# E3 2018



## StevenC (Jun 10, 2018)

Microsoft's conference just wrapped up, EA's was yesterday and Bethesda's is coming up in a couple hours. What's everyone seen so far that they like?

Really excited for Crackdown 3, Ori and the Will of the Wisps, and oh my gosh Tales of Vesperia! Hopefully Halo Infinite is a return to form and Battletoads will finally be a good Rare revival. Jump Force and Devil May Cry 5 could be cool, too.

Nothing really drew me from EA, because EA, and beyond Battletoads there wasn't really anything surprising at Xbox.


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## MFB (Jun 10, 2018)

Pumped largely for: Tunic, Forza Horizon 4, Devil May Cry 5, and Jump Force.

Fun but same old, same old: Halo Infinite, Gears of War 5, Just Cause 4, Crackdown 3 (not looking forward to Terry Crews as the main character)

The rest didnt really sway me one way or another


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## Church2224 (Jun 10, 2018)

I am going to be all over Fallout 76.

Then again I love anything Fallout....


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## NotDonVito (Jun 10, 2018)

I'm gonna have to get a new graphics card lol.


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 11, 2018)

Fallout 76 looks awesome. 

Sekiro also looks really cool. I love 3rd person action games and considering it's being developed by From Software I'm even more excited.

I know there's not really any gameplay in the Cyberpunk trailer, but if they can just deliver on the concept with the level of polish they had in Witcher 3 I'll be giddier than a 5 year old on nitrous.


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## Xaios (Jun 11, 2018)

KnightBrolaire said:


> Fallout 76 looks awesome.



To be perferctly honest, as a nearly 20 year fan of the franchise, Todd Howard's utterance of the phrase "entirely online" was basically a nuclear strike to my interest. It's especially frustrating because of how much I loved Fallout 4. However, I have absolutely no desire to play ARK or Rust, even if its in the Fallout universe (a fact which makes it doubly frustrating because the setting really does look great).


KnightBrolaire said:


> I know there's not really any gameplay in the Cyberpunk trailer, but if they can just deliver on the concept with the level of polish they had in Witcher 3 I'll be giddier than a 5 year old on nitrous.



Agreed. I've been waiting for more news on this game since the 2013 announcement.


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## Lorcan Ward (Jun 11, 2018)

So hyped about DOOM Eternal. Spotted Arachnatrons, pain elementals and an Arch Vile in the trailer. The final boss better be the Icon of Sin. 

No interest in Fallout anymore after 4, wish they left it with Obsidian instead of moving further away from what the series meant. 

RAGE 2 looks fun! Trailer made the game look a little easy but maybe that's just for gameplay footage. That's 3 games set in various wasteland earth settings. Bethesda sure know what the public wants. 

Looking at 2024+ for the new Elder scrolls so that will be on the next gen of consoles from now. 

Cyberpunk 77 trailer looks so good.


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## StevenC (Jun 11, 2018)

Bethesda's show was really underwhelming. I'll probably grab Doom and Wolfenstein, but otherwise there are enough shooters in the world. Really weak of them to show such nothings for the games people actually want to see from them, in Elder Scrolls and whatever Starfield is. (It should totally be space Khajiit who don't like Mondays)

Also people involved with Fallout should know how to pronounce "nuclear".


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## wankerness (Jun 11, 2018)

That better end up being "Elder Scrolls VI: Single Player Like the Others" and not "Elder Scrolls VI: MMO Horde Mode" or some shit.

Here's hoping Doom has a bit less platforming than the last one. I felt so drained when I played that game just cause of all of that!! The shooting was super adrenaline-inducing, but then you'd get to almost as much platforming as Turok 1 and ugh.


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 11, 2018)

Xaios said:


> To be perferctly honest, as a nearly 20 year fan of the franchise, Todd Howard's utterance of the phrase "entirely online" was basically a nuclear strike to my interest. It's especially frustrating because of how much I loved Fallout 4. However, I have absolutely no desire to play ARK or Rust, even if its in the Fallout universe (a fact which makes it doubly frustrating because the setting really does look great).
> 
> Agreed. I've been waiting for more news on this game since the 2013 announcement.


I'm a little apprehensive about the online crap with fallout 4, but the idea of being able to play fallout with my buddies is very tempting. Granted, I felt the same way about elder scrolls online which ended up being less of "skyrim with friends" and more "MMO with an elder scrolls skin".


