general gaming

[quiet swift]

Yeah

Hmm. Seems that Normal was the only rarity, but some had affixes, which would in modern times be considered rares

And then the uniques, yes

[river veldt]

ZELDA II MENTIONED

[random steppe]

Checking the wiki, it was called "undead crown"

[random steppe]

Well magic, since I think it was limtied to two affixes

A suffix and a prefix

[quiet swift]

THE GRANDFATHER

[random steppe]

Rares in these games tend to have 3 or more

[quiet swift]

Where's the four hour youtube video about the history of ARPGs when you need it

THere's a few, but under 10 minutes and under 10k views

Meanwhile:

[random steppe]

There are many things I had to learn when I went deep and learned POE1 and 2

By far the most important of them all is that the ARPG fans are all whiny bitches

[quiet swift]

Well yes

This is Known ™

[slim thorn]

admittedly... my prejudice is that any genre literally defined by resemblance to an older game is... exceptionally likely to have that problem

[random steppe]

It's also crossed with "I'll play this game over and over for the next 10 years"

Another exceptionally whiny trait

Or I should say, predictive of whinyness

[slim thorn]

and a dash of "I played other game over and over for 10 years, why do none of your games make me do that" directed at 10 games all released in the last year competing for this exact niche

[random steppe]

very true

[random steppe]

The funny part is that they are pretty much always technically correct in their criticism

They do overblow the part that affect people that play the game A LOT but they are rarely incorrect about a problem, they are also exceptionally whiny though.

[bitter stream]

I think part of that, at least for PoE circles, is that memes and "balance posts whines" are sometimes effective at getting things changed.
One singular person submitted custom memes for delirium fog in the PoE 2 subreddit for two weeks, and come the announcement, delirium fog was reduced.

It.. maybe doesn't help that PoE bleeds into every other ARPG due to it's size? not sure.

[random steppe]

For example, the POE2 community is kind of up in arms right now, because in the next update they are putting out a new class and a new main mechanic, but are pushing back the Endgame rework they previously said would be coming.
Now, the endgame right now is kind of stale and repetitive, especially if you play that a lot, so they arenot "wrong" that it needs a rework, but also...

We get a new league and a new class, it's not like the game is dead.
The reaction is always "the sky is falling"

But at least they do whine at real problems, I guess in the gaming communities it is better than most.

[bitter stream]

aye aye. They always make GGG regret announcing future plans lol

[quiet swift]

Gamers a;waus ex[ect DLCs to be the size of brand new games

[bitter stream]

Maybe it helps me personally that I'm not hooked into the PoE social media systems. I play through the campaign, check out the new stuff, get to endgame and then stop lol

though I'm tempted to go a bit deeper into endgame if only for the new League Mechanics. the Atziri Temples or whatever their name is

they look sick

[random steppe]

This was the league that really got me into POE2 Endgame
Sadly POE2 completely destroyed any interest in POE1 because WASD is just a more interesting way to control your character in these games, so unless they eventually retrofit it inot POE1 I'm never gonna be able to touch that again.

[quiet swift]

Some of the D4 seasons are genuinely fun to play, but others do fall flat. I am curious as to what blizzcon 2026 will announce though, needs to be fairly big for them to even have a blizzcon. I'm guessing D4 xpac, since we technically already know about WoW's future content

[bitter stream]

yeah WASD feels so much better than mouse movement lol.
What's D4 like to play? I've not really played diablo since 2.

[slim thorn]

well, back in my day, "expansion packs"/DLC were that big!

just look at Call of Duty: United Offensive (2004)
or Mass Effect 2: Lair of the Shadow Broker (2010)
or... Outer Wilds: Echoes of the Eye (2021)
ok it's not just my day

[quiet swift]

I think my "back in my day" might be older than yours too

[slim thorn]

probably; I did play games before this but I might not have played an expansion pack before this

the genres I like weren't nearly as keen on that model as RPGs and RTSs and such

[quiet swift]

Trying to think of what the earliest expansion pack that I played was

[bitter stream]

Command and Conquer for me maybe? or maybe AoE 2

AoE 2 Age of Kings? probably

I got it from a Cereal box, if you can imagine that

[quiet swift]

Yeah I'm thinking C&C

Oh wait. Warcraft 2, beyond the dark portal

[bitter stream]

oh fair! those games were pretty popular for their time.

When did Battlefield 2 come out? that game was everywhere.

2005 huh, neat

[quiet swift]

Heck, even Diablo 1 had the Hellfire expansion

Both seem to be around 1996. I can't really think of many others earlier than that

[bitter stream]

Did wolfenstein have an expansion?

or was it just a sequel?

though... i think the second one was just more of the same with different levels lol

[slim thorn]

hm, Ultima VII: Forge of Virtue was 1992

[bitter stream]

wait, 1992 and it was a 7? how old is Uiltima?

