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Giant Bomb #23 | See you Space Cowboy...

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Antiwhippy

the holder of the trombone
Am I right to think that Sony really fucked hello games over?

They seemed to have allowed things to spin out of control in a way that it wouldn't if they didn't try to make it a major release.
 

oti

Banned
The good thing about Pax is that the Q&A stuff usually makes me want to kill myself and that should line up nicely with some other stuff this year.

Is it PAX again? Ugh. I hate PAX so much. It's garbage and zero value for me. Actually it's taking value away from me. Can I sue PAX? I thought this was America.

Am I right to think that Sony really fucked hello games over?

They seemed to have allowed things to spin out of control in a way that it wouldn't if they didn't try to make it a major release.

Well, do you know the details of the contract? I assume you don't, so no, you're not right to think Sony fucked Hello Games over. The AAA marketing surely didn't help but it wasn't a Sony representative saying all those things during the interviews.
 

Antiwhippy

the holder of the trombone
Well, do you know the details of the contract? I assume you don't, so no, you're not right to think Sony fucked Hello Games over. The AAA marketing surely didn't help but it wasn't a Sony representative saying all those things during the interviews.

That's what I'm thinking though, because from the way I see it (as someone who don't really know the intimate details admittedly), but NMS has all the classic signs of a game that is in perpetual beta until it isn't, where there are a lot of grandiose promises but something worked on over months, if not years. Instead they have to release it as a finished AAA game.
 

oti

Banned
That's what I'm thinking though, because from the way I see it (as someone who don't really know the intimate details admittedly), but NMS has all the classic signs of a game that is in perpetual beta until it isn't, where there are a lot of grandiose promises but something worked on over months, if not years. Instead they have to release it as a finished AAA game.

Sure, I still don't see how this is Sony "fucking over" Hello Games. Who knows what the game would be like if Sony didn't support them. Maybe better, maybe even worse.

Isn't it kinda funny how two weeks after release nobody's talking about the game anymore after talking about it for three years? Video games are such a weird business, man.
 
Played about an hour of Nuka World last night.
It's starts off pretty well, and has a lot of promise.

It also continues the streak of Bethesda expansions being better and having better writing than the base game.


Fake edit: Oh, and the radio dj kinda sounds like he's doing a David Lee Roth impression. So that's a plus, for me at least.
 

Peru

Member
Am I right to think that Sony really fucked hello games over?

They seemed to have allowed things to spin out of control in a way that it wouldn't if they didn't try to make it a major release.

Sony made NMS sell like an AAA game at an AAA game price despite not being one. If I were a developer that'd sound like a pretty good deal.
 

Antiwhippy

the holder of the trombone
Sure, I still don't see how this is Sony "fucking over" Hello Games. Who knows what the game would be like if Sony didn't support them. Maybe better, maybe even worse.

Isn't it kinda funny how two weeks after release nobody's talking about the game anymore after talking about it for three years? Video games are such a weird business, man.

Hmm, fair enough, I'm just seeing it as hello games taking on something that blew up to something beyond their control, which is their own doing as well.
 

Maiorum

Member
Whoever's fault this all was, I can't imagine how it must feel to be in Sean Murray's shoes right now. To go from being adulated by the gaming community at large to having his name and his studio's name dragged in the mud, knowing that they've likely been irreversibly tarnished, must be demoralizing.
 
Whoever's fault this all was, I can't imagine how it must feel to be in Sean Murray's shoes right now. To go from being adulated by the gaming community at large to having his name and his studio's name dragged in the mud, knowing that they've likely been irreversibly tarnished, must be demoralizing.

money's cool, though
 

Jintor

Member
i personally think the gaming audience reaction has been childish... but that's tempered criticism because i didn't buy into the hype, didn't follow the game at all, and in fact didn't buy the game, so actually my opinion is probably totally worthless

from the outside looking in though jeeeeeeeeeeeeeze
 

hamchan

Member
Whoever's fault this all was, I can't imagine how it must feel to be in Sean Murray's shoes right now. To go from being adulated by the gaming community at large to having his name and his studio's name dragged in the mud, knowing that they've likely been irreversibly tarnished, must be demoralizing.

Well, he must have known this would happen since he's the one that shipped out the game with half the features he promised not in it, so he was probably mentally prepared for it for a while. The amount of money he got helps too.
 

Tubobutts

Member
I don't understand the vitriol outside of people's love of yelling about about how devs are lazy liars. NMS did what I wanted it to do.
 

demidar

Member
I said from day one that one of my biggest worries about NMS was that they would focus so much on procgen that they would forget to put in the "fun". If a person really liked exploring new places then that can work for them, but personally I prefer exploring environments that are authored.

Seeing all this blow up thought, doesn't surprise me one bit (given if Hello Games wasn't able to deliver their Pie-in-the-Sky experience, which they had no chance of ever doing).
 

