Wormerine

This is how I used to think as well, but I am not sure how true that is. Your logic assumes that if a game doesn't get VO, than it can invest more money into other features. I just don't think it works that way. I suspect it is more reasonable to assume that if a game won't get budget for a major or full VO, it will also be underbudgeted in other aspects as well. I can think of two instances of when RPGs got full VO post release - so I think it might be better to think of VO an extra accessibility/mass market appeal feature. I think it is less of a case make great RPG or full VO RPG, and more of creating a great RPG and spending extra money to expand your potential audience. It really comes down to how many sales one could loose without including full VO, and that's something I can only speculate about. Unfortunately, it seems that higher ups at Obsidian decided to have the cake and eat it too - spend money on full VO, but still skimp by not accomodating production schedule putting a lot of extra burden of devs. Perhaps it had an impact on the final game's quality, but even if not it seemed to come at a cost of devs wellbeing and morale. Why not take a cue from D:OS and DIsco Elysium and wait with VO post launch, if you can't fit/afford it for 1.0?

I don't think that's true. Full VO seems like a rather coveted feature - no doubt you will find a lot of support on this forum (including myself, as I don't require full VO or VO at all to enjoy a game) but you will cut your self from a potential player base. There is also no evidence of "VO limits writing". Yes, Bioware games became smaller and smaller in scope as they wramped up production value, but there are also enough examples to the contrary. It seems that if one can afford it, full VO seems like a rather valuable feature to have - both for audience and marketing (aka. streamers) From what I remember (Josh mentioned decision to full VO in his Post Mortem) full VO was mostly a scheduling nightmare - as they didn't plan for full VO, having to fit recording sessions took a toll on the devs - it is not as simple as sending a script to a third party and having it recorded. Yeah, I also thing the "feature" he mentions was the Ship Combat.

Decided to take a break from Dragon's Dogma1, and reinstalled Final Fantasy7Remake to do a hard mode run. I wouldn't recommend it unless ones feels like doing a 2nd playthrough and want to untick remaigning achievements and the handful of extra battles. I am nearing the end, and it just hasn't been very interesting - the gimmick is that one can't use items. Which means MP used for casting spells is rather limited. After struggling with the first boss in the game, I switched to utilising non MP Materia's (Chaklra, Prey for healing, elemental and synergy for elemental damange).... and so far that's been pretty much it. Climbing through the ranks in SF6. Eached Platinum1, which I believe is most populated, most middle of the road rank. The game tends to funnel players into it, as up to this point leveling up is far easier than leveling down. It is quite interesting how quality of matches got worse - previously players often weren't great, but they tried. I had couple good matches in platinum, but most opponents where cheesy, one tricks ponies. It is also rare to get rechallenged after winning. Wierd bunch that platinum1. I sincerely hope I won't get stuck in that bracket.

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/whatever-the-fallout-tv-show-does-with-new-vegas-lore-josh-sawyer-doesnt-care-it-was-never-mine bla bla bla, Fallout, bla bla bla No new info regarding PoE2 production, but quite a bit of flavour from JS point of view:

Pathfinding aside they hold up very well, even on an iPad.

I retrieved my heart in Dragon's Dogma. What happened next surprised me, and I don't quite know what to make of it.

Ah! If I knew at some point that you can give orders to your pawns at some point, than I completely forgot about it after the tutorial. Might give it a go, next time. I must admit, I am liking DD more and more. Started encountering more large monsters, and while rather gimmicky they are fun. The game has issues, but it sells the idea of party adventuring like few other games. In a way it feels like playing classic RPG, and I like it. I even grew to like UI. It was a nightmare to start with, but once I got used to it, it became fairly efficient to use. Unlike, let’s say Baldur’s Gate3, in which the more time I spent the more issues an inefficiencies I found in the UI. speaking of BG3, I wonder if Dragon’s Dogma was one of Larian’s inspiration. Grabbing&throwing enemies, exploding barrels, mayhem and fire everywhere, pawns hurting themselves while autofollwing you, gimmicky boss fights. It seems curiously similar.

Well, that's unfortunately not the case in Street Fighter6, but otherwise I see your point. Still, difficulty for me to not be apprehensive about every Capcom release, as they tend to come with a lot of red flags. It's like Bethesda not sending out review codes for Doom2016. Just... why? Maybe Capcom is playing a long game - releasing years of quality releases, making us complacent and make us stop worrying about microtransactions. And when we do: BAM, mictrotransaction driven Resident Evil live service.

I remember seeing a quote of one of the higher up suggesting that all WB learned from that was: “dang, we should have monetized Hogward’s legacy more”. I don’t hope that Capcom will stay its current awesome self forever. Line must go up and at some point continuing to release great games will stop doing a trick and they will start cashing in. Really, a line between good and bad Capcom is them being more forceful about current monetisation.