[slim thorn]

80s, the original is in that pile of RPGs so early you could start using terms like "proto-RPG" for them

Akalabeth, sometimes retroactively called "Ultima 0", was 1980 and looked like this

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqkHWAzqKOrR8ZOa9n__bcQUyZYxzrwYISV-xroDZ3neDN5YjE2Xr851oLsT2UywDqY6Yf3J0_vGkMh4DafG0cBVJJ6r84hkpF_-TxO2KjWRFLV-lTqlkp51dibPOZ_jViof_Y-5g8AajI/s400/akalabethmain.PNG

[bitter stream]

holy moly

"the ancient texts"

[slim thorn]

Garriott designed the game as a hobbyist project, which is now recognized as one of the earliest known examples of a role-playing video game[2] and as a predecessor of the Ultima series of games that started Garriott's career.[3][4] Garriott is the sole author of the game, with the exception of title artwork by Keith Zabalaoui

he demoed the game – now renamed to Akalabeth – for his boss, [...] who suggested he sell the game in the store. Garriott consented and spent $200 to package and sell the game for $20 inside Ziploc bags, with photocopied instructions and a cover drawn by his mother. It warned "BEWARE FOOLISH MORTAL, YOU TRESPASS IN AKALABETH, WORLD OF DOOM!!"

it is about as ancient as the texts get

[bitter stream]

haha awesome

[slim thorn]

(oh right, and "Akalabeth" is technically a Tolkienism, which is why they had to pick a new name when he realized this was an actual career option)

aaaaaanyway

[bitter stream]

Tolkein estate Lawyers loading litigation with malicious intent.

[slim thorn]

I think Ultima VII was the first one to have a true expansion pack

at least in this series

so that's my best guess for earliest noteworthy expansion pack

[bitter stream]

fair enough

I wonder if any of the Mihoyo Gacha games will one day close, and then people will host offline versions of them.

There's gotta be older games like that right?

that closed for whatever reason, and people archived it?

[slim thorn]

googles "ultima online private servers"

yes

[bitter stream]

ah neat

I should do some research about older anime games.... or maybe play that Atelier Sophie game I picked up since I got it back recently haha

it just seems like so many of those anime gacha games have cool content, but I don't want to play them as they are atm

[slim thorn]

fwiw, my understanding of game history is that you can more or less blame Dragon Quest for immediately popularizing manga/anime art styles in the Japanese market

[bitter stream]

hah! fair enough

oh, there is a site that archives em, but it's in japanese lol. ah well

[slim thorn]

oh right, if you're including unlocalized games...

[bitter stream]

I was just thinking there's gotta be some "offline" old gachas and have just been googling to see what turns up

something without the actual pay to gacha system, but some of the fun gameplay

[slim thorn]

ah, "gacha" might be the wrong kind of genre to search for then

fwiw I've heard the earliest gachas were things like match-3 and other simple puzzle games

[bitter stream]

yeah fair enough. ah well. I guess if I really want to go gacha'ing I could alwasy Re-install Rainbow 6 Siege XD

that game has tons of lootbox cosmetics

but I don't really want to support those monetisation models.

[random steppe]

Since I check every time this gets mentioned, Yes Ultima Online official servers still exist, and yes, it's still essentially a montly subscription MMO

That said there is a free to play mode with some limitations, but it's essentialy still a subscription MMO to play in the official servers

It will still be online long after we are all dead, I'm convinced of that

It must costs peanuts to keep opperating it at this point

It's not even one of the cheap subscriptions, it's the full 12.99

[quiet swift]

Thank you blizzard for never upping the sub cost

[toxic seal]

Been playing the Mafia trilogy lately. Mafia I, loved it, Mafia II, decent but definitely not nearly as good as Mafia I.
So far I am about an hour into Mafia III and it has already become my favorite of the bunch. I just hope it continues to hold up.

[bitter stream]

ooh nice nice. have fun!

[icy crescent]

i just finished the series too, 1 and 2 are good but third just doesnt feels like italian mafia anymore

[astral steeple]

https://www.ign.com/articles/tekken-development-chief-katsuhiro-harada-announces-bandai-namco-exit-after-30-years

[cunning galleon]

I can't believe kamikaze drones are an actual thing in war thunder

[toxic seal]

As far as I can tell it's not meant to be an Italian mafia story anymore. It's meant to show the changing landscape of organized crime and different mob groups than what people are used to seeing in their heads when they think of the term "mafia."

[bronze abyss]

this is either great or a disaster,not inbetween

on one hand,he managed previous games so he knows more than other devs would,on the other hand his recent work was...questionable at best dogshit at worst

[cunning galleon]

Mafia I and II is amazing

Mafia I Tommy my beloved

[slim thorn]

interesting; when I read/watch game dev stories I often come away with the impression that most good designers are only good within a specific era, and sooner or later there will be some changes to the industry and/or audience expectations that they just don't adapt well to

[icy crescent]

true, but hey my boi vito scaletta still kickin

mafia 3 is literally just a john wick video game

the first mafia is the best as far for me, havent tried the old country yet but im so looking forward to it

[little badger]

New tomb raider being revealed at the game awards on Thursday

[rancid herald]

why are they telling us? don't the understand we only watch for the reveals

[little badger]

At least they haven’t told us the setting if it’s a mobile game we riot

[slim thorn]

I'm tempted to say "do they know what 'reveal' means"

but I guess they'll probably say something about how this is different from the last installment

[little badger]

What are you hoping to see?

