Vidya Games Thread

[PleaseCheckYourReceipts]

I think part of the problem with 4e was that it was designed to be kind of video game-y with the idea it would mesh with a proprietary virtual tabletop they were going to design so that it all ended up being more like a video game than something like foundry/roll20, but then, uh... the project manager was murdered by her SO and the rest of the project kind of... didn't happen.

Wow... you learn something new every day.
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You know, that explains a whole lot more about the stupidity coming out of WotC over the last years. Lead Devs were actually insane and it scared off competent talent a long time ago.

 

[PleaseCheckYourReceipts]

No, I feel much the same way man. I think your analysis of "They don't want evil, they want edge" is spot on. I was having this discussion with the wife a few months ago where I mentioned I noticed a trend of Twitter/Tumblr/Soycuck minded people not letting evil people BE evil. In particular - I can't remember what piece of media it was - but I remember it was a giant group of people complaining that rape had been used as a narrative element in some show/game. And not only were they complaining that the act of the rape was allowed to occur, they were upset there wasn't any admonishment of the rape within the media. However, I remember the person who did the raping was unequivocally an evil person. So the simple fact "Bad person do bad thing" wasn't good enough to these viewers. They needed a dissertation talking about WHY it was bad and to regale the user with a lesson on why its bad. Fucking mongoloids.

On top of that, I've also noticed a trend where it's impossible to portray someone having done horrible acts for justifiable reasons. The thing where you go "Man, he sure did a lot of bad shit. But I completely understand the reason why they did that."

Two examples I can use to illustrate my point. One recent, one not.
Recent - Anyone who has played FF14 knows how great of a character Emet-Selch is. I consider him one of the greatest villains in Final Fantasy, if not a lot of video gaming. For anyone who doesn't know (and I'll spoil this for anyone who is interested in playing FF14 [spoilers for only through Shadowbringers])
although he starts the game as a leader of essentially nigh-invincible beings (similar to the Q) set on causing catastrophic disasters that kill untold amounts of people in your world, by the end of the expansion you can understand his motivations. For a very brief summary, the world you inhabit was actually split into 14 parts many millennia in the past. And you live on the 'main' part from which the others were copied. Emet was one of the leaders of the people who existed before the sundering. He had to witness everyone he loved have theirs souls ripped apart and split into 14 parts. He literally views everyone that is currently alive as malformed husks and mockeries of the people he once knew.

The reason he's causing the natural disasters is they are the catalyst needed to rejoin the parts of the split world back into the main world. He's just trying to return everything back to the way it was when he was an inhabitant of the world. And he doesn't care how many people he kills, because they're literally only 1/14th of a person to him. They're literally not-people, treated as insects. The fact they are split is the greater evil to him. A literal perfect case of moral relativism. So by the time everything is said and done, you get his motivations and most people will look at the circumstances and the choices he was given and think "Would I have really done any different had the same happened to me? How far would I go to bring back my friends, family, and everyone I loved?"

However, there is a giant faction of the FF14 player base who despise Emet and never allow themselves to understand his point of view. "Emet-selch is a genocidal monster", and that's as far as they get trying to analyze his motivations. I've witnessed these 'fans' literally get hostile seeing anyone discuss why they like him, and can understand his motivations. They seem completely unable to break out of a linear 'black/white' dichotomy of good and evil, and just never go beyond it.

Old example - I used to read a webcomic called "Dominic Deegan" during the early internet. Quality of the comic notwithstanding, one plot point I remember was interesting was when they were focusing on orc tribes. The orcs were analogous to Native Americans, where they had tribes each of which had very different cultures. So in it, you end up meeting two orcs through different story lines, and you find out they're 'married' to each other. However, they are on exceedingly bad terms with each other. When you find out the reason why, the author basically ended up creating a really fucked up trolly problem. The male orc was a visiting dignitary from one clan during his early teens and witnessed the girl orc's family get slaughtered due to a series of events outside his control. The host clan treated orphaned girls as basically worthless due to their heavily patriarchal structure, and were about to slaughter the girl as well. However, the visiting dignitary orc stopped the murder by claiming the young girl as his own. Under his own tribes traditions, he could get her out and at least allow her a life within his own tribe to grow up and move on with her life. However, the host clan's traditions demanded he 'make her his bride right then and there' in order to take ownership of her. So he was basically forced to rape the girl to save her life.