Well, no. Live-service doesn't equal post launch content/support. Live-service model sees games and platform, rather than a title. It's a game meant to be played endlessly and continuasly with a regular trickle of limited time content. There are of course games that blur the lines. Are new Hitman's live services? I would say they definitely try, but there is a great, selfcontained game there with live-service stink all over it. For a while now even non-live service games implement live-service like monatizations (Street Fighter6 battlepass for example). I can't speak of Conan Exiles, but I am pretty sure MMO was were a lot of live-service concepts were first born - than publishers became interesting in having same long term "engagement" through habit and ongoing revenue through microtransactions in other titles. I think that if a game releases post release content, and you are not pressure to log in play it/buy it right now, it is not following live-service design. It has less to do with how much post launch content it gets (god knows, a lot of services tend to die rather quickly) and more with how it tries to "engage" its players.

So far my fondest encounter in DD1 was a free roaming cyclops. Hired pawn mounted the monster and rode him off the cliff. Too bad I couldn’t sent the pawn back with a generous gift for his service.

Easily the think I have been looking forward most since Suicide Squad release

Ok I haven't made my gaming updater in a while, and I am sure you are all dying to know of my gaming habits. Dragon's Dogma I am commiting to finishing this one as my highest priority. I pushed beyond opening and the game became quite playable. There is originality to it, I appreciate, but so far I am still not convinced it is a "good game". I think it was a cult classic for a reason. But perhaps, it will get better as it goes on. I find quest design frustratingly uneven. So far they seem like excuses to get you our into the wild more than anything else, but them seem to range from handholdy to frustratingly obtuse. So far it more seems like uneven standard an inconsistant design, rather than intentional creative choice. More importantly, I am not sold on combat, and overal systems. UI is horrendous, that the first thing. But to me the game seems to land in the awkard spot for action-RPG where it is neither decent action game nor an RPG. I am not seeing much possible variation in builds so far, and gameplay seems to revolve around spamming attack and abilities with final result mostly coming down to stats (do I do enough damage and stagger, and can enemy kill me in a single chain of attacks). Of course, the most novel and interesting bit so far are enemy weaknesses - but while capturing imagination, I wasn't particularly blown away gameplay wise. So far it seems simply that certain enemies need to be attacked certain way to made the encounter more managable, but that's about all the depth it has. You either know or you don't. Climbing enemies is cool, though, at least from visual perspective. Still, games like Dark Souls also had optional limb removal/weak spots mechanics, and overall I think their system is far more competent and intricate in both halfs of action-RPG genre. I like thought, that it is an action-RPG focused on a party - but again, without controlling the party members it's not particularly deep experience. Edit. Oh, unprofeshional, out of tune singing in the main menu really, really irritates me /edit Prince of Persia: Lost Crown It's good, but I wasn't blown away by it. Being done by same devs as excellent latest Rayman games platforming is great. Combat is also more complex than your usual metroidvania experience (a bit of side scrolling DMC there), but I also wasn't particularly impressed by it. Yes, there are more attacks, and you can create basic combos, but I just didn't think the combat was deliberate enough to be rewarding. Yes, Hollownight had very basic attacks, but all upgrades, modifiers and player in combat decisions felt very impactful. Not so much in Prince of Persia, and in spite of fairly decent enemy variety, I didn't find enemies particularly memorable. Bosses were fairly challenging, but in what I found to be rather annoying way. In a dark souls fashion, you kinda need to memorise their moves and timing. At least on highest difficulty parrying and dodging isn't very forgiving, so reacting on what you see isn't really possible in my opinion. It's all about dying few times, learning of proper timings and responses to each attack sequence. As for the motroidvania bit - it felt quite handholdy. It took the game a long time before it actually allowed you to explore a bit, but every area felt to be designed more like a Dark Souls level - a maze that you explore in linear fashion and unlock shortcut, rather than genuine exploration. I was surprised, as with game giving you new ways of marking the map (with in game screenshots) and option at the start between guided and non-guided experience, I expected something a bit more freeform. Most things you need to get back to, are collectibles that you can see but can't get to due to power X, Y and Z being missing (think Arkham series) but personally I find this design more frustrating that rewarding. Still, overall a good game, though it feels a bit derivativede. It mostly just seems to adapt well tested designsed (a lot of Hollow Knight in there), which I think is a bit of a shame - I would prefer if there was more Prince of Persia in there. Diablo 4 Not much to say. With it coming to GamePass I gave it ago, played for two evenings and got bored. It's not really a criticism of the title, that's how my adventure ends with all hack'n slashes so far. Numbers going up just doesn't excite me much, which is good considering the state of my bank account. Street Fighter 6 150h in and still going. I exhausted single player content, and am deep in online play and getting my butt kicked, and occasionally kicking butt of even bigger noob. I am getting better, but the progress is gradually slowing. Looking at skill ranking I am still a below average player (and by a fair margin). I am still enjoying myself, though, and that's what's important. So yeah, after years of dipping into fighting games I can recommend SF6 for its onboarding experience. Lengthy singleplayer campaign is a good way of familiarising one self with controls, roster and various mechanics. There is also a fairly gentle transition into online play, where game keeps you in the noob section for a while, before allowing you to get pummeled. I double down on my commitment by buying an arcade stick in an impulse purchase: For one, I am a bit angry at myself that I bought it instead of a Flight Stick, as it would be a more versatile purchase. I am also not sure of how good of a purchase it was, but I am getting around to it. I am still getting proficient with it, and I had to dose my playtime as between it and violin playing I started to strain my wrist. By either my hand got stronger, or spring weaker, and I didn't encounter any issues lately. I am also getting more and more competent with using it, with less wrong imputs and quicker response time. It's this funny thing, where a stick definitely didn't make me a better player, but the game makes more intuitive sense. Chaining command inputs is far easier for me to wrap my head around, than with buttons. It being a Capcom game, one also needs to mention monatization. Game has been very stingy with cosmetics costing extra and new character not being earnable in game - now, the game isn't designed as annoyingly as other titles. Shop button is decreet enough, and the game doesn't bombard you with microtransactions like other games do. But the truth is, everything extra will cost you. Unfortuantely, that means that game will be pricey to continue playing as further character passes are released. It's definitely a financial commitment.

