General gaming talk

[Cult Icon]

Elden Ring concept art (Godfrey).  The Elden Ring reddit has been ruined by memes and hype posts which conceal the news on the game:

 

 

[Cult Icon]

@Enrico_sw  have you heard of the Dark Souls Convergence mod?  

 

Impressed with this:

 

 

I might have to watch more of it eg.

 

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7RtZMiaOk8hZI-QCa7fskRVPsgGpbTjg

 

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more Elden ring concept art

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This is a "Demake" of Bloodborne.  I didn't know this was a thing:

 

 

[SympathysSilhouette]

In general I am pretty sad about the state of the video games industry. Ten years ago, I would have imagined that super-exciting stuff would be happening right now.

Especially in terms of procedurally generated games. But the industry as a whole only ever embraced that development in a very limited way, instead doing things largely the old-fashioned way, only with ever ballooning budgets. Had they made better/different choices in the past like 10-14 years, the video games industry probably looks very different right now, even from a purely technological sense.

[Cult Icon]

Fan made Dino crisis.  Very sexy face

 

 

[Cult Icon]

1 hour ago, SympathysSilhouette said:

In general I am pretty sad about the state of the video games industry. Ten years ago, I would have imagined that super-exciting stuff would be happening right now.

Especially in terms of procedurally generated games. But the industry as a whole only ever embraced that development in a very limited way, instead doing things largely the old-fashioned way, only with ever ballooning budgets. Had they made better/different choices in the past like 10-14 years, the video games industry probably looks very different right now, even from a purely technological sense.

 

What are you thinking about when you say procedurally generated games?  And what were you expecting to happen?

 

10 years ago I didn't know what to expect, I already felt like they were just making big budget versions of the standard game styles (open world, shooter, action RPG etc).  It must be nuts for kids/teenagers to have so many quality choices.  For them, they experience these types of games for the first time.

 

The last game that really wowed me in terms of innovation was Witcher 3. (in 2015) 

 

The most impressive gaming experience I've ever had was around in 2000 when I played Shenmue for the first time.  Back then there was no game like it, and the high level of detail/ immersion was so unusual for the time:

 

 

I think the most disturbing thing is when the games turn into franchises like Call of Duty, Madden etc.  where they make the same game over and over again, and most of the money seems to be invested in advertising rather than development.

[SympathysSilhouette]

34 minutes ago, Cult Icon said:

 

What are you thinking about when you say procedurally generated games?  And what were you expecting to happen?

 

 

 

Procedurally generated means that much of the game is created within the engine itself. Thus the modeling/animation does not have to be done by the video game creators, they instead create a game engine that does this for them.

 

One early and famous example of this was Spore.

You can read more about how they used procedural generation here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Development_of_Spore#Procedural_generation

 

When Ken Levine left to do his own thing after Bioshock Infinite, he wanted to go create the holy grail of gaming: a procedurally generated game that still had a strong narrative (by using what he calls narrative Lego's).

You can read more about that here: https://thenewsmotion.com/ken-levines-ambitious-new-game-is-reportedly-in-development-hell/

Most of the games that had used procedural generation up until this point have largely been sandbox type games that don't have much story.

 

This is the direction I thought a significant portion of the games industry would go in in the past thirteen of fourteen years. Instead they have mostly continued to make games the same way, only occasionally using this new way of thinking. e.g. in the Nemesis system for Shadow of Mordor.

But I believed that by 2022 procedural generation would be the bedrock upon which many games are entirely built. Instead it is still more of a gimmick or an afterthought.

Especially with ever increasing computing power of the game machines, it would make sense that this is the next frontier for gaming.

 

 

 

[Enrico_sw]

On 2/4/2022 at 8:55 PM, Cult Icon said:

@Enrico_sw  have you heard of the Dark Souls Convergence mod?  

 

Impressed with this:

 

 

I might have to watch more of it eg.

 

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7RtZMiaOk8hZI-QCa7fskRVPsgGpbTjg

 

 

I didn't know it. Looks really cool!

[Cult Icon]

6 hours ago, SympathysSilhouette said:

 

Procedurally generated means that much of the game is created within the engine itself. Thus the modeling/animation does not have to be done by the video game creators, they instead create a game engine that does this for them.

 

When Ken Levine left to do his own thing after Bioshock Infinite, he wanted to go create the holy grail of gaming: a procedurally generated game that still had a strong narrative (by using what he calls narrative Lego's).

You can read more about that here: https://thenewsmotion.com/ken-levines-ambitious-new-game-is-reportedly-in-development-hell/

 

I should look at Shadow at Mordor.  I am not aware of the "Nemesis" system".  One of the things that is striking is the lack of development of sophisticated AI for shooters.  

 

TBH I do not fully understand what kind of games this technology could spawn.  From what I recall, No Man Sky randomly generated planets and so forth. 

 

+It is unfortunate that Levine had little success after Bioshock Infinite.  Perhaps this is a sign that trying to do new things entails risk and lots of problems, meaning a lot of time and money.  I think Kojima ran into problems while developing MGS5 and attempting to create a game with all sorts of new features.  The game ended up being unfinished AAA title and ended his career with Konami.

