The creative, interesting part about any strategy game is when you learn the game. When you come up with strategies, when you figure out the ideas. Or you go on youtube and learn the currently optimised ideal strategies and destroy that element of the game because you wanted to win more immediately. After that comes improving mechanics and becoming better through repetition, tightening those response pathways in your mind for those specific thought patterns to happen faster and easier.
Jarno
Gender : Posts : 2281 Join date : 2015-08-27 Age : 32 Location : Finland
Sure, but I'm still very new to fighting games against human opponents, I don't think I do it to play nice, but to learn faster and actually control what I'm doing, do I want to close the distance, or poke, if I don't follow up with something it doesn't lead to anything since he won't fall for same trick twice. It doesn't feel earned if I tried to do a throw move, but instead it does some other ability, it feels satisfying when I actually predict if the opponent is going to jump or charge etc rather than if I just hit the player by accident pressing the wrong buttons. It's very disorienting to be thrown around (or to throw someone around) so it takes practice to be able to perform combos at any moment, combos have to be done so fast and sometimes you have to do a small run in between a juggle, and it's highly likely that the opponent will block the combo so you have to be able to do it casually and move on to a next thing.
I actually think the only way to play dirty is to play the "top-tier" characters that have easy combos, fast punches and small hit boxes. I quit rocket league for a long time because of Octane car, it has a higher hit box and it can make easy kicks at any angle, so got really annoyed at 1 v 1 games when both cars hit the ball at the same angle at the same time (50/50) in the beginning of a match, so each time my car flew on it's back and the ball flew over me towards my goal so I didn't think it was fair and I think it takes less skill to take shots and dribble with that car.
So either way I can't psychologically enable myself to powerplay or to feel good about playing current meta (most effective tactic/character/build etc), I want to come up with my own strategies and new ways to play, that's the most important thing for me. Of course I will utilize tactics at some point that could be classified as cheap just to to provoke someone, but no point doing that right now since most players are much better than me.
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
@13:14 This brings it to the point why the Souls series peaked with Demon's Souls, the first game in the series. The whole video sums it all up. They have taken out more and more of the cerebral parts and made it about the combat game mechanics and the mechanical difficulty. Pushing and extending the simple yet elegant combat beyond its breaking point approaching more and more a mix between a button masher and a twitch reaction game.
Jarno
Gender : Posts : 2281 Join date : 2015-08-27 Age : 32 Location : Finland
Didn't even know the first ones had tricks like that, goes to show how these fighting games have evolved, I'm not at all immersed or interested in story or characters, but I've noticed playing Mk X improved me in other games, since you have to predict and react to other player very quickly constantly, so at first it's very exhausting to keep up playing many fights in a row (just fighting a comp tower), then you either learn to deal with the pressure or not, it takes practice even to learn to play 2 different characters back to back since they can differ a lot in fighting styles and button combos
Jarno
Gender : Posts : 2281 Join date : 2015-08-27 Age : 32 Location : Finland
About that dark souls video, I just can't get into third one, it's loud and obnoxious, I only bought it because I liked the lore behind the Yhorm the Giant, yet I never got that far. Yes, a good analysis, they are taking it too far/wrong direction
Comment wrote:
If you go to the Knight Artorias's grave before the DLC and rescuing Sif, he attacks you because he thinks you want to defile the grave of Artorias. You can see the anger in his eyes. But if you rescue him and put Artorias out of his misery in the DLC first, he fights you because he remembers and respects you and doesn't want you to go to the Abyss and get sucked into darkness like Artorias did.
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
About that dark souls video, I just can't get into third one, it's loud and obnoxious, I only bought it because I liked the lore behind the Yhorm the Giant, yet I never got that far.
I’ve played Demon’s Souls and Dark Souls a lot, especially Co-Op and PvP. I played through Dark Souls 2 once, I think, and I couldn’t bring myself to play through Dark Souls 3. The combat in DkS 3 feels like a grind and a chore to me. I can’t really say why, but although the characters and the atmosphere of the game are something I would expect to like, somehow I don’t care about any of them. I haven’t thought about why that is, maybe it’s too big, too much spectacle from the get go, maybe it’s because I just don’t like how they have tuned the combat mechanics. In Demon’s Souls, once you have understood how an enemy or a boss works and you have conceived good tactics against them it is rather easy to defeat them. In DkS 3 it always remains being about having good reflexes, that’s a different kind of combat and game design.
