Game News 2.0

johnny_ultimate

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121192590#Comment_121192590

The problem is though that a 'TV unit PC' that supports VR and Steam Deck streaming is just a desktop PC. You can very easily hook up a PC to a TV or big monitor, and Big Picture Mode already exists so is quite easy to navigate the Steam interface with a controller. If anything, a set console-style PC has notable drawbacks compared to a standard PC, as you're presumably stuck with a particular hardware configuration that will (again presumably) be significantly less powerful than a desktop. Valve has tried this a couple of times already with the Steam Machines and Steam Link / controller, and only really the Steam Deck - which has an actual novel use case of a portable gaming PC from a major player - succeeded. Desktop PCs already exist, and consoles already exist, so something in-between doesn't quite have the same ring to it as a Steam Deck - your PC library in a portable form! - had.

I'm not going to write it off completely based on a rumour, and tbh I can't even see these rumours in the first place from a cursory google. But the idea of a 'Steam TV edition' or whatever is immediately less appealing and novel than the Steam Deck was.

Retr0gamer

Yep it's kind of a product that is already there. Ive a minisforum um560xt hooked up under the living room tv.

Grumpypants

The codename is Galileo.

It's to be paired with the upcoming VR headsets. The "console" does the heavy processing and sends the video wirelessly to the headset. Rather than having the headset do the work so battery life & performance would be better.

These guys give a run down on what's been data mined and what the current thinking is.

https://www.uploadvr.com/is-valve-building-a-consolized-living-room-pc-for-wireless-vr/#:~:text=Valve%20Is%20Definitely%20Building%20A,big%20investments%20in%20new%20headsets%22.

johnny_ultimate

TBH whatever about a Steam 'console', I'm more skeptical again of the market for more and more expensive VR headsets (beyond a niche, enthusiast one). Especially one that will require additional hardware, presumably bumping up the already high price.

Grumpypants

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121192874#Comment_121192874

Speaking as someone with 4 VR headsets that never get used I fully agree. 🤣

The thing with Valve though is they kinda don't need it to be a success in the same way other companies do. They make so much money elsewhere they can do niche things like this.

My feeling here is though, that they want their next headset to be cheap and for the mass market. So it would work out of the box on a PC that is powerful enough (via cable). If your pc supports becoming a WiFi hub then it can do wireless.

But if you don't have a pc and just want something that works with their new vr headset they have this steam console option too and you know you just need to plug it in and go.

Like you don't need to have a steam deck to play steam pc games in a handheld format. But you know if you buy a deck, all the "great on steam deck" validated games will work without any messing.

But from looking at the **** show PC ports have been over the last few years and how Devs like the "Great on Steam Deck" tag I can see positives from having a similar set configuration of parts for the steam console that PC ports can be "great on".

I'll buy it anyway. Put it beside all the other things I've no time to play on. 😞

Retr0gamer

Reports coming out that Hyenas was Sega's most expensive project ever. I really don't get this insane race towards GaaS development. Avengers really should have been a warning signal to all publishers.

PixelPlayer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121192210#Comment_121192210

It sounds more like an nVidia shield. Probably a very expensive shield.

Edit: Oh I see it's a lot more than that.

CatInABox

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121194940#Comment_121194940

Thing is that it takes years to develop one of these games, so most likely this game shutting down actually is the first "learning from the Avengers".

Even Sony are learning it the hard way, imagine spending several billion on Bungie to help your GAAS pivot, and the first thing they do is rubbish your first attempt at it with Last of Us thing they were developing.

sniper_samurai

In other news.

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/five-former-ubisoft-executives-arrested-after-sexual-harassment-investigation

Markitron

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121194940#Comment_121194940

What I will never understand is how publishers keep pumping millions into developing these games as if they have come up with a novel idea and will corner the market. GAAS customers are a finite resource, in order for any of these games to be successful they have take players away Fortnite, CoD and Destiny.

It really annoys me how many legit games could have been made with the resources absorbed by all of these failed GAAS's.

Retr0gamer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121197352#Comment_121197352

Look at Sony. Closes Japan game studios and has a paltry 1 console exclusive this year and 1 timed exclusive. Imagine how good the PS4 and 5 could be if they could pump out exclusives like Nintendo or even Sony of old.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121197352#Comment_121197352

F*cking "roadmaps" too.... that p*sses me off.