[rancid herald]

spyro 4

lol

[little badger]

GT will faint if that happens

[river veldt]

what if Tomb Raider is what thhe statue is

[river veldt]

New Vegas remaster

[rancid herald]

the statue is actually the new expansion for civ 7 where they're adding heaven and hell civilizations

[fresh bane]

I know Lara has faced some monsters before including actual dinosaurs but I don't think she's fought literal demons from hell so I doubt it

[fresh bane]

This is going to be the first look at this ''unified'' version of the games they're doing right? I'm at least curious to see what this will look like

[rare dew]

Weren't there demons in the first game, or was that "monsters"?

[fresh bane]

I literally don't know I never played any Tomb Raider games before

[fresh bane]

I thought the design at least was a nice step in the right direction

[river veldt]

yeah i like that design a lot

[slim thorn]

I think it's supernatural monsters but not specifically religious? though the distinction gets pretty blurry when we're talking about deities from ancient mythologies

[random steppe]

Imagine if the eldrich statue is of Tomb fucking Raider
(Mostly joking)

[fresh bane]

jesus christ

I thought she was just stealing shiny artifacts what the hell are these games about

[random steppe]

Oh I see Cap had my same idea

But yeah, Tomb Raider 1 is pretty weird

Towards the end especially

[river veldt]

i just wanna know what this statue is lol

[uneven epoch]

i mean, arent mummy dinosaurs inherently cool?

[slim thorn]

the joke I kept hearing in old game retrospective video essays that touched on Tomb Raider is that the OG is unfair enough that almost nobody back then got to see these later levels with all the crazy monster designs

[uneven epoch]

(is it supposed to be a dinosaur? i think there's dinosaurs in tomb raider im like solid 80% sure)

[slim thorn]

yes, one of the famous moments of the OG Tomb Raider is an unexpected T-Rex walking up to you

[fresh bane]

Unexpected and T-Rex aren't usually words that go together

[slim thorn]

(I'm told it's also an unfair moment, apparently you kinda have to know it's there to have any chance of evading in time?)

[random steppe]

Never forget the doppleganger boss which is just a skinless lara monstrosity

[uneven epoch]

well it is an old game

unfair is frequently a correct word to describe them

[random steppe]

or the meat hole (one of many) towards the end.

[fresh bane]

Silent Hill 3 (2005)

[river veldt]

this is some Dusk shit

[random steppe]

They could definitely go horror if they wanted to

It'd be weird but not unprecedented

[uneven epoch]

cerberus vore mechanic

remember your ABC!

[random steppe]

It still sends me a decade later that the B team is the one that gets eaten because (B)elly

And the muffled music

[uneven epoch]

it feels like im always on adds or chains i like neverrrr get sorted into b in that alliance raid

[wind stump]

CONTEXT, BRNGI CONTEXT

[river veldt]

i was really tempted to quote that

[uneven epoch]

which leads to infrequent but joyous "hooray, vore time!"

i may be doing this on purpose

for morale

[random steppe]

That raid is a silly time

[little badger]

It was rumoured that the first game would be getting a remake. But I’d love to see the new game they are currently working on it’s been a while since the last game

[visual hill]

when the Super Mario Galaxy bnnuy is roleplaying the Skyrim intro:

[proud warren]

You got it flipped: galaxy came first. Skyrim is ripping off Mario Galaxy confirmed /j

[cunning galleon]

I watched a VTuber player Old Country and it looks great, it's like Mafia I where you're stuck in the story

Heard you manual start your cars too

[quiet swift]

Raora? 🐱

[cunning galleon]

Yes, beeg mama cat

She kept getting distracted by the little things.. She's so me

Amuni

[mossy flume]

Helldivers 2 pushed out a beta update which cuts the game's install size enormously, from about 150GB to about 23GB

It also seems to run better IME

[teal sonnet]

digital ozempic

[rugged flax]

yeah, because they deduped their game data
they had several copies of everything in the game data solely for people still running the game on HDDs to reduce drive seek times

[gaunt marten]

We talked about it earlier. Premature optimization strikes again

[minor plover]

if you know the game Euchre, you know the pain of this scenario: my teammate called diamonds.

[cunning galleon]

what the fuck

[minor plover]

but this time I got to make the call. Opponent got the queen. Didn't matter.

[minor plover]

presumably you want them in the seat indicated by a ... uhhh venn diagram and microwave for the row/column?

[cunning galleon]

oh its a coordinate thing

[minor plover]

yeah that's my best guess

[gaunt marten]

Yeah move them top right

[ripe escarp]

God please give us a new Spyro

Then again they'll probably use AI for it

[gaunt marten]

No reason to think like that

[ripe escarp]

Black Ops 7 has completely shattered my faith in any studio owned by Microsoft, especially Activision, being able to make a good game with no AI again

[gaunt marten]

Yeah, but getting mad about a hypothetical is not healthy for you

[ripe escarp]

I'm not mad, I'm just disappointed

[gaunt marten]

I urge you to focus on things you can change, have control over, are immediately relevant, or make you happy

[astral steeple]

I mean

Tony hawk pro skater 3+4 from this year and 1+2 from 5 years ago both are Activision

Both are probably like some of the best modern games of all time

[gaunt marten]

Oh, what's the best modern game pre 2000?

