Vidya Games Thread

[UberSoldat]

Holy shit

Annapurna Interactive's Entire Staff Resigns From The Company

Following a breakdown in negotiations, every member of Annapurna Interactive has resigned.

www.gamespot.com

@God's Strongest Dragoon I guess we were wrong

 

[reinigen]

Holy shit

Annapurna Interactive's Entire Staff Resigns From The Company

Following a breakdown in negotiations, every member of Annapurna Interactive has resigned.

www.gamespot.com

@God's Strongest Dragoon I guess we were wrong

• Donut county
• Gone Home (self published originally)
• Edith Finch
• The Outer Wilds
• Neon White
• Sayonara Wild Hearts
• Stray
• Thirsty Suitors
• Maquette
• The Artful Escape
• 12 minutes
• Kentucky Route Zero
• Open Roads
• The Pathless
• Ashen
• Cocoon
• Journey (published by Sony originally)
• The Unfinished Swan (published by Sony originally)
• Flower (published by Sony originally)

Responsible for some of the most amazing Indie games of all time, and some of the most trash self-indulgent dreck at the same time. I think it will overall be a loss for the industry as they were mainly a publisher, and I think they did good overall.

 

[CalciumAnimal]

Holy shit

Annapurna Interactive's Entire Staff Resigns From The Company

Following a breakdown in negotiations, every member of Annapurna Interactive has resigned.

www.gamespot.com

@God's Strongest Dragoon I guess we were wrong

can i get some massive context for this i feel like i'm missing so much.

• Donut county
• Gone Home (self published originally)
• Edith Finch
• The Outer Wilds
• Neon White
• Sayonara Wild Hearts
• Stray
• Thirsty Suitors
• Maquette
• The Artful Escape
• 12 minutes
• Kentucky Route Zero
• Open Roads
• The Pathless
• Ashen
• Cocoon
• Journey (published by Sony originally)
• The Unfinished Swan (published by Sony originally)
• Flower (published by Sony originally)

Responsible for some of the most amazing Indie games of all time, and some of the most trash self-indulgent dreck at the same time. I think it will overall be a loss for the industry as they were mainly a publisher, and I think they did good overall.

yeah but the self indulgent trash (like neon white sayonara wild hearts and outer wilds) is still actually fun to play and honestly no one else would even give those types of games the time of day and games like OuterWilds don't happen without a place for it.

and if you don't believe me go read how up his own ass the team behind outerwilds is about that DLC no one likes. It's not a bad game it's not even a bad DLC but that kind of blockheadedness only come from dedicated fart huffing.

 

[reinigen]

can i get some massive context for this i feel like i'm missing so much.



yeah but the self indulgent trash (like neon white sayonara wild hearts and outer wilds) is still actually fun to play and honestly no one else would even give those types of games the time of day and games like OuterWilds don't happen without a place for it.

and if you don't believe me go read how up his own ass the team behind outerwilds is about that DLC no one likes. It's not a bad game it's not even a bad DLC but that kind of blockheadedness only come from dedicated fart huffing.

I was referring more to Gone Home, Thirsty Suiters, and 12 Minutes but I can't exactly disagree with the point you're making here. And I personally consider Outer Wilds one of the best video games ever created. It's easily in my top 3.

 

[PleaseCheckYourReceipts]

I was referring more to Gone Home, Thirsty Suiters, and 12 Minutes but I can't exactly disagree with the point you're making here. And I personally consider Outer Wilds one of the best video games ever created. It's easily in my top 3.

DLCs either do Bigger, Louder or More. Outer Wilds works because of its minimalism. It's the new era Myst, and Cyan Worlds could never really make a solid follow up. It's actually to be expected they'd have real problems expanding it. But they clearly didn't know enough to move on to another project.

 

[God's Strongest Dragoon]

can i get some massive context for this i feel like i'm missing so much.

