This is another of the benefits of patient gaming, avoiding the delays caused by the double-dip fishing Rockstar does with their games. For me, the last three years’ release schedules have been so stacked that they don’t leave much room for temptation or frustration with delays. I’ve always got something to play.

I understand the frustration for the diehard GTA fans, but I would have figured those people moved to console if they weren’t already.

Could also try crossposting in !jrpg@lemmy.zip.

I don’t think it’s a super common opinion, but I really liked Starfield’s main story. That said, it completely fails on the dynamic world front. You might be better off with Cyberpunk for now.

Western-style ones, yeah. High-effort side content is CD Projekt’s specialty at this point.

It’s like the super bowl champs giving the next decade to the Bears.

nowhere is safe 😫

Well…that’s better than the 20+ I needed for Crusader Kings 2.

Jumped into Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous a couple weeks ago. Was a bit concerned at first because I enjoyed Kingmaker and kept hearing this one was better, but I was not feeling it. Then the end of the first chapter hit and the hook set in deep. I’m not far in, but the scope of this story is already really impressive. I feel like this is the kind of thing that’s too ambitious for me to ever have a chance at playing in tabletop (not without a really experienced DM and group, anyway), so it’s cool that this story can be experienced in this way.

Terra Invicta has been on my wishlist for a while now but I’ve been holding off because a) I sometimes avoid early access and b) the learning curve sounds brutal. Sounds like it’d be right up my alley if I got into it, though.

Surviving Mars is delightfully chill. Amazing soundtrack, too.

Some of us have favorites that arrived well after starting the series.

That said, I feel the need to tap the sign: if anyone thinks mainline Final Fantasy games are bad, they need to play some genuinely bad games for perspective. There are plenty available even within the genre: Beyond the Beyond, Ancient Roman, Lunar Dragon Song, etc.

The series is constantly reinventing itself, and that’s going to leave people behind. SQEX still manages to retain consistently high production quality despite that.

And it’s not just that. Half-Life also spawned Counter-Strike, one of the foundational pieces of e-sports (if not also the modding scene in general today). Not to mention being a precursor to today’s digital distribution model in the industry.

Yeah, I don’t think I realized how much nostalgia I had attached to the movie’s music.

The trailer had all the elements that felt good about movie games from back then, but there was a lot of actual trash put out back in the day.

Hopefully the gameplay is good on this.

The only one I have that hasn’t been mentioned yet is Suikoden II. Gorgeous sprite art, and it’s also just a solid game. Ironically, it’s getting a remaster very soon which is sure to clean up its biggest weakness (the English localization), though we don’t know how the rest of it will shake out.

I consider the fifth gen to be a lost generation for sprite-based games, this is one of those on the console that make the case for an interesting “what could have been” scenario (Symphony of the Night, Final Fantasy Tactics, and Valkyrie Profile also being sprite-based standouts).

Definitely one of my essentials. I think the gameplay is bit meh, but it’s still the best story in the genre.

Nice to see a shout-out for DOS2. I liked that it leaned into its sex scenes when called for. Too many M-rated games are still afraid to go there with it. I also feel like it’s a bit more earned when it takes a while to develop, or as is often the case, the setting is so oppressive that it puts romance firmly in the background. Mass Effect 3 was great about this.

Thanks. For those that don’t read Japanese (and want to drop it in their favorite MTL or what have you), here’s the relevant interview answer from creative director Jonathan Dumont:

――ネタバレは避けますが、ゲームのオープニング時の映像はちょっとびっくりするような、怪しげな感じでした。本作をクリアーするころには、その謎は解決するのか、あるいは謎に近づくことができるのでしょうか？

ジョナサン 　これは現代編の新しい出発点です。時間とともに発展するストーリー部分があるため、今後の複数のシリーズでも続きのストーリーが語られることでしょう。ここで目にするのは、長年のファンにとってすばらしく感じられる部分であり、新しい物語を予感できるはずです。また同時に、新しいプレイヤーにとっても非常に期待を持ってもらえるようなコンセプトになっていると思います。

Can we get a link? If you mean https://www.gamedeveloper.com/, they’ve only had one article specifically on Shadows this year and it’s about a service platform for the series, not the story.

What’s the source for this?

It’s definitely one of those that can take a little while to click with the player. I had the advantage of being deeply interested in the setting. It made me miss living in Oregon so, so much. Aside from that, I really came to like the characters by the end of the original game and Before the Storm.

I’ve continued to enjoy the series–yes, even the newest one–aside from LiS 2, which felt like misery porn after a while. That said, all of the games excel at getting the quiet moments right, and it’s worth taking a moment to pause when the game offers the chance.

“The original NES hardware literally only had around 55 colors that were pre-programmed in and no other color was allowed,” Wozniak explained. “We broke this rule by adding 5 colors to help with a few things the NES palette lacked⁠—namely, darker and desaturated colors. But we justified that decision by treating it as compensation for the fact that everyone is playing these games on much brighter, higher fidelity screens than the CRTs of the past.”

This is a great example of how some retro-style projects get it and some don’t. The successful projects are the one that have the feel of the games you used to play in the context of today’s gaming, not the ones that do a historically accurate, 1:1 conversion. There’s an art to it.

It has a strong 80’s vibe, so I was immediately attracted to it for that alone. I didn’t recall having much nostalgia for the original track, “Dear to the Heart,” and I still can’t parse whether I didn’t realize it or the synthwave here retroactively implanted it in my head.

Honestly, the original soundtrack wasn’t my favorite Final Fantasy soundtrack. Usage of music in video games has improved so much since then, and there weren’t many who knew what they were doing placing and looping music in games once composers started leaving chiptunes behind in the mid 90’s and were producing longer tracks with more real-world sound. Rebirth’s soundtrack is such an impressive project. The sheer size of it is colossal, and then they put dynamic music layering on top of a lot of it, even in quiet scenes. All the while, it somehow simultaneously fits the variety theme of the gameplay while evoking memories of the original game. Crazy.