[dense crypt]

I'd unironically say either Doom, Half-Life, or Final Fantasy 7

[proud warren]

I'd argue doom since it has it's roots as deep as it is in terms of influence

as a standalone game, not looking at any sort of influence it may bring, I'd prolly say Half life tho

[gaunt marten]

None of these are modern

[proud warren]

then care to give an example of what is modern then?

[gaunt marten]

A good rule of thumb is that if a person who was born after the video game was released is old enough to drive, it's probably not modern!

[proud warren]

well by that logic, how would that make sense to call anything pre-2000 "modern"?

are you referring to franchises that came before 2000 that had their most modern release recently?

[grim stirrup]

i personally think billy hatcher and the giant egg is the best modern game of all time

[proud warren]

I have not played it myself, but I've seen an entire playthru in 1 sitting before

[slim thorn]

honestly I assumed this was a joke

(I'm also used to comic books literally defining "the modern era" as post-2000 )

[gaunt marten]

It was a joke!

[proud warren]

welp

I couldn't tell

[gaunt marten]

It seemed funny to me that the same sentence had the qualifiers "of all time" and also "modern"

[slim thorn]

that too

[proud warren]

guess it just goes to show how bad I am at picking up jokes

[slim thorn]

tbf there also could be an unironic reading, e.g. a game that was ahead of its time when it came out but in retrospect feels oddly like a current game

[gaunt marten]

I don't blame you. I did not make it obvious that it was a joke

[slim thorn]

but I can't think of any candidates for that before 2000

plus in this context the fact that you can't be sure is arguably part of the joke

people say nonsensical things about their favorite media all the time

[proud warren]

closest I can say are some of the metal gear games, but those games (aside from the first one) baaarely just didn't make it before the 2000 threshold

[slim thorn]

yeah, I don't think any of the early 3D games can quite fit that just because the graphics date them so hard

my closest would be the original Call of Duty (2003), because at the time that style of cinematic campaign design with tons of highly scripted events was novel and groundbreaking, but of course now that it's been the norm for decades it's painfully cliche

[proud warren]

also are we talking like, well developed story, or gameplay, or graphics, or something else I'm not thinking of?

[slim thorn]

that's probably where the discussion gets interesting

I think graphics is just out of the running because of the simple reality of tech progression during our lifetimes

some old games still look great but they certainly don't look modern

even Myst stopped being a bunch of still images when they remade it

story, ironically, is IMO also out of the running because is you take it in isolation, games have been all over the place on that metric from the beginning; purely text-based games have always been capable of amazing stories, just with relatively weak production values to back them up (not unlike a paper book)

[proud warren]

trying to think if anything groundbreaking released from newgrounds before 2000 lmao

can't look to The Behemoth cus it wasn't even around yet

[slim thorn]

Hm... Cave Story was 2004. That's not AAA of course, and I do think it's been outdone since, but it still feels like a lot of modern indie titles.

seems like I keep landing on the early 00s

[gaunt marten]

Oh

[slim thorn]

yeah editing fail

[proud warren]

would you count D&D in the conversation?
I'm kidding of course, I figured this prolly doesn't count as it's not necessarily on a screen like any other game in the conversation

[gaunt marten]

A video game must be a video game to be a video game

[slim thorn]

not only that, but a video game specifically working like D&D is an 80s-90s trend, which RPGs took a while to grow out of

(yes I'm aware Baldur's Gate 3 exists)

[proud warren]

I mean to be fair, you did just say "game" and not "video game", but semantics gonna semantic

[gaunt marten]

If we go by what I said instead of what I meant, the answer is probably chess

[proud warren]

so true

[slim thorn]

what was the first chess website? /hj

[proud warren]

prolly not around any more in all honesty

[gaunt marten]

Odds are it was played by post

[proud warren]

joke went right over my head prolly, but I'll just nod

[gaunt marten]

Yep https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online_chess#History

[proud warren]

email chess is not where I thought online chess started

[gaunt marten]

That's what play-by-post means

[proud warren]

I see

[gaunt marten]

You post your move, your enemy updates your side of their board, and you update your side of your board

Then they post their move

You have a lot of time to think that way

[proud warren]

I would have thought something simpler like tic tac toe would have done this first, but idk prolly not considering how iron clad chess rules seems to be

[gaunt marten]

Tic tac toe was also done

[proud warren]

well which came first?

[gaunt marten]

Probably around the same time -- all it takes is you emailing your grandma and saying "let's play x"

So you can't put an exact date to that

[proud warren]

yeah that adds up

[dense crypt]

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/756622375927283782/1447866875844231178/image.png?ex=69392e9b&is=6937dd1b&hm=f5fbdf73d3bda565c9f0eb79561a937f381bb9b2dcf67edd3f001dae3f0eae64&

Robler

I love my Robler fashion

Not like it's easy to tell what's going on here, mind...

[arctic fern]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2791510/Frostpunk_2_Fractured_Utopias/?curator_clanid=41041469 i was invited to the betatest of this dlc, and it was really good
little disappointing there was no story/campaign set around the new features but what can you do
i actually dont know if the features arent included in the new london campaign, need to check
but yeah, DRASTICALLY changes utopia mode

Steam

Frostpunk 2: Fractured Utopias

You can purchase this DLC as a standalone product, or as part of the Deluxe Edition Upgrade at a discount, together with the two other planned DLCs and bonus digital items.

