Mudran

I don't know if culture did change in my country after the fall of communism. Before there was always that kind of stupid official pseudo culture, but there was also quite good underground going against all official. But if there was someone talented it was possible for him to create what he wanted - with friends on the right places and with the right confession I guess. But nowadays - I don't like what they offer, it feels as stupid as before, only now instead of copying east they copy west. The best years were in the time between - people had enough of socialistic grey and they tried to be unique, a lot of people were hoping that their dreams will be possible to fulfill just to end up in black reality. Nowadays they don't have money for anything special - so before it was forbidden, now it is without money, esp. with government not allowing higher salaries for ordinary workers. So you will not have enough of people for anything requiring entrance fee or buying products. Or maybe they can - I don't know what is the reality of middle class now. But maybe really middle class is people who want stupid culture. EDIT: But when I did visit England a few years back, I felt almost sorry for those people there - everything around them was private, so I had the feeling that taking a trip and having some adventure didn't exist for them, everything around hobbies or restaurants was overpriced, so the most common scenario was staying home, having fun with TV or doing shopping in local shopping centre - eastern Europe felt so much better with the possibilities of how you wanted to spend your free time. But now it is pricey as well or it is forbidden by laws of EU for the safety. But I don't know how it can influence creativity.

I tried to play Everquest II and loved some features, characters and quests, but even with all the paint on it it still felt like 2004 game. For some reason even if the graphics are similar, WOW managed to look more modern not only with graphics but also with very rich background lore and quests surrounding it. Maybe because of consistency - in Everquest everything felt like on the top of something older, like one big mess, but in WOW, all quests and zones felt like they have some meaning, so it felt more immersive (atleast the starting zones). But it is nice when those older MMOs find someone who fall in love with them.

Continuing with my so on: Simply put, it looks like Ubisoft has hard time to make their life service working. With all the innovative systems and clever AI, raids, cosmetic events, their openworlds were not good enough. Which is quite interesting why. It looks like their openworld franchises which started as openworld - like Farcry and Division - were doing better. Both of them had built busy work appropriate to the role you was playing and working quite well with Ubisoft formula. For me Assassin Creed was mixed because I imagine that sneaking is better for cities with narrow streets and a lots of people, so they remade it with more historical feel, but for me it didn't feel historical really, because I didn't feel the atmosphere there. It was welcomed generally as an action/story/exploration game, but for me it is wasted potential already. Because it is missing RPG mechanics: there is no interaction with the world around outside of the story, so the world feels lifeless to me. It has similar problems like Elderscrolls online at the start or Secret world legends with removal of hardcore content - action with story is not good enough to keep attention longer usually. It should be similar to Farcry, because they remade it according to that franchise - they are almost identical, but for some reason Farcry feels more interesting for me. Why Ubisoft never tried to add different characters with different background, or different factions? It cannot be more expensive than a fully voiced story cutscenes. Also every MMO knows this magic - offer more of character differences like races, classes and players will replay a lot. I think military games didn't work because for most of ordinary players they are too much repetitive and the usual life of a soldier - go to a mission, get the target and return, I don't know if open world is really needed for it, because there are no other mechanics. And with Breakpoint they removed even the few extra RPG mechanics which could make it more interesting (like survival - real camps/hideouts, lack of ammo, hunger/thirst, hiding from enemies in special places) and imersivity made for this game. But I don't play shooter games usually, so maybe there is more - I know that Destiny can keep player play longer with gear progression and challenges, or Warframe with crafting and different builds, but that is exactly what players didn't want in Breakpoint. But it looks like that is what Ubisoft does call "RPG" for shooter games ( which is a bit frustrating for me because how can I say what I want in games if someone is using that word for something else which doesn't even fit the original meaning, so it is very misleading) So I wish Ubisoft would break their formula of 1 character and add some real RPG mechanics - not just action games. But maybe I want too much.

I just saw this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5glu32M2po It looks quite interesting. 3rd person will make it possible for me to try this. Someone suggested Elleros game before and sadly it looks like it ended with early access. So I hope this game will do better. So good luck with finishing and releasing the game and getting all the features you want there.

