This week, it’s Alan Wake 2, which has released and scored an 89 on Metacritic, a tick below a 90, but a 92 if you’re looking on PC where its visuals can be maxed to their fullest.
The last spot is a toss up between Armored Core and Super Mario Bro’s: Wonder but co-op focused family games tend to not be contenders for GOTY and especially not in years with many strong options.
Personally I think BG3 will take it. It has a lot going for it, western, it’s got a touch of humor and charm which the times call for, part of a legendary franchise that hasn’t seen a new release for a decade+. And on top of that it’s a fantastic game that really is the culmination of the journey western RPGs has been undergoing since BG 2 (I say 2 because that game started the companion focus prevalent across the sub-genre and a massive focus of BG3).
Though in my opinion Tears of the Kingdom is the best game of the year. It just plays so amazingly well.
Alan Wake 2 is the game equivalent to Oscars bait so I wouldn’t be shocked if it won.
Hogwarts Legacy is great and exactly the type of game GOTY favors, but it was released early in the year and is a bit “done” now. It’s also a tad controversial. But it’s not undeserving.
FF XVI is not mainstream enough to have the wide appeal GOTY is all about. You could argue BG3 also doesn’t have the wide appeal of Hogwarts Legacy or Tears of the Kingdom and I’d agree. But that doesn’t change that FF XVI just feels further away from a win than the above games. Another year it very well could’ve won though.
And the bottom spot, Armored Core 6 is a great game. It doesn’t try to be anything else than a game. And in that regard (and that only) it’s similar to the new Mario. It doesn’t advance the medium it just delivers a great gaming experience. Also a game that could’ve won in a weaker year in my opinion.
Good job Remedy on making a game that really uses high end hardware to craft something that looks incredible while actually scaling performance with settings. Double FPS going from Max to Low is pretty good all things considered and should be enough to make it playable on anything not too dated, at least with DLSS / FSR.
Squadron 42 is the single player campaign of Star Citizen, that is supposed to launch as a separate game. It's basically a small portion of Star Citizen, but with a story and ending. I'm still not confident; waited too long for that.
Wouldn’t it just be perfect irony if they run completely out of money before managing to release something/anything? Though with how many people put in money over and over even though progress over the years has been slow to say the least I guess the more likely outcome is nuclear holocaust putting a damper on the release schedule.
How do you mean you can still play CSGO? There are no official servers and even installing and launching it is not straight forward at all? I’d akin that to saying you can still play Vanilla WoW and point to private servers, which is not what anyone means.
I was under the impression that they’re all on Burning Crusade now and soon Wrath of the Lich King, but I don’t really follow that scene anymore. But even Blizz vanilla WoW wasn’t truly vanilla but I guess that’s pretty moot.
Eh. If you count CSGO when there are no official servers I think you need to count WC3 unofficial servers as well. There are workarounds to playing old WC3 online, just not through battle.net.
I regularly check in on their site because BattleTech and Shadowrun are smack-dab-fucking-right-in-the-center of my gaming tastes. But BattleTech launched 2018 which is an absurd long time without a big new title for a developer that makes (very good) games in the A to AA scale. Lamplighters look OK but not a theme I particularly care for and I fail to see how it took 5+ years. And if their whole team worked on the BattleTech expansions, well then they’re either much smaller than I thought or took it very chill.
What? I refuse to believe a game director for one of the cornerstone RPG franchises, from a studio with excellent writing, especially character writing imo, would somehow have an epiphany playing FF VII? Especially if they played it 202X seeing how basically every story driven game post FF VII has taken inspiration from it or a game inspired by it (etc.).
EDIT: Oh I’m a silly goose, BG 2 not BG 3… Still BG 1 companions are imo more iconic than BG 2, but they did up the seriousness and reduced the stereotyping with 2 so they did improve, even if they didn’t have that magical X factor that 1 did.
Teamfight Tactics is introducing a new Collector’s Bounties system that is aimed at the wealthiest of players. To roll the Collector’s Bounties, you’ll need to cough up 450 Treasure Tokens (approximately $17 USD). In order to guarantee you hit the Prestige skin you’ll need to roll at least 30 times.
Because in our society we very much need money and gambling sells itself by making you believe you’ll get money. Cosmetics in games has no such issues.
EDIT: as long as you can’t sell them for money a la CSGO.
That is a pretty substantial subscription base, no wonder it’s profitable even if it at times feels like a really good deal. Like now when Starfield launched on Game Pass.
A new Nintendo Switch 2 rumor has surfaced claiming that the next-generation hybrid console could actually arrive with more memory than a powerful rival like the Microsoft Xbox Series S. The same source has also offered an update in regard to the Switch 2’s potential DLSS support and ray-tracing capabilities.
More importantly too battery draining. I can’t imagine them making a much bulkier switch but it could be that DLSS and Raytracing is docked only or optional with battery warnings if used undocked.
