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points by parineum 2 days ago | 0 comments

Also, aside from the dupe bugs, his "improvements" in Diablo 3 I consider it's downside. Changes that are framed as QoL changes in games are very frequently just reductions in risk or investments in your character.

His general outlook seems to be that the small teams of the past creates more rough edges and that the larger teams on modern AAA games creates a smoother experience but requires more concern for income because the cost is so much higher for the larger team.

I get that comparison but I think he's totally missed the advantages of the small team. The cheaper dev cost means less risk of financial ruin if the game fails which means innovations are less risky. Less developers means the vision of one person can shine through more which results in a more creative end-result, for better or worse.

The "too many cooks" in the kitchen is a real problem of modern software, especially games. Huge budgets mean games need huge audiences to be successful which means everyone needs to like it. The death of productivity software is, unsurprisingly, anything that stands in the way of productivity. The save bugs he mentions are real killers. But for games, as an art form, the turn from focusing on the vision of the artist to the desires of the audience makes for uninspiring work.

I'll take bugs all day long if it comes with a unique experience.

[–] bombcar 2 days ago

There are real QoL changes that simply make the game better - but there are also QoL changes that simply remove the game. It's an extremely delicate balance, and easy to get wrong in ways you don't notice until it's too late.

For example, quest tracking in modern games is phenomenal, and people used to add addons to do that - but there's really a way in which "figure it out yourself" and/or read the guidebook/talk to people was better. Same with pug tooling - no need to find a group anymore, the computer does that for you, but you also don't develop relationships with those around you.

[–] scottLobster 2 days ago

> but there's really a way in which "figure it out yourself" and/or read the guidebook/talk to people was better.

Going to have to disagree on this one. Perhaps if you have an extremely well architected game that will organically guide a lost player in the right direction it can work, but I have many painful memories of just blindly exploring entire maps and clicking on every NPC because the obvious route of progression wasn't doing anything. Sometimes it would be an actual quest bug and I'd just be wasting my time.

Particularly in large open world games like GTA/Witcher 3/etc, quest tracking of some sort is mandatory.

[–] parineum 2 days ago

Blindly exploring parts of the game and talking to npcs that you would have run straight passed towards the quest beacon doesn't sound as terrible as you're making it sound.

[–] scottLobster 2 days ago

I wasn't "exploring" in the spiritual sense or "talking", I was brute-force-searching the entire map to find whatever stupid magic button or item or conversation the devs were forcing me to have so I could keep playing the game.

Completely immersion breaking.

[–] bombcar 2 days ago

That's exactly it, really, amazing games are degraded by the modern over-hand-holding; but the average game is much better for it.

[–] nickjj 2 days ago

The interesting thing to me is D3 had everything going for it before it was developed and released. It had an answer book with D2's success. They had a rabid fan base with over 10 years of data to see what did and didn't work with D2.

To be fair I only played D2 in 1.09, 1.10 and 1.12 with LoD so I don't know what day 1 looked like but I'd consider D2 still to this day the best ARPG I ever played where as I stopped playing D3 shortly after release after completing it (before it nerfed everything) in hardcore mode from the beginning, it had no longevity. I didn't even buy D4.

I think it's harder to have a sequel be well received when the previous version was considered as good as it gets for a large player base. With that said, I'm still surprised how D3 panned out.

[–] hilariously 2 days ago

To me that is a sign of someone who games a lot, they've maybe not a chef themselves but are always in search of new flavors and experiences.

Whilst there are many epicureans, the vast majority of time played/food consumed is going to be pretty bland, and the audience both wants and expects that.

Thankfully there is room enough for both, and I think the tension between them is interesting.

[–] forgetfreeman 2 days ago

This is a relatively recent attitude. OG gamers expected to have their hair blown back through some combination of novel game mechanics, setting, and storyline pretty much every title every time, and if a game didn't deliver it didn't sell.

[–] paulryanrogers 2 days ago

> OG gamers expected to have their hair blown back through some combination of novel game mechanics, setting, and storyline pretty much every title every time, and if a game didn't deliver it didn't sell.

That is not my experience having gamed "seriously" since 1992. Everyone has different tastes. And besides folks over identifying with a console or platform, I recall most folks just trying a lot of different things then settling into what they enjoyed.

Sports games in particular have always been popular through many phases of low/no innovation because that just wasn't a priority to most of that demographic.

Your expectations remind me more of GameGate than 90s and oughts era gaming.

[–] parineum 2 days ago

I don't expect my hair blown back, I'm just looking for something novel. I play a lot of half-baked, buggy titles because they have some interesting angle.

[–] forgetfreeman 2 days ago

Fair, a lot has changed in the space over the last 45 years. Take the proliferation of titles that are basically just you having a job as an example. That shit absolutely would not scan with older gaming audiences. Why it became popular is a complete mystery to me. Audience expectations for their entertainment dollar spent have definitely declined sharply.

[–] BigTTYGothGF 2 days ago

> That shit absolutely would not scan with older gaming audiences

Are you quite certain about that? https://archive.org/details/Lemonade_Stand_1979_Apple

[–] ThrowawayR2 2 days ago

That's an edutainment game for early grade schoolers. (I should know; I played it in that era.) Nothing in it would hold an adult's attention.

[–] BigTTYGothGF 2 days ago

"Older" in this context is "the gaming audience of 45 years ago".

[–] BigTTYGothGF 2 days ago

> OG gamers expected to have their hair blown back .... pretty much every title every time

OG gamer here (started on the Fairchild Channel F). This is absurd.

What is true is that the hardware rapidly advanced, and as programmers got familiar with each platform the software also advanced, but the shelves were full of stinkers and disappointments and copycats.