Even before such games come out, all about the roadmap of what's coming. Season 1 we're going to add this, and a few weeks later this DLC drops, and then in Season 2....etc. Yet most of the time the actual roadmap ends up being:

"We're delaying Season 1 to address balancing issues because everyone's b*tching about how grindy and repetitive the game is.... We're adding extra free content into Season 1 as an apology.... We're still releasing the DLC because we're legally obliged to because people have already paid for it as part of the SuperMegaUltraDeluxe Collectors Edition.... Season 2 is out now, but you won't believe the incredible stuff we have coming in Season 3..... We've stopped development on the game and are shutting down servers because no one is playing it"

That's a huge part of why Marvel Avengers failed. The game had such little content at launch for the GAAS side of things, and then they delayed the first sets of additional content because they were trying to fix all the issues with the base game, so by the time new content started coming out nobody cared (and very few people cared to begin with because the game was mostly a dud at launch anyway). From what I heard, over time some of the characters, new content and new story missions they added were decent, but you can't expect people to hang around on the promise of "One day, there might be enough content that you'll actually want to stick around and play".

I loved Destiny 1 at launch.... for about a month. After that I had to give it up because it was the same stuff over and over again, and as good as the gameplay was, it just wasn't enough. About 6 months before Destiny 2 came out, I downloaded it again, got all the DLC, and had a blast. There was a lot of great content there. Had a great time for another 4-6 weeks or so.

Then a while after, Destiny 2 came out, and I really enjoyed it..... for about a month. And now there's so much DLC and content that I just don't care.

When so many games are a GAAS model, the vast majority of them aren't going to retain most of the initial audience, as they'll either already be committed to another game, not engage with the GAAS model, or just move on when new games come out. But so many devs seem to be planning for retaining most of the audience for several years. The ones who have managed that like Fortnite, they are the outliers. Replicating that is next to impossible.

Markitron

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121197599#Comment_121197599

My inherent problem with GAAS and MMO's before them is that gaming is pure escapism to me. I don't like the pressure and repetition of having to do daily and weekly quests, having to be on time for dungeons and raids etc. I have a mentally demanding job, I don't want to have another job on the PS5 when I get home. I don't even play multiplayer games anymore for the same reason. Obviously this is just me though.

They take so much effort and money and if the stars don't align, they can be dead on arrival no matter how well made they are. They are such a risky bet and have devastating consequences when they fail. I hope we have turned a corner on this and publishers will stop trying to get on the bandwagon. Maybe the next trend everyone chases is smaller is scale - like when everyone bolted on a MP mode to their SP games to compete with CoD.

johnny_ultimate

I hate GAAS as a model and design approach - it runs contrary to what I'm interested in about the medium, it can fatally undermine otherwise good games, and it pulls talented developers away from more interesting projects. But I also entirely understand the cold, cynical commercial logic of pursuing it. Of course, publishers are looking at Fortnite, Destiny, Apex Legend, FIFA (sorry, EA FC), CS, League of Legends, Warzone, Overwatch etc.. and desperately want a cut of that pie. The commercial risk is high, given the high failure rate. But there are quite a few success stories there - even if there are exponentially more failures than successes - and for companies that extended, seemingly bottomless revenue stream is obviously worth pursuing even if the chances of success are low.

I mean, it's extremely grim that that's the reality, but I'm also not surprised so many publishers are chasing the elusive but potentially lucrative live service mega-hit.

One of the big problems though is it's clearly a highly specialised field, and requires serious talent and infrastructure to pull off. Look at how 343 fucked up Halo Infinite because they clearly weren't in a position to deliver what was needed at the speed that was needed: it's ruthless, and a publisher really needs an efficient ongoing development flow for things to run smoothly. It also rings alarm bells when teams that previously specialised in particular types of games - like Creative Assembly - are suddenly called on to deliver something radically different. If it's coming at the cost of more traditional games in a studio or publisher's usual lane, that's a real problem.

Markitron

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121197748#Comment_121197748

This is why I think Sony giving Bungie oversight on their GAAS's was a smart move. They advised gutting that TLOU MP game as they knew it probably wasn't going to work as-is.

johnny_ultimate

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121197794#Comment_121197794

I'm not a fan of Sony acquiring Bungie (more consolidation), but it does make sense to get a team that knows what they're doing - relatively speaking, given the constant community moaning about Destiny 😅 - on board if they're insistent on the GAAS model.

TLOU MP* has always set off a lot of alarm bells. Weird to pine for the days of MP add-ons to SP games given how many crappy MP modes we ended up with, but the original Factions was one of the good ones, so more on that scale to launch alongside TLOU2 would seem like a no-brainer. Not every multiplayer experience has to be built with extreme longevity in mind.

*obviously we haven't seen what Naughty Dog has/had planned, so we can only speculate. Always a chance they had something more ambitious in mind, but seems like a bad idea conceptually to me

Zero-Cool

Factions 2 with a camp survival element sounds like a dream to me. Hell, an updated Factions to along with TLOU 2 would have been great but yeah, sounded like scope changed warranted a stand alone release before bungie stuck their big **** nose in.

Retr0gamer

Was destiny really that special though? I mean it had really bad teething issues as well but got by on not having much competition and launching when the PS4 and Xbox one had feck all games. I doubt it would survive in it's current environment.