So Breakpoint didn't sell well and Ubisoft is going to push releases because of that and change... something. What do you think they should change? Their openworld formula worked quite well for Far Cry franchise, not that well for Assassin Creed and not at all for their military games - why? For me the problem is that even if they would follow some good advices, it looks like it is also about the right combination, so I start to be scared of good advices - for me Breakpoint was the wrong combination - the story would be great for a singleplayer game and it does sound like a new approach to Tom Clancy - this time when you are sent to investigate a problem, you are shot down and the enemy know where you are. So you are an elite soldier alone behind enemy line and because you have learned a lot you can survive. So I would expect 1. to be hunted by people mainly (not just drones) from the beginning - like it was in their trailers, and not just people standing around in a swamp, but really trying to get you. 2. I would expect searching for food and water and bullets, like it was in Far Cry 3 3. I would expect searching for hideout not to be that easy. and it would take longer. And I would expect the missions would not be around all the island, like it was similar problem with Fallout 4 - I would expect if there is some immersive story, that the quests progression would follow that story. But in this case of this game it looks like Ubisoft was listening to too many people - 1. I guess they thought that casual and military wouldn't want survival mechanics, 2. In the case of this game it was obviously crippled by marketing department, 3. the latest formula didn't match at all the original story for this game. But I think another reason is that their subscription model failed even more - players if they played this game, they did for a month with Uplay sub for 15 dollars and they decided to buy the game later in a year with all DLCs when it will be for sale for another 30 dollars, so they have no reason to play longer - maybe because it is similar game to Division 2 and the main problem of Division 2 was that they did offer nothing beyond finishing the game, only problems and frustrations with everchanging stats, later more and more random rewards during cosmetic events, first feature to add was a raid, which takes long to balance and you need top gear for it, which should be polished already - I guess that is the reason why in MMOs it is instance cluster with smaller dungeons released first, so they could see if all the stats work properly and let players grind for the best gear to get ready a for big raid. And more.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJt_i2_vsSw Interesting video, only until someone pointed at the fact, that it wasn't Skyrim starting in 2007, it was ESO, it wasn't Skyrim which did cost 300 millions, it was ESO, so it wasn't Skyrim Bethesda needed money for, it was ESO development, similar way like Bioaware was sold to EA because they needed funding for SWTOR. So monetization didn't start with Skyrim CC, but with ESO ingame shop and lootboxes - a lot of mechanics from Fallout 76 marketing looks very similar. Still the information about the investors company is quite interesting. And why it is now in all of their games? Well the simple fact that it was successful in ESO, is good enough reason for me. I wonder when people will realize, it is not a different company as someone is proclaiming, so people wouldn't connect important facts - it is all Zenimax. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elder_Scrolls_Online

I feel for those people from Hongkong. I don't know what is going on there, but generally it just sucks to live under some government, get used to some order, just to be thrown into something else and not having the power to do anything about it, you get used to some standards, which I don't think are that common in China. Because it sucks to be forced to live a different life because of someone else or to leave what you loved behind. Maybe there some way how to fight all mighty people in totalistic government, but for sure it looks desperate. On the other hand there are people making similar protests in Western Europe and I don't know really why. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/21/paris-on-high-alert-as-protesters-try-to-revive-gilets-jaunes-movement