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## Siggevaio (Jun 11, 2018)

I'm a huge fan of From Software since I first played Dark Souls. I was hoping for Bloodborne 2 (or something really dark) but I'm sure Sekiro will be amazing and full of surprises (as well as elements I love from Soulsborne games). 

I'm looking forward to Sony's conference and Square-Enix's. Hopefully a lot of progress has been made with Final Fantasy VII, I don't want to see too much of it before I play it (FFVII is my all time favorite game) but it would be nice to know the work is going in the right direction.


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## bostjan (Jun 11, 2018)

I've been a mile away from new games and modern gaming, but the 2015 Doom really got me sparked again. My favourite part of the game was that there was no bullshit about it. If there's another one, I'm going to have to pick it up.


Lorcan Ward said:


> No interest in Fallout anymore


You might need a new avatar.


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## TedEH (Jun 11, 2018)

Xaios said:


> Todd Howard's utterance of the phrase "entirely online" was basically a nuclear strike to my interest


+1 for me, I think. I want to by hyped for new Fallout, but I have no interest in online games. Even if you can play solo, that's not what a single player game is to me.


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## Xaios (Jun 11, 2018)

TedEH said:


> +1 for me, I think. I want to by hyped for new Fallout, but I have no interest in online games. Even if you can play solo, that's not what a single player game is to me.


Agreed, and it's not really single player either. You can "solo" (air quotes) MMOs and games like ARK as well, but if there's PVP, it won't be long before you get your shit kicked in by a group of people looking to prey on a lone easy target.

I want to like it, I really do. In spite of the fact that I absolutely hated Fallout 3, I loved Fallout 4, so I will probably still give this one a try (unless the information that gets published in the intervening time makes it absolutely clear that I'll never like it). I just really wanted a new traditional Fallout game.


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## Necris (Jun 11, 2018)

I just want to know what's going on with the remake of Resident Evil 2.


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## NotDonVito (Jun 11, 2018)

RIICHAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRDDDD


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## Lorcan Ward (Jun 11, 2018)

bostjan said:


> You might need a new avatar.





I still do a biennial play through of 1 + 2 and Tactics.


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## Ralyks (Jun 11, 2018)

My body is so fucking ready for Cyberpunk 2077.

I’m concerned at the lack of FFVII Remake from Squares press conference. Does it show up on Sony’s stage?

And did I miss them announcing a new Wolfenstein? I mean, I know it’s a trilogy, just didn’t see it (new Doom though, hell yes)


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## Steinmetzify (Jun 11, 2018)

Anybody see anything about Mavericks?


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## Albake21 (Jun 11, 2018)

Lorcan Ward said:


> No interest in Fallout anymore after 4, wish they left it with Obsidian instead of moving further away from what the series meant.


Couldn't agree more about Fallout. So damn disappointed with 4 and now 76...


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## TedEH (Jun 11, 2018)

Ralyks said:


> new Doom though, hell yes


Very excited for that one. But at the same time, I'm trying to imagine where there is to go with it from where it is now. If it's more of the same, why wouldn't I just go back and play the one that's out already? It's still great. If it's different, there's a risk of "fixing" something that wasn't broken in the first place.


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## groverj3 (Jun 11, 2018)

TedEH said:


> Very excited for that one. But at the same time, I'm trying to imagine where there is to go with it from where it is now. If it's more of the same, why wouldn't I just go back and play the one that's out already? It's still great. If it's different, there's a risk of "fixing" something that wasn't broken in the first place.


You can have "more of the same" with the same mechanics and more levels.

There aren't many games I play where I wish I could keep going at the end. Doom was one of those.


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## groverj3 (Jun 11, 2018)

Not gonna lie. I was pretty excited by the new Halo trailer. Nothing mindblowing it, but I'm of that age that played the first on the original Xbox at launch, high school for Halo 2 (which was also my first online MP experience), college for Halo 3 (tons of Team Slayer was played in the dorm) and Reach. I enjoyed 4 and 5 although I didn't play them as much as I had in the past because of declining free time. I've always had a lot of fun with the series.

Fallout 76 looks fun, but I still need to play Fallout 4 some more to have gotten my money's worth. Wolfenstein looks good, but I haven't finished the last one yet. etc...

Can the industry just take a year off for me to catch up


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## StevenC (Jun 11, 2018)

Skull and Bones and Starlink still look cool from Ubisoft. Obviously excited for Beyond Good and Evil 2.

Square Enix was kinda boring.