Annapurna's Entire Gaming Team Has Resigned - IGN

Annapurna Interactive's entire gaming staff has resigned from the company following a leadership dispute, IGN can corroborate.

www.ign.com

[archive]
Seems like a nothingburger as they were already planning on replacing their president during the negotiations and it's just a fresh dev team that has put out nothing. Basically the side of Annapurna that was actually making games wanted to be spun off as its own company independent from the part of Annapurna that is a publisher. The president of Annapurna Interactive, Nathan Gary, wanted to spin off the gaming segment as its own independent company but the Annapurna founder and billionaire, Megan Ellison, backed out of negotiations so staff just quit and they appear to be just planning on making their own studio now. The only game I found that Annapurna themselves were developing was Blade Runner 2033: Labyrinth, which hasn't even been published and they only announced the formation of their internal game development studio back in 2022.


A few years prior to this, three studios under Annapurna Interactive (Mountains [Florence], Fullbright [Gone Home and Tacoma], and Funomena [Wattam]) reported concerns of abuse and a toxic work environment created by their company founders but the publisher sided with the founders (Ken Wong of Mountains, Steve Gaynor of Fullbright, and Robin Hunicke of Funomena). I have watched the video about it and I think this whole thing is just more indie devs feeling like they're too big for their britches again as they slowly put out low effort "auteur" games and then lose their shit as their asshole boss is just as unprofessional as they are.
=========================================================
WARNING: 40MINS OF INDIE TEARS ABOUT THEIR ASSHOLE BOSSES
=========================================================

 

[Helkar]

that DLC no one likes.

Was Echoes that unpopular? I never felt that it was particularly necessary or added that much to the game(that was an exceptional complete package without it), but it was fun enough to play.

 

[El Rrata]

12 Minutes

This game is in "so bad, it's good territory" for me. That is mostly because it is fun to watch streamers have to play the shit and slowly realize how fucking stupid it is.

 

[God's Strongest Dragoon]

and if you don't believe me go read how up his own ass the team behind outerwilds is about that DLC no one likes. It's not a bad game it's not even a bad DLC but that kind of blockheadedness only come from dedicated fart huffing.

The Outer Wilds dicksucking has always annoyed me. I was getting annoyed with the game and accidentally stumbled upon the Dark Bramble bullshit and immediately dropped it when a friend told me how retarded that entire ending section is. Normally I'd stick through games despite shit endings but I felt zero attachment with that game or the characters. I had no interest in dealing with the rest of the time-wasting game design if that dogshit is just waiting for me at the end.

 

[Thomas Talus]

The Outer Wilds dicksucking has always annoyed me. I was getting annoyed with the game and accidentally stumbled upon the Dark Bramble bullshit and immediately dropped it when a friend told me how retarded that entire ending section is. Normally I'd stick through games despite shit endings but I felt zero attachment with that game or the characters. I had no interest in dealing with the rest of the time-wasting game design if that dogshit is just waiting for me at the end.

Once you know what you're doing, Dark Bramble isn't hard or time-consuming. You just need a target point to aim at and some momentum.

 

[httn]

Once you know what you're doing, Dark Bramble isn't hard or time-consuming. You just need a target point to aim at and some momentum.

If you are playing with controller you can move around without alerting the anglerfish by applying the smallest amount of thrust. I don't recall the game telling you this at all. Add on the fact you can't do differing levels of thrust on kb/m and you end up with people having to do the more frustrating strat of hitting the entrance at high speed and hoping you have enough momentum to reach the next portal.

I like the game but dark bramble is poorly done and causes unneeded frustration.

 

[CalciumAnimal]

Was Echoes that unpopular? I never felt that it was particularly necessary or added that much to the game(that was an exceptional complete package without it), but it was fun enough to play.

At launch yeah they revised the segment rather heavily. and now its "tolerable" but also no fun at all because they dont move anymore even more so that some of them are now directly Infront of other pathways you used to able to take.

there is this one video i watched a while ass back that examines the whole echo's segments and trying to figure out what it was meant to accomplish

 

[PleaseCheckYourReceipts]

This game is in "so bad, it's good territory" for me. That is mostly because it is fun to watch streamers have to play the shit and slowly realize how fucking stupid it is.

It's a good mechanic setup for a small crime story. So, rather than play with Noir Tropes, it becomes Tumblr PG Trauma Porn. Which leads to the classic Norm response:



It's a great Streamer Game setup, it's just watching everyone get pissed is the funny part.

