October 2023 PCG Article Links and Discussion

[ZedClampet]

Add your links!

 

[ZedClampet]

Paradox reveals Foundry, a procedurally-generated factory sim that looks like a mix of Factorio and Satisfactory, and you can play it next week

Start building your infinite factory when Foundry's demo appears during Steam Next Fest.

www.pcgamer.com

I'm already in love, but the article is a little confused. What just happened was that Paradox agreed to be the publisher. The game was already announced long ago. The game, perfectly playable, was even for sale on itch.io 3 years ago, but they have since removed it to concentrate on expanding the Steam version.

 

[ZedClampet]

Epic Games head of publishing strategy Sergiy Galyonkin has left the company: 'I am not a good fit for this new version of Epic'

Galyonkin joined Epic in 2016 but said the company now requires people "of a different kind."

www.pcgamer.com

The quote in the headline sounds bad, but all he means is that Epic's focus on becoming a metaverse is outside of his expertise.

3 of the 5 top wishlisted Steam games are city builders, and I want to play them all

Despite sharing a genre, they're all vastly different games.

www.pcgamer.com

The hottest niche market. Is that a thing?

 

[Brian Boru]

The hottest niche market

Oh, Manor Lords is one of them—I've had that on radar for a long time, but as a RTS with base building. If the base is a town, that can work

 

[ZedClampet]

Five former Ubisoft employees arrested following investigation into sexual misconduct complaints at the company

Ex-employees including former chief creative officer Serge Hascoët and vice president Tommy François were taken in for questioning following a lengthy police investigation.

www.pcgamer.com

To quote the Ubisoft HR Director, "Yves is OK with toxic management, as long as the results of these managers exceed their toxicity level."

That's one of the most remarkable statements I've heard lately.

 

[ZedClampet]

Chess grandmaster denies using anal beads to cheat against world champion: 'categorically no, of course not'

"It really has taught me a lot of very important lessons about life and chess."

www.pcgamer.com

I made a promise to a dying man once that I would post links to all stories that contain the words "vibrating anal beads". Promise fulfilled.

"the player had cheated through the use of vibrating anal beads that, somehow, communicated on-the-board moves to him."

 

[Zloth]

The idea that video games are getting out-weirded by chess is something I find deeply disturbing.

 

[ZedClampet]

I have no problems at all with the moderator edit, but that really did happen.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Chess grandmaster denies using anal beads to cheat against world champion: 'categorically no, of course not'

"It really has taught me a lot of very important lessons about life and chess."

www.pcgamer.com

I made a promise to a dying man once that I would post links to all stories that contain the words "vibrating anal beads". Promise fulfilled.

I always wanted to be on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. Anyone in?

Cyberpunk 2077 sequel is officially in early development, CD Projekt says

The next game in the series is now at the "conceptual design" stage.

www.pcgamer.com

I liked CyberPunk 2077, and looking forwards to getting into 2.0. But it occurred to me that if Cyberpunk follows anything like the way the Witcher series evolved over the 3 games then the next games in the series might really be something special. Probably doesnt track the same but thinking happy thoughts in that direction anyway.

 

[Brian Boru]

I always wanted to be on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. Anyone in?

I will keep a beady eye on your performance

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

YMMV but personally I'd be hoping that not too many of the answers were the fourth option.

 

[Reola]

I always wanted to be on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. Anyone in?

Cyberpunk 2077 sequel is officially in early development, CD Projekt says

The next game in the series is now at the "conceptual design" stage.

www.pcgamer.com

I liked CyberPunk 2077, and looking forwards to getting into 2.0. But it occurred to me that if Cyberpunk follows anything like the way the Witcher series evolved over the 3 games then the next games in the series might really be something special. Probably doesnt track the same but thinking happy thoughts in that direction anyway.

The continuation of favorite games is always a great event. I'm a fan of The Witcher, so I really understand.

 

[Zloth]

I was obsessed with real-time ray tracing in Cyberpunk 2077, until playing it on an older laptop delivered a sorely needed slap to the face

The allure of pretty graphics, like the dark side of the Force, can be very powerful

www.pcgamer.com

Something occurs to me here - could there be a hotkey to turn ray tracing on and off? It might take a couple of seconds to load textures (where are those NVMe speed boosts!?), but it seems like you could use ray tracing over most of the game, then turn it off when it looks like the bullets are going to start flying.