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## Steinmetzify (Jun 11, 2018)




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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 11, 2018)

I'm way behind on assassin's creed games but this one seems super cool.


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## mongey (Jun 11, 2018)

pretty lack luster for me so far

new elder scrolls, great . but announcing games in pre production pisses me off


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## Metropolis (Jun 12, 2018)

Ghost Of Tsushima seems very cool, it's an open world RPG which takes place in 13th century Japan.


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 12, 2018)




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## TedEH (Jun 12, 2018)

mongey said:


> announcing games in pre production pisses me off


To be fair, the only thing that was shown was a teaser image, right? We have no idea how far along production actually is, and while I know very little about Elder Scrolls games (I could never really get into them, but should probably give Skyrim another shot hah), those are pretty huge games right? I mean, you'd have to be pretty far along in production by now to say that it's coming, I would think? If it was still in pre-prod, that would strike me as too early to show anything, since an actual release would be sooooooooooo far off that the hype would be meaningless.

Uuuuuuunless the teaser just exists because it has to be there, lest they endure the rage of the internet.


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 12, 2018)

Between Ghost of Tsushima and Senjiro looks like I'm going to get all my gaijin weaboo power fantasies fullfilled


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## TedEH (Jun 12, 2018)

I've been noticing a really strange reaction I've been getting to a lot of the E3 stuff this year and it's this weird sense of.... "meh, I'm not the audience for this". Which is weird to me. I remember a time when pretty much any video game basically was YEAH VIDEO GAMES WOOOO PLAY ALL THE GAMES, but now it's an industry that has grown faster than my interests can keep up with it. So many games are trying to appeal to so many people. I still really like video games obviously, but just.... so little excitement for a lot of it anymore. I guess it's becoming like music or movies, where it's not just one thing anymore, it's a whole range of different genres and things that will appeal or not appeal to different people. I'm ok with this. More just making an observation.


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## Albake21 (Jun 12, 2018)

Sony's E3 was by far the weirdest and most anticlimactic conference I've ever seen. They showed a few things that were cool, but the actual conference itself was a complete joke. I even went to a theater by me for a PlayStation Experience showing.


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## StevenC (Jun 12, 2018)

Sony is doubling down on the long uninteresting musical performances before trailers I see. Fair play to them, though, for not really having a lot of shooty games, but that was instead replaced with slowly walking through dark areas and stealth killing people without shooting them. Sony's style of showing gameplay has never appealed to me for some reason, despite enjoying some of the games.

Roll on Smash Bros!


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## bostjan (Jun 12, 2018)

TedEH said:


> Very excited for that one. But at the same time, I'm trying to imagine where there is to go with it from where it is now. If it's more of the same, why wouldn't I just go back and play the one that's out already? It's still great. If it's different, there's a risk of "fixing" something that wasn't broken in the first place.


The 90's _Doom_ was followed by _Doom 2: Hell on Earth_, which used the same engine, added a few characters and added two weapons. But the experience of playing _Doom 2_ was transcendent for gamers at the time, because the maps were generally more fun to play through, and even though there were not a lot of new elements to the game, those elements were put to good use.
I loved the old Heretic games, too, using the Doom engine, and I'm really secretly hoping that those make a comeback, but they were so less hyped than Doom, because why play a 3D medieval-type game with scattered RPG elements and Zelda-like item inventory when you could just grab a chaingun and go blasting hordes of demons?!


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## Ralyks (Jun 12, 2018)

Sooooo..... no FFVII remake. It's not happening, is it...


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## StevenC (Jun 12, 2018)

EVERY FIGHTER RETURNS!


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## Metropolis (Jun 12, 2018)

At least 3 years long hype train for The Elder Scrolls VI has finally started


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## Albake21 (Jun 12, 2018)

Metropolis said:


> At least 3 years long hype train for The Elder Scrolls VI has finally started


Good luck waiting another 5 years on that hype train lol


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## lurè (Jun 13, 2018)

Hyped for Death Stranding. Kojima never disappoints.
I've seen a lot of videos trying to find links between DS and the Metal Gear saga, but I honestly think is going to be an indipendent game or saga. If I'll be proven wrong, I'll probably lose my mind.

TES 6! Can't wait for that, but we're going to wait at at least 3 years.
Bethesda still has to release a Skyrim special edition for every device powered by electrical current.


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## TedEH (Jun 13, 2018)

TedEH said:


> We have no idea how far along production actually is


I guess I take this part back - I forget where I saw it, but apparently there was an official statement along the lines of it being in "pre-production". Sounds like it's gonna be a long while for that one.