I would, but first I have to buy new PC :sad: I'm glad for the possibility to play console games - like quantic dream has games coming to PC, only I'm not sure I would play them, because I'm more interested in Fantasy/historical setting, so western game with horses is something more close to my interests. But anyway - all the AAA open worlds have no fantasy setting - Ubisoft has pseudorealistic games, even though I believe fantasy setting is much easier to make interesting for open worlds, Rockstar has realistic games, CD project red has more realistic setting, even their elves looks more like humans, and Bioware attempt wasn't that successful - why nobody else but Bethesda with TES and MMOs do that? To have really crazy worlds? I mean still realistic, RP, but with something interesting - like this new small game Pine, or MMOs like GW2 world, WoW or Shire/bree zones in LOTRO. I do like realism, but I play games for world I don't know and there is nothing. Even Star wars MMO doesn't have this living inhabited open world feel... And there is no Star wars living open world singleplayer game - even though Star wars franchise strength was in different crazy worlds, but if there is any open world, it is an action game. Even Fallout franchise was remade into more realistic action game. EDIT: my english sentences. I think Divinity Original Sin 2 is maybe the only game I can think of. I guess that is more true for a lot of isometric RPGs Because the most interesting feature about DnD (or similar) was to explore an unknown crazy world with its own rules and society made by someone else, because the only limit was creator's fantasy, and when I was GM, that was always the most interesting part, my own, unique world, unique characters, unique races - why that is not in games anymore? Maybe because most of AAA open world are always sterile with nothing unique or extreme, so it wouldn't offend anybody, they make it realistic at least.

So the next RPG game is Pine https://store.steampowered.com/app/1042780/Pine/ The description sounds like something I was expecting from Outward, which turned out to be more about combat than exploring. Maybe if they would have bigger studio there could be more. This game looks like with more of RPG mechanics with interactions with NPCs and PC generated stories. Something more advanced is used in other indie titles like Kenshi, but here it is more connected to exploration and puzzles rather than progression, squad or combat bosses. It reminds me a lot of Outcast, only it has disney graphics, but I like the style. And people say it looks like Zelda, which I never played. Only it doesn't have voiceacting. I'm still at the beginning, so I was just testing the camera,movement, overal feel and as usually my older PC handles those indie games better than what I read on internet.

If I understand it right you want the game act like if it would be in reality or do you want testing your skills of tactical thinking which is more about kind of games than real war simulator? I think the main problem here is this grey area of "casual" group of players. I tried to have discussion in this section about it, but nobody was willing to discuss that. I'm not sure myself if that group really exist or if it is more about our set of skills which leads us to prefer certain kind of game mechanics which others simply don't have and that is why they cannot play it. Or maybe there is some kind of mainstream, but then I don't understand it as well - I don't think of myself as being part of any mainstream. I think combat games are "mainstream" between certain groups who are playing games. So if there is group of players who are complaining about difficult games being minority, there is my group of players complaining that roleplaying mechanics and not pure action combat are minority, so I guess I have the same problem. But if it would be about preferences from bigger part, then big openworld games are simply destined to fail the same way as small games, only it does cost more. And then their microtransaction are necessity because of bad design of those games. Sadly they can point at Skyrim as "mainstream" game or at streamlined WoW - that is sadly the reason why companies even if they have the money, they don't really bother making games more detailed to fit needs of more groups instead of simply cutting of the edges, so more groups would continue to play even if it is not 100% what they wanted. But WoW or Skyrim had more than just streamlined features. Because that is my theory - if you want a good game then you have to make it niche anyway, like smaller, more detailed - like your smaller tactical hardcore shooter, or if it is big, then you have to make it more detailed. So if I'm right then Ubisoft makes the same mistake as Bioware with their DAI and Andromeda - it looks like they think that if they will use the same features their smaller games had, it will be enough. Just to find out it is enough only for certain group, which is different than their previous one and question is if that group is big enough. On the other hand I'm not sure how such game should looks like because I don't play shooter games that much. Combat generally bores me, I can enjoy it only if it is connected to something interesting - like set of skills, tactical thinking or survival, then I would play it. so for me in Breakpoint I was hoping for a real hard survival game with a lot of enemies around me, but not too much like in stealth games, so I could relax in between, but more tense. But it looks like devs came with a good idea, then the idea was remade to fit the newest Ubisoft trend, which is sad, it could be really good. But on the other hand, still there will be enough of players playing those games. EDIT: I'm not sure if I would play Breakpoint anyway, my PC crashed during beta, so I can't anyway

Well, this discussion was about games 1. which aren't really known and 2. which are the opposite of action RPG, usually mistaken for the only one which should exist. and are listed here because of players like you - every time some RPG focused game comes out, it is attacked for not having combat they want, even though it is said the game is not about combat. While in Doom it was favourite joke that some players wanted story (I never heard about anyone but whatever) they are very serious with their demand of the opposite in games like Vampyr or Greedfall...even not recommending them for that reason... If it is random jerks like you attacking me, I'm OK with it, but when it comes from someone proclaiming to be gaming journalist, it is a bit sad... Also proclaiming that leveling gear is RPG mechanic... But anyway funny is that you are right - Fortnite for me is RPG game of my dreams - I dream about having truly different archetypes to play with, and having my version of RPG mechanics - which is unique skill set I can use as a tool for "roleplaying that character". Also it is interesting how this discussion triggered you...

