What are you playing now?

[GhostofAnakin]

I miss the whistle ability from Black Flag to lure enemies toward you when you're hiding around a corner or in a bush.

[Fighter]

I dunno why motion blur, depth of field and film grain are considered improvements over being able to see what you are doing as well as what is around you. The motion blur is on for sprinting, but you sprint 80% of the time in that game. At least you can turn off all that crap. 

 

Resource intensive effects that makes your game look and play worse. Horray. 

 

I've read it that motion blur is supposed to be something or other more realistic. I still don't understand how.

[Keyrock]

 

I dunno why motion blur, depth of field and film grain are considered improvements over being able to see what you are doing as well as what is around you. The motion blur is on for sprinting, but you sprint 80% of the time in that game. At least you can turn off all that crap. 

 

Resource intensive effects that makes your game look and play worse. Horray. 

 

I've read it that motion blur is supposed to be something or other more realistic. I still don't understand how.

 

It's supposed to simulate the effect that you naturally get when your field of vision changes rapidly, like turning your head really fast.  The problem is that I've yet to see a single game come even semi-quasi-remotely-esque to replicating the actual motion blur I experience in real life if I change my field of vision rapidly.  The motion blur in games always, and I do mean ALWAYS, feels extremely unnatural.  I think no developer has been able to contain themselves to allow the effect to look natural.  In real life, at least in my experiences, the effect is extremely quick, I'm talking microseconds, and it's virtually unnoticeable unless you're actively thinking about it and looking for it.  When a developer adds the effect they want you to notice it, so instead of making it super quick and subtle, they clobber you over the head with it and maker it last 1000x as long as it does in real life, hence why it feels so ridiculously unrealistic.  That's my theory, anyway.

Edited January 31, 2015 by Keyrock

[Tale]

"I don't wanna Bust All that."

 

Don't tell me what I do and don't want to do, Calavera.

[Zoraptor]

It's supposed to simulate the effect that you naturally get when your field of vision changes rapidly, like turning your head really fast.  The problem is that I've yet to see a single game come even semi-quasi-remotely-esque to replicating the actual motion blur I experience in real life if I change my field of vision rapidly.  The motion blur in games always, and I do mean ALWAYS, feels extremely unnatural.  I think no developer has been able to contain themselves to allow the effect to look natural.  In real life, at least in my experiences, the effect is extremely quick, I'm talking microseconds, and it's virtually unnoticeable unless you're actively thinking about it and looking for it.  When a developer adds the effect they want you to notice it, so instead of making it super quick and subtle, they clobber you over the head with it and maker it last 1000x as long as it does in real life, hence why it feels so ridiculously unrealistic.  That's my theory, anyway.

 

 

I actually have difficulty thinking of a single* 'graphical realism' effect that consistently makes graphics look more realistic beyond the trivial ones like better resolution/ colour depth. Bloom/ hdr all too often ends up with people looking like they've been living in the Chernobyl Sarcophagus/ been smeared in vaseline or has objects that are quite matte in reality that shine like a localised supernova if there's so much as a candle nearby; SSAO puts weird black outlines around everything and lens flare is used in situations where it shouldn't occur at all and in a manner that would shame JJ Abrams. And motion blur... well yeah, not exactly what I experience in real life, albeit my eyes are pretty borked.

 

No doubt there are effects that do work and I don't really notice because they're properly understated, but yeah, it really does seem like the programmers and artists doing video games really do want to make sure you notice all their effort rather more than they want their effort to give a realistic visual result.

 

*Fog and weather usually seems to be OK, but even then there have been some rather prominent overdone examples.

[LadyCrimson]

^^ So much this.

 

Most effects/graphical "enhancements" in games, I end up turning off/forcing off if it's somehow an option. Sometimes I like shadows, graphically, but most of the time I find even those rather unnecessary or at least unnatural looking. In some games I've liked what ambient occlusion does (not that I really understand what it does, only what I think of it when I turn it on/off). I tend to always like rain, however ... it's a mood thing.

 

Nothing new to report about what I'm playing. Still 7DtD off and on.