 

[ZedClampet]

YMMV but personally I'd be hoping that not too many of the answers were the fourth option.

I don't know a single person who could be trusted with controlling the beads.

Announcer: And Zed is still sitting there, eyes wide as saucers, staring into the distance. This is the second turn he's forfeited.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

I was obsessed with real-time ray tracing in Cyberpunk 2077, until playing it on an older laptop delivered a sorely needed slap to the face

The allure of pretty graphics, like the dark side of the Force, can be very powerful

www.pcgamer.com

Something occurs to me here - could there be a hotkey to turn ray tracing on and off? It might take a couple of seconds to load textures (where are those NVMe speed boosts!?), but it seems like you could use ray tracing over most of the game, then turn it off when it looks like the bullets are going to start flying.

Cyberpunk looked pretty damn nice at high settings without RT to me.

I'm probably dreaming but how about a dynamic scaling setting? You select an FPS target of whatever and the game automatically scales quality up and down depending on whats happening to give you the best experience based on how your hardware performs.

I havent owned a console in a while except the Switch, but I think Xbox and PS have been doing something in that ball park with their prefer quality/performance settings and resolution scaling.

 

[Pifanjr]

I like PCGamer's new fancy animated logo, but the first article about Total War: Pharaoh (which I assume it's based on) is somewhere way near the bottom of the front page:

Total War: Pharaoh's dynamic weather system lets you feel the heat of battle

Creative Assembly's latest has several new features that affect the flow of battle.

www.pcgamer.com

 

[Zloth]

I'm probably dreaming but how about a dynamic scaling setting? You select an FPS target of whatever and the game automatically scales quality up and down depending on whats happening to give you the best experience based on how your hardware performs.

I could swear I've seen a "target framerate" before, but I can't remember the game.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

I could swear I've seen a "target framerate" before, but I can't remember the game.

Could be, I know that consoles do something that but I think there its based on resolution upscaling, basically DLSS/FSR on the fly.

If they havent done it I'm sure they already rejected the idea at least for now.

 

[ZedClampet]

I like PCGamer's new fancy animated logo, but the first article about Total War: Pharaoh (which I assume it's based on) is somewhere way near the bottom of the front page:

Total War: Pharaoh's dynamic weather system lets you feel the heat of battle

Creative Assembly's latest has several new features that affect the flow of battle.

www.pcgamer.com

Looks like Pharaoh is going to have bits and pieces of the most recent 3 games: Troy, Warhammer and Three Kingdoms. I'm really not thrilled about the court intrigue from Three Kingdoms, but the resources (wood, stone, bronze, etc) from Troy will add a lot of strategy to the map.

 

[ZedClampet]

Cyberpunk looked pretty damn nice at high settings without RT to me.

I'm probably dreaming but how about a dynamic scaling setting? You select an FPS target of whatever and the game automatically scales quality up and down depending on whats happening to give you the best experience based on how your hardware performs.

I havent owned a console in a while except the Switch, but I think Xbox and PS have been doing something in that ball park with their prefer quality/performance settings and resolution scaling.

I don't think I would rely on that. Some settings don't make a bit of difference to me, and some, like film grain and motion blur, I always want turned off (even though most post processing hardly amounts to anything performance-wise). In most games, I find the need for anti-aliasing to be negligible, etc, and I would want things like that turned off before, for instance, adjusting the texture quality. Might be good for people who just want to play instead of tinker for an hour with the settings like I do. Heck, I reinstalled CP2077 just to play with the settings and run the in-game benchmark.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

In my dream world you can make it as granular as you want. Turn some stuff entirely or limit some settings to a maximum or minimum level. Let it be done!

 

[ZedClampet]

Todd Howard says Starfield was 'made to be played for a long time,' but a month after launch I'm already drifting away

Bethesda's biggest RPG wound up feeling a lot smaller than its earlier ones.

www.pcgamer.com

After reading the article and a bunch of the comments, I have come to the conclusion that it is now impossible for Bethesda to make a game that meets player expectations for a Bethesda game. I don't think any studio could make such a game.