The Deluxe Edition Upgrade does not support the "complete the set" feature. Please keep in mind that if you purchase a single DLC, the price of that DLC won't be deducted if…

Price

$12.99

[hushed onyx]

Chess has a very long history of play-by-post ("correspondence chess"), far predating computers, so sending moves by email instead of postal mail would not be a large change or require any alterations of any kind.

[slim thorn]

I think it's even a trope in fiction that you can establish someone as cultured and sophisticated by showing their house has a random chessboard that's presumably doing play-by-post because it's arranged like a game is in progress but no one's sitting at it

[arctic fern]

gonna stream some of the new content in vc

[cunning galleon]

The preview gave me a funny blurry image, aw man it isn't blurry

[arctic fern]

question, do i allow peoples private data to be publicy displayed or keep it private?
yes somehow these are two options

[sacred grove]

Don't worry, a data breach will make it public anyway

[arctic fern]

lol

[slim thorn]

unless you start very heavily policing hackers

that's an option right

[arctic fern]

this is like 1900 something, there are no hackers
this is data posted on billboards with paper

[slim thorn]

lol

[arctic fern]

what do i do lads? both are legit options
public randomly reduces workforce requirement, goods or food demand, or makes things more tense
private increases trust but drastically reduces favor from the technocrats

[gaunt marten]

Which private data is it,

[arctic fern]

from doing this

[gaunt marten]

This sort of data is not that bad, but I like being nice so fuck the technocrats

[arctic fern]

lol

thats fair

[sacred grove]

In modern times: people will voluntarily post this information on social media

[gaunt marten]

Nobody is posting their job performance metrics on social media without being made fun of

[rugged flax]

https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:gwp2nvce3rk5nwcmik7zpfnn/post/3m7j5cpwn2k2c

Trinket (@trinketbirdy.bsky.social)

I know people hate SC for it being buggy but I'm afraid I adore the kind of bugs that happen in this game

Bluesky · Dec 8, 2025, 11:04 PM

[green fulcrum]

These bugs I love

Just goofy things that can easily become memes in the community

Like the silly ragdoll physics in Bethesda games

[robust latch]

Best part when the new turtle fuse burns out you can make turtle soup

[worthy rose]

Wasn't there something about dwarf fortress babies worshipping gods at birth being fixed?

[slim thorn]

in my own mods, by far the best bugfix patch note I ever got to write was "nerfed the sun so it only kills you once when you die"

[wind stump]

I'm going to kill you, then kill you again.

[cerulean herald]

yep

#1032716748887179434 message

[mossy flume]

Fantastic

Conflicting item IDs area great

[worthy rose]

Best thing i saw while working for swtor was a localization issue. Ace as in a pilot, is translated to "Ass" in German. So when the space ship "ace-plug 2468" was translated...

[cerulean herald]

🫠

[slim thorn]

I ended up browing other DF bugs including https://dwarffortressbugtracker.com/view.php?id=0010350 "Horses have objects of worship"

and my first thought was "wait that's not a bug"

[worthy rose]

https://automaton-media.com/en/news/square-enixs-major-shareholder-drops-100-page-presentation-criticizing-how-the-company-is-managed-rallies-other-shareholders/

[worthy rose]

Woof. This is not a good look for the fired leads. https://wccftech.com/krafton-claims-unknown-worlds-founders-do-not-want-nor-deserve-their-jobs-back-subnautica/

[fresh bane]

The PS Store just leaked the box art for RE9

[wind stump]

Content Warning: Content Warning video

and he made the same joke i just made

Landfall made Peak?
Man, they're really getting their hands in all the pies

[craggy vine]

For as funny as content warning is, it is also a really great horror game

The feeling of getting lost, the earie look with dark lighting and black and white, limited battery for lights

Yeah it's a little goofy but it is scary when you're wondering around, potentially lost, and then a mixer is charging head on at you down a hallway

[wind stump]

having watched the video, yeah there's some pretty sp00ky dudes

but also FIRE TURTLE

[rugged flax]

damnit bethesda we didn't need yet another skyrim version
https://youtu.be/nHxhOQsSj6E

[mossy flume]

One might think that Bethesda just makes that one game

Apparently it doesn't run at 60FPS on the Switch 2, which is just.... how.

[arctic fern]

will this version have basic bug fixes?

[rugged flax]

Fallout 5?
Nah
Another Skyrim

[worthy rose]

It makes others?

[mossy flume]

How is your engine from fifteen years ago so bad that it can't run on a console from this year at full speed?