So like I said, fucked up trolly problem. Given the settings and its restrictions, what's morally worse? Allowing an innocent to get murdered when you absolutely have to power to save their life? But by saving their life, you're literally forced to rape her as per dogmatic religious and societal beliefs. Which is worse. And like, bad writing and ridiculous scenario aside it's at least an interesting thought experiment.

But no, everywhere you read all you see is the reductionist position "Rape becomes justified, trivialized, and defended tirelessly by Dominic against all detractors". All nuance stripped away. Just "Bad thing bad, how dare you try to justify it!"

I'm looking forward to it. I like the Persona formula, but I can see why people wouldn't want to play the games due to the focus on Japanese High School settings. Taking the JRPG formula with social/reputation aspects, and seeminly applying it to an isekai setting with reputation building with factions sounds absolutely fucking amazing.

Part of the real reason is the major diehard fans of D&D still live and die by the 3.5e rules. 4e is seen as the beginning of the end of their hobby where it keeps getting more and more watered down and having the edges sanded down to appeal to people who care less and less about the game itself and just want to be part of the aesthetic. And it doesn't matter there are other systems and settings that might suit normies more. They want to be part of the popular thing, even if popular thing has to be bastardized in order for normies to enjoy it.

Edit:

Don't forget they want to remove all racial modifiers too. Can't have inherent natural physical abilities, oh no.

A reply to the large points you mention.

The problem with these types of people is that they, themselves, are actually evil and need a combination of something else to be more evil than them, evil to be spelled out and something to project their own emotional evils on. As much as we view the 2 Minute Hate from Orwell's 1984 as a propaganda technique, the reality is that it's also an actual outlet for far too many people. These people are the death of nuance, perspective or insight about any hard topic.

And, the worst part, is they're also the loudest because its the only way to quiet the demons eating at their souls. Thus, they'll ruin any space they're around because of how pathetic they are. It's part of the reason a place even like this, Proctor has his Gatekeeping boundaries because you have to. You'll always attract people that'll ruin a larger group activity, and you have to gatekeep them. (This used to be called "Having Standards", but, again, we're dealing with people that have none that isn't pure moral relativism.) Is it any wonder this was set off by a moron that couldn't get over the "inherent racism" in the storyline of literal Demon Spawn?

While I haven't played FF14, Emet-Selch sounds like the perfect "big bad" in a MMO or a massive "epic" story in general. He has his reasons, perspective and view that what he is doing is right, but the costs to achieve his outcome is clearly beyond the pale. Yet, by the same measure, his loss is real, painful and there is no actual resolution to the issue. This is called "good worldbuilding", generally.

As for D&D in general, it's never been my thing (outside of games), but the fact WotC hasn't had a complete online system to let people play has been insane. There's been 3D MMOs based off D&D for over 20 years. It's basically Farmville as far as necessary interfaces. You could sell an endless amount of microtransactions. How dumb is this company? Then everything with a new OGL came out, I got to watch all of the D&D fans go nuts and see actual discussions about WotC and Hasbro. The Hasbro board needed to have fired everyone at the upper management space a long time ago. They're a moronic company surviving off inertia and a couple of IPs.

 

[Harrow Prime]

If Soken and FF16 don't win OST of the year at the Game Awards and other places, they were fucking ROBBED.

I would actually get a little mad if it doesn't win GOTY or at least best soundtrack (that exists, right? It better). It really deserves any awards it gets imo.

 

[UberSoldat]

It took me around 40 tries on the chapter 1 boss of Armored Core 6 to beat it.
Then I swapped up my build specifically to counter it and wrekt it.
It is more than a bit weird to be able to die, swap your entire build, and then restart at a checkpoint. No other game in the series does that. It's also weird that you AC isn't locked looking in the direction of your crosshair.
It's a fun, fast, fluid game. But I'm on the fence if this "modernized" AC is losing a bit of the series's identity.

This game is going to be a lot of people's gateway into the series and mech games as a whole. It's very clear FromSoft wanted this one to be more accessible to those newcomers, and I can't fault them for that honestly.