I feel all the successful GaaS games have been a product of when they were released or else released fully formed and didn't haemorrhage their whole player base before there was enough content to sustain the game. They really fly in the face of traditional game development schedules and rushing one of these games out to appease shareholders with a game release is a recipe for disaster.

Retr0gamer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198208#Comment_121198208

I feel like bungie shut it down because it was a bit ****.

johnny_ultimate

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198211#Comment_121198211

Destiny 2 is doing pretty well for itself - rarely falls below around 40-50,000 concurrent players on Steam alone after all these years, and that number jumps significantly during big expansion pass drops. Not up there with the likes of juggernauts like DotA or Apex, but I think most live service developers would kill for that sort of ongoing, consistent playerbase, moaning though they perpetually do be :P

I do agree new titles need to launch in a very confident state, though, with a steady content stream after launch, or a game will just disappear into oblivion. Halo: Infinite is the perfect example of that - entire years go by without substantial updates, and the audience just loses interest. I do of course wish a strong base game could sustain an audience - ala Call of Duty multiplayer - but in the live service route developers need to be a lot more efficient. Fortnite and Apex at least always seem like 'live' games, that are constantly changing and keeping players on their toes with regular major updates and changes. It's a pretty ruthless demand, and I've little doubt some of the successful GaaS studios only get there with pretty extreme development schedules.

awec

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198211#Comment_121198211

Destiny was ok, the game itself was fairly mediocre but it was saved by the social aspect of it, like having 6? people do the raid etc was fun at the time. No other game has really done anything like this since.

The competitive PvP they brought out was fairly good too.

Zero-Cool

Dredge Dlc out in November, bound to be quality.

https://twitter.com/PlayStationEU/status/1709947215794360327?t=FGEC1jVqK1Z_eC_tvtBCuw&s=19

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198211#Comment_121198211

Destiny has solid core gameplay and a lot of the design was stellar. The actual shooting and traversal mechanics, particularly at the time of the first game, were tremendous. It was also one of the first big GAAS type of games, so I think regardless of how many other games were coming out around that time, Destiny still would have made its mark.

That said it was meant to be a 10-year game and they had to scrap that and properly release a sequel as the game had lost a lot of its base due to how many people abandoned it in the month or two after launch. But as JU showed, Destiny 2 is still doing pretty well 6 years after launch. Compare that to Marvels Avengers which had the weight and brand recognition of Avengers behind it, and 3 years after release its been fully delisted from stores and no longer receiving support.

Destiny at its core has always been a great game. Not without its issues, but absolutely rock-solid core gameplay and design. It's biggest issue was that there simply wasn't enough of it at launch.

Exclamation Marc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198372#Comment_121198372

Absolutely cracking game.

Retr0gamer

When I say destiny wouldn't survive in this day and age I meant the way destiny launched with very little content and a raid introduced late on which people grew bored of quickly. It grew into a much more fleshed out experience and by all accounts destiny 2 was a much better launch. What I mean is that if destiny launched the way it did today I'm not sure it could have sustained it's player base and ended up as another causality of the oversaturated market.

Zero-Cool

Apparently this guy is a movie (and more recently game) leaker and is saying Factions 2 is dead after it was reported that lead monetisation designer at naughty dog has left after working there for just 11 months. I can picture him in a cape saying "i must go. someone, somewhere needs my help to implement a battle pass".

https://twitter.com/ViewerAnon/status/1710039299151044653?t=s27korK8iO8XEjiibcCZ7Q&s=19

Grumpypants

Expect lots more live service games to get canned. Money is just not there to keep them afloat. Costs for keeping servers online is far too high, market is saturated, no one has spare money for in game trinkets due to inflation, and the COVID extra gaming time bubble has burst.

EoinMcLovin

https://variety.com/2023/digital/news/cyberpunk-2077-movie-show-video-game-1235746145/

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Varik

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198439#Comment_121198439

Destiny 1 had plenty of content and the raid was a week after release, it then took weeks more for normal players to manage to even get it finished in a week before it reset.

By the time people could get through it normally out comes hard mode and then 3 months after release out comes Crota and the new DLC.

Destiny 1 had far more content than the average similar game and a much better first year than destiny 2 before they partly undid some of the changes from D1.

Potential-Monke

This is why I prefer single player games. Done and dusted, move on. All my favourite games are that, Legacy of Kain series, God of War series, the earlier Tomb Raiders. Granted, producrs of their time, GaaS was not possible on console. But the recent GoWs and Spiderman games prove that there's still a large market for solid, single player experiences, even if they're not for everyone, they're for quite a lot.

It's great we have such a massive pool of games to fit any preference. But story driven single player action games float my boat. They don't even have to invent anything new, just make a solid enjoyable game, with emphasis on the game part, ie: Immortals of Aveum (again, for me and my preferences). GaaS just never stuck with me really, unless you count the CoDs pre-WWII.