Games

1. Larian is working on two games right now and restructuring the company around making both of those projects flow.
2. They've got a new narrative team meant to improve the work processes of detecting issues with player reactivity in complex RPGs.
3. Vincke has a lot to say about machine learning, and it's somehow both vague and nuanced. He sees it as a way to speed up development on certain tasks, particularly prototyping and detecting problems that come up from iteration and changes, without replacing the need for handcrafted content.
4. For some reason, we're still talking about "single player games are dead" discourse, even though Larian made the Best Multiplayer Game of 2023 and single player games are demonstrably, all the time, not dead.
5. At least #4 led to an interesting discussion about how to lead a sustainable game business, including how to manage your "S" growth curve with more innovation. Mostly, Vincke summarizes it as "happy player, happy business", which you might have surmised from his Game Awards speech.
6. Then there's some pretty low-hanging fruit when it comes to interacting with a game's community that's difficult to argue with, like "embrace mods that put your characters in other games".
7. Vincke says the team finds DLC boring to make, so they don't really want to make it anymore.
8. As far as what Larian's actually doing next, with the interviewer Tamoor Hussain keeping it to things that Vincke will actually answer, Vincke is hoping to make a pipeline over the next 5 years where they can get multiple RPGs in development at the same time smoothly. About as close as we'll get to a timeline on their next game is that Vincke says his wife will divorce him if their next game isn't out 5 years from now.

Hey guys this is my first time playing city skylines so I am pretty new to this game though I am I feel confident on how I am going with my first playthrough feels like I know what I am doing though I would appreciate some help and just some eyes

I've been playing a lot of Oblivion Remastered and was hoping on starting a discussion thread about it.

I've put in around 12 hours so far and it's everything I wanted from a remake. Aside from the gorgeous graphics overhaul, they added a lot of more subtle QoL changes that really add up. Having a sprint button is great, and the reworked leveling system is way better than how it used to be. Combat has also been enhanced in lots of subtle ways like significantly better animations and better impact when hitting enemies.

The remaster is very impressive, when news got leaked that this was in development I expected a low effort re-release with a higher resolution, but they managed to make it play like a modern title. The lighting is crazy good and the open world can look breathtaking at times. They also managed to keep all the old Oblivion charm by not messing around with things people loved - the game under the hood still works the same, glitches and hilarious NPCs are still intact. They even kept some goofs from the original.

The only two issues right now for me are:

• Open world performance is just not good. It hovers around 50FPS on my 3060 Ti in the open world on medium settings, which is rough.

• Difficulty settings are wack. Normal is too easy and hard is way too hard. The slider literally goes from 1x/1x damage taken/damage dealt to 3x/0.6! No idea why we can't get something in the middle, but luckily there's already a mod that fixes it (I'm now using 2x/0.75 which is the sweet spot).

If those get fixed, it's basically a perfect remaster. Anyone else here playing right now? How are you enjoying it?

cross-posted from: https://sopuli.xyz/post/25995230

The GoG preservation program has done it once again by bringing back what seems to be a classic JRPG from the PS1 era back to the modern systems.

I am absolutely overjoyed at the fact that the GoG preservation program constantly keeps on giving and providing us with these various classic titles that can be played on modern systems.

This game in particular seems absolutely perfect to being played on the Steam Deck due to it being a turn-based JRPG.

I personally don't have any experience with this particular title, or the overall series for that matter, but you can bet I am jumping into this game as soon as I finish setting it up on the Deck.

One of the latest additions to the GOG preservation program is Breath of Fire IV.

Never heard of it myself, but it looked interesting, so will probably try it out this weekend.

Was recommended this because I love Final Fantasy 5, but it was just a terrible experience. The quests felt like I was playing an mmo they were so boring and uninspired, and the classes and skills all sucked.

Was I just not giving it a fair shake, does it eventually get better, at the moment I can't see how anyone enjoys this.

Looking for fishing games, but not the serious ones, more like Dredge, fishing in Stardew or Animal Crossing, stuff like that.

I heard Moonlight Bay wasn't good, unfortunately.

