmorpg?

resident ESO shill, so gotta recommend it.
plays more like a sequel to gw1 than the actual sequel. monetization is mostly content, even if it looks worse on the surface. word of warning, combat takes some getting used to and the old leveling is a relic from 10 years ago. if the quests bore you there's nothing wrong with skipping/doing them later and rush to gearcap (doesn't take long) to get to the real meat of the game - collecting sets, trying to beat challenging content or nolife in pvp etc.

 

[Rumpled Foreskin]

resident ESO shill, so gotta recommend it.
plays more like a sequel to gw1 than the actual sequel. monetization is mostly content, even if it looks worse on the surface. word of warning, combat takes some getting used to and the old leveling is a relic from 10 years ago. if the quests bore you there's nothing wrong with skipping/doing them later and rush to gearcap (doesn't take long) to get to the real meat of the game - collecting sets, trying to beat challenging content or nolife in pvp etc.

Concerning eso, i’ve heard very polarizing things. Your take is rare to me, in that it falls within the gray area. People either shit on it or worship it, in my personal experience.

 

[CIS White Droid]

I've played ESO since release and it's a decent game with fun to be found if you look for it. That being said I also find it's incredibly easy to get burnt out on. Recently I've taking my time actually roleplaying my character (RP walking, avoiding certain quests/activities, etc.) and it made the game a lot more enjoyable for me. Also avoiding PvP like the plague is a must in my opinion.

 

[ZMOT]

Concerning eso, i’ve heard very polarizing things. Your take is rare to me, in that it falls within the gray area. People either shit on it or worship it, in my personal experience.

the problem with eso (granted no game is perfect) depends when you played it, where you come from and how much you can stomach the combat.

if you're an elderscrolls-fag it plays a bit too fast and lose with the lore, which people still whine about 10 years later, but for me is more like "kotor isn't the original trilogy" and I can keep it separate.
eso at launch was also a bit rough and undercooked (without going into it they were going for dark age of camelot pvp endgame initially, to then scramble to have enough pve content for launch since that's what you need if you want to appeal to the mainstream), complete with trying to ape wow's progression and payment model afterwards.
after roughly a year when it was obvious that wouldn't work out ZOS (almost) completely retooled the game into a guild wars-clone which worked out much better. however you can never remove progress from players (unless you want your game to crash and burn right then and there), so the current leveling and gear-cap level are a relict from that retooling 10 years ago - the gearcap is basically the old maxlevel from back then (and hasn't changed since and probably never will), and there are still 50 levels per character etc.
that means the game you played 10 years ago is quite a different game, and even starting now having to level first makes it look like a run-of-the-mill linear progression mmo lot of people people burned out from over the years. ironically you can't just dump new players right into it with access to all the subsystems otherwise they get overwhelmed. damned if you do, damned if you don't.

combat is probably biggest point since it takes some getting used to, made somewhat worse by said leveling. not only do you need the combat to click, it takes quite a few hours (even if you speedrun it, even more if you're a casual) till you get access to enough skills and sets (gear isn't just higher numbers, but also an extension to your skills and character) to get a real feel for the class, and there are enough differences between them where one class might be a better fit, but there's a good chance you'll never get to that point. the initial experience (especially when you play it like a classic mmo) is quite different.

even for me it took a while to get off my ass to really look into it and "get it", but after that point and figuring out what the game actually expects it's great. for example every class has a skill for a buff that gives 20% more damage. some classes only unlock that later on (with one class being able to buff the whole group, that's more or less how ESO's teamplay works since you only have access to 10 skills + 2 ultimates, meaning in a group they can replace that skill that buffs themselves with something else), but it's still right there in the tooltip. now take a guess how many players conveniently overlook it or simply think it's not that important.
funny enough it still beats gw2's "lol faceroll" combat, and if you play it like that it will feel even worse - there's no global cooldown, you have to juggle resources and know when to use what to not run empty and whiff autoattacks. there are outright skills that will drain you dry since they're not supposed to be spammed (unless you properly gear for it with, and then only in a group).

as much as "it gets good after X hours" is a meme, sadly that's how it works, with no guarantee it will for you. it IS still a mmorpg after all.

however as I mentioned before (and elsewhere probably) it's also a great filter. the people you'll end up with in the challenging content are there because they want to, not because the game forces them to get purple pixels with higher numbers. content is still challenging later on (there's stuff from 2016 that still fucks group today), lot of nifty little design decisions to curb some of the usual mmo drama shit too while lowkey improving the community aspect overall, even if changes take a while to happen (if anything ZOS is pretty slow changing stuff, but that's also a pro for some people, and by now most issues have been more or less "fixed"). so even outside the sweaty circles (except pvp because that's just how it goes) most people are pretty chill. interestingly a lot of boomers (real ones and the meme ones), still no idea if one is the reason for the other or vice versa.