[Fighter]

On the subject of Dying Light. When you dive in the water and resurface it simulates the "your eyes are covered in water and things are blurry" effect, it's unsubtle and pretty annoying.

[Keyrock]

The one effect that developers use that's clearly overdone most of the time and nowhere near realistic, but that I do like, is light shafts, god rays, that sort of thing.  It's quite rare in real life to see god rays as pronounced as they are regularly in games, but I think that it looks really awesome, so developers should feel free to continue overdoing that effect as far as I'm concerned.

 

On the what I'm playing front, I'm holding off on Dying Light for a bit.  There's a bug on Linux making it impossible to secure safe houses (other than the ones that are part of scripted events).  I thought I was just doing something wrong, but it's a problem on all Linux machines.  This isn't a showstopper, but it does hamper gameplay at night to a significant degree and I'm at a point in the game where I'm about to do some night missions.  The first patch fixed some Linux stuff, but that bug remains for now.  Hopefully it's fixed soon.

 

I scooped up Raven's Cry.  I'm not a fan of either Two Worlds game, but I scooped up the game for several reasons:

 

1) Reality Pump is a Polish studio.  I can't help but give studios from the motherland more extra chances than I would otherwise.

2) I love me some pirates.

3) Day 1 Linux release. 

4) I desperately need an RPG to tide me over until Pillars of Eternity.

 

So, the game is a pirate RPG set in the real world, though I've yet to meet and real historical characters.  So far as I can tell, there is no magic, it's real real world (except with a fictional story and all that).  The game features normal on foot stuff, ship combat, trading, and crew management.

 

I typical TopWare and Reality Pump fashion, the game is buggy and obviously unfinished at launch.  Some characters are completely missing voice acting (I don't think they were meant to), the sound mixing is way off in certain scenes (luckily there are separate volume sliders for voice acting, sound effects, music, etc., so it can be worked around), animations are pretty stiff and hilariously bad at times, the environment looks decent but character models look like they're from 2008, dialogue is hilariously bad, the story they drop you into at the beginning has a bunch of stuff happening and they do a really bad job of explaining why (until after the fact and even then, it's not explained well), and on foot combat is pretty clunky.  The game is a mess right now.

 

With all that said, I'm kinda liking the game so far.  The game has a weird, low budget, clunky charm to it and there is a lot to do, even if some of it is implemented in a less than elegant way.  I kinda like how the character you play is pretty much just a straight up ***hole.  In many games this might work against the game, but you're playing a pirate, you're kind of supposed to be a scumbag thief and murderer, that's what pirates were (and still are).  The naval combat is far slower and less graceful than in AC: Black Flag (that was my favorite part of Black Flag), but it's serviceable once you get used to the controls, and I like how they don't physically show you an arc for where your cannon shot is going to go, but instead you need to adjust the cannon angle by your own judgement watching where the previous volley went (did it go over the ship or come up short?).  There is a fairly basic trading system, buying and selling goods with different prices in different ports.  I haven't played enough to see if the prices fluctuate and if they do so randomly or using a real supply/demand economy model (hopefully it's the latter).  I like how you have to keep your crew paid and happy and how hiring different officers gives you bonuses/penalties in naval combat.  Also, the game has sea shanties in taverns, and not nerfed sea shanties, but real, proper, dirty, sexist sea shanties, the way sea shanties were meant to be.  

 

As an aside, your character's name is Christopher Raven and the name of the game is Raven's Cry.  They went with the every cheesy action movie naming scheme.  "They kidnapped his daughter and killed his wife.  Now there will hell to play when former Navy Seal Henry Stone returns for blood and hard justice in Stone's Throw." 

Edited January 31, 2015 by Keyrock

[Bartimaeus]

I would rather they spend more time on proper/non-garbage looking dynamic shadows than keep working on already overdone sunrays...

[Oner]

Extra Early Access of Darkest Dungeon

Not sure what to say about it. Gameplay is "fun", in the roguelike BS ragequit sense. Some of the gameplay mechanics are poorly explained (Took me a while to find out what DOD is, and I've still no idea how to camp).

