Industry News / Upcoming Games

[Antimatter]

I guess, the topic of this week is very high system requirements for Alan Wake 2 that releases soon.

Alan Wake 2's PC requirements may leave AMD RX 5000-series and Nvidia GTX 10-series users high and dry

A potential lack of mesh shader support may leave older generation cards out in the cold.

www.pcgamer.com

Everybody's either mad or sad about the Alan Wake 2 system requirements

Remedy shared the final PC requirements today, and they're pretty steep.

www.pcgamer.com

For me personally, even BG3 was a watershed. The game's performance on an HDD was very bad. Seems AAA PC gaming might become a rich kids club soon.

 

[Chronicler]

PC's in general are kind of becoming a bit of a niche specialty interest.

Amazes me how many people just don't have a desktop or laptop computer these days. They do everything on their phone.

 

[mlnevese]

PC's in general are kind of becoming a bit of a niche specialty interest.

Amazes me how many people just don't have a desktop or laptop computer these days. They do everything on their phone.

I agree. And there are so many things that are just more convenient to do using a computer. Even just browsing the web is better done on a computer than any phone.

 

[Chronicler]

I've never been able to get the hang of typing on my phone. I can't imagine being a full time student and trying to type all my notes and essays out on some app, but people do it somehow.

 

[InGameScientist]

There are a whole bunch of indie (tempted to put this in quotes per the conversation happening in the other thread) turn-based tactics and RPGs coming out in November that I wrote about here: https://ingamescientist.substack.com/p/new-games-to-whet-your-appetite-in

I'll be continuing to have a look every couple of weeks at upcoming games and will be posting as they come up!

 

[Antimatter]

This issue is being discussed more and more frequently in the industry and by players. A Baldur's Gate 3 "anomaly" / "atypical game" controversy.

3 months later, we got a balanced video with research about the topic:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1720126320473227653

 

[Antimatter]

The Epic Games Store still isn’t profitable. According to The Verge, we knew the company was spending millions to give away free games every week, but we’d heard it was a bit of a money sink despite not actually paying for each and every copy given away.

In case you’re keeping track, Epic Games Store boss Steve Allison says on the witness stand his store isn’t profitable yet. The goal is still growth, he says. Emails revealed during the Epic v. Apple trial suggested the company was hoping to claim half of all PC gaming revenue.

Epic v. Google: a battle over Fortnite fees goes to court

The antitrust trial has taken years to reach a courtroom.

www.theverge.com

 

[RolePlayerEverHappy]

Diablo getting a tabletop game: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/di...ontinue-the-lore-and-story-of-the-video-games

Black Geyser getting an Expansion pack 'Tales of the Mooncult": https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1374930/view/7282941875955194066

 

[Black Elk]

So BG3 pretty much sweeps the Golden Joystick...? And SAG-AFTRA prevails on the same night!?

Feels like it's going to be a good weekend! And a pretty decent charge into the holiday season kicking off heheh

Baldur's Gate 3 won so many Golden Joystick Awards that Swen Vincke can barely hold all of them

Larian's going to run out of inventory space before the year's out.

www.pcgamer.com

I know awards are just awards, but it does make me happy, truly! In my wildest imaginings I wouldn't have guessed I'd ever even get to see a BG3, let alone a BG3 that aces and maybe even seizes the triple crown before all's said and done. I hope they take this as a real good cue to announce an expansion! Lol

Fingers crossed!

 

[Antimatter]

I like Ubisoft games a lot, but man.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1728028400835563727

 

[Antimatter]

We knew Starfield wasn't performing as expected, but here is a new "know-how" by Bethesda. This is just so sad to see.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1729456327838015614

 

[OrlonKronsteen]

We knew Starfield wasn't performing as expected, but here is a new "know-how" by Bethesda. This is just so sad to see.

I actually think this is hilarious. That bit about the first astronauts finding nothing on the moon but not being bored is pure gold.

 

[Antimatter]

It is. But imagine that experienced teams at Microsoft and Bethesda took ~2 months to think about the marketing and PR response to the not-so-great Starfield launch, and came up with this strategy. It's either the marketing and PR teams doing something that is not known to Todd & Co, or this is coming from the above. Both of these options are bad, but the latter is just plain brutal and sad if true, from the future standpoint for that company.

 

[Urdnot_Wrex]

I think it is sad indeed.
I don't want to play 200 hours with one character and then another 200 with another to find out there are small varieties of outcomes.

Also, when they were excitedly presenting us the game during development, we were skeptical about the 1000 planets they advertised, as maybe being too generic and just resource mines, but if now even a large percentage of them are just empty rocks, it's just disappointing. If their explanation for that is "It's Space, dude, it's supposed to be empty", there's only so much realism a game can handle.

Starfield is a freaking expensive game. People mostly play games for entertainment in their leisure time. If I think about a game with space exploration, I'd think about the excitement of new discoveries, not so much about feeling small and insignificant in the vastness of space. You can generate that realism by filling space with planets but letting us land only on those that have something to discover. Especially if you consider the way they advertised all of it.

I mean, an uneventful hiking trip of 3 days through a barren desert to get from A to B would be realistic too, but that doesn't mean people enjoy that kind of realism in a game.

 

[Chronicler]

I mean, yes, space is mostly empty, but it's not like all those other videogame journeys take place in a setting without uninteresting locales. It just skips over that shit.

If you get on a train, you're either gonna get deeply entrenched in a murder mystery or the game's gonna skip forward sixteen hours to when you arrive at your destination. Same principle. If there's a planet that's boring you leave that out of the game and make a level out of the interesting one.

 

[Antimatter]

It looks awkward, especially considering the same people at the company don't fully understand the scope of the problem. When Andromeda failed, BioWare stopped promoting it. When Cyberpunk 2077 was criticized on its release, CDPR stopped all promotional videos and posts about it and got back to work.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1728065941747925499

Just look at the responses...

They would get more positivity if they didn't aggro players with these moves.

And then, it becomes more awkward when we find out apparently it took 7 years to find fun in Starfield... When the sentiment around is that fun is still lacking in that game.

Todd Howard says it took 7 years to make Starfield fun to play: "I thought we would find the answers faster"

It was only in 2022, Starfield's original release year, that the RPG got fun

www.gamesradar.com

 

[Urdnot_Wrex]

And then, it becomes more awkward when we find out apparently it took 7 years to find fun in Starfield... When the sentiment around is that fun is still lacking in that game.

Very awkward indeed. Yesterday I talked to a colleague (I happened to admit to gaming on 24h shifts and we entered a discussion and he turned out to be a huge Skyrim fan) who is excitedly looking forward to Elder Scrolls 6, but not only Starfield itself, especially the way it is being advertised and handled post-publishing, gives reasons for serious concern about Bethesda policy.

Mistakes aren't just failure, they're chances to learn and improve, but for that to happen, you have to admit them, even if it's only to yourself.

 

[OrlonKronsteen]

It is. But imagine that experienced teams at Microsoft and Bethesda took ~2 months to think about the marketing and PR response to the not-so-great Starfield launch, and came up with this strategy.

Believe it or not, this happens all the time. I worked in corporate communications for many years, and you’d be surprised just how often responses to major incidents and blunders look like the case studies of epic failure you see in crisis management textbooks.

 

[m7600]

Wizards of the Coast: "We did it, no other gaming company can treat their customers and fans worse than we did during the OGL crisis."

Bethesda: "Hold my beer and my PR disaster."