I was an original backer, I’ve played various iterations over the years and it really takes a lot of rose tint to find the game as it is enjoyable. The core loop isn’t even in place yet. The systems that do exist and work are interesting, the graphics and aesthetics are top notch, in parts, and at times it feels like we’re going to get something revolutionary. But then you play for a while and the unfinished jank gets to you, it’s not very fun. It’s cool, it’s impressive, the scope is insane and you can get lost in the vastness of space in ways that other games just can’t even approach. But it’s not fun. You can make it fun with friends or by setting up your own goals disjoined from the gameplay loop. Like try and jump a vehicle into the cargo bay mid flight or see how tightly you can race around asteroids. But if you just play the existing little loops it sucks. This is of course my subjective opinion. You might love the bounty system and the combat. You might love the salvage runs and transport missions but to me it’s like Euro Truck Simulator which is about the most boring shit I can imagine. And both the space and ground combat just isn’t even remotely as good as other games that just focus on that, which is understandable but I’m always left with this feeling of “will I really enjoy the finished product?” And I’m not sure. The game they said they were going to make in the Kickstarter, that game I would’ve enjoyed. I loved Chris Roberts games as a kid, but this monstrosity it has become? I just don’t know.
That said I really do believe they’re trying to make the best game ever. They just don’t fundamentally understand why we need deadlines and a fixed scope to get things out the door.
That’s a bit disingenuous. It’s Intels own Limited Edition A770 SKU that is discontinued not the A770 as a model. They still ship the chip to AIB makers like ASRock etc. Their second generation, BattleMage, is still on track as well so on the contrary I believe we’ll see much better support for Intel GPUs in the coming years since more game developers will have had adequate time with the hardware. Intels cards are also priced competitively if we’re looking at the entry level cards which is bound to make them end up in many cheaper pre-builts that parents buy for their younger kids. So I expect to be quite commonly used for certain games in the coming years.
I’m placing 0 blame on developers here but it’s just a fact that Intel can’t reasonably optimize the drivers for all games past and present in such a short time. And developers haven’t had access to the card for even remotely long enough for it to be part of the testing for any game (outside small titles maybe but they generally don’t need special treatment driver wise) releasing this year or next. AMD and Nvidia have literal decades of head start. So while I would’ve wanted Intel to do a better job I’m not trivializing the monstrous task either, and all things considered they’ve done OK. Not great, not horrible.
If it wasn’t clear in the articles you read then those places wanted the clicks and engagement that comes from vaguely implying that Intel is killing their GPU division.
Falsehood flies, and the Truth comes limping after it - Jonathan Swift
Mass Effect games are often praised for their cinematic storytelling and exceptional companions, but the series' unique approach to enemies is often overlooked.
I’m willing to bet a cool $100 we’re getting a Bioware ME in the coming 5 years but I’ll concede it’s far more likely to be Andromeda “quality” than ME2.
If you argue BioWare is already dead after some big names leaving and thus doesn’t really exist anymore then sure. Like a Ship of Theseus line of thinking that too much has changed already. I could accept that.
But if you honestly think EA will kill the brand of in 5 years time I think you’re delusional. Sure they haven’t delivered in some time but their legacy still gets games both hyped and sold. ME Legendary edition sold very well and SWTOR has been very profitable as well.
Visceral didn’t have even 10% of the name recognition BioWare has. As for the substudios that happens all the time when expansion plans fail due to poor releases, it’s extreme to think that spells the imminent death of BioWare. But sure, EA has that kind of track record. Westwood was a huge name way back when and they got killed. Though they didn’t manage like BioWare to get known for multiple things. They really only had Command & Conquer which still “lives on” in a Frankenstein’s Monster kind of sense.
I was interested in buying a Steam Deck… Until I discovered all the (apparently) better alternatives. Asus Rog Ally, OneXPlayer, Aya Neo etc… I like the idea of an handheld console and obviously I would like to have a device that can run almost everything, so the Windows based handhelds seem better than the Steam Deck. Is it...
Steam Deck punches way above its weight. But it does so much thanks to its lower resolution. Though in the format 720p isn’t bad at all. It’s what the switch uses as well.
Skip all the Chinese alternatives, they require far more tweaking / researching than you’re fit for (judged solely by this post).
Really I’d break it down to games and game types you want to play. If you want say Genshin Impact then it’s a lot easier to go with the ROG Ally. There are other Asian games that also don’t play nice with Linux. Multiplayer titles also tend to be finicky with Linux. The ROG Ally is also strong enough to dock to a 1080p screen for titles like Valorant or CSGO. If that is appealing.
If you’re playing mainly older games then the deck is the obvious choice, it’s a beast when it comes to emulation and has much better battery life in that setting than the ROG Ally. It’s also arguably more plug-and-play especially if you play mostly steam games.
Running Windows on the Deck isn’t very good, it kills the decks battery advantage and the lower performance becomes more obvious. Same running Linux on the ROG is also missing out on what it’s actually good at and Linux won’t improve the battery life much.