Jarno
Gender : Posts : 2281 Join date : 2015-08-27 Age : 32 Location : Finland
maybe it’s too big, too much spectacle from the get go, maybe it’s because I just don’t like how they have tuned the combat mechanics. In Demon’s Souls, once you have understood how an enemy or a boss works and you have conceived good tactics against them it is rather easy to defeat them. In DkS 3 it always remains being about having good reflexes, that’s a different kind of combat and game design.
That's the right way to describe it, the choir music is one of the things that takes me out of it, it does have all these cathedrals, but I just feel it doesn't fit, I guess the artistic choices just felt wrong. I've mostly played 1 and 2 since I didn't have playstation. I haven't played bloodborne, but I think the mechanism is closer to that than other dark souls games.
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
Haven't played this but from what I've read this game would be a good showcase for eugenics, if.... If it wouldn't be filled with RNG to the brim. This way it's about muh unique stories that develop randomly. Like a headless chicken of a fantasy author coming up with all kinds of cool story events which are not tied together in a cohesive universe. Actions without longterm consequences, thus no longterm planning, thus no strategy, merely a nice headless story.
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
That's the right way to describe it, the choir music is one of the things that takes me out of it, it does have all these cathedrals, but I just feel it doesn't fit, I guess the artistic choices just felt wrong. I've mostly played 1 and 2 since I didn't have playstation. I haven't played bloodborne, but I think the mechanism is closer to that than other dark souls games.
The game lacks soul. The artistic craft is there, the artwork, but it just doesn't tie together the way it should. I haven't played Bloodborne but from what I've heard from people who I know and thus who's views I can judge more accurately, it's more back to the original qualities in some ways. Still, to quote Conan, Demon's Souls is best in life. Best atmosphere, best creativity, what came later was not building on it but chiseling the essential charm away and replacing it with mediocrity bit by bit.
I mean, everybody was talking about how difficult the Souls games are and that became the defining character. I never thought of Demon's Souls as a difficult game - but you had to be careful, attentive, not get cocky, think, then you were good. Later iterations were about more and more twitch reflexes and harder to read animations. Difficulty which is overcome not by thinking (outside the combat as well in preparation) but by getting better at learning longer and trickier sequences, a memorisation and twitch reflex sort of difficulty.
Jarno
Gender : Posts : 2281 Join date : 2015-08-27 Age : 32 Location : Finland
This guy doing the review is unbelievable, he complains that system shock is not intuitive because it cannot be played on a controller, mocks the cyberspace, saying "it's weird", says that level design reminds him of "dark souls"...Sure you get shortcuts, but that comparison is idiotic. He says that audiologs sound good and are not bland because of the static/audio effects, nothing to do with good voice acting or writing. Says that control scheme and interface is it's "biggest setbacks". A complete moron talking in a condescending way, so no wonder all games who try to be spiritual sequels fail because they can't even understand what made it good, no wonder nothing good ever comes out anymore
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
The controls, be it the user interface or what your inputs actually do (lengthy combos/animations, and others) make a large part of the actual gameplay, much more so than I realised in the past. Streamlining everything does not automatically improve a game. If it's a fast paced action game where you have fast and fluent control over the movement of your olympic gymnast athlete level of a character then it doesn't work very well for the horror elements. There is not much tension if your character's skills of evasion and combat are godlike. To some extent the tension comes from a mind which is quick enough in its thinking but a body which is lacking in the execution. I know I want to escape the axe wielding killer but my legs won't move fast enough so what do but hide in the cupboard... something like that.
I was thinking about this because of Starcraft 1 vs. Starcraft 2. Starcraft 1 is the better game in my view largely because your units are dumber, less smart in following your orders, less automation features and so on. RTS is rather boring on a strategic level, it becomes interesting if you have to factor in your own limitations of control, your prioritisation skills, your unit micromanagement is a large part of what makes an RTS good. I used to think the opposite way, that making it less micro oriented would be better but I think that's where turn based games shine. RTS needs the micro.
Jarno
Gender : Posts : 2281 Join date : 2015-08-27 Age : 32 Location : Finland
Yeah, somehow I feel starcraft 1 has much more strategic possibilities than age of empires even. You can distract and fool the opponent in different ways and there are different kind of vulnerabilities, just one unit in your base can be a nuisance, can't just press one button to get all the villagers into a town center to shoot arrows. Also even RTS veterans from other games can't keep up how fast you have to react to situations, you have to know what your opponent is doing and respond fast. Yes, it's great that even if you have a large group of units they are vulnerable and die easily if you don't control them right, you have to constantly change their positions, like dragoons, they are great if you use them right, but unattended they will die.
