Shagger

As a teen, socks and underwear, but oddly enough I love getting them as gifts now.

I have posted about the possibly of having a VGR discord before here and @DC explained how that wouldn't really work. All fair enough. Still, if members want to live chat or group up to play together we could organize such efforts on the forum them use Discord to make it work.

I'm Scottish, so maybe it's not my place to say, but I saw Donald Trump as a predicable disaster from the moment I couldn't believe America elected him, and I think most of the rest of the world felt the same. @The Blackangel put it in more detail, and she's right in the end, but put it simply he hasn't made America great again, he's made America hate again. And now's he's decided to engage in military action that could start a new world war because he thinks it'll help his re-election. Sorry to Americans reading, but I hope my government does not answer your beck and call to fight this time. We're four days into 2020, and we're already on the brink of WW3 and the part of Australia that's isn't made of dust and sand is on fire. This is gonna be hard year.

I hated the Duke (Original Xbox), that controller was too large. I have not got small hands, but even I found myself stretching my claws all over it to reach the buttons. Future Xbox controllers kept the layout, but were much easier to wrap your hands around, thank god. Obviously more modern controllers are better, but even with that in mind, I think the DS4 is the best controller I've ever used. It's width, it's refined, it's comfortable, the huge rand of control options it offers, and they're built like APC's. The one problem is the perema-battery. I'm sorry, but XBox have the right idea by giving to option to use rechargeable or regular batteries, and that stupid Micro USB charge port only make it worse. The controller can only live as long as the battery. The DS3 was like that to, but this problem only existed in theory because that controller WOULD break long before that became an issue. Something to consider though is that innovation can be risky. For example, there is a controller that was the first to feature a pause button, a fully analogue control stick, shoulder buttons, a partner console with four control ports instead of two and it is widely regarded to be one of the worst controllers in gaming history. It was so bad, it pretty much killed the console itself. That is the infamous Atari 5200. Atari were always willing to experiment. They made popular interchangeable cartridges, removable controllers, they were the first company to develop a wireless controller as well as the aforementioned attempts to innovate with the 5200, the first company make a handheld in colour and also really moved forward home computers. There experiments didn't always work, but they deserve props foo trying. Great post. Amongst the systems you mentioned that I've used, I have to agree. The SNES controller was very well-designed, although it's innovations like the wide shoulder buttons and it's compact, curved profile seem more like common sense today, back then it was radical. The N64 controller divides opinion even to this day, but I liked it. It suited the console and it suited the games. Starfox 64 (Or as it was known in the great U-of-K "Lylat Wars", for some stupid reason) and Zelda: OOT, felt amazing to play on that controller.

I'd say the line of Nvidea GPU's are easier to wrap your head around, they keep things simple. AMD to me seems like a more adventurous tech company more willing to experiment, but can offer more bang for your buck. The last PC I built had an AND Radeon Pro Duo, essentially a graphics card with 2 GPU's inside it. It's power was comparable to the very best GTX had to offer, but significantly less expensive.

Let me start with by saying this practice is wrong, utterly wrong, but I have encountered it only once. I found it with Child of Light for PS4, and that's it (Awesome game, BTW). The gaming world will go digital, sooner or later, but consoles have held on to the principle that the buyers rights accosted physical media don't have to disappear. Yes, games are already getting over 100GB on PC, far bigger than a Blue Ray or an affordable Cartridge, so big downloads and online connectivity are a part of this now. However, buying games on physical media, even with the massive download installs you get these days, still grants you rights that game publishers just don't want you to have. That's why physical game media will die, not because digital is the future, but because it's the future ass-hole publishers want. This of course only applies to console users because PC users were willing to sacrifice the rights that physical media offered years ago, so no PC gamer holds any right to sympathy over this. Seduced by their oh so precious Steam, they have been willing to accept basic buyers rights on a drip feed because "Praise Gaben". Yes, I'm a PC Gamer, but I'm no PCMR fanboy hypocrite as I consider the lack of physical media and the buyers rights that go with it a huge disadvantage with the platform. I own no game on Steam, just paid retail price for the right to play it. Digital media is paying for access to games, not actually buying them, and that's what publishers want.

A character creator that sticks out in my mind is Dragon's Dogma. You couldn't just alter the gender, face, race, class and so on like other western RPG's (Yes, I know the game was made by Capcom, but it is western style RPG, just made by a Japanese company. JRPGS are different and have their own defined traits and style, but save that debate for another topic.). You could also customize the body in terms of height, shape and weight in a way I've not seen in any other game. This even had gameplay effects as well, something else that very rare in these types of games. Obviously, getting down to the more precise details it's got its limits, but's it's no worse than any Bethesda RPG I've played. I just wish the rest of that game held up.