EDIT: I also should mention since the goal is not have you to grind for higher numbers over and over but collect a lot of sidegrades, with plenty of other stuff to do if you care about it, there's a good chance it will sour you on other games. anything that tries to hook me via linear progression can fuck right off, and since loot is deterministic - meaning you know exactly how long it's gonna take to get most of the stuff you care about, even if it takes a while, but it also means if you grind hard you'll get rewarded appropriately and not just another pull on the slot machine - all the games that try to sell me RNG as "endgame" can fuck right off as well.

I've played ESO since release and it's a decent game with fun to be found if you look for it. That being said I also find it's incredibly easy to get burnt out on. Recently I've taking my time actually roleplaying my character (RP walking, avoiding certain quests/activities, etc.) and it made the game a lot more enjoyable for me. Also avoiding PvP like the plague is a must in my opinion.

luckily with capped progression you can just take a break and come back later, without having all your gear invalidated and having to grind through the last 2+ expansion to catch up. since sub is optional you don't have to drop money first either.

pvp can be fun if you don't go full sweat and stick to zerging in cyrodiil. can't even think of a current mmo which offers siege-pvp besides gw2's knocking on doors.

 

[Caddo Cobgang]

if you're an elderscrolls-fag it plays a bit too fast and lose with the lore, which people still whine about 10 years later, but for me is more like "kotor isn't the original trilogy" and I can keep it separate.
eso at launch was also a bit rough and undercooked

ESO sucks and im the biggest defender of Elder Scrolls on this site, theres really nothing fun about the quests at all, if you want to explore shit they will never cover in a singleplayer ES like Valenwood, go right ahead, otherwise trying to play that seriously is not worth your time, its far too grindy to me, and they lock too much content behind higher levels

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

The game is easier than most soulslikes outside certain parts like invasions because you are given AI companions to use.
Enjoy the Cathedral area, but don't worry no other area is like that.
View attachment 7496549

That area would forever be the one thing people remember from that game, besides big anime tits.

 

[ZMOT]

ESO sucks and im the biggest defender of Elder Scrolls on this site, theres really nothing fun about the quests at all, if you want to explore shit they will never cover in a singleplayer ES like Valenwood, go right ahead, otherwise trying to play that seriously is not worth your time, its far too grindy to me, and they lock too much content behind higher levels

fair enough, but be aware I can't really take that opinion seriously when there's hardly locked content because almost everything is level scaled. unless you're talking about veteran (for the monster/raid sets, which is just gear) or hardmodes (for the cheevos), and even then you can probably get the required char progression (not BIS obviously but close enough it won't raise eyebrows) to do veteran in a few days. as I said the game isn't the same as it was at launch since 2016 when one tamriel released.

quests are whatever, it's not like elder scrolls blew people away with quests that were mechanically more than "go to X, then do X" in different order. what matters is the contents, and in that regards eso is more than fine - especially considering how hard everything else dropped in the last 10-15 years.

 

[EmpGulcasa]

Jumping in on the ESO bandwagon, I enjoy it quite a bit but as an MMO it's lacking. It's best played if you just want a very, very long single player Elder Scrolls game set in areas not covered in the mainline series, or are into the mass PVP.

I'm a couple hours out from finishing Lunar Remastered, and it's been mixed. The nostalgia is definitely there but I don't think it holds up particularly well. Thank god for the combat speed increases and auto battle or it would be a real slog. Moonlighter was going to be my next single player game when I finished but I dipped my toe into it a bit early after playing too much Lunar today and I'm finding I enjoy the shop aspect more than the actual dungeons. Some of the enemies feel a little unfair in how they expect you to approach them, but I could also just be bad at video games.