Today's game is some more Assassin's Creed Shadows. I did a tomb that i passed by on my way to track down some missing Priests. This section above with the tree reminded me of a previous Screenshot i did in Far Cry 3 (A game i still need to go back and finish) of a temple in a cave with a tree. Coincidentally this cave also had a ton of Grappling Points around it like in a Far Cry game.

I also went hunting for one of the last few legendary Sumi-e's i need for a achievement. This one was of a bird that was nearby this pond that was really pretty. The water was really clear and i spent just a little bit splashing around in it since i had some time to kill before the bird spawned.

I also did a Sumi-e that spawns in all seasons of these 3 wise monkeys. I've known about these for a while but keep putting it off, but i was in the area and at the right time so i went ahead and did it before i put it off again.

The final screenshot i wanted to share was this village i passed by with red lanterns all over the place. The wind was blowing a bit at this point so all the lanterns were gracefully blowing in the wind. I ended up buying a fox statue here

This game is amazing. I'm about halfway through i think, but I need to slow down. I've kind of been speed running the story progression just because its so fucking good, and as a result I dont think I'm powerful enough to move on to the 3rd map. I haven't even fought a horde yet because they scare the fuck out of me.

The characters are fantastic. Sam Witwer, who is an absolute underrated gem of a national treasure, in the role of the player character (Deacon St. John) is just brilliant. The mocap, face capture, and performance capture are so well done, you'll find yourself appreciating the facial animation a great deal especially. The NPCs are varied and feel alive, and frankly most of them piss me off, buncha tryhards and pieces of shit, lol. The dialogue is so good that I feel emotionally invested enough to legitimately hate a lot of these fucks (obligatory FKSKIZZO). Meanwhile there's other characters you care deeply about, like your bro that you ride with and your absent wife. It really draws you in.

The game mechanics are a little different from what you typically see in an action horror. The horde mechanic is what stands out. The game isn't scary but barreling over a hill on your motorcycle and finding yourself suddenly waist deep in 100 or more (up to 500!) enemies all at once, just surrounded. I haven't yet learned to fight a horde, but just trying to get away from them while you have their aggro is tense as fuck. They'll clothesline your ass and knock you right off your bike.

Speaking of your bike, it's some of the most satisfying driving I've ever done in a game. I hate driving mechanics in games. I'm terrible at it. I veer all over the place. I can't stay on the fucking road. But this game, it's intuitive. It's manageable. I can stay on the road even! The driving is actually fun. I even skip fast traveling at times just to enjoy riding around on my motorcycle. It's fantastic. The implementation is just right for me.

As an aside, I'm running a ROG Ally, which is a mobile AMD processor, and it runs just great with no tweaking.

So anyways, if you skipped Days Gone like I did, as an action horror junkie, I highly recommend it l. The story and characters and voice acting are the highlight, and I just dont have a single complaint about the combat or driving, even the crafting (which I typically hate) is well done. My only complaint would be that the game has allowed me to progress the story before i feel prepared for it, and that's minor. Plus for all I know maybe I can handle the next chunk, I won't really won't know til I get there. Great game.

New video just released by Funcom.

Today's game is some more Assassin's Creed Shadows. I did a tomb that i passed by on my way to track down some missing Priests. This section above with the tree reminded me of a previous Screenshot i did in Far Cry 3 (A game i still need to go back and finish) of a temple in a cave with a tree. Coincidentally this cave also had a ton of Grappling Points around it like in a Far Cry game.

I also went hunting for one of the last few legendary Sumi-e's i need for a achievement. This one was of a bird that was nearby this pond that was really pretty. The water was really clear and i spent just a little bit splashing around in it since i had some time to kill before the bird spawned.

I also did a Sumi-e that spawns in all seasons of these 3 wise monkeys. I've known about these for a while but keep putting it off, but i was in the area and at the right time so i went ahead and did it before i put it off again.