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## Albake21 (Jun 13, 2018)

lurè said:


> Hyped for Death Stranding. Kojima never disappoints.
> I've seen a lot of videos trying to find links between DS and the Metal Gear saga, but I honestly think is going to be an indipendent game or saga. If I'll be proven wrong, I'll probably lose my mind.
> 
> TES 6! Can't wait for that, but we're going to wait at at least 3 years.
> Bethesda still has to release a Skyrim special edition for every device powered by electrical current.


All we know about Death Stranding is that you can walk in it lol. Definitely can't wait to see more of it though. I'd be very surprised if it has anything to do with MG, especially since Kojima did say it's a completely new IP.


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## Mathemagician (Jun 13, 2018)

Apparently all fighter in smash ultimate aren’t unlocked from the beginning? Woo. Playing characters I don’t like just to try new ones. 

I buy my SF5 characters with cash for a reason.


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## Albake21 (Jun 13, 2018)

Mathemagician said:


> Apparently all fighter in smash ultimate aren’t unlocked from the beginning? Woo. Playing characters I don’t like just to try new ones.
> 
> I buy my SF5 characters with cash for a reason.


I like this WAY more. It makes you want to actually play and feel like you are actually achieving something while doing so. I always loved back in Melee trying to unlock all of the characters. It also makes you try characters you wouldn't normally play. I don't see a problem with this at all.


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 13, 2018)

Albake21 said:


> I like this WAY more. It makes you want to actually play and feel like you are actually achieving something while doing so. I always loved back in Melee trying to unlock all of the characters. It also makes you try characters you wouldn't normally play. I don't see a problem with this at all.


that was part of what had me playing melee for so long, was the surprising amount of depth in it (well that and there were constant tournaments when I was in college). I feel like that was the perfect smash game as all the subsequent games felt kind of sluggish in pace/responsiveness and that one was pretty fast feeling.


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## Albake21 (Jun 13, 2018)

KnightBrolaire said:


> that was part of what had me playing melee for so long, was the surprising amount of depth in it (well that and there were constant tournaments when I was in college). I feel like that was the perfect smash game as all the subsequent games felt kind of sluggish in pace/responsiveness and that one was pretty fast feeling.


Well there's a reason why competitive smash still plays Melee. It's still the king in my opinion, but even with that said I'm still super excited for Smash Ultimate.


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 13, 2018)

Albake21 said:


> Well there's a reason why competitive smash still plays Melee. It's still the king in my opinion, but even with that said I'm still super excited for Smash Ultimate.


I'm excited for it as well. Probably the only other game besides breath of the wild that lets me justify owning a switch.


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## Mathemagician (Jun 13, 2018)

Albake21 said:


> I like this WAY more. It makes you want to actually play and feel like you are actually achieving something while doing so. I always loved back in Melee trying to unlock all of the characters. It also makes you try characters you wouldn't normally play. I don't see a problem with this at all.




I get that other people like it. But there should simply be an option to just start with everyone though. That was those of us without time to waste don’t have to. 

I don’t need “a reason” to play a multiplayer game. I play fighting games to play with others. And having a gimped roster behind forced single-player or grinding wins pisses me the fuck off because for my $ single player content in a fighting game isn’t content. It’s filler. 

I mean shit I’ll pay extra for a DLC key that immediately unlocks them, THATS how much I hate this shit. I bought the game to play with friends for 1-2 hours. Not to grind “single player” by myself. 

RPGS like The Witcher and Fallout exist. And platformers like Mario exist, so the “single player” content in fighting games is always some thrown together ideas that go on for too long versus shit AI. 

Just like the endless “fly over everything with metaknight” Subspace emissary in brawl? 

Good god my friends and I hated that. We turned to the multiplayer “wins” route and set everything to 1 stock and just ran off the edge of the smallest stage to rack up “wins” to unlock characters. Wow yeah it was “SO” fun just unlocking characters. We ended up drinking and throwing on a movie while just jumping off stages in the background. Got tired and turned it off after a half hour. 

Not everyone has the same level of free time for forced grinding in a multiplayer game.


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## TedEH (Jun 13, 2018)

Mathemagician said:


> I don’t need “a reason” to play a multiplayer game.