I don't know the franchise history, only Division, and Wildlands, but I was a bit confused about it - from this wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Clancy%27s it looks like it was always centered around some kind of military unit with their own story and their own kind of enemies. So I wasn't sure what Breakpoint is because originally I thought Ghost Recon was meant to be military squad control, but now it looks like it is about the story more. so if they are doing similar things like similar unit named Division with the more futuristic setting with more cool main boss (if I understand it correctly), it is clashing for me a bit. while Ghost recon Wildlands felt more realistic setting of real soldiers - fighting drug cartel. Maybe the difference is simply big city problem kind of story in Division and some kind of military-pseudo military conflict with Ghost Recon. Also from the wiki it looks like Division was an online spin off developed by Massive rather than Ubisoft, with leveling online mechanics added to keep players there longer, but players didn't stay there longer than in Wildlands, which was more singleplayer, so I'm not sure why they follow Division online version with their main studio. But anyway I asked someone who is playing both - 3rd and first person - in Breakpoint, and he explained to me that there are movement based skills/mechanics - like prone, hiding, positioning and sliding, which would look the same in first person, so it is centered and connected to 3rd person, because it is tactical shooter where it does matter. Still it could be full 3rd person in Farcry 5 and they don't allow players to use it - only if it glitches in coop you can see it. But I guess there is some explanation as well.

I guess I'm turning this into article instead of discussion again - here is another comparison: I saw some video about recent Ghost recon breakpoint where the author was complaining about 3rd person view, how bad it is for clear shooting view, flexibility and so on. The problem is that animations will always hinder flexibility, because there is longer process from noticing something into doing it. But isn't it more natural with animations? You shouldn't be that fast in reality anyway. Clear view is bigger problem and the only solution would I guess really be to have both view options, but for some reason it is not that common to have it - Bethesda is one of the few who didn't streamline this feature for some reason. I have heard this argument all the time - it is how the Ubisoft franchises are different, they cannot change it. But is it right to have franchises differences based mainly on camera view? Shouldn't be there some other ones? like survival depth, squadron gameplay, singleplayer, covershooter, lootershooter, crazy vilians - like in Farcry and so on? Or would it make the game really that worse? If some players really cannot play in 3rd person, or it is very difficult for them and the opposite - is that reason serious enough not to allow it? I mean worse game with unsupported view - for someone used to it - is combined together the same as - camera the player dislike with game centered and polished around it does sound almost the same, only for the player it has more negative feeling connected to it. EDIT: I guess it can damage reputation of the game if it will have less supported camera view and it will look worse - I can see it all the time how biased some players are, how they don't care about facts - like someone gave Vampyr on GOG bad rating because he didn't like the game on PS4 graphics - it doesn't make sense, but players do it anyway.

I downloaded Seven: the days long gone demo and tried it - it does have strange hybrid - camera is isometric, but you control the character with mouse, and I'm not sure it works well for me. I'm not sure if I feel comfortable with restriction from the character point - that I cannot look up if I want to see more, and at the same time I cannot look around with tactical camera (or I didn't find it), so I feel too much restricted with this combination - like the game is not taking the best from isometric view or the best from moving directly your character. Sadly it looks great otherwise - It is voiced, the background is interesting, and yes - as usually with small games - they are more annoying because they are not that much polished, but they also add some kind of "challenge" to make you feel even better - so you cannot save it manually. And because I'm more action person and I don't think forward every step I usually make mistakes, so such games without saves can be more frustrating for me. So I will see if Desperados III will make me want to play isometric games (aside from Divinity II OS and Dungeon Seige - I have no idea why I played that game, only that I loved Dryad race and gathering their armors)

I don't play horror games, but I can agree - for me the right music with sliders is important - I wish MMOs managers would understand it... But I guess everyone gave up on immersion in MMOs already... Also I wish so many times there would be some mod for it.