 

[JMForte]

It took me around 40 tries on the chapter 1 boss of Armored Core 6 to beat it.
Then I swapped up my build specifically to counter it and wrekt it.
It is more than a bit weird to be able to die, swap your entire build, and then restart at a checkpoint. No other game in the series does that. It's also weird that you AC isn't locked looking in the direction of your crosshair.
It's a fun, fast, fluid game. But I'm on the fence if this "modernized" AC is losing a bit of the series's identity.

Yeah it's clear they want you to have different builds and switch them out depending on bosses. Can't really speak about it losing it's identity, as I've never played an AC game, there are good ways to modernize a game and bad ways and as someone who liked Battlefield and CoD I've seen what happened to them, I know what it's like to see a series lose its identity. Really only thing to ask yourself is if you think AC has lost its identity, is if the new identity is worth it or not.

 

[reinigen]

The entire Garlemald segment of Endwalker is also a giant check of whether you're a thinking, feeling human being, or a soulless automaton powered by reddit upvotes, and a solid 80% of the fanbase just fucking fails it, then goes online and gloats about being right over failing it it.

Or y'know, the three choice question at the very end with Zenos, where he straight up asks you "Did you have fun playing this game?" and people pick both of the wrong answers because "muh WoL would NEVER AGREE WITH ANYTHING ZENOS EVER SAID, HE'S A NAZI GARLEAN!"

Thinking about this again last night into today, and while I think the Garlemald segment is a great NPC check there is one that is better - Gaius van Baelsar. How you feel about Gaius is a real judge of your ability to think, empathize, and have perspective about the circumstances of ones life.
Especially after Endwalker and the Sorrrow of Werlyt storylines. Here is a man who has committed untold numbers of atrocities in the name of his country. And even when he was still a Legatus there was methods that went too far for even him - Black Rose and Nael's Project Meteor. But after being betrayed by Lahabrea and having the mask ripped off - literally and metaphorically - he finally has the truth of all of his actions laid bare before him. And instead of just giving up he seeks to right the wrongs he was responsible for enacting and begins to attempt to atone for his crimes.

Far too often I've seen people be like "Nah, he's still a Nazi. A remorseful Nazi is still a Nazi. Still should be fucking killed", and I'm just aghast at the complete lack of empathy some people seem to possess. There never seems to be a road to redemption available that these idiots find acceptable.

 

[The Rrat]

It took me around 40 tries on the chapter 1 boss of Armored Core 6 to beat it.
Then I swapped up my build specifically to counter it and wrekt it.
It is more than a bit weird to be able to die, swap your entire build, and then restart at a checkpoint. No other game in the series does that. It's also weird that you AC isn't locked looking in the direction of your crosshair.
It's a fun, fast, fluid game. But I'm on the fence if this "modernized" AC is losing a bit of the series's identity.

Eh, I replayed AC1 leading up to AC6 and I'd say that while it is definitely modernized, it still very much feels Armored Core down to the story, the storytelling presentation, mech designs, combat, etc.

 

[Schockwellenreiter]

New English voice acting, animated cutscenes, new music, new story scenarios, and four years of development.

This isn't just a port, it's a complete remake with new stuff added.

I understand the position, but in this case I don't think it's valid. They've got a port of the PSP version of the game on steam for $20 right now.

Reload is a totally rebuilt game that's been redone in the P5 engine. As well, it had (for better or for worse) it's voice work completely redone. I think the amount of work they've put into making this justifies the full price tag.

Well in that case I think it's justifiable. Sort of. £60's still too steep for me but what the fuck do I care, I don't buy games day one anyway. Thanks for the heads up, lads

 

[MrProcessor]

This should be fun....

 

[Bug Eater]

Anyone else playing Blasphemous 2? I'm only a couple of hours in but it's really good, I'm having a lot of fun swinging the Veredicto around - the platforming/combat in general feels more fluid than the first game. My only complaint so far is that the new cutscene style doesn't really fit with the game's overall aesthetic (and I guess the fucked up body horror/Catholic setting doesn't hit as hard now).

 

[MrProcessor]

Anyone else playing Blasphemous 2? I'm only a couple of hours in but it's really good, I'm having a lot of fun swinging the Veredicto around - the platforming/combat in general feels more fluid than the first game. My only complaint so far is that the new cutscene style doesn't really fit with the game's overall aesthetic (and I guess the fucked up body horror/Catholic setting doesn't hit as hard now).