 

[⋖ cørdion ⋗]

ESO sucks and im the biggest defender of Elder Scrolls on this site, theres really nothing fun about the quests at all, if you want to explore shit they will never cover in a singleplayer ES like Valenwood, go right ahead, otherwise trying to play that seriously is not worth your time, its far too grindy to me, and they lock too much content behind higher levels

ESO is best consumed through those guys who make youtube vids in which they 100% all zones and do a summary/ranking. There is nothing to gain by doing the same yourself, which is usually the redeeming aspect of playing bad games.

It's best played if you just want a very, very long single player Elder Scrolls game set in areas not covered in the mainline series, or are into the mass PVP.

Same case with GW1, GW2, and SWTOR.. And WoW.. Basically no mmorpg is an mmo anymore. Guilds are only actively briefly when new content drops, else they're on a Discord somewhere talking about anything but they game they initially met through. I do enjoy SWTOR's take of having companions (ESO too?) to make content easier and more classic Bioware'esque, seeing as any group content in WoW is just to be ignored. No one talks, no one queues. The social filler; the single mother, the aging grandpa, the racey 3 kids in /g who won't shut up, are all gone. They've moved on (to be by His side) to other games because they go where the gameplay is, while the rest of us rot away, constantly resubbing hoping this time is the one where it'll all click.

I finally got a 7-3 job so I'm capable of raiding every day, but holy shit does it just not appeal to me. In WoW it's 1 of 20 ways to get gear, so there's no endgame feeling about it. Years ago you got gear from dungeons and pvp in hopes of getting to raid where the ultimate gear is dropped. Now you get tier pieces from fucking dungeons? If anything, this should exactly be the time where I get into gw2 or swtor for the story/gameplay, but they're just so inferior to WoW in terms of feel, abilities, UI etc. I only need to complete 3 class stories in Swtor but I can't even bring myself to doing that.

 

[ZMOT]

Basically no mmorpg is an mmo anymore. Guilds are only actively briefly when new content drops, else they're on a Discord somewhere talking about anything but they game they initially met through. I do enjoy SWTOR's take of having companions (ESO too?) to make content easier and more classic Bioware'esque, seeing as any group content in WoW is just to be ignored. No one talks, no one queues. The social filler; the single mother, the aging grandpa, the racey 3 kids in /g who won't shut up, are all gone. They've moved on (to be by His side) to other games because they go where the gameplay is, while the rest of us rot away, constantly resubbing hoping this time is the one where it'll all click.

they probably play eso now because that's still happening there. how systems and progression work inevitably affects how players interact with the game and with each other (look at the average moba "community") and eso solved a lot of those early on, either by accident or purpose (like have single server per region, not the cucked MUH SHARD MUH FACTION crap). since you do the hard stuff for the challenge, you not only get people who want to be there, but you also want to have a social circle to find the right people. but even in randoms that still works more often than not (but obviously less optimal if that's what some people require to be able to enjoy the game without flying off the handle).

another example is that you HAVE to communicate with other players, be it for being able to kill world bosses or get those quests shared. or you could just treat it like a singleplayer game and wait minutes to hours at the boss for randomly someone else to show up (and then still wipe). up until 2023 the game didn't even have a party finder (and there's still no matchmaking for raids, only dungeons), the only way to find a raid was to idle in craglorn where everybody else was doing the same. sooner or later you have people do or say stupid shit, either because of boredom or knowing there's a captured audience. ffs back when they put in a new endgame item that required picking fucking flowers in one fucking zone (meaning the whole server was camping there to get it, and like I said it's ONE server per region) it was pure barrens chat - and I mean vanilla "chuck norris" tier barrens chat, none of that gay classic shit.

I got into my last raidgroup doing hardmodes for over 2 years because I helped one of them late at night in a dungeon years prior and they still had me on their friendlist and were looking someone competent they could vibe with - what could be more MMO than that? unless you mean a pricedumping global auction house or people idling in capitol cities. heck I just got another invite a few days ago via people and guilds I met during that time over a year ago. that's how it always worked, all the way back to vanilla and earlier before normalfags ever heard of mmorpgs.

that might sound too much like real-life where you need the right connection to progress, but that's how it is. people want "the real mmo" experience, overlooking you have to involve yourself since "real mmos" are social to a large degree. it's like a neet whining about no gf when he never leaves the fucking house.
if you treat everyone like a bot, you'll be treated the same. if you don't, even if most people don't bite, the few that will are the ones you end up raiding for years and doing dungeon hardmodes with. of course there's also a time and place for everything. if you want to RP in a dungeon where most people just want to rush through to get their daily done, you won't have much luck. but if you're looking for people to do pvp or hard content with, doing that with randoms (even if some runs will suck) and meeting people that way will get you results because you'll inevitably encounter people with the same interest. it's basic bitch social interaction 101.