---

As for the Annapurna stuff, as far as I can tell it isn't the Game Studio but the Publisher Staff that up & quit. It's really weird all around. Reading between some of the lines, I think the assumption was that the Movie side of the business was causing the Game side nothing but constant troubles and the staff felt they were always on random decision from being thrown around. Because making the gaming publisher a separate entity wouldn't have changed the ownership. You don't often see large resignations over corporate structure issues, but it must have been pretty severe for that to happen.

 

[Punished Anime Discusser]

Helldivers 2 is getting a big patch that reverts a bunch of nerfs, and improves a lot of weapons, including making the overcharged railgun stronger than it was at initial release along with the Ponder The Fragrance content drop, all about gas weapons, and a stim pistol to recuperate your homies after they inhale your salty braps. Oh yeah, and rocket bots are getting nerfed to having smaller rocket hitboxes, and having to reload after firing a volley and chargers are getting nerfed somehow, not sure on specifics.

Patch is on the 17th, I believe, and warbond is on the 19th.

 

[RestlessRain]

I love Yoko Taro, Drakengard was interesting but Nier 1 and 2 were amazing. The man should have been tapped for directing a Final Fantasy game. Yoko's been toiling away on mobile shit for a few years, so it's good to see him back on a proper console game, and I love me some turn-based RPG gaming. Really looking forward to this in October.

 

[CalciumAnimal]

I love Yoko Taro, Drakengard was interesting but Nier 1 and 2 were amazing. The man should have been tapped for directing a Final Fantasy game. Yoko's been toiling away on mobile shit for a few years, so it's good to see him back on a proper console game, and I love me some turn-based RPG gaming. Really looking forward to this in October.

Voice of the Cards is a fun enough time but he had nothing to do with the scenario's (except the 3rd game?) so they don't have his writing. SinOfAlice is the mobile game which he worked on for like whatever development time and like a year or two because it was shut down almost immediately.

You are right about him needing a console game though the writing just does not hit without a proper story structure to throw out.

 

[agility_]

The Outer Wilds dicksucking has always annoyed me. I was getting annoyed with the game and accidentally stumbled upon the Dark Bramble bullshit and immediately dropped it when a friend told me how retarded that entire ending section is. Normally I'd stick through games despite shit endings but I felt zero attachment with that game or the characters. I had no interest in dealing with the rest of the time-wasting game design if that dogshit is just waiting for me at the end.

There are worse cases of pseudo-intellectualism on indie games, I wouldn't make a big deal out of it.

 

[PleaseCheckYourReceipts]

There are worse cases of pseudo-intellectualism on indie games, I wouldn't make a big deal out of it.

They made a Sci-fi, 3D Myst with most of the same story lines. It was actually bound to go over really well for a large audience. The problem is that it was a bit to "revelatory" for a few too many reviewers. Probably because they aren't good at puzzle games or haven't done enough puzzles in life. It also set a really good atmosphere and the use of the Groundhog's Day mechanic created a time risk that wasn't punishing. The weird part about the game is how much of an actual decades-old throwback the design actually is.

Though we're clearly into a Design Nostalgia age in games, as VR killed a lot of innovation for a couple of years.

 

[Bug Eater]

It's the new era Myst, and Cyan Worlds could never really make a solid follow up.

I really wanted to like Obduction but there was some point in the game that I completely lost interest, Outer Wilds just did a way better job at translating that kind of old school adventure game into modern language. (that being said I'd still like to try the Myst and Riven remakes)

Was it the point where you had to assemble a passageway via rotating parts of a sphere in multiple worlds?

It's pretty impressive for a puzzle to be so tedious that even solving it with a walkthrough seems extremely unappealing.

 

[PleaseCheckYourReceipts]

I really wanted to like Obduction but there was some point in the game that I completely lost interest, Outer Wilds just did a way better job at translating that kind of old school adventure game into modern language. (that being said I'd still like to try the Myst and Riven remakes)

The real power of Myst was being pre-rendered graphics in an era before anything looked that good and the Internet not really existing yet. The approachable puzzle solving really helped.