I've been more and more thinking that games should more often than not stick to just multiplayer or single player. From a development standpoint, you end up having to basically make two different games/experiences. You're either making two whole separate experiences, or making compromises in one to make it work as the other. It's not impossible to pull off, but there's a strong argument to be made that dedicating your focus to one or the other can make for one singular stronger experience, rather than ending up with one good part of a game and one throw away part, or potentially two "ok" experiences that could have been better without the compromises made for the other mode.


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## Mathemagician (Jun 13, 2018)

It’s basically content for people that don’t want to turn off that specific game.

Fighting games have 3 settings:

Training room
Online Unranked
Online Ranked


Various tournament and spectator settings are cool nice to haves. 


Single player games I don’t care to have “my character” shoot another guy. 

MMO’s similarly end up being mediocre at both as well. Either make a PvP focused mmo with balance as a priority, or a PVE mmo with group content as a priority. 

It’s like people just like ONE game and want it to do everything other games do.


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## TedEH (Jun 13, 2018)

Given that the topic was Smash games, I don't tend to think of Smash as a "fighting game" in that sense. All kinds of semantic arguments could be made, but I tend to think of it as being more of a party game, almost even an arcade-y kind of game. Although I suppose competitive players probably treat it more like a fighting game than I do.



Mathemagician said:


> It’s like people just like ONE game


Some people do only play one game. It's strange to me, but to each their own. I actually find it difficult to get into some games because the sheer number of games I want to play prevents me from investing the needed time/focus on just one at a time.


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## Mathemagician (Jun 13, 2018)

Oh I agree on most points you have there, especially as for me Smash is most fun in local multiplayer. As a party game if my buddy wants to play as say Wario, but that requires 30 “wins” or “beat X boss in the story mode” then that’s time one or both of us isn’t enjoying themselves instead of throwing poke balls and motorcycles at each other or trying to see who wins in a 3 stock Final destination. 

I don’t get a sense of “pride and accomplishment” from this kind of stuff. 

But on the flip side, I can see from a consumer POV people who only buy 1-2 games a year feel like they get more out of a game and aren’t roped into paying for extra DLC characters every few months. You know you’re not going to get nickel and dimed with a first party Nintendo game.


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## Kyle-Vick (Jun 13, 2018)

KnightBrolaire said:


>




I am most excited about this and the gameplay looks absolutely amazing. I cannot wait. The first one is my wife and I favorite game. 

I was really excited when I heard about Fallout, but since I live in a rural area, with crap internet, I more than likely will not get to enjoy it.


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## Xaios (Jun 13, 2018)

As we learn more about Fallout 76, while I've come to accept that it's not the game I was hoping it would be, it still may very well be a game that I'll enjoy, maybe even a lot. I was afraid it was going to be a multiplayer griefer's wet dream like Rust or Ark, but Bethesda has made it very clear that's not the direction they want the game to take. While they want PVP to be present and always a possibility, it seems like they want to reward a more cooperative approach. So, less Rust, more Minecraft, which suits me just fine.


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## TedEH (Jun 13, 2018)

Mathemagician said:


> roped into paying for extra DLC characters every few months.


I honestly kind of hate the state of the industry right now. And I have a pretty strong (partly irrational) aversion to DLC in general. If a game requires DLC to enjoy it, I'm just going to skip that game. Or skip the extra content. I would rather have just the base version of a game with missing pieces than have to spend more money on a thing I've already paid for. And I absolutely skip anything that's based on microtransactions or weird time-wasting mechanics or any of that other side of things. Given that I don't play anything online, that leaves me in a weird state of finding it hard to find games that appeal to me, or are targeted to my kind of "gamer". I just want to play through a game, like I would watch a movie or read a book most of the time, and then move on. But that's not what gaming is anymore - now it's mobile / gambling / lootbox / costmetic / competative / time-killing / streaming / create your own experience / join your friends / meme-fodder all over the place, and not at all the kinds of stories/experiences that hooked me on games in the first place.

It is what it is. I'm not going to say that I think the industry should bow to my tastes, I don't need everything to be "for me", but I think there's a hole in the market right now for AAA single player traditional experiences for the older gamers, outside of just high fantasy and JRPGs. Indie games have in some ways taken over that space a bit, and I'm thankful for that, but there's room for something new from the AAA side I think.