The final screenshot i wanted to share was this village i passed by with red lanterns all over the place. The wind was blowing a bit at this point so all the lanterns were gracefully blowing in the wind. I ended up buying a fox statue here

bit of a long shot, don't think i'm breaching community rules? but feel free to let me know if there's a better place for this

i'm running a Ryzen 5800X + Radeon 6900 XT ( Adrenalin 25.4.1) + Windows 10 (22H2 19045.5737)

and i'm getting the following error ~3 secs after launch

'The game has crashed Error code: 0xc0000096 '

i've tried restarting: updating Adrenalin, running as admin, running a repair operation on the game install, removed sl.pcl.dll

has anyone else ran into this error and was able to address it?

below is the content from 2 events I could dig up in Event Viewer ` Error 1: Faulting application name: OblivionRemastered-WinGDK-Shipping.exe, version: 5.3.2.0, time stamp: 0x00000000 Faulting module name: OblivionRemastered-WinGDK-Shipping.exe, version: 5.3.2.0, time stamp: 0x00000000 Exception code: 0xc0000096 Fault offset: 0x0000000006511667 Faulting process id: 0x79bc Faulting application start time: 0x01dbb58df3c4968a Faulting application path: C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\BethesdaSoftworks.ProjectAltar_1.0.3.0_x64__3275kfvn8vcwc\OblivionRemastered\Binaries\WinGDK\OblivionRemastered-WinGDK-Shipping.exe Faulting module path: C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\BethesdaSoftworks.ProjectAltar_1.0.3.0_x64__3275kfvn8vcwc\OblivionRemastered\Binaries\WinGDK\OblivionRemastered-WinGDK-Shipping.exe Report Id: 427771ea-7584-4846-9d75-3fe7d178eabf Faulting package full name: BethesdaSoftworks.ProjectAltar_1.0.3.0_x64__3275kfvn8vcwc Faulting package-relative application ID: AppUEGameShipping

Fault bucket 2270348712785277475, type 5 Event Name: MoAppCrash Response: Not available Cab Id: 0

Problem signature: P1: BethesdaSoftworks.ProjectAltar_1.0.3.0_x64__3275kfvn8vcwc P2: praid:AppUEGameShipping P3: 5.3.2.0 P4: 00000000 P5: OblivionRemastered-WinGDK-Shipping.exe P6: 5.3.2.0 P7: 00000000 P8: c0000096 P9: 0000000006511667 P10:

Error 2: Attached files: \?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\Temp\WERB5ED.tmp.dmp \?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\Temp\WERB63C.tmp.WERInternalMetadata.xml \?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\Temp\WERB66C.tmp.xml \?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\Temp\WERB66A.tmp.csv \?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\Temp\WERB68A.tmp.txt

These files may be available here: \?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\ReportArchive\AppCrash_BethesdaSoftwork_0bee12e71d833c6a9a936aa1d39329bbf9847_aa12295b_95d9956b-1753-43b8-b80a-49fa5560cee4

Analysis symbol: Rechecking for solution: 0 Report Id: 427771ea-7584-4846-9d75-3fe7d178eabf Report Status: 268435456 Hashed bucket: 3b4e7710f2ddf1216f81e6201dd4f223 Cab Guid: 0`

Seems Ubisoft have followed through on their promises.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/28652623

The design lead of Subnautica 2, Anthony Gallegos, presented a short clip about Subnautica 2.

There are some new scenes to analyze here.

They are also asking what we want to see in Subnautica 2.
Answer in their discord: https://discord.gg/subnautica

Welcome back! For my next screenshot-laden game discussion, I'm going to be talking about my favorite of the Far Cry series, Far Cry 5.

The original Far Cry was released in 2004 by Crytek to demonstrate the expansive capabilities of their brand-new CryEngine. As such, it was more of a tech demo than a solid video game title. Sure, it had a story and missions to complete, but it was mainly focused on showing off long-distance outdoors scenery, something that was difficult to render in those days. The game took place on a lush green tropical island and pushed computer hardware of the time to the limits of their functionality.

Ubisoft quickly bought up the Far Cry franchise from Crytek and proceeded to remake the original game, including several direct spin-offs/sequels of it, all for consoles. These were severely limited due to console hardware at the time, so they were far more linear and lower quality than the original open world PC game.