Greedfall is another one from what I have heard. A true RPG (in the original meaning).

Sometimes it is scary how people are different. And they don't believe what is important for the other person and sometimes it is misused, so I wish simply there would be many options. You would say it is matter of money, but sometimes even Ubisoft don't have it and they can afford it for sure. But back to the topic. I guess some players play themselves in FP and imagine in their heads that they play someone. in Isometric games they imagine their groups of adventurers walking around, having tactical combat or builds. I guess players like me or maybe who are not really gamers they have this reality FOV inside of their heads and if the game doesn't match that, it is frustrating. But the problem with 3rd person view is that it requires also very good fitting character. For example Pyranha Bites have their german dude with his low voice and for some players it was a problem, for me it was good enough. On the other hand Two worlds or Divinity 3rd person game had very ordinary villagers or I don't know how to describe it (the males atleast) and I couldn't enjoy those games anyway. But still old MMOs can do it, and most of new games cannot. The movement is always too heavy or things like that. Also the first Divinity Original Sin had weird characters, but I guess it was good enough for isometric view. But with more of money they really made so many really cool characters in Divinity 2 original sin... Also Wasteland 2 had really good character creation with backgrounds for each character for the party, they had indians even - I always wonder why this cannot be in 3rd person view. Because Bethesda does have a lot of options, but no background option, even if it would be just a text. I wish some features would be brought into 3rd person view. That there would be a game, which would be really RPG - meaning the original translation of this: roleplaying games - not leveling up games and gear... Because true RPG is actually against levels.

I'm aware of a lot of players (a lot of those are used to first person view from old games) see first person view as immersive and I can agree with that is possible, but I wish it wouldn't be used as another agenda which leads to only one goal - preventing some players playing games they would enjoy otherwise, because who would enjoy this mainly are RP players and some players hate them. well, atleast I will have time to continue with my own learning... So I can add - first person view for playing myself=immersed in the world around, third person view for playing some other character. But anyway this post wasn't meant to be about some agenda, but about how I was surprised that some sort of isometric games can be interesting for me if there is gameplay supporting /made for that view and not just tactical combat. Also I don't care that much about characters there, because there is not much of details. And most of offered RPG games are based on the opposite. A lot of players still do enjoy it - I guess they have bigger imagination than me, so this is just a thought, not like the right thing to do.

I'm trying to be just happy but it is not working :( but maybe here is some enchantment here on Nexus aswell - I'm not happy until I will solve that trivial problem with multiple paralel stages in creation kit and I will fulfill my dream and post my mod finally. Atleast it is known what was Hitler's enchantment - his name was Goebels and he was minister of propaganda and their fuel of money was german bankers, who wanted to be... I have no idea what they wanted to be - why they just didn't want to be happy with their money?

Your question leads me to new question - Why we should even bother with dreams? Like everything - it doesn't make sense if we are here temporary, but it is like a living force which leads ants into working for the queen, leads birds to fly south before winter, and bear to have long sleep, even if there is no why - nobody will miss ants, or any other animal, and nobody will miss humans either. Like a program left running even if all the components would disagree and question it. Still there is something inside of us which drives us to some goal. The moment when we loose a goal we realize that it was the goal which was reason for our lives. So maybe sense of life is fulfilling your dreams or trying not realizing that in reality it is pointless and it doesn't matter if you succeed or not - simply the process can make you feel happy. Still some people manage to be happy no matter what. They don't have any goals and dreams, they just have happy mind. So maybe it is part of being unhappy to have the need for goals and dreams hoping that fulfilling those will make us happy. But maybe the secret is to shut down the brain and just be happy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3HQMbQAWRc

The problem is when you have a wrong dream - you named people who obviously have been able to do what they decided, but what if Musk would be a half undecided biologist and his dream would involve something like growing flowers on rockets? I envy poeple who have united mind and they know their whole life what they want to do - in my mind there is constant battle - I always start something, the moment later I tear it down. So I write things, maybe I should be a writer of... something. It looks like Trump wanted to be rich person, after he finished his first dream he decided that rich and powerful does sound much better. Now he is rich and powerful. I wonder what his next dream will be. And I envy him double time :tongue: So from him I would learn to have simple goals - nothing overly complicated.