That's re-defined what goes through my mine when I hear "X Gon' Give it Ya". Back on topic though, another good example of great sound design immersing you in a game is Helblade: Senua's Sacrifice. For those who don't you, in that game, you're playing a Senua, a Celtic Warrior suffering from severe mental heath issues. The programmed the sound to, if you're wearing a suitable headset or headphones, to make it feel like the voices in her heard are really in YOUR head. I played the game like that it really is very uncomfortable and makes what is already a very daunting game that much more frightening. An amazing job Ninja Theory did on that.

Never underestimate the importance of sound design in a video game. Sound can alert you mind and provoke responses is a way visuals, no matter how detailed they are, can't. Poor sound design can also take you out of a games world very easily, I'd say more so than lower quality visuals.

Hi and welcome to the forums.

First thing I want to say is, that's a great article. Whether one agrees with your opinion on the game or not, that was well written. Fun and easy to read. Very good job. I'm always very dubious about mobile games and mobile game ports, I just don't trust the monetization practices, but your article got me interested and it's dirt cheep on stem right now, so I might just bite on this lure and give it a go.

https://www.vgr.com/never-been-easier-to-make-games-on-playstation-than-it-is-on-ps5/ I more or less agree with the article, but I want to expand onto something. I've seen this coming, not just for the PS5, but the Series X as well. The hardware and software architecture has been growing more similar to PC's in recent years, and not just any PC's, a single PC, with all the same parts in it, and that's important for game development on consoles. Developing games to operate on the same hardware is much easier than developing a game to work on thousands of different adequate hardware and software configurations. The article references the difficulties surrounding game development for the PS3. The PS3 was a beast, in fact even now there is no APU you can buy that can match its capabilities, but's complex architecture meant few game developers could easily tap into it's full potential. I bring this up for a reason. It may sound like I'm saying consoles should be even more like PC's, but in fact that couldn't be further from the truth. Consoles, their exclusives, they way the influence game development and the gaming industry as a whole are essential. All modern games are PC games really, that's how they're developed, but the last couple of generations consoles have become more like PC's. PC ports are only harder to develop because they have to work for thousands of different of adequate hardware and software configurations, whereas on consoles it's only as may versions of that console the is (Usually 2 or 3 tops). This close association to PC hardware architecture for consoles is good overall, but I really want consoles to remain consoles. Great quality exclusives, physical media (and the buyers rights that come with it) and the ease of use are great features a PC just lacks. Some say consoles hold PC game development back. I agree, but I see it as a good thing because if the fast paced world of PC gaming tech was left to set the bar for game development it would be disastrous. PC fanboys often delude themselves and others into thinking consoles don't need to exist, but like them or not, consoles need to exist. Now seriously, think about it. What would happen if the next generation of console just didn't happen? We'd be left with PC's, right? Doesn't sound so bad until you think it through. Gamers would constantly demand better graphics (as we do, admit it, we're vain little shits), so hardware manufactures would have to develop more powerful and expensive hardware to make that possible more frequently, making gaming more expensive. Without exclusive hardware platforms to promote, games would have to make money on their own, as would hardware manufactures who don't get a cut of software sales on PC like console manufactures do, again making gaming more expensive. It wouldn't do to sell hardware that will still be useful in a few years, like how no washing machine manufacturer makes a washing machine to last more than a couple of years, making gaming more expensive again. This higher hardware cost (that's already much higher or PC's than consoles anyway) would shrink the market for gaming hardware, thus shrink the market for games themselves as fewer people would have enough money to buy the hardware to play them on, meaning each game would, yet again, have to draw more money out of each customer, making gaming more expensive yet again. Game development itself would become more expensive to keep with the hardware advancements, yet again most likely increasing cost to gamers through higher prices and more shady business practices like microtransactions. Putting it bluntly, the cost of gaming for both developers/publishers and customers would spiral out of control to the point it was to expensive for everyone. Console exclusives also play their part. These games are made to sell not just themselves and make money, but to sell the console and give people a reason to buy them. That's why console exclusives tend to be best games, there's a purpose and focus to them to actually be good games that multiplat's just lack. Exclusive games are about making their own money, but also promoting the hardware you play them on, so less easily surrender to shady money making bullshit you see on major multiplatform games. So what I'm curious about guys and gals is, how close should consoles get to PC'S? Or should PC's even be more like consoles? What, for you, is the happy medium? Do you think I'm right or do believe that, based on this, my brain is smaller the boils on my rear end.