 

So most producers ignore serious innovation and play it safe, and generate predictable work flow and focus on marketing/merchandising to cash in.  

[Cult Icon]

looked at this a bit, not sure where the tech is 

 

 

[Cult Icon]

4 hours ago, Enrico_sw said:

 

I didn't know it. Looks really cool!

 

I watched a little.  According to cowboy this is the best of the mods.  I think it is worth downloading and installing for Souls fans.  It has a ton of new content, levels, bosses, enemy placement.  It also looks very hard, and harder than the base game.

[SympathysSilhouette]

8 hours ago, Cult Icon said:

 

 

TBH I do not fully understand what kind of games this technology could spawn.  From what I recall, No Man Sky randomly generated planets and so forth. 

 

 

 

No Man's Sky is another example of a game that tried to use procedural generation as the entire basis of their game-play, yes.

 

Well the golden grail of a procedurally generated game would be one that gives each player - and through each new playthrough - a completely unique experience.

So the world is unique, the enemies are unique, the NPC companions are unique, the story is unique...

 

A small indie game that has experimented a bit with procedurally generated story lines is Wildermyth.

 

 

 

 

[Enrico_sw]

9 hours ago, Cult Icon said:

 

I watched a little.  According to cowboy this is the best of the mods.  I think it is worth downloading and installing for Souls fans.  It has a ton of new content, levels, bosses, enemy placement.  It also looks very hard, and harder than the base game.

 

I've seen people talking about another mod called "Cinders". It looks good too, but it's true that "convergence" looks even better.

[Enrico_sw]

 

Quote

Master Chief to take backseat to female cast in Halo Live-Action 2022

https://poptopic.com.au/news/master-chief-to-take-backseat-to-female-cast-in-halo-live-action-2022/

 

 

In the upcoming Halo series... the main roles and antagonists are wamen. Bye Masterchief, you're punished for your "crime" (having the wrong gender).

 

 But hey, suuuure, there's no Woke agenda in Hollywood.

 

They shouldn't be surprised that everybody turns their back on the American culture.

[Cult Icon]

The things that I anticipated 15-20 years ago (and never happened) were a few:

 

1. Very sophisticated team-based AI for shooters- like AI fireteams.  The best AI is still individual, and fairly rudimentary like in Halo, Far Cry franchises.  And quite boring.

 

2.  Extremely immersive, detailed and large open world games.  When I played Shenmue I thought I was playing the future.  I think a lot of the hype/deceptive marketing of Cyberpunk relied on manipulating people's expectations along these lines. The reality is that open world games are typically somewhat empty and lifeless, with repetitive tasks.  There are usually only small sections of the open world games that are immersive (at best).  IT is rather odd that the immersion of Shenmue 1/2 was not repeated much at all in the industry.  I guess it was considered too expensive and not value adding as the Shenmue franchise performed sub-par. (nearly a flop).  Cyberpunk had a few immersive sections and that was it.

 

3. One of my favorite genres, the RTS- instead of getting better AI and immersion, basically declined as a genre.  

 

4. War games, particuarly those of WW2.  I thought they would improve massively but instead they stagnated and in some places, even got woke.  War games are largely indie rather than big-budget.  The indie games largely get the gameplay mechanics right but the games overall are severely hampered by their small teams/low budgets/bad AI.  

 

The last game that really breached my expecations was the W3.

[SympathysSilhouette]

23 minutes ago, Enrico_sw said:

 

 

 

In the upcoming Halo series... the main roles and antagonists are wamen. Bye Masterchief, you're punished for your "crime" (having the wrong gender).

 

 But hey, suuuure, there's no Woke agenda in Hollywood.

 

They shouldn't be surprised that everybody turns their back on the American culture.

 

Did you play AC:O?

 

IMHO, Kassandra is a far superior protagonist compared to Alexios.

 

In general I find it odd to assume a game is going to be rubbish just because the main character is female. Or male for that matter.

[Enrico_sw]

23 minutes ago, SympathysSilhouette said:

In general I find it odd to assume a game is going to be rubbish just because the main character is female. Or male for that matter.

 

You feign to not understand what I say. You adopt a Manichean view here.

 

Nobody said that a game/movie is going to be rubbish if the main character is female. There are many great games with female characters (Tomb Raider, Horizon Zero Dawn, Jedi Knight: MOTS, RE, etc.). Nobody questioned the fact they were female. I loved these games.

 

The problem is gender swapping or belittling men in their own franchises. Just because they are men. That's sexism and Hollywood is sexist (antimale because that's the Zeitgeist).

 

Nobody ever created a "John Croft" in a Tomb Raider movie adaptation.... but the opposite is true most of the time nowadays. Hey, maybe you have internalised misandry if you don't get it

[Enrico_sw]

31 minutes ago, SympathysSilhouette said:

Did you play AC:O?

 

IMHO, Kassandra is a far superior protagonist compared to Alexios.

 

Yes, I did. It helped me go through the 3rd freaking lockdown (which in reality was the 5th if you count the curfews).

 

Kassandra and Alexios have the exact same lines in the game.

[Enrico_sw]

Alexios and Kassandra are not my favorite characters.

 

Bayek of Siwa and Aya were better IMO.