Crytek, meanwhile, made a deal with EA to develop a whole new game called Crysis, which would become famous for having realistic physics rendering and graphics far beyond consumer PCs' capabilities. Crysis would become the benchmark for high-end computers for many years afterward. But that's a game discussion for another time...

When it came time to make a true numerical sequel to Far Cry, Ubisoft decided they needed to get away from the tropical jungle setting. A lot of games at the time were focusing on that setting, including the new Crysis franchise. Plus, they felt like the main character from Far Cry just wasn't interesting enough to become the face of the franchise. So Far Cry 2 was actually a completely new game, with a new story, a new protagonist, and set in an unnamed African nation.

And thus began Ubisoft's trend of resetting the whole franchise with each new title. So jumping to the 2018 title Far Cry 5 isn't skipping any important story or background; it's an original standalone game. Although Far Cry: New Dawn is a direct sequel to this game; don't play it unless you want spoilers to the ending of Far Cry 5.

If you want a cool intro to Far Cry 5, Steam has a free 30-minute video called Far Cry 5: Inside Eden's Gate. It's a live-action prologue, following three people (one of which is a vlogger) who attempt to infiltrate the Eden's Gate cult. They meet with a local man who claims his sister just abandoned her home and joined the cult. She's changed, dedicating her whole life to the cult's religious beliefs, and refuses to come home. This video shows how people are brainwashed into joining Eden's Gate, as well as how news of the cult spread outside of Hope County, Montana, which brings us to the intro of the game.

Far Cry 5 begins with clips of a documentary talking about Eden's Gate, a dangerous cult in the fictional Hope County, Montana. They discuss how the cult started buying up land, then the local radio station, then even the cops. Before the locals realized it, Eden's Gate was in control of all of Hope County. They're a militant religious doomsday cult, preparing for the End Times, which they believe is coming soon. Their leader, Joseph Seed, is worshiped by the cult followers as a prophet. He's also known as "The Father."

We cut to you riding in a helicopter over Hope County. You play a rookie deputy to the local sheriff's department, accompanying a U.S. Marshal. You, the Hope County Sheriff, and another local deputy, are escorting the U.S. Marshal to an Eden's Gate compound. The sheriff keeps mentioning "Peggies," which he explains is what they call the cult followers here.

Your helicopter lands in the compound and you find yourself in a tense situation. Peggies are everywhere and not happy at your presence. The four of you nervously walk up to the church in the compound and let yourselves in, approaching Joseph Seed at the altar as he gives his congregation a dangerous sermon.

Despite the sheriff trying to keep the situation calm, the hot-headed U.S. Marshal walks up to Joseph and thrusts a warrant for his arrest in his face, demanding he turn himself in. The crowd gets agitated and you suddenly find yourself surrounded by angry, armed Peggies... until Joseph himself calms them down. He tells them that it's all right, they planned for this, and he will NOT be taken. He then offers himself up for capture.

Now, here's an opportunity to play a secret (and quick) ending to this game. You can choose not to cuff Joseph at this point and instead walk away. If you do, the sheriff will comment that it's best to leave the cult alone and that the team would likely die if they attempted to arrest Joseph anyway.

But then we wouldn't have a game to play, so... you cuff Joseph and escort him back to the helicopter. The Peggies outside are highly agitated at this turn of events and the closer to the helicopter you get, the more tense the situation gets.

You strap Joseph into the helicopter and are prepared for takeoff, but the Peggies don't want you to leave with him. They start jumping on the helicopter and the team is forced to fight them off as they lift off into the air. One climbs over the windshield and into the blades, causing the helicopter to come crashing down!

You awake to find Joseph recovering from the crash. He calls off support over the radio, then tells you, "I told you God wouldn't let you take me." He gives you a grave warning:

Peggies gather around Joseph as he rallies them toward action. Which begins by taking you and your team captive.

The Peggies manage to grab the deputy, but a burst of flames from the helicopter holds them back long enough for you to unhook yourself and bolt into the woods. You run from shouting and gunfire, quickly learning how to hide in the foliage and silently pick off stragglers.