Zaph

Member
It's been beaten to death, but yeah, GB's output has been disappointing (quality and quantity) for quite a while now. The summer is always a busy time for me, so it hasn't bothered me too much, but GB really needs an injection of new blood, on both coasts. It seems like if Dan is distracted/absent, everything mellows to the point of stopping.

i personally think the gaming audience reaction has been childish... but that's tempered criticism because i didn't buy into the hype, didn't follow the game at all, and in fact didn't buy the game, so actually my opinion is probably totally worthless

from the outside looking in though jeeeeeeeeeeeeeze

While there's no doubt some childish and hyperbolic shit in the mix, overall I think the reaction is good for the industry. There needed to be a landmark game that drew a line in the sand for how games are marketed pre-release. And this isn't just about misleading customers (easily avoided if you don't. preorder. games.), but also the pitfalls in trying too hard to suck all the attention away from other games and how that can backfire.
 
While there's no doubt some childish and hyperbolic shit in the mix, overall I think the reaction is good for the industry. There needed to be a landmark game that drew a line in the sand for how games are marketed pre-release. And this isn't just about misleading customers (easily avoided if you don't. preorder. games.), but also the pitfalls in trying too hard to suck all the attention away from other games and how that can backfire.

I think one of the big problems though is that a lot of these discussions have taken place in the main NMS threads (not necessarily here given the amount of NMS threads we had but definitely other forums I use) and its driven away people who were actually enjoying the game and just wanted to chat about it. Obviously this is more just a need to organise discussion better but it definitely contributed to my negative feelings towards the gaming community. In the end I just stopped going in NMS threads and so wasnt chatting about it anymore, losing one of my favourite parts of playing a game at launch.
 

Jintor

Member
i dropped dead rising 3 for a month because i send my pc in a box somewhere and now i think i don't like it much anymore. i guess it was worth dicking around with it for 10 hours to find that out.
 

derFeef

Member
i dropped dead rising 3 for a month because i send my pc in a box somewhere and now i think i don't like it much anymore. i guess it was worth dicking around with it for 10 hours to find that out.

I started to hate the map after a while, stopped after 20 hours or so and never finished it.
 

kiguel182

Member
i personally think the gaming audience reaction has been childish... but that's tempered criticism because i didn't buy into the hype, didn't follow the game at all, and in fact didn't buy the game, so actually my opinion is probably totally worthless

from the outside looking in though jeeeeeeeeeeeeeze

A reaction to a video game being childish? No way...

But yeah, the reactions to this game are embarrassing.
 

bomma_man

Member
It's really not that hard to not day 1/preorder everything...

Not making excuses for misleading statements. But consumer/professional reviews are a pretty useful guide and they're a dime a dozen once the game is actually out.
 

Patryn

Member
I started to hate the map after a while, stopped after 20 hours or so and never finished it.

I enjoyed my time with the game up until I got to the Overtime section at which point I suddenly decided that I had had enough.

Being able to craft weapons on the fly really helps the game.
 

kiguel182

Member
It's really not that hard to not day 1/preorder everything...

Not making excuses for misleading statements. But consumer/professional reviews are a pretty useful guide and they're a dime a dozen once the game is actually out.

Three years hype cycles are bad and will always lead to misleading stuff (because things change or whatever) but yeah, just wait for reviews. And if you don't then it's kinda your own risk.

Deceiving marketing sucks but it's not like is that hard to wait a couple of days before buying it.

Anyway, this whole situation got ridiculous once people started going through all the interviews and picking things apart from years ago. At a certain point is like "we got it, now just talk about what's there".

Fortunetly things have calmed down. Now we just wait for the next "controversy ".
 

Jintor

Member
I started to hate the map after a while, stopped after 20 hours or so and never finished it.

it's so garbage for driving. what looks like an open world is boxed in by broken trucks and crap everywhere. You can always just shoulder charge past a crowd but it's not actually that much fun.

Being able to craft weapons on the fly really helps the game.

Wish there was a way to set the UI to highlight shit I want in-world so I can restock on combo weapons. Though I ended up just going to safehouses all the time.

I think I'm just not especially enamoured of any of the characters really. I am kinda curious to see if old characters return, but the gameplay is so... non-challenging I don't kinda feel like I'm really achieving anything by playing
 

derFeef

Member
it's so garbage for driving. what looks like an open world is boxed in by broken trucks and crap everywhere. You can always just shoulder charge past a crowd but it's not actually that much fun.

Yup. The artificial roadblocks were the worst part.
 

Jintor

Member
brad was right that dr2 was the perfect mix. Hoping the dr1 re-release does some tweaking to get it to that level without going full on no-timer blah like dr4 looks. I get that people like infinite zombie murder but the appeal of what is Dead Rising to me just isn't there without the actual challenge and an actual requirement to Groundhog Day-esque loop.
 

popo

Member
Awkward Q&A called to a dramatic halt when someone stands up and asks Max what it is like to be accused of sexual assault.
 

demidar

Member
brad was right that dr2 was the perfect mix. Hoping the dr1 re-release does some tweaking to get it to that level without going full on no-timer blah like dr4 looks. I get that people like infinite zombie murder but the appeal of what is Dead Rising to me just isn't there without the actual challenge and an actual requirement to Groundhog Day-esque loop.

I was reading that DR4 thread and just shook my head.