As has recently been said in a PCG article focusing on quotes by a CDPR developer, you can either make a sandbox simulation like Bethesda games, or you can make an elaborately detailed spectacle like Cyberpunk 2077, but you can't make both in the same game.

And that's exactly what people want. They want the sandbox simulation of Bethesda games with the outrageous graphical details, cutscenes and storylines of Cyberpunk 2077 and The Witcher 3.

The closest game to creating that that I've played is Fallout 76, and we all are familiar with its 8 years of constant development. But it is still much more sandbox than anything even with 5 years of steady, focused mission content added. The stories can be elaborate and interesting, but they aren't graphically impressive like the CDPR stories people rave about.

 

[Zloth]

I just rolled my eyes at that headline and didn't even bother to read it.

As has recently been said in a PCG article focusing on quotes by a CDPR developer, you can either make a sandbox simulation like Bethesda games, or you can make an elaborately detailed spectacle like Cyberpunk 2077, but you can't make both in the same game.

And that's exactly what people want. They want the sandbox simulation of Bethesda games with the outrageous graphical details, cutscenes and storylines of Cyberpunk 2077 and The Witcher 3.

A sandbox simulation?? I don't think very many people want that. A proper sandbox game would be a game with NO quest scripting at all. It might have goals, but getting to those goals would be entirely on you: no scripted wizard to educate you on the magic system then getting killed so you can go on and be the hero, no scripted betrayal by a loved companion. The game might have wizards partial to training young hero types and it could have a loyalty and hidden motive systems for people that choose to follow you, but nothing pre-set. Kenshi would be an example of that.

They sound awesome and, if you like that kind of thing, they have insane replay potential. The stories aren't nearly as good as stories written by skilled writers, though. Also, a lot of people (most?) really don't want to mess with the whole "discovering what is fun for you" thing. They come with a lot of "discovering what is not fun for you" time, after all.

A game could always give sandbox'y side activities, I suppose. Breeding & racing chocobos in Final Fantasy 7, for instance, or playing the game for extra long so you can fight optional bosses. I don't remember anything like that in any Bethesda game, though.

 

[Pifanjr]

A sandbox simulation?? I don't think very many people want that. A proper sandbox game would be a game with NO quest scripting at all. It might have goals, but getting to those goals would be entirely on you: no scripted wizard to educate you on the magic system then getting killed so you can go on and be the hero, no scripted betrayal by a loved companion. The game might have wizards partial to training young hero types and it could have a loyalty and hidden motive systems for people that choose to follow you, but nothing pre-set. Kenshi would be an example of that.

They sound awesome and, if you like that kind of thing, they have insane replay potential. The stories aren't nearly as good as stories written by skilled writers, though. Also, a lot of people (most?) really don't want to mess with the whole "discovering what is fun for you" thing. They come with a lot of "discovering what is not fun for you" time, after all.

A game could always give sandbox'y side activities, I suppose. Breeding & racing chocobos in Final Fantasy 7, for instance, or playing the game for extra long so you can fight optional bosses. I don't remember anything like that in any Bethesda game, though.

I don't think you'll get a better "proper" sandbox experience than by playing an open-world table-top RPG with a decent game master(GM). Considering the current popularity of tabletop games, especially Dungeons & Dragons, I think there would be quite a lot of people interested in a proper sandbox game. It'll still be a couple of years at least before AI has gotten good enough to simulate a human GM though.

 

[Brian Boru]

the whole "discovering what is fun for you" thing. They come with a lot of "discovering what is not fun for you" time

"A precondition for reading good books is not reading bad ones: for life is short."
—Arthur Schopenhauer

sandbox'y side activities

Recent Far Crys have done that, fishing being prob the best example—you can spend hours at it if it's your thing, and progress thru the ranks to end up catching the ancient super boss fish

FC6 has a bunch of pre-set adventure-puzzles called Cryptograms, which are a fun diversion. FC5 had the Arcade for player-made levels—some were quite good when I dipped a toe in. Almost none of these necessary for the main game progression.

So maybe that approach is a happy medium, add-on activities within graphical scripted games.