[fresh bane]

I saw Santa and thought this was that terrible christmas AI ad

also another Skyrim re-release lol lmao

[craggy vine]

I guess Skyrim is as hard to run as Cyberpunk

They better have really pumped up the visuals to have it be at 30 fps

And even at that, knowing them, mods from 10 years ago would look vastly better and potentially even run better

It's like when the special edition came out and it's like 'oh I already made my skyrim look 3x better then this'. But at least 64 bit is a lot more appreciated for modding, 32 bit always sucks with its ram limit

[fresh bane]

Seems like the mysterious statue also has been deciphered, people are talking about the game it's likeliest to be more tied to

People were looking at trademarks registered and found one for || Divinity || with a logo pretty much identical to the one in the statue

[fickle garnet]

O shit

Hype if true

[fresh bane]

Some key art for some characters has been leaked as well

So, watch out for that I guess

[worthy rose]

I just saw that. That would be so fucking awesome if true

[slim thorn]

oh, the details of this got kinda sad

Animals trying to worship some gods and not succeeding may be why they are then getting distracted

As with other posters, it appears to be related to them still having needs but being unable to fulfill them, in particular the "pray" need - they cluster around the temple and are there almost always, whereas my citizens only go there occasionally.

In addition to the assignment of deities to [historical figure] animals (inherited by their offspring), animals can also crave alcohol and be distracted because of that. My confirmed instance was a pet cat who also was distracted because of a lack of praying.

[dense crypt]

that is kinda sad

a voiceless animal that cannot pray to a god it believes in

[green fulcrum]

The tradition continues!

[fickle garnet]

I saw an article about that yesterday, I really hope I don't get spoiled

[mossy flume]

https://youtu.be/eVTYD1AuEN0?si=TP31mNtxCbDOBdBM

[quiet swift]

[bitter stream]

is stranger things that big?

why is it showing up in so many places lol

[mossy flume]

I guess so?

I’ve only ever heard about it in passing and the synopsis didn’t seem too interesting to me

[cerulean herald]

it was pretty massive, back then at least

[mossy flume]

They’re doing the final season now, I think

[quiet swift]

[mossy flume]

So I guess they’re getting in on the cash deals while they can

[fickle garnet]

Anything but letting it end

[bitter stream]

oh i see, fair enough

[astral steeple]

Isn't the whole thing with flight simulator is that it's supposed to be the earth lol

[mossy flume]

Yes

And indeed it is, at full scale with realtime weather and ATC data

And high quality satellite imagery and 3D models for both geography and features like buildings

But MSFS2024 added the ability to create mission-based scenarios. They can also be instantiated.

[astral steeple]

They should just do a mlp FIM expansion lol

[mossy flume]

They did a Top Gun one too, because of course

[river veldt]

yeah it's always been big. iirc volume 1 of Season 5 briefly crashed netflix

anyways that's really cool Midnight

wish i played Microsoft Flight Sim

[bitter stream]

ah ok Captain Mario, that is pretty big

[mossy flume]

Me too

I have it and play it sometimes, but I'm impatient these days and have a hard time playing games because my brain just goes "You could be doing something productive, you know"

[bitter stream]

that feeling is the bane of free time haha, I hate it

[mossy flume]

MSFS is a bit of a time sink

Heh indeed

[bitter stream]

i sometimes get the more granular, "This game isn't as optimally fun as another game, so I should stop playing"

which is like, c'mon brain

wtf

[mossy flume]

Gotta minmax your fun input

[bitter stream]

hahahah

yeahhhh, it's an issue sometimes. Like, I way overthink what "quality gaming" is and then don't end up playing anything instead

If i spent that time actually playing, I'd have more fun

haha

it does have some uses though, in that I avoid money sink games or games with really bad monetisation

[mossy flume]

True, true

[bitter stream]

I'm really excited to see the next update for Last Epoch, they announced a bunch of things coming in S4, but er, it's 3 more months away lol, March 26th or so.

It's been 4 months since the last update

I think playing PoE has spoiled me for update cadanece in video games

anyone else here play Diablo-like ARPGs?

[mossy flume]

I really need to get around to trying Path of Exile, it looks like my jam

[astral steeple]

WHAT

[bitter stream]

oooh if you do give it a shot, let me know! PoE 1 is a bit obtuse to learn, so I can help there. PoE 2 isn't yet Free to play as it's not fully out, but if you go that route it's better explained and graphically better etc

[random steppe]

The biggest benefit of going into POE2 is that it has way fewer systems

As it's a much younger game

It doesn't have a literal 12 years of content piled up on it

It is much easier to dip your toes in IMO, that said it's also a negative because well...it does't have 12 years of content for you to do

[bitter stream]

yup yup

[river veldt]

is PoE a mmo

[gaunt marten]

Yes and no

[river veldt]

care to elaborate ....?

[bitter stream]

not in the traditional sense of the MMO term

So there's a player economy, multiplayer, and trading

but generally people tend to play solo

occasionally party play

[river veldt]

ah

[gaunt marten]

It also needs an internet connection to play and they can ban you from playing it single player

[bitter stream]

However, due to items being giga-critical to a builds power, you're always interacting with the economy of the game if you're tryingi to craft, get certain build enabling uniques, and so on

The game is also designed to have multiple players doing different things

hmm

how to say

In PoE 1 for example, people focus on a particular league mechanic, and trade it with others to get access to other rewards from people focusing on other league mechanics

[fresh bane]

The confusing thing is PoE could mean two completely different games

[river veldt]

what's the other one

[fresh bane]

It could be either Path of Exile or Pillars of Eternity

[quiet swift]

Pillars is guud

[river veldt]

ive never heard ofnit

[fresh bane]

I don't know anything about either of the games but I have heard discussion of them and it's always confusing to know which one is being discussed because of the acronym

[slim thorn]

I know just enough to know they're Not My Thing ™

[fresh bane]

I could see myself playing Path of Exile 2 maybe, I was playing Torchlight earlier in the year and I found myself really really liking it, it's just a relaxing genre to kinda tune into and play for a few hours

just good old dungeon crawling

[river veldt]

alll i know about PoE is when Mr Twitter was paying someone to level his character for him or something to that effect

[fresh bane]

well if it helps it's kinda like diablo

[gaunt marten]

Yeah I tried Path of Exile and found it thoroughly represented a lot of things I didn't enjoy

[fresh bane]

ARPGs in general or just specific mechanics?