I guess devs make decision about this based on their own preferences, but recently I realized that I prefer different views in different games. It sounds obvious, but it doesn't always match released games - like Vampire the Masquarade 2, Outer worlds etc. It is different for different kind of players, so I should get over it if they decide differently. I thought I will never like isometric view, but when I saw Desperados III gameplay, it is probably that kind of game, where I would prefer it. So I started to think about different isometric games made by Obsidian and others and I guess the difference is: I don't like flat isometric levels with only combat, because it feels clunky and boring for me and I prefer action combat. I don't like adventure games in such levels, because it is not immersive and I require immersivity if it should have heavy dialogues - to feel like "in character". So it is very frustrating if the only games with a lot of dialogues are only isometric for some reason. I prefer if it does have heavy mechanical gameplay, with icons with objectives like on a map and it is more vertical, stealthy - like a very detailed city, not a lot of small dungeons - like it was in Seven the Days long gone or Shadow tactics. And I don't like if I have to search for something. So I guess it is my way of RPG strategic games without heavy strategy. I prefer 3rd person view when it is roleplaying a character with different background story, because it is all about that character, so I want to see that character, and also in 3rd person I can see better surrounding - to feel immersed in the world. And first person - I still don't like that, but I guess it is good for accuracy or when you really need to see a lot of details before you, but in an open world it is frustrating for me. So I prefer first person view in dungeons of Rage 1, where it is all about shooting mechanics and fast aiming and reactions and you need that accuracy. And you don't need to look around that much, and it is not about playing some character. I hope finances are not the only reason for such decisions. On the other hand there are always players who are fond of that chosen view, so I guess it doesn't matter. But I still have the feeling that if those 2 new RPG games would be 3rd person it would be more preferred by RPG players. But who knows. I have the feeling from trailers that Outerworlds are trying to be Borderlands and they will never be that and question if they will be able to combine it well. But a lot of games are trying to be copy of something successful, so I guess it is tempting to play safe.

When someone very close to you die, you can have similar feelings to mine - that everyone is a walking corpse, only they don't know about it. Seriously if we all are destined to die, why we even bother with anything? Then I have to agree with those saying that this is a theater, a game, or a simulation is very close to that. The only outcome is - nonsense. We live a nonsense. like kids on playing field, trying to entertain themself before taking off. The simulation picture gives it nice sterile non emotional cover, but all of it is about the same. So what is meaning of that? The only meaning I can see in that is that it is true - this life cannot be real, because it doesn't make sense, so the real life has to be the one after you die. And the life before that you can call simulation game dream theater - it doesn't matter - it is all about the same - why? I cannot continue in answering, because it is forbidden to have religious debates here, but if it is about morale, there has to be judge after death, otherwise, there is no pattern and no simulation, only accident and chaos. But I don't believe in that because people always believed in afterlife, also people always had some codex of honor, and if you are capable of morale thinking and self reflection, then or you are the highest being in this universe, or there has to be some entity higher than you, meaning if you were not meant to be bothered with questions about what happens after death, you wouldn't be able to think about it.

What is the most disgusting food combinations/habits you know about? I have a bad habit to buy 2 pieces of different pizza because I cannot decide which one, and then eat it together like sandwich, because I'm lazy to eat it one by one, so this way I can save my muscles from working overtime. I had more, but the moon phase is out, I will have to wait for another round.

Fallout 76 I guess. I doubt it would make any difference. There is something wrong with Bethesda/Zenimax lately even without F76. And even more - I wish there would be some solution to this, but lately all MMOs are so wrong.