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## mongey (Jun 13, 2018)

gotta say the only game I'm really interested in is smash ultimate or whatever its called 

and that's mainly cause a someone who who call themselves a fighting game fan I have never played a smash game 

I'll get hyped on elder scrolls at e3 2020 where they show alpha game play


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## QuantumCybin (Jun 14, 2018)

Death Stranding and Last of Us II have my interest. I'd be VERY surprised if Death Stranding is part of the Metal Gear saga because I'm pretty sure Hideo Kojima as an individual does not own the Metal Gear IP anymore since he got booted from the company. I mean, Metal Gear Survive? Come on lol


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## TedEH (Jun 14, 2018)

I'd be curious to hear some opinions about this one:
Ubi has setup this sort of collaborative art/music thing for BG+E2 where you can contribute your own stuff to the game and if it's used they'll throw some money at you, and it's sparked a weird argument/debate among some people I work with.

The argument some are making is that what Ubi has set up is a sort of evil predatory speculative work platform to take advantage of people, whereas others see it as just a harmless (and pretty cool) community involvement thing. Anyone have thoughts on this?


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 14, 2018)

TedEH said:


> I'd be curious to hear some opinions about this one:
> Ubi has setup this sort of collaborative art/music thing for BG+E2 where you can contribute your own stuff to the game and if it's used they'll throw some money at you, and it's sparked a weird argument/debate among some people I work with.
> 
> The argument some are making is that what Ubi has set up is a sort of evil predatory speculative work platform to take advantage of people, whereas others see it as just a harmless (and pretty cool) community involvement thing. Anyone have thoughts on this?


same kind of idea that valve had with dota 2 skins or csgo skins (and everyone who's followed suit and copied that concept ie PUBG,LoL, COD, etc). If they're just making small assets or skins then I don't see a problem. The problem is if they try and outsource work to the public due to laziness. It's hard to say without knowing what kind of guarantees/percentages they're offering for using your stuff, and how that would compare to a pro in that field. My guess is it's partially a shrewd business plan to save them some money and engender goodwill among some of the community. They don't have to hire more expensive creators, the community feels incentivized to make things in the hopes of getting some money/recognition, and UBI gets tons of free content that they didn't have to pay for.


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## TedEH (Jun 14, 2018)

I don't think it's a "we don't want to hire people" kind of idea, since they're a huge company who already have dedicated artists and the resources to hire people if they need it, it struck me as a community stunt more than anything else. Try to make the fans feel more involved. In my mind, I see it as something like the universal choir thing Devvy did a while ago, but with a small chance of getting paid.


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 14, 2018)

TedEH said:


> I don't think it's a "we don't want to hire people" kind of idea, since they're a huge company who already have dedicated artists and the resources to hire people if they need it, it struck me as a community stunt more than anything else. Try to make the fans feel more involved. In my mind, I see it as something like the universal choir thing Devvy did a while ago, but with a small chance of getting paid.


Ehh I don't trust Ubi as a company. For everything they've done to engender goodwill with their game communities, they've done other crap that eroded that goodwill (granted not to the level of say EA). R6 siege is a perfect example of that and how the characters are blocked behind a progression wall basically. They basically took the DOTA2/LoL model of making you really have to grind to get new characters (if you don't want to pay with real money), which is frankly, an asinine thing to do on a 60$ game imo. It basically just artificially prolongs the lifespan of the game. Conservative estimates put the amount of time to get all the operators at around 150 hours, with more casual players claiming it took them 400 hours. Granted, the operators can all fulfill multiple roles, so it's not the end of the world if you can't sneak up on people as Caveira (even though her stealth/interrogation skills are super useful).


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## MFB (Jun 14, 2018)

I'm 90% in the "this is good for those who would already make fan art for this franchise, and now it has an actual platform WITHIN that thing they're making it of" and 10% "boy, I hope this doesn't lead to the route of 'now we don't have to design content here because people will just make it for us until we dry up that well'"


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## TedEH (Jun 14, 2018)

KnightBrolaire said:


> Ehh I don't trust Ubi as a company.


I suggested this somewhere else, but I think we're weirdly primed right now to hate on big game companies no matter what they do. Just look at the Battlefield lady-on-the-cover story. You can't do anything in gaming without someone stirring up some internet rage about it. Would we have the same reaction if this was a small respected indie instead?

I just can't jump on the bandwagon for hating game companies for monetizing their work. They are a business at the end of the day. And they're business that are operating in a space where this is how you stay competitive. I don't think the people putting this stuff together (things like microtransactions and loot boxes and disliked monetization strategies I mean) like it anymore than we do.


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## Albake21 (Jun 14, 2018)

It's a great idea, but we all know Ubisoft... I just don't trust them with an idea like this.