I’ve been thinking about a taxonomy of Roguelikes that should help us speak more clearly about this genre - or group of genres - that we love. I’d rather do this than just call things “roguelites”, which basically doesn’t mean anything. So here we go!...
Stuff like FTL and “The PIT” doesn’t fit super well into your categories I feel. I think they’re a little to defined and narrow.
I think one way to slice it would be how the games handle progression, is there any? Is it only on complete runs or also on partially complete runs or every single run you gain something?
It’s similar to what you’re on but a bit more concise. So
No progression: the game is about completing a run, which is very challenging but also very rewarding.
Some progression: the game builds over multiple runs offering different/new ways to tackle it as you complete runs or discover stuff.
Full progression: every run builds on your previous runs.
I don’t see the point in naming a genre for rougelike card games. To me it’s a mash up between a full progression rougelike and a card game, and it doesn’t need a name. Also a name for rougelike with safe havens seem weird as well. And rougelikes with full progression by nature become grindy since that becomes one way to win.
What I’m saying is those already are genres, a game can have more than one genre so use that. Rougelike TCG, Rougelike RPG and Rougelike Action RPG are all valid and much more universally understood than trying to make people understand what “Action Rouge”, “Bandlike” or “Cardlike” is. Then mentioning the type of progression helps as well. But if we try naming all permutations with more than 3 games fitting it then we’ll just end up with 10 new genres noone will use or understand.
‘Alan Wake 2’ Complicates An Already Wild GOTY Competition (www.forbes.com)
This week, it’s Alan Wake 2, which has released and scored an 89 on Metacritic, a tick below a 90, but a 92 if you’re looking on PC where its visuals can be maxed to their fullest.
Alan Wake 2 Performance Benchmark Review - 30 GPUs Tested (www.techpowerup.com)
Cities: Skylines II - Performance, Post-Release Plans & Goals (store.steampowered.com)
Space sim Squadron 42 is "feature-complete" and gunning for Starfield's lunch with massive new video (www.rockpapershotgun.com)
Squadron 42 is the single player campaign of Star Citizen, that is supposed to launch as a separate game. It's basically a small portion of Star Citizen, but with a story and ending. I'm still not confident; waited too long for that.
The new worst gaming trend: killing our favorite games to replace them with sequels (www.pcgamer.com)
Paradox Interactive and Harebrained Schemes to part ways on January 1, 2024 (www.gematsu.com)
Your favourite Baldur's Gate 2 companions were 'a bunch of cardboard cutouts' until the game's director played Final Fantasy 7 and felt the heat of competition (www.pcgamer.com)
Vintage Mac Community Begs Manufacturers for New Supply of Rare Dongle as Resellers Charge $250 (www.404media.co)
Cyberpunk's storytelling makes Starfield seem ancient (www.eurogamer.net)
LoL players rebel against “disgusting” prices with new Prestige TFT skin - Dexerto (www.dexerto.com)
Teamfight Tactics is introducing a new Collector’s Bounties system that is aimed at the wealthiest of players. To roll the Collector’s Bounties, you’ll need to cough up 450 Treasure Tokens (approximately $17 USD). In order to guarantee you hit the Prestige skin you’ll need to roll at least 30 times.
This is Microsoft’s new disc-less Xbox Series X design with a new gyro controller (www.theverge.com)
Gamepass has 30 million members (twitter.com)
Consumer Nintendo Switch 2 rumored to have more RAM than the Xbox Series S (www.notebookcheck.net)
A new Nintendo Switch 2 rumor has surfaced claiming that the next-generation hybrid console could actually arrive with more memory than a powerful rival like the Microsoft Xbox Series S. The same source has also offered an update in regard to the Switch 2’s potential DLSS support and ray-tracing capabilities.
Star Citizen reaches $600 million raised but the game future is really worrying (gamerkick.com)
Bethesda claims that the Intel ARC GPUs do not meet Starfield's PC minimum requirements (www.dsogaming.com)
According to Bethesda Support, even the Intel Arc A770 GPU does not meet Starfield's PC minimum requirements.
Was There A Game That Did Enemies Better Than Mass Effect 3? (www.dualshockers.com)
Mass Effect games are often praised for their cinematic storytelling and exceptional companions, but the series' unique approach to enemies is often overlooked.
Dreadwolf's Delays Are Impacting The Next Mass Effect - Insider Gaming (insider-gaming.com)
Speaking on a Giant Bomb podcast, Jeff Grubb explored how Dreadwolf's constant delays are also impacting the next Mass Effect game.
Steam Deck VS rivals
I was interested in buying a Steam Deck… Until I discovered all the (apparently) better alternatives. Asus Rog Ally, OneXPlayer, Aya Neo etc… I like the idea of an handheld console and obviously I would like to have a device that can run almost everything, so the Windows based handhelds seem better than the Steam Deck. Is it...
A taxonomy of Roguelikes
I’ve been thinking about a taxonomy of Roguelikes that should help us speak more clearly about this genre - or group of genres - that we love. I’d rather do this than just call things “roguelites”, which basically doesn’t mean anything. So here we go!...