Arming yourself, you meet up with the U.S. Marshal in a trailer house, where you have a stand-off with a wave of Peggies. Hopelessly outnumbered, the U.S. Marshal jumps into a pickup truck and instructs you to ride shotgun and keep the Peggies off your tail. Thus ensues an action-packed car chase, through blockades, gunning down trucks and ATVs filled with Peggies, and even an airplane armed to the teeth!

Despite your best efforts, the U.S. Marshal ends up crashing the truck into a river. He's captured by Peggies, but some stranger fishes you out of the river downstream. You wake up in a bunker, facing an older guy who calls himself Dutch.

He explains that your coming was prophesied by Eden's Gate and it's set off "The Collapse." Basically, they think society is on the brink of destruction now, so they're leaning hardcore into their plans to secure Hope County. All roads are blocked, all signals in and out of the valley are cut. We're completely isolated out here. And now they're going to force all the locals to "save themselves" and convert to their cult... or die.

Dutch tells you to change clothes so he can burn your uniform. It's just going to make you a target from now on, so best to get rid of it. This is your first opportunity to customize your character's appearance and clothing outside of just picking a gender.

When you find Dutch, he's hanging out in a sort of war room of the bunker, with an information board on the wall showcasing the four leaders of Eden's Gate. You can read the bios on all four of them at this point. There are the three brothers: Joseph, Jacob, and John Seed. Then the "sister" Faith, a woman who mysteriously showed up one day to join their family. Joseph is leader over all of Eden's Gate, while each sibling controls a region of Hope County.

Dutch's bunker is on an island between all three regions of the map. He sends you out to help him clear Peggies off his island before you set off to build a resistance and liberate all three regions of Hope County. Every mission you complete, whether it's part of the main story or side missions, helps to free more citizens in a region and build a stronger resistance against the Eden's Gate leader in that region.

Once you clear the island, you're free to go anywhere on the map you desire. There are three main quest lines for you to follow, one per region. They will eventually lead to toppling the leader of that region, which you have to accomplish before you can go after Joseph himself. Or you can just explore anywhere and knock out any side quests or other objectives you come across. You can also rescue and hire resistance members to follow you and help out.

While approaching enemies, it's best to first look at them down your sights or through binoculars to tag them, so you can follow them no matter where they go in the area. You can even tag objectives in an area, to help you plan your strategy accordingly.

You get bonus points for clearing missions undetected, so I highly recommend the stealth approach. You can sneak up and break enemies' necks or use silenced weapons from afar. My preferred weapon of choice is the bow and arrow. No one ever hears it coming! Just remember to hide bodies, because roaming patrols will alert a whole compound if they find a body. And some compounds have alarms that will draw in reinforcements. Make sure to disable the alarms before assaulting a compound, or take out anyone running to set off the alarm.

This game also includes hunting and fishing, as you need supplies to trade, barter, and survive in the wild. The wildlife in this game is very diverse, and some deadly if you're not careful. I've been bitten by several snakes and my only warning was a rattling sound just before they struck. The sound effects are not just ambient noise! Pay attention to them!

If you lose all your health, you pass out and get a cutscene of being captured by the leader of whatever region you're in. They go over how they're going to "free you of sin" in their own sick twisted way, before you're shipped off to a detention center.

But your prisoner transport is ambushed by the local resistance and you manage to escape! Then you have to fight through the internment camp, clear it of Peggies, then survive wave after wave of Peggies before a rescue helicopter comes for you. Only then can you go back to exploring the map. So losing all your health (without a resistance member nearby to quickly revive you) is kind of an ordeal.

I really like that they include this gameplay in the game. It allows the story to continue, so there's no actual death of the player. And it ties into the lore of the game while making you work to get back on track with your mission; a sort of entertaining punishment for failing to survive. It's much more creative than just showing a "Game Over" screen and then resetting you at your last save point, and it gives you motivation to stay alive and not just accept a quick defeat.

These same prison vans can be found driving all over the map and you can assault them and free the captive locals inside. After being captured once yourself, you'll likely feel the need to chase after every prison van you see afterward. No one should be subjected to that torture!