Jarno
Gender : Posts : 2281 Join date : 2015-08-27 Age : 32 Location : Finland
Yeah, somehow I feel starcraft 1 has much more strategic possibilities than age of empires even. You can distract and fool the opponent in different ways and there are different kind of vulnerabilities, just one unit in your base can be a nuisance, can't just press one button to get all the villagers into a town center to shoot arrows. Also even RTS veterans from other games can't keep up how fast you have to react to situations, you have to know what your opponent is doing and respond fast. Yes, it's great that even if you have a large group of units they are vulnerable and die easily if you don't control them right, you have to constantly change their positions, like dragoons, they are great if you use them right, but unattended they will die.
Because micro-managing and setting up your units makes them much more effective in combat there is an advantage in playing defensive and only attacking when you have the time for the necessary attention to spare. Simply moving a large chunk of units into a well set up enemy position is not effective. The defensive player can set up his units beforehand, arrange their formation, choose the position to defend (funnels for example) while the attacking player has much more to micro-manage during the initial skirmish phase. In other games they have to give you particularly strong base defences or something to give you an advantage as the defending player but in Starcraft the player's personal limitations of multi-tasking, speed and accuracy make it more difficult to attack than to defend.
I liked the building up aspect of Age of Empires. Getting your economy going, setting up walls and defences, researching new technologies. Those are the satisfying aspects of that game, which are nice, but the actual combat is rather crude in terms of tactics.
What I have played some time ago is a mod for Company of Heroes called Blitzkrieg. They made it more realistic, unlike the vanilla game. So it only takes a few seconds at the most for your infantry to die if they are shot at by a machine gun if they are not behind cover. The tanks are also much quicker to die if they meet a too powerful gun or kill the enemy tanks quickly if their gun pierces the enemy armour. It made the gameplay better in my view, defensiveness gets its reward but neither can you just sit around behind your fortifications because there is deadly artillery in this game as well.
Jarno
Gender : Posts : 2281 Join date : 2015-08-27 Age : 32 Location : Finland
I guess I didn't get into CoH because there were enough WW2 games to pick from. I have tried CoH 2 few times, if only dawn of war (soulstorm) had more options on base upgrades for more unit options I would still be playing that regularly.
Looks promising so far, I hope they make the smoke mechanism more useful, since in Mowas smoke only gave you cover if you had cease fire on (and you had to be on a specific spot), nobody would use it, and overall going into a cover sometimes worked and sometimes it didn't so they probably will fix that, though I don't know how they will manage 8 v 8 scale games, if I remember right they wanted to make it possible. In mowas units also had an inventory and you could pick up weapons/ammo etc from ground, but it's a bit tricky in a serious game, so it had too many obsolete features, I tried to utilize many of these, but it just didn't work well. Though you could take a single unit with cease fire on and crawl on the other side of the map and take out tanks, tanks can't see infantry very well unless they have a gunner.
Call to arms does not only have direct control, but it has a first person mode. The whole game feels like a bug free mowas.
Some fans have come up with the term "Ruhrpott fantasy" or something like that, to refer to Gothic games, because apparently many people from Piranha Bytes who participated in creating them were from the area of Ruhrpott, where people were more "rough", i.e. less domesticated and more masculine, hence why the games have a different, unique atmosphere, as they were created by people who retained some of that mentality, and (English) voice acting was fittingly rough as well.
Predictably enough the 2019 remake is terrible. No urbanite soyboy developers are able to emulate it, and the voice acting is so pathetically generic it's puke-inducing.
I only checked it out in the first place because, despite of my attitude towards vidya and fiction in general, I have fond memories of the original games. tbh I'm even sort of glad it's shit, at least I can skip it without missing out.
_________________ "WOMEN BAD, CHURCH GOOD, NIGGERS BAD, WHITE GOOD, EUROPE CUCKED, PATRARCHY GOOD, ARISTOCRACY GOOD, DEMOCRACY BAD" - polishyouth
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
People make games and today the game producer companies are filled with fabb0ts, especially the larger ones. With smaller ones, there is a chance that it is some masculine enclave.