[Hurlshort]

I was planning on picking up Darkest Dungeon in a couple days. Is it worth it?

[GhostofAnakin]

Still playing AC Unity.  The blocking/dodging mechanic seems more ungainly than in Black Flag.  I'm having a hell of a time getting the timing down against those heavy axe wielding enemies.

[Oner]

Probably. It's in Early Access, so no idea what might change. There's some clunky stuff in there and a bit too much randomness (hireable heroes, lots of misses, enemies resisting your cc, wasting your turn). And a lot of reliability for enemies (Crits, Sanity-wrecking attacks that never miss and the enemy using them is the first in the round, many crits,)

 

It's easy to screw yourself over in a fight too. Leper has abysmal hit chances, so he has to use one of his abilities first to make up for that. Then wait a whole round, hoping not to get stunned (I lost my buff once before my guy got out of his stunlock, fun times). Then a miss or a resist and poof, another turn wasted. Oh and if you get critted, you lose sanity. Then your guy gets an affliction and everyone automatically loses more sanity. And another guy loses his cool, repeat. And all through this you can't act and have to wait until the heroes stop talking. Grrr.

So yeah. Wait till it's more polished, I think. Besides, why would you buy an unfinished game?

 

For now it's pretty easy for the game to piss you off. Aarrrgghh

Edited January 31, 2015 by Oner

[Starwars]

Was planning to play Darkest Dungeon as I got my kickstarter key but my game doesn't even start up. It tries to load for a few secs and then just... stops. Hope they can fix that soon.

 

Picked up the Grim Fandango remaster. Not normally a fan of remasters but I'd long since lost my old disc and the point and click addition makes it worth it to me.

[HoonDing]

I typical TopWare and Reality Pump fashion, the game is buggy and obviously unfinished at launch.

Two Worlds 2 was perfectly playable on release.

[Keyrock]

 

I typical TopWare and Reality Pump fashion, the game is buggy and obviously unfinished at launch.

Two Worlds 2 was perfectly playable on release.

 

Fair enough, my bad, I didn't get Two Worlds 2 until much later.  I do remember the first Two Worlds was a horrible mess on launch.  Anyway, there are tons of issues being reported on the Steam forums about Raven's Cry.  I've been quite lucky with the only major issue being an autosave bug that causes the game to completely lock up often times (not always) when autosaving.  It's easily enough worked around by disabling autosaves (manually saving has never locked the game up for me).

 

The game is clunky and low budget as hell.  The dialogue in it is bad, really bad.  Lip syncing is way off (I'm guessing because it was synced to Polish rather than English originally?).  This is nowhere near a AAA title.  Still, I'm having a lot of fun with the game.  I love how much of an ***hole I get to be.  Many conversation options break down to these options: a) Be an ***hole/threaten the person b) Threaten the person more forcefully c) Kill the person on the spot.  That seems spot on for a pirate.  Also, the game is nearly worth the money for the sea shanties alone.  They are so vulgar, so deliciously vulgar. 

 

Edit:  Just played the game some more.  The main character is even more of an ***hole than I initially thought.  I'm talking EPIC LEVEL ***hole with roughing up women and smacking around and threatening to kill helpless dudes, it's freakin' fantastic.  Don't get me wrong, I don't condone those kinds of actions, but I am playing a pirate and it's refreshing to play an antihero with seemingly no real redeeming qualities, rather than how games always try to make the character likable and have him have a heart of gold inside (that might still happen here, but not so far).  Hollywood had pretty much always tried to paint pirates as good people with good hearts trapped in a dirty world, struggling against what they must do and wanting to do the right thing inside, when in reality pirates are ****ing scumbags and murderers.  Hopefully this game sticks with what I've seen so far, because it's really refreshing playing a complete scumbag.  The SJWs are going to have a field day with this game if it doesn't fly completely under their radar.  I hope it doesn't so they can all **** their collective pants about a pirate being portrayed like an actual pirate and how awful that is and Reality Pump not giving a **** about it, if I know my countrymen like I think I do.  We don't give a **** about your feels.  Cry to someone who cares.