I just got it on GoG, but it's making me wait before I can download it. I thought I had preordered it, but I guess not. Unless I preordered it on Switch, so I hope I didn't buy it twice. It should be available to download shortly.

I finally beat the tutorial boss in Armored Core 6, hooray! It only took me 12 or 20 tries.

 

[Abomination]

Anyone else playing Blasphemous 2? I'm only a couple of hours in but it's really good, I'm having a lot of fun swinging the Veredicto around - the platforming/combat in general feels more fluid than the first game. My only complaint so far is that the new cutscene style doesn't really fit with the game's overall aesthetic (and I guess the fucked up body horror/Catholic setting doesn't hit as hard now).

I haven't yet, but definitely looking forward to it. I actually only just played and beat the first one about two months ago, so it's still pretty fresh in my head. I enjoyed it quite a bit. Playing some other games right now, but seeing 2 really gets me tempted to pick it up. So maybe soon...

 

[MrProcessor]

I just got it on GoG, but it's making me wait before I can download it. I thought I had preordered it, but I guess not. Unless I preordered it on Switch, so I hope I didn't buy it twice. It should be available to download shortly.

I finally beat the tutorial boss in Armored Core 6, hooray! It only took me 12 or 20 tries.

Darn it, I had preordered it. I got a key for it on IndieGala last week. I better try to refund the copy I bought on GoG.

 

[MrProcessor]

Ah, this one has english subtitles...

In other news, the key I preordered from IndieGala for Blasphemous 2 on steam is saying:

"Sorry, unfortunately something unexpected happened. Please retry later.
If it persists, please contact our support and we will look into it as soon as possible."

Yay! I get to talk to support! Fun!

This reminds me of that time I ordered a videocard with "free included" digital copies of Devil May Cry 5 and Resident Evil 2. When I finally went to redeem them the Website said "Keys expired. Fuck you!" (Well, that wasn't the exact phrasing.)

The reason it took so long was because the video card had to be installed to redeem them, the Website that dispensed the keys from AMD checked. However, the graphics card needed a bigger power supply than my computer had at the time, and that meant getting a new case. Finally I just decided to build a new PC around that graphics card. However, I took my time in purchasing the parts, not realizing there was a ticking clock on my games...

Oh, that computer got destroyed after a hurricane flooded my house later...

 

[Todd's Strongest Howard]

So I decided to go do a bit of digging and reading out of curiosity for some things that come up in Baldur's Gate 3, and the fact that there is a prequel adventure, Descent into Avernus, that serves to set the stage for some facets of the story and in hindsight of even just several small details it makes it so much more funny that one guy's whining about racism with the Tieflings.

Spoiler: BG3 spoilery things, even if it might not really be present in the game proper; extended autism

So Aradin talking shit to Zevlor about how tieflings aren't known for their bravery might be an actual personal attack against Zevlor, since there's a bit of dialogue between him and his right hand in his little enclave room where there's a mention of Hellriders. I don't know if it's ever brought up in BG3 itself since even after 180 hours I've still not finished act 2, but in the setup preamble of the Descent into Avernus adventure path it mentions that the Hellriders were a unit of Paladin knights of Elturel trained by Zariel when she was still an angel for the purpose of invading Avernus to intercede in the Blood War and try to curb some of the destruction it wreaks through the multiverse. Things went south for the unit and surviving Hellriders abandoned the fight and retreated, sealing the portal they used to reach Avernus behind them and abandoning Zariel in the Nine Hells, where she was defeated, captured and corrupted. This set the seed for what would eventually happen to drag Elturel into Avernus by Zariel and the forces she ends up commanding, and in the event that pulled Elturel into the Nine Hells, members of the Hellriders, who still existed as an organization to protect the city as a military force, fled along with refugee civilians. There's bad blood between Baldur's Gate and Elturel historically, so identified Hellriders seen fleeing their duty (as a Paladin order, mind you) were arrested for desertion basically, so they wouldn't cause trouble in Baldur's Gate. Naturally, this is exactly what Hellriders ended up doing, because a number of them seem to believe Baldur's Gate itself is responsible for what's happened. It isn't surprising either, given what this book says about the interactions between Elturel and Baldur's Gate. Elturel seems like it only has ocean access via a river that runs through Baldur's Gate itself, and folks in Baldur's Gate have been just straight up robbing Elturel's trade ships they send up the river to try to conduct trade, so all this tension between the cities is because of the people of Baldur's Gate being fucking antagonistic to begin with.