Cute socially awkward gingers though Yeah, you see my memories are completely opposite. It is the opening that I remember fodly as far as narrative is concerned (Alloy being shunned by her local tribe and longing to become), and after the intro I remember being somewhat bored by the story. Yeah, it was generic and predictable (humans created AI, bla bla bla) but it is a game about hunting robot dinasours. As I am trying to recall it I think my issue might have been that story missions weren't particulalrly interesting, rather than the plot itself. Anyway, I can't recall story well enough to provide strong opinion piece. Mostly what I remember is beautiful visuals and killing robo-dinasour with its own minigun. AH, I also absolutely hated "RPG" systems. There was some kind of inventory management, I think.

Hmm, I must say, I don’t remember H:ZD story to be much more than serviceable. I cool visual design though. Alloy was likeable, if a bit too one note. I am tempted to pick it up at some point. While Open World checklist simulators aren’t my cup of tea, Sony ones (Spiderman, Horizon) have been fairly pleasant time wasters, when I wasn’t in a mood to play anything demanding attention.

Meh. It’s a mixed bag. Obviously, if a game has some form of multiplayer functionality, it will require internet connection, and it will better have build in security features so I can enjoy multiplayer with minimal amount of cheaters. As long as non-online functionality works fine, I would call it less of a DRM, and more “realities of life”. I also dont mind minor, meaningless rewards like in BG3, but we are entering a slippery slope of devs incentivising connecting online by unique content (and how disposable such content is will depend player to player). I have been mostly happy with GOG releases I bought, but they did relax their policy in recent years somewhat.

It's perfectly fine to not like certain mechanic, but your post suggests that RTWP and turn-based are one and the same. "Turns" is a ruleset and has an impact on gameplay decisionmaking. Chess wouldn't be "better" if everyone moved at the same time - it would be fundamentally broken as the game is build around players taking turns with one move at the time. I think the issue with RPGs is that they don't have particularly great combat loop to begin with - so speeding through encounters tends to be more desirable. In general, though, I do find turn-based RPGs to have better designed combat - not every turn based game, but outside Pillars of Eternity, I can think of only turn-based RPGs in which combat does suck (ignoring action-RPGs systems, like Dark Souls). But yeah, if combat requires little decisionmaking, and it is resolved based on your character build, that it would be desirable for combat to be over as soon as possible - or not be there in the first place.

In case over 2hour long podcast/interview is too much here is a bit more concise Judas pre-preview impression.

Pretty sure I posted it earlier in this thread as well. Oh well, no one said life is fair.

That sound more interesting than I expected. Narrative rogue-lite?

Possibly, or something Divinity (there is more to the IP than Original Sin games) related. When asked about it (according to IGN):

Sven explains his reasoning in the video I posted earlier. Chasing trends was never Larian’s MO. It seems Sven has a vision that he wants to reach one day and BG3 was just a stepping stone toward it. They took BG3 IP as they needed money and profile to evolve beyond D:OS2. Now they have both and they can do the next thing. it seems BG success did give them pause and they started thinking about continuing with BG. But they decided against it. That’s good. Milking same IP until it runs dry has been business staple for a long time. But it wasn’t always so, and I don’t think it is a good way to do things. Sure BG3 sold well, BG4 would sell well as well - but is there more for Larian to do there? Gaming (and not only gaming) is stagnating due to risk averse strategies. They did BG3 and seems they achieved what they wanted with it. Cool, let’s move to something new.

Well, there are. Seems the game runs fine, aside from the city, and issues there seem mostly be related to CPU. A powerhouse of a CPU seems to be able to pump out about 60FPS with dips, but frametimes are all over the place. Edit. Soo, with all this talk about Dragon's Dogma, I booted up DD1. As PC port is crap and can't even display prompts correctly, I guessed wrong and attacked NPC instead of talking to him. Now I am in jail....