Edited January 31, 2015 by Keyrock

[Keyrock]

Oh man, I just swindled a widow out of one of her possessions in Raven's Cry by playing the kindly stranger who needs her help to help her get more money (I might as well be a Nigerian Prince).  I'm not sure if the game will give me a chance to actually repay her later on (doubtful), but if it does, **** that, I'm playing a pirate and I'm here to swindle everyone the last bit of coin out of fools I can, be they male, female, young, elderly, handicapped, senile, retarded, or whatever.  The more mentally challenged or gullible the better, easier score.  I will take all your money!  AHAHAHAHA AHAHAHAHAHAHA!  AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Edited January 31, 2015 by Keyrock

[mkreku]

I actually have difficulty thinking of a single* 'graphical realism' effect that consistently makes graphics look more realistic beyond the trivial ones like better resolution/ colour depth.

 

Ignorance.

 

This is what games used to look like.

 

 

You think adding resolution and colour depth would change anything?

 

This is a game that uses most every modern graphics effect (video for full effect).

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sD8EjshQ6yo

 

You don't think simple things like dynamic light/shadows, shaders, bump mapping, normal mapping, antialiasing, screen space ambient occlusion, etc. consistently makes graphics look more realistic?

 

Ignorance.

[Keyrock]

 

I actually have difficulty thinking of a single* 'graphical realism' effect that consistently makes graphics look more realistic beyond the trivial ones like better resolution/ colour depth.

 

Ignorance.

 

This is what games used to look like.

 

 

You think adding resolution and colour depth would change anything?

 

Whoa, if I'm not mistaken, that's the first Need For Speed.

[Tale]

Finished Life is Strange Episode 1. Not as great as Telltale Games, but that might be that there's quite a bit more slice of life to it, and I'm not as drawn into that kind of thing. The time rewinding is more of a mechanic than it is central to the plot, though that may change as the series approaches a climax.

 

Still, I thought it was pretty good. There's a few plotlines in it I'm really interested in seeing how they go.

[Wrath of Dagon]

Can't believer I finally beat the Berserkers in "Of Orcs and Men". Tried a bunch of times and usually couldn't even kill one. Looked at a guide but didn't have the skill they recommended. In desperation restarted the game on easy, and noticed in the first tutorial battle that if you use Powerful Blow the other Orc seems to usually get interrupted. So I went back to my old game and had Arkail use only that, while Styx

mostly just ran around drawing off the other Berserkers and revived Arkail whenever he went down.

Worked like a charm.

[HoonDing]

Edit:  Just played the game some more.  The main character is even more of an ***hole than I initially thought.  I'm talking EPIC LEVEL ***hole with roughing up women and smacking around and threatening to kill helpless dudes, it's freakin' fantastic.  Don't get me wrong, I don't condone those kinds of actions, but I am playing a pirate and it's refreshing to play an antihero with seemingly no real redeeming qualities, rather than how games always try to make the character likable and have him have a heart of gold inside (that might still happen here, but not so far).  Hollywood had pretty much always tried to paint pirates as good people with good hearts trapped in a dirty world, struggling against what they must do and wanting to do the right thing inside, when in reality pirates are ****ing scumbags and murderers.  Hopefully this game sticks with what I've seen so far, because it's really refreshing playing a complete scumbag.  The SJWs are going to have a field day with this game if it doesn't fly completely under their radar.  I hope it doesn't so they can all **** their collective pants about a pirate being portrayed like an actual pirate and how awful that is and Reality Pump not giving a **** about it, if I know my countrymen like I think I do.  We don't give a **** about your feels.  Cry to someone who cares.

[Enoch]

The best part of a DA:O playthrough.

[Orogun01]

The best part of a DA:O playthrough.

Hey!...That's my waifu you're ****ing with.

[Apatia]

Whoa, if I'm not mistaken, that's the first Need For Speed.

I believe that is Test Drive. Had fun with it back in the day.