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## Albake21 (Jun 14, 2018)

TedEH said:


> I suggested this somewhere else, but I think we're weirdly primed right now to hate on big game companies no matter what they do. Just look at the Battlefield lady-on-the-cover story. You can't do anything in gaming without someone stirring up some internet rage about it. Would we have the same reaction if this was a small respected indie instead?
> 
> I just can't jump on the bandwagon for hating game companies for monetizing their work. They are a business at the end of the day. And they're business that are operating in a space where this is how you stay competitive. I don't think the people putting this stuff together (things like microtransactions and loot boxes and disliked monetization strategies I mean) like it anymore than we do.


To be fair the BFV thing is WAY more than just "lady on the cover". Without getting in to politics, it pisses me off when all of these feminists come out of no where just to "get back" at gamers for being pissed off when majority aren't upset about the women, they are upset about the weird take on WWII. But of course they have to find something to talk about with their agenda.


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 14, 2018)

TedEH said:


> I suggested this somewhere else, but I think we're weirdly primed right now to hate on big game companies no matter what they do. Just look at the Battlefield lady-on-the-cover story. You can't do anything in gaming without someone stirring up some internet rage about it. Would we have the same reaction if this was a small respected indie instead?
> 
> I just can't jump on the bandwagon for hating game companies for monetizing their work. They are a business at the end of the day. And they're business that are operating in a space where this is how you stay competitive. I don't think the people putting this stuff together (things like microtransactions and loot boxes and disliked monetization strategies I mean) like it anymore than we do.


It's not that i have a problem with companies being profitable, it's the way some companies do it. EA, activision and Ubisoft were chronic offenders of emphasizing profit at the expense of the user's experience (such as releasing critical story dlc or fragmenting multiplayer communities with dlc map packs). Other companies like valve/cd projekt red have gone the opposite direction. 
My problen with ea more stems from the whole battlefront 2 pay to win/ubergrinding bullshit, and how they fragmented the battlefield community with dlc map packs (which they're rectifying with bf5 and already did with titanfall2). I don't have a problem with adding in female soldiers, even though the vast majority of women never saw front line combat (barring snipers/resistance fighters). Battlefield was never the most realistic game so I don't have a problem with the customization crap (barring the red dot sights ).


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## TedEH (Jun 14, 2018)

Albake21 said:


> To be fair the BFV thing is WAY more than just "lady on the cover".


Is it really though? Where does it say anywhere that this is a feminism discussion? Does a woman on the cover of a game have to be a feminist statement? I guess that's what I mean about everyone being primed for outrage. Putting a woman anywhere on the cover immediately prompts a response of "this must be because of some kind of feminist agenda". I'm convinced there's zero way for them to not be on the receiving end of outrage at this point:
- Women up front > Feminist agenda!
- Women in the background > They're just tokens!
- No women > That's sexist!
- Lots of diversity > They're just trying to check everything off the "we're progressive" checklist!
- No diversity > They're a leading example of lack of diversity in the industry that we need to correct!
- No people on the cover at all > They don't have the courage to have a voice in the matter!

There's zero winning in these kinds of conversations.


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 14, 2018)

TedEH said:


> Is it really though? Where does it say anywhere that this is a feminism discussion? Does a woman on the cover of a game have to be a feminist statement? I guess that's what I mean about everyone being primed for outrage. Putting a woman anywhere on the cover immediately prompts a response of "this must be because of some kind of feminist agenda". I'm convinced there's zero way for them to not be on the receiving end of outrage at this point:
> - Women up front > Feminist agenda!
> - Women in the background > They're just tokens!
> - No women > That's sexist!
> ...


I think the whole "we need feminism in gaming" thing is vastly overplayed. There have been strong female protagonists in quite a lot of games over the years (ie the Tomb Raider series, Heavenly Sword, Hellblade, Horizon Zero Dawn, Silent Hill 3, Okami,etc). 
The way the industry has been approaching diversity is pretty pathetic honestly. Some developers are literally shoehorning poc/female characters into certain games (or making mention of them being women/poc/gay) when there's no context for it. Bioware has become increasingly obvious about it (especially with Andromeda ). 
Elder Scrolls, The Witcher series and a lot of JRPGs have included groups like that from the get go, and never felt the need to be like HEYYYY THIS CHARACTER IS A STROOONG INDEPENDENT WOMAN/TOKEN POC. If it's relevant to the story, cool. If not, I don't care. 
A good example outside of games would be JK Rowling trying to retcon hermione into being black and dumbledore into being gay, when her own books give no decent supporting information in regards to those details. It's all well and good when the character is actually gay or a poc and that matters in the context of the story (ie Renly Baratheon/Loras Tyrell in Game of Thrones, Native Son by Richard Wright, Incognegro by Mat johnson). 