The only thing that stopped me from playing Diablo once was just the old game feel, which I'm usually fine with, but for games that old it gets a bit in the way

I never tried Diablo 2 but I'm guessing it's probably the same ish

[river veldt]

Diablo looks interesting

[gaunt marten]

Path of exiles specifically

[fresh bane]

I would ask for more details but I don't think I know enough about the genre to really grasp someone's gripes with the mechanics of a specific ARPG

[slim thorn]

"I can't believe they used a health bar. Everyone knows this genre is all about the health circles."

[gaunt marten]

It's more that the online only, trading and leagues focused nature prevents me from having a game I can play whenever and focus on optimizing

[fresh bane]

You know it's funny you say that because a streamer I watch was casually playing PoE2 the other night and I said in chat ''you know diablo had it right when they said what if BIG RED ORB for health''

and then every other ARPG did that and you know what, yeah I get it

[gaunt marten]

Not to mention FOMO and aggressive monetization

[river veldt]

how does the big red orb work

[slim thorn]

it's just a vertical bar that's weirdly thick in the middle

[river veldt]

hold on a sec

[gaunt marten]

I'm holding

[river veldt]

oh it drains

[gaunt marten]

Let me know when I can breathe

[river veldt]

you can breathe now

[gaunt marten]

Thanks

[slim thorn]

"line of icons" is also fairly common though it feels like a variation on "bar"

the only other health UI shape I can think of is a health spiral in Soul Reaver

[river veldt]

hmm

[fresh bane]

just an orb

[fresh bane]

well that's the tradeoff for free to play games I guess

[gaunt marten]

Doesn't have to be

There are free to play games with none of that

[fresh bane]

It never has to be, but it do be the way it be

unfortunately

[gaunt marten]

No

I don't need to just sit and say "that's how it is"

I can discourage people from making games like that by not playing them, and encourage healthier monetization by rewarding it

[river veldt]

ive decided i dislike the orb

[fresh bane]

Of course not, and that's why you don't support any games that do this kind of stuff, which is what I do

it is the way it is, that doesn't mean I'd tell others to just accept that though

some people, that is to say a lot of people, find it really hard to do that for some reason, but I have no problems with not playing a game if it means not supporting shitty practices because I have a million old games to play as it is anyway

[random steppe]

I do feel that Poe in the grand scheme of things it's pretty okay as far as monetisation goes.
Could be better, but I do have some level of grace when I approach f2p games, as I do expect to pay something at some point to be playing any game

The worst thing they do is the cosmetics loot boxes if you ask me, but also they do deliver a massive expansions every 3 months or so.

[gaunt marten]

It felt really bad to me compared to paying for a game upfront

[random steppe]

Yeah I do prefere that model when it's avaialble, that said if we look at the current games in the genre I do feel like it's the best one of the currently acrive ones as far as having a pretty generous offer

Like, Diablo 4 do pay the game in advance, full price at 50 bucks, then they have a battlepass, and a cosmetic shop on top of that, and they also are releasing paid expenasion.
Fuck that.

Last Epoch was pretty good, 30 bucks.
But they do also have a cash shop, and now they are plannint to sell classes indipendently.
Even though the content expansions will be free, so it's already better than D4 somewhat.

That's the main 2 competitors, there is other stuff, I think No Rest of the Wicked has promise and it's a one time buy I think, we'll see where that goes

[gaunt marten]

That's why I simply don't play any games in the genre

[random steppe]

I do like the genre though, and I want to play it

[gaunt marten]

Same! However

[slim thorn]

I often wonder what I would do if one of the genres I cared about had more of these problems

the worst I get is, like, Metroid Prime 4 having extra music behind an amiibo? wouldn't have even known about that if MA wasn't mad about it

[river veldt]

Metroid gacha game comin soon

[random steppe]

It's also fair to mention that it's one of those genres that are done better when iterated upon, like, I think the formula of seasonal new content works really really well for this, and if the devs gotta eat, I do think they have to sell you stuff for that to be a thing that's sustainable.

[slim thorn]

remember that time Nintendo put literal in-universe gacha machines in a Zelda game, but with no irl monetization attached

[random steppe]

(I should clarify, there is basically nothing gacha in PoE except some lootboxes for cosmetics if you consider that gacha, the only gameplay affecting stuff they sell is extra stash tabs, so essentially quality of life)

[astral steeple]

Lootboxes should just be illegal at this point

[random steppe]

I tend to agree, I don't like lootboxes.

At the very least they should be strictly regulated.