So, this whole adventure path was also only all resolved some months before the events of Baldur's Gate 3 begin. When Aradin is talking shit to Zevlor, it's not random racism for the sake of being an asshole. He's talking shit to someone that might have abandoned his holy duty to defend his home and may have additionally fought against the authority figures of another city to avoid being detained as actual wildcard threats to stability among a throng of panicked refugees fleeing the planar deletion of their city. Baldur's Gate had to basically enter lockdown to keep Elturelan refugees out of the city to try to keep things somewhat in order, the Flaming Fist were busy dealing with all that business and the rogue Hellriders, which meant there wasn't enough law enforcers focusing on the rest of the city to deal with the sharp spike of murders that began for the sake of the Dead Three. Murders orchestrated by one of several big bads of the adventure, who incidentally, was also an Elturelan refugee. TURNS OUT THERE'S A LOT OF BAD BLOOD, with very understandable reasons just in the lead-in to the set up and I've not even gone 14 pages into the book. It's actually not even just broad mistrust for a race with some very real infernal complications, but actually just remaining resentment over hilariously recent political tensions between actual rival cities that at it's ultimate result could have seen Baldur's Gate pulled into Avernus as well thanks to the actions that had taken place in secret up to this point.

Now, a bit of research suggests Zevlor might not have been one that fled Elturel when it was taken, so he could have stayed to defend and survived the whole ordeal. He's not in the adventure proper, so he's non-canon to the broader story there at least, but unsurprisingly seeing as this whole-ass city gets pulled into the Nine Hells and returned there would obviously be some tension with the devilkin Tieflings. To no surprise, the Zariel, Asmodeus and Mephistopheles bloodlines in the game are representative of Zariel, a major antagonist of the adventure, Asmodeus as the one that corrupted her (and a god in his own right) and Mephistopheles is also mentioned somewhere in the book I've yet to see. What a shock that the three bloodlines associated with a very recent devil contract shenanigan attack on an entire city would cause some consternation among the citizens. Sure, it's misplaced bigotry against people that really didn't have anything to do with it, but lumping back in to the past discussion on the nature of fiend blood and the fact that all this shit just fucking happened in the first place, again it really can't be faulted. Look at reality with how any brown-looking motherfucker got treated when a couple of planes slammed some tall buildings in New York, but consider the further implications of what if instead of political ideology, it was remote puppeteering through devil taint that drove someone to commit a terrorist attack? I'd be inclined to agree with the notion of casting out some redskinned motherfucker whose blood runs with the power of the gigachad demon daddy that just dragged an entire city into hell to be assrammed by pit fiends.

Also unrelated to all this above but still within context, Ulder Ravengard, the big Duke-man of Baldur's Gate that went and got abducted by the Absolute cultists? Yeah, he was bamboozled by two of the antagonists of this adventure path and got trapped in all this shit too. This motherfucker just cannot stop being captured by devil worshippers, meanwhile his own damn son Wyll goes and makes a fiend pact with a cambion. Stay losing, Ravencuck.

 

[Takodachi]

I was bored playing SMITE so I decided to be an utter and complete degenerate by split-pushing the entire match.
Needless to say they were salty.





edit:
kson cant voice act to save her fucking life.

 

[MrProcessor]

"It's ok, no one will breathe, because they'll be dead."

 

[Todd's Strongest Howard]

I was bored playing SMITE so I decided to be an utter and complete degenerate by split-pushing the entire match.
Needless to say they were salty.
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View attachment 42084


edit:
kson cant voice act to save her fucking life.

You're still all retarded fags for arguing about skill at a video game.

At least you won though.

 

[Kalion]

A collection of Hololive emblems for AC6 PC:

Spoiler: All Twitter links

 

[reinigen]

Holy shit that Bijou one is amazing.