I think the biggest problem is that some of these sjw nutjobs (like most of the writers at kotaku) are super vocal about wanting diversity in every game, when it's not always the correct context. I remember reading an article by kotaku where they complained about the lack of diversity in Kingdom Come: Deliverance, which is a game set in 1500s CZECHSLOVAKIA. Of course there's not going to be much diversity, barring a few turks/magyars you come across. The game's creators literally worked with history professors to ensure that little details like that were period correct. Context is everything. If it's a fantasy rpg game, sure, make a bunch of interesting lgbtqizasdlawsdf elf/tentaclemonster/furry characters.


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## TedEH (Jun 14, 2018)

KnightBrolaire said:


> I think the whole "we need feminism in gaming" thing is vastly overplayed.


Oh I'm very with you on that one. I just don't read a woman on the cover of the game as making a blatant feminist statement. And even if there's an undercurrent of that, to some point it's playing to what the market wants right now.



KnightBrolaire said:


> Okami


Interesting that you mention this as an example -> I was just talking with someone the other day about how the localization of this game into English (according to some article I read) tried to downplay the fact that you're playing as a female for the sake of western audiences.


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 14, 2018)

TedEH said:


> Oh I'm very with you on that one. I just don't read a woman on the cover of the game as making a blatant feminist statement. And even if there's an undercurrent of that, to some point it's playing to what the market wants right now.
> 
> 
> Interesting that you mention this as an example -> I was just talking with someone the other day about how the localization of this game into English (according to some article I read) tried to downplay the fact that you're playing as a female for the sake of western audiences.


It's relatively obvious that okami is a female. They explicitly mention in the beginning of the game how okami is the embodiment of Amaterasu: "mother of us all" and the japanese sun goddess.


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## TedEH (Jun 14, 2018)

^ Absolutely, but the language was tweaked, from what I understand, to sort of downplay the fact. Supposedly the original Japanese text referred to this more often than the western versions. I just finished a playthrough of the game, and it didn't occur to me that the character was female until a good chunk of the way in, and I googled it. Arguably "the mother of us all" is the only real hint you get, and it could be just a figure of speech, so it's not suuuuuuuuuper obvious if you're not looking for it.


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## Albake21 (Jun 14, 2018)

TedEH said:


> Is it really though? Where does it say anywhere that this is a feminism discussion? Does a woman on the cover of a game have to be a feminist statement? I guess that's what I mean about everyone being primed for outrage. Putting a woman anywhere on the cover immediately prompts a response of "this must be because of some kind of feminist agenda". I'm convinced there's zero way for them to not be on the receiving end of outrage at this point:
> - Women up front > Feminist agenda!
> - Women in the background > They're just tokens!
> - No women > That's sexist!
> ...


@KnightBrolaire said it pretty perfectly. I wasn't talking about BF's agenda, I was talking about the feminists agenda. That's a whole other discussion that Knight touched on pretty well. I was talking about how feminists come out of the cracks whenever they find chance to pounce on something to shove their own agenda down other's throats. This is exactly what happened with BFV.


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## KnightBrolaire (Jun 14, 2018)

TedEH said:


> ^ Absolutely, but the language was tweaked, from what I understand, to sort of downplay the fact. Supposedly the original Japanese text referred to this more often than the western versions. I just finished a playthrough of the game, and it didn't occur to me that the character was female until a good chunk of the way in, and I googled it. Arguably "the mother of us all" is the only real hint you get, and it could be just a figure of speech, so it's not suuuuuuuuuper obvious if you're not looking for it.


It was obvious to me, but i had a serious obsession with world mythology as a kid. Plus, like I said the "mother of us all" line is right in the beginning. I don't think they'd be calling a male god "the mother of us all" or anything like that. Even if that was somehow misconstrued, people could google Amaterasu and read about the mythology.


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## TedEH (Jun 14, 2018)

I'll admit it went over my head - and because you spend a good amount of time not seeing the reference, you forget after a while. The imagery of a white wolf is pretty neutral, so outside of that one reference, there's nothing really to go on. I see what you mean though.


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