The Ruhrpott has been a heavy industry (coal mining,...) site so its people are descendants from physical labour working class, with an income structure to support a patriarchy on the family level for a long time. It was not a breeding ground for office drone homophiles. They are lagging behind the times of mass globo-homo-consumer-office-drone culture.
Last game I actually played regurlarly, at 15, I only got into card games(hearthstone, magic, poker, black jack) for a period of two or three months, on/off couple of times, even played some amateur tournaments, but then I dropped it completely after 2 years from 18 to 20, If I ever get time I will try this game, the trailer looks cool:
Jarno
Gender : Posts : 2281 Join date : 2015-08-27 Age : 32 Location : Finland
These matches are very entertaining to watch, glad to see other than US minorities in the tournaments, and playing characters that are not the best on the current meta, so tired of seeing Liu kang vs Liu kang or Johnny vs Johnny
I'm still sticking to mkx until I get a new graphics card, I was avoiding corner play until now because I thought it would be too easy or cheap, but it really adds new dimension to the strategy, I can keep up with players with thousands of games so and I strive to not be predictable so I'm happy with the winratio
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
I haven’t played much of any Kojima game but this is pretty much what I think of his Metal Gear Solid series. It’s basically why I haven’t played them, though not as a conscious decision at the time.
Slaughtz
Gender : Posts : 2593 Join date : 2012-04-28 Age : 33 Location : A stone.
I think a game fails to combine story and gameplay when it doesn't distinguish the two clearly. If you're telling a story, concentrate on the good story telling at that moment. Make it gripping. If you're doing gameplay, do that well, in that moment. Use story to contextualize the gameplay so it doesn't appear 'grindy' or 'the same' as every other part of the game. A player doesn't mind doing basically the same shit over and over if there's good story behind doing it, and it's engaging gameplay. Running the story parallel instead of within the game has it's own issue, that way. So you can't just have the story disconnected from the action, either.
All story games run the risk of downplaying and hurting the interpretation, perception, of the gameplay by the player. For example, being hyperbolic in the story, being cliche, makes the grind appear cheap.
-- I haven't played Metal Gear Solid or Deus Ex because I don't think the story justifies what would feel like the grind of a stealth/action shooter; probably they don't invest a lot of time into the depth of every objective that's between the start and the end of the game. And why would I start something that I know I'll get bored of and not finish? Most AAA games only attract me for the graphics, like every other common idiot (I am the same way, a common idiot), like with Star Wars ("IDK why people hate on Star Wars hurrdurr, it had good graphics"), I would play it for the graphics and to see pretty novel things graphically - but I don't have the hardware for it.
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
I never played a game for its "good graphics", I mean the technical aspect of "good graphics". I do appreciate a good art style kind of "good graphics". So for example I like a lot of pixel art games, if the art is appealing to me. Hand-drawn and animated 2D just looks better, at least it has been that way for the most part until now. In 3D I don't mind fewer polygons if I find the textures and composition appealing. Current AAA game graphics for the most part look generic to me, it's usually not exciting me at all.
I like the thief series and I liked Deus Ex 1 but its gameplay is not a strong point. Thief (the original series), I like gameplay wise.
Thinking about it, gameplay that is good is usually not very complicated if you break it down. There are some simple forms which just seem to work. For example, I think it's important for an action game that your character can move and shoot/fight at the same time. That's why an old-school first-person-shooter has much more interesting gameplay than those cover shooters. It's not just important that you can move around and fight/shoot at the same time but it must be an important element to master both at the same time, not artificially rewarding but it must give you an edge in the game to get good at running and gunning. We were made to enjoy mastering certain things. Or for example if you play a sharp shooter, I think it would be boring to just lay in the grass and shoot enemies all day, you have to incorporate a necessity for you to change your position after a couple of shots. Your movement through space in order to achieve your goals is in almost all action games one if not the core part. If you don't run around all the time in a game then at least it should be on your mind to think ahead about where you will move next, it must be rewarding to find good ways, better ways, best ways of moving through your environment. It must be a necessity for success to master this, there must be pressure on you to do good in that aspect.
In the Thief games movement is an important part. Gameplay wise, your movement creates sounds and alerts the guards. Do you move loudly and quickly, how far are the guards away, do you move on soft and quiet types of ground but take the longer path? That doesn't mean you move around all the time, sometimes it's best to stay still in the shadows. Either way thinking and optimising your movement is a key element of this game as well.