Endless zombie killing isn't actually fun, they're too dumb and weak. Even Musou games have a map control/time pressure layer to the fighting.

I mean, DR2: OTR does have an infinty mode without a time limit so it already satisfies people who do want mindless killing.

The timer and level design is what elevates DR to something above schlock.
 

derFeef

Member
brad was right that dr2 was the perfect mix. Hoping the dr1 re-release does some tweaking to get it to that level without going full on no-timer blah like dr4 looks. I get that people like infinite zombie murder but the appeal of what is Dead Rising to me just isn't there without the actual challenge and an actual requirement to Groundhog Day-esque loop.

I even enjoyed Case Zero and to a smaller extend Case West a lot more than DR3. Those smaller titles made a lot of sense for Dead Rising - I would play one of those again.

And yes I enjoy killing zombies in video games, but DR4 does not look very good and I would go that far and say it looks like a copy of DR3 with even less motiviation to actually play the story and move on.
 
If this controversy gets publishers/developers to stop bullshitting about their games while also getting people to stop buying into marketing campaigns and blindly preordering games then it was worth it. I doubt anyone will learn anything from NMS though.

Still don't think there's anything wrong with people getting refunds for shitty games though.
 
I enjoyed my time with No Man's Sky. I have found some the reaction super cringey.

I understand being miffed if you thought it was something else, but the crusading is so lame.
 

kiguel182

Member
Refunds for technical problems? Makes total sense.

Because the game is bad? Nah. Especially when you have a bunch of hours put into it.
 

Meguro

Banned
I saw someone say getting a refund after playing 50 hours is fair because NMS promised "infinite gameplay" so what is 50 hours.
Videogames!
 

Salarians

Member
Dead Rising 4 looks like a zombie themed musou game, seemingly stripped of what made that series (DR1 in particular) so interesting in the first place. I hate that they brought back Frank just to (apparently) change so much about him. It just comes off as a cheap nostalgia play.
 

hamchan

Member
Refunds for technical problems and thinking the game was something else because of the marketing seems like valid reasons to me. I got my refund after 1 and a half hours of playtime, and I'll defend anyone who refunds the game for those reasons too. It did get a bit weird when some people tried to shame the other people seeking refunds on the game, as if they were personally insulted on behalf of Hello Games by the refunds. I think Jeff said it best, and it always needs repeating: "Publishers aren't your friends" (In this case it's a developer, but the same concept applies). Exercise your consumer rights if you want to people.

Refunding just because the game is bad isn't a good reason, sure.
 

Jintor

Member
refunding is fine but refunding after x amount of time is pretty shitty (x depends on the game)

it's like if you went to the movies and got your money back after you watched the whole thing. yeah if you walked out halfway through cos it was garbage maybe you should get your cash back. if you stayed to the end guess what, you bought in already. i suspect the 50 hours thing was an outlier but yeah...

i forget what australian consumer law says about this situation, usually reserves refunds for beyond-expectations faultiness or substantial deviation from advertisement. does america have consumer protection laws?
 
Refunds for technical problems? Makes total sense.

Because the game is bad? Nah. Especially when you have a bunch of hours put into it.
Checking the refund thread, the guy who got a refund after 50 hours was experiencing a crash every 20 minutes once he got that far. That's worthy of a discount. I'm all in favour of the refund thing if it gets Sony and Microsoft to be more open about refunds as well as getting rid of overly zealous marketing campaigns by devs. As over the top as I think this outrage will get, I'm hoping it will be a net positive for the industry. I'm really glad I had zero investment in NMS after all this.
 

hamchan

Member
The 50 hours was from the GAF thread. The game was constantly crashing every 20-30 mins at that hour point and the user was no where near accomplishing his goals in the game. The guy was actually enjoying the game at that point but since it then became unplayable, he got a refund. That sounds very fair to me.

I had the same thing with Skyrim PS3. Game was unplayable with the single digit framerate and I had so much I still wanted to do in the game despite putting dozens of hours in. Except back then there was no recourse to getting a refund like there is these days, so I just had to suck it up.
 

Jintor

Member
yeah that sounds straight up defective

i guess this is what happens when you (I) base opinions based of soundbites without looking into anything
 

derFeef

Member
"Marketing" makes it also seem like Adam Jensen is a killing/stealth machine with unlimited powers. Yet in the game I am constantly frustrated by the limitations of the systems. Can I get a refund for that too? I don't think so and I think this is a terrible reason to ask for a refund.
 

Meguro

Banned
That sounds like a legitimate reason at least.
It honestly reminded me of that guy who completed Firewatch and then thought about getting a refund even though he enjoyed the game.
 

hamchan

Member
"Marketing" makes it also seem like Adam Jensen is a killing/stealth machine with unlimited powers. Yet in the game I am constantly frustrated by the limitations of the systems. Can I get a refund for that too? I don't think so and I think this is a terrible reason to ask for a refund.

Uhhh but he is?

Also "marketing" is a great reason to ask for a refund. There is so much regulation based on false or deceptive marketing for a reason, it's ludicrous to say it's not a valid reason for a refund.
 
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