I absolutely love the visuals in this game! The forested mountainous region of Montana is absolutely gorgeous and they do an excellent job showcasing it, especially if you have a computer than can max out this game's graphics. Here are a few screenshots of my actual gameplay in the world, no cutscenes involved. Open them in a new window to enjoy their full 4K quality:

I guess this game resonates with me because I used to be extremely religious in my youth. I even carried a pocket Bible with me everywhere I went and would quote scriptures as I felt they applied to situations. My friends all voted me most likely to become a pastor one day.

But I was also a very curious person who loved to learn and study new things. I wanted to understand the Bible as much as I could. And when I started to find contradictions and inconsistencies in my Bible, I turned to my pastor and congregation for answers. But I received a resounding "have faith; don't question the Lord" dismissal, from pretty much everyone. The more I looked into it, the more problems I found, and the less friendly my religious community got about helping me resolve it.

After giving the Bible a full read from cover to cover, I discovered that it was an awful book full of glorified rape, torture, infanticide, bestiality, war, incest, as well as plenty of other horrifying topics, all sanctioned by God. It's no wonder we cherry-pick passages every Sunday! There are too many stories that aren't church-friendly in that book. You can't do a straight reading of the Bible without losing your congregation. I turned atheist pretty quick and learned to apply critical thinking and logic in the future instead of blindly trusting something to be true.

This game is all about the extreme end of that religious faith. Joseph Seed is considered a prophet, supposedly given direct communications from God about an upcoming apocalypse and how His chosen few can survive. Joseph's methods are based on the concept of "the ends justify the means." He will do whatever it takes to save "his people," even if it means violently kidnapping, torturing, and brainwashing them.

Even worse, the way the four Seed siblings preach to their congregation, the serene country/gospel music, even the way cult members worship, all remind me of my church-going days. Which were very happy, nostalgic days for me. So I personally feel this nostalgic pull toward this very evil cult and I have to remind myself that this cult is doing an excellent job in making it seem so appealing.

Joseph Seed is what happens when a cult is designed to dominate a culture and indoctrinate all its citizens, and this game is a good look at this kind of world from an outsider, trapped within it. It is a terrifying concept, but all the more fun to play a protagonist who is able to resist and fight back against this fascist takeover of an indoctrinated region. Which seems rather relevant in today's world.

If/when you find Boomer, make sure to give him lots of pets! He's a very good boy.

Today's game is Assassin's Creed Shadows. Taking a break and going to Arkham City (And 100% the base story) was definitely worth it.i think i was starting to get burnt out a little. Ubisoft made a fun game, but it's way to big for it's own good.

I did a quest where i had to rescue kidnapped Envoys. Having been playing a bit of Arkham lately i instinctively found myself trying to block and stuff with it's control scheme. It took me a minute to get the hang of it again. The moment i loaded my save i entered a fight and was basically flopping around like a fish trying to remember how to dodge.

After rescuing the Envoy i had to recover a letter for peace talks. It took me up through the mountains and i got to look at all the pretty trees and see some lovely sights.

The letter ended up being taken to a castle which i had to break into to grab it. The NPC who gave me the objective told me to approach from the south but i had some issues getting up too the wall.

I luckily was able to scale the cliff faces with a bit of luck and scaled the outer wall. While i was in there i grabbed the synchronization point and took out a few of the samurai.

The letter ended up being guarded by these two guards. I stood there for a bit hoping there pattern would change but i guess they have no patrol route and just stand there 24/7. So instead what i did was stab one and make a break for the outer wall and hung off of it to hide. Once i was free i took the other guy out and grabbed the letter.

The Quest ended with me having to take the letter to this temple where the lady who needed it was waiting for me. While fast traveling to it the Season changed to winter, which gives me the opportunity too get some good photos and also grab a legendary Sumi-e i need.

I have a small gaming group of 3-4 ppl where we love proper progression based multiplayer games. We've been playing Barotrauma for ages, a fair share of voidcrew, multiplayer modded RimWorld, and we rode the Lethal Company Wave of crew based mission collecting games, but we're looking for more games in the same vein with a good mix of progression, asymmetry and replayability. Please suggest any games that you feel may fit!