 

[⋖ cørdion ⋗]

that might sound too much like real-life where you need the right connection to progress, but that's how it is. people want "the real mmo" experience, overlooking you have to involve yourself since "real mmos" are social to a large degree. it's like a neet whining about no gf when he never leaves the fucking house.
if you treat everyone like a bot, you'll be treated the same. if you don't, even if most people don't bite, the few that will are the ones you end up raiding for years and doing dungeon hardmodes with. of course there's also a time and place for everything. if you want to RP in a dungeon where most people just want to rush through to get their daily done, you won't have much luck. but if you're looking for people to do pvp or hard content with, doing that with randoms (even if some runs will suck) and meeting people that way will get you results because you'll inevitably encounter people with the same interest. it's basic bitch social interaction 101.

I've wanted to be 'that one healer' ever since I started vanilla wow. Back when each realm had their own infamous /2 spammer, ironforge ganker etc. I did content for the sake of being able to say I had to such a degree I'd tank naxx on a friend's warrior simply to say I had done it. Yet, being a healer main in a guild is still a thing I never achieved, and it's the one thing keeping me interested in WoW. Finally giving it my 120%, healer maining, doing all the content, talking to guildies.

But reality is that Discord has largely damaged the social aspect of these games, and time passing has likewise removed all the social non-gamer filler you'd meet and read about. When'd you last hear about video game addiction? WotLK? I'm one of the few people I've witnessed actively trying to reduce phone and social media usage, and that's the kind of unicorn behavior you'd need to find in WoW to not just end up in another Discord + twitch chat guild. Smart people moved on from mmorpgs, yet few of those who remain are exactly going against the grain by still playing such an outdated genre, which can be a good place to find people who aren't living vicariously through e-celeb streams and shit.

If you made any lasting friends on the internet it was likely tens of years ago. Landing a partner on early tinder, joining a group when Apex was new, hanging out with your 12 year old WoW guild in which not a soul play the game anymore. It's as if every facet of the internet has been washed clean of meaning and whether it's a twitch, in-game or leddit Discord, it more or less boils down to the same channels, same discourse, same terminology, same loss of identity. Join a game discord and you'll see not half of it is about that game anymore. I joined a GW2 guild with a lot of online players, none of whom speak, and a Discord of people who don't play the game. That's the new normal.

Ultimately I want to control my time and my usage of it, so doing scheduled mmorpg content is just a complete fallacy. Yet those few memories of doing content with people who care still lingers, however much easier it'd be to find 3 friends to play DRG or whatever fotm game with.

 

[ZMOT]

Ultimately I want to control my time and my usage of it, so doing scheduled mmorpg content is just a complete fallacy. Yet those few memories of doing content with people who care still lingers, however much easier it'd be to find 3 friends to play DRG or whatever fotm game with.

scheduled content isn't the issue, it's not different than joining a club or sports team. recurring recreational activity you do with likeminded people (and if you want to progress in a fixed group there is no other way around it). heck we often had breaks or non-progress raids because the raidlead was an actual professional athlete and off to events. almost complete normie outside the game as well, and raiding 2-3 times per week for 2 hours was just that.

the problem is finding those people, but it's not a thing that happens overnight or the minute someone hits levelcap and is ready for a guild while ignoring everyone and everything up to that point. it also helps not trying to get into the top sweatlord groups and stick with the more casual ones. you won't clear content on your first try and progress will be slower, but also more enjoyable (ymmv). most of the guilds I was in was full of boomers, who treated the game like a hobby or distraction, not a second job or something to lose their life in. ironically those are also the ones who are more picky who they hang out with, because some early twenties drama magnet isn't worth the time and energy, half of them has their own kids for that shit. still did server firsts all the way back, in part for simply having less drama and being more chill in general.