From a Scotsman to the rest of the forum as it is past midnight local time, it's Hogmanay! Happy New Year!

Data Processing Simulator. You already have some inexplicably popular simulation games based on incredibly tedious professions and tasks out there. So no concept, no matter how high the suicide rate is for people actually employed in it (Looking at YOU Farming Simulator), is too tedious for a video game for reasons I will never understand.

Not because of the crabs, it's because Crazycrab is boob face

Him...

Is Jerry Springer still a thing?

Let's just say he contagious and leave it at that.

Scalps, toes, souls, the usual. Seriously though, no really. I've got a modest amount of retro gaming stuff and one or two bits of heavy metal memorabilia, but nothing I'd call a collection.

I'm about to speak negatively of the Souls games. Before you read what I have to say, let me make something perfectly clear. If you're a fan of these games, I've got nothing against you. This is a re-telling of my own experience combined with what is only my own opinion, nothing more, nothing less. These games have appeal, just not to me. If you like them, good for you. I'm glad that you managed to find fun and satisfaction in them where I could not. So if you simply can't take negative critique of these games, I'm not responsible for how you feel if you choose to read on. Sorry, but I felt compelled to say this little disclaimer because some fans of these games are so sensitive and unable to take criticism they rally round to kick me off message boards and gaming communities just for expressing my opinion. I'm not kidding, it's happened before. I gave up on Deamon Souls, not because it was hard, but because it was crap. Basically, the game's "challenge" is a lie. Enemy behaviours and patterns are cryptic, nonsensical and unfairly prey on one's natural instincts as a gamer, so you can't use strategy, not to mention the blind traps in the environments. The controls are cripplingly and deliberately sluggish and slow to respond, so you can't rely on skill. All you can do is tediously go through a frustrating gauntlet of trial and error to figure out those cryptic patterns and trap placements, so all you really need to beat it is time. Time that the game just flat out doesn't deserve. I'll need to take a brave pill before I say this, but because of that the game isn't even challenging, at least not genuinely so anyway. You're even discouraged you from taking on enemies at a higher level for, well, you know, a challenge because you earn almost no XP from them. What other RPG has you earn no experience for taking on tougher enemies? I discovered this because the game deliberately misleads you into entering the wrong level at the start, that's how much an ass hole this game is. I get the mechanic of when you die, you have to try to fight back to where you were to get some of your XP back, I don't have a problem with that, but that's still very harsh in a game where you pretty much have to die then employ trial and error to progress. All that might have been fine if the rest of the game had something to offer, in fact no, nothing can absolve the bullshit this game throws at you, but the point is I think that game hides behind it so-called difficulty to distract players from its other issues. The graphics are horrible even by the standards of the day, cliché in its design and art style, has no story worth telling and the online component is pointless and only means the game can't be paused (In a single player RPG, that is just ludicrous). That "trial and "error" approach also makes the game more repetitive than it needed to be. I've never played a game that managed to be both this frustrating AND boring all at that the same time. I want an RPG to test my skill, reflexes and strategy. This game and it's inexplicably popular brethren are only good for testing your patience. I know in the minority with my view on this, but I don't care. Soul's fanboys always say I hate the game because I need to "Git Gut" and I'm just don't like a challenging game, but that's not true. That "trial and error" style of difficulty that these kinds of games employ is cheep, lazy and I'm even tempted to call it padding. So it's not that the game is hard, it's why it's hard that makes me hate it. To be clear, I have not played any of the Dark Souls series (Deamon Souls put me off for life), but from what I hear a lot of the problems like the storylines, blind traps and control issues are gone or greatly lessened, but that "trial and error" approach to difficulty is something that will always be a pet hate of mine, so I'm not interested in playing those types of games ever again. Thank you for reading. Can I ask that you at least sterilize your pitchforks before you use them? I don't want to get an infection.

Well, Christmas is all done, the kid's asleep, I've got a PS4 controller in one hand, a can of Lager in the other, Horizon Zero Dawn on the TV, I don't go back to work until the 6th of January and she's making a curry. Things could certainly be worse.

My son to be healthy and happy. I'd also like him to be rich, so I can retire early and mooch of his ass.

I'd have to look it up to get the precise details, but I believe what happened was a community leader and popular player on Fallout 76 exposed a bug or exploit in the game, recorded footage of it and reported it to Bethesda. However to show the exploit in the footage he obviously had to use it and that got him banned. I might be wrong, but I think that's what happened.

It's more like a Fallout 4 asset flip.

If 19 of them stop playing, the last one will get what we all wanted, a single player Fallout game.