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
Running the story parallel instead of within the game has it's own issue, that way. So you can't just have the story disconnected from the action, either.
Some have come up with the concept of gameplay-narrative dissonance. For example the story told depicts you as a young, unexperienced Lara Croft trying to survive in the cold harsh environment as you've just killed a couple of wolves and mysterious evil henchmen in upfront combat, playing this poor girl.
That's the kind of game or story for people who don't feel sick after eating and still having their cake.
Good gameplay, which usually is tied to you mastering something, to become more powerful at the game, is difficult to incorporate with a woke story. Good gameplay is inherently "fascist".
Jarno
Gender : Posts : 2281 Join date : 2015-08-27 Age : 32 Location : Finland
Oh, strange, I thought first deus ex gameplay was great, I was used to playing UT99 and unreal so it was amazing to see the inventory system, UI, level up system for different skills and all the text logs in their own pages. I was also surprised how many options there are and how characters treat/talk to you much different depending on your choices, and the choices weren't obvious. Only thing that took me out of the experience was first time not knowing where to go, it doesn't hold your hand much which is a good thing, I just had bad luck. I've played MGS 1-2, but I don't know if they hold-up so I won't be defending them.
Thief was next on my list since I was first time trying Gothic series a while ago, but it was difficult to get them working properly. Graphics can't fool me either, horrible dialogue takes me out of the experience very fast. It's always the "you're the chosen one" power fantasies and when you die you wake up in previous checkpoint without any penalty, and of the AI is often very dumb compared to what it used to be. I try avoiding anything with quest arrows.
Speaking of those old "simple" shooters, I had a lot of fun and excitement with Blood remaster. But Dusk despite all the praise didn't feel so great, but probably only because I played it right after Blood.
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
Deus EX 1 has a very good atmosphere, music, story, the way the story is delivered, RPG elements,… What I mean with gameplay not being its strongpoint is that while the combat and shooting is decent it’s not the best part of the game. Where the game shines is walking around the places when no combat is happening, you get to talk to the characters, make choices which have (gameplay) consequences later in the story. When I remember the game I think about dialog set pieces, the cool atmosphere, the good voice acting, the music and atmosphere. I usually don’t like story-driven games and Deus Ex is actually that. The reason why I still like it quite a bit is because it’s rare that the story and your role isn’t boring and gay.
You should give Thief 1 a try, the first real level (after the training introduction) is also one of the better levels in the game, so you quickly get a good idea if it’s your cup of tea or not. I like how Thief 1 does maps. There is no auto-map or quest marker, you usually get some sketches giving you a rough idea of a place, like the shape of the house, a garden, a rough idea what kind of rooms are on each floor, sometimes notes on what should be where to find, that’s the way it should be. It’s not a turn your brain off auto-map all quests have been marked and big glowing exclamation symbols informing you which person to talk to and so on.
Jarno
Gender : Posts : 2281 Join date : 2015-08-27 Age : 32 Location : Finland
Ah, that's true. I often watch the Thief vs AAA video, it makes a good point that maybe people used to be good map makers because they played D&D as a dungeon master. I just need to get resolution mod/patch working, the vanilla resolution is like 400X600 and probably can't jump to desktop without a crash. I've played Deus ex 1 first time this year, and same with System Shock 1 & 2 and I can't really find anything that is better. I also bought Gothic 2 on steam, but couldn't install few patches because of windows defender, so I downloaded Gothic 3 for free instead. So I'm pretty much going for the classics I've missed.
I even prefer the authentic modtracker sound, I feel like the most UMX songs are actually in mp3 format on youtube, some of these feel much different
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
why does every video game site nowadays routinely have articles about star wars, marvel, etc.? they're not games and actual "gamers" don't give a shit about them
I haven't read gaming sites for many years by now but this explains how this transition to the woke-journalism is not an organic bottom-up phenomenon but comes regulated from the top downwards. It's not an accident that unlikeable nitwits with a practical degree in depraved behaviour and thinking were hired as the writing staff.
Anfang
Gender : Posts : 3989 Join date : 2013-01-23 Age : 40 Location : Castra Alpine Grug
I had no idea about these streams. Sseth has such a relaxing way of entertaining without getting boring, kind of like having Attention-Deficit-Disorder while being on Methyp-something-something, he explains it himself better anyway.