[astral steeple]

Just make it to where all items are directly purchasable instead

Like with pubg mobile it uses lootboxes for its cosmetics

people had to spend like 500 dollars with rerolling over and over just to get the goku skin

That doesn't even take into account the other 3 characters either

So that's even more

[random steppe]

I am not sure what regulations I would like to see exactly, but yeah, if you want to have them in your game it's fine, but put spending limits on how much you can spend on them so people don't destroy their lives.

Also publish the odds.

I would be happy with those two things, I think that would already fix the vast majority of instances in which they are actually super destructive.

[astral steeple]

Overall would just be better being completely removed and then replaced with knowing what items you're getting and the actual cost itself

And how long the items stay etc

[gaunt marten]

Lootboxes are perfectly fine, as long as they are treated the exact same way as other gambling

[slim thorn]

I might be okay with a lootbox that is always bypassable by direct purchase and has mandatory pity on rolls, given some reasonable limits

[random steppe]

Yeah, I do think with those two things you do eliminate the incentive for putting them there in the first place so I do think it would essentially make it so almost no one uses them in their games anymore.

[slim thorn]

though as a player I'm still likely to just run away very fast from any game that isn't a one-off upfront purchase

[random steppe]

Like, the draw of a lootbox for a game dev, is that you have people that pull the lever thousands of times

[slim thorn]

I never want to think about irl money in a video game, that immediately takes the "play" out of the game

[random steppe]

If you put spending limits, you do cut a lot of that draw

[slim thorn]

probably, not that this is an argument against limits

[astral steeple]

It's also weird cause the regular console pubg has no lootboxes whatsoever despite the mobile version being filled with them

[random steppe]

POE works for me because you buy a stash tab maybe at the start of a season for a new mechanic, if you want to (most of the time you even don't, and wait to see how the mechanic is and if you even want one for it, maybe you even hate it and want nothing to do with it) and never think about it for the subsequent 6 months of fun you are having with the game, so it's not something that is in your mind while you are playing it.

[slim thorn]

makes sense

if I ever played only one game for 6 months maybe I could relate

[fresh bane]

I remember when I was a kid and first finding out about the concept of an MMO subscription, I thought WoW was a thing you paid for like a normal game, I could never wrap my head around the concept of having to pay monthly to even be able to access the game, I'd be so insanely anxious all the time about optimizing the time I have with the game to do as much as possible I could never have any actual fun with it

[random steppe]

Well to be fair, I don' play it for 6 months straight, but yeah.
I did level like 4 characters to endgame this league so I did play it a lot more than usual

[fresh bane]

to this day I still don't know how people do it, I've thought about playing MMOs like The Old Republic before but I just can't with that whole model

[gaunt marten]

I was so sad when I spent three months of my allowance to buy Everquest because the cover art looked so cool

And then I found out I need both internet and to keep paying in order to play it

[fresh bane]

I would feel so terrible if I went one day without playing and thinking ''man I just burned through one day of my subscription that's money I'm not getting back''

[gaunt marten]

I couldn't return the game because I already damaged the box obsessing over the manual and the cover

[fresh bane]

and that's when you go complain to the guy at the store and he points you to the very small text in the back of the cover saying *requires in-game purchases

[astral steeple]

The longest I've played a game for overall is 10,568 hours iirc lol

Since 2019

[random steppe]

My first online subscription MMO, was Ragnarok Online

It was at a point in which paying for a game online was pretty new, and I was 18 and didn't have a credit card, so to pay it I had to go to the post office to make a wire directly to the company.

Every month

[fresh bane]

[random steppe]

EVERY MONTH

[fresh bane]

the game can't be that good you went out of your way to do that for many months...

[random steppe]

I mean, first MMO and the social experiences you get from it, it's usually pretty damn unique

[fresh bane]

Oh right, I missed that part

[random steppe]

I went and spend literaly new years parties with some of the people I met through that game

[quiet swift]

My first MMO was FF 11. But then the WOW nation attacked

[fresh bane]

Unfortunately I never got to experience that because by the time I was old enough to even think and have consciousness WoW was already like maybe 7 years old

[fresh bane]

I still can't believe that game was on the PS2, the concept of the PS2 having online to that degree is so alien to me because I never had that functionality

[quiet swift]

I'm still amused at when they first made FF14, it feels like they saw all the worst part of ff1 and thought "yknow, let's keep all that and make it worse"

[fresh bane]

That's kinda the part I was always fascinated by with these games when I was a kid, just the second life (heh) aspect of it all where you could play the game super sweat-like but you could also just chill, maybe meet some people, go somewhere

it's not like a shooter or a moba, it's like a little simulated world you can chill out in

[green fulcrum]

FF1? Did you mean FF11?

[quiet swift]

yes

[cunning galleon]

This game is honestly not bad

[cunning galleon]

Who gave her a BAR..

[quiet swift]

https://frontlinegaming-org.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/frontlinegaming.org/2025/12/08/what-we-learned-about-the-new-starcraft-game-at-essen and things come full circle...

Miniatures!

[visual hill]

the definitive version of Gran Turismo 4 is an online beta that happens to have some bug fixes and better widescreen support

(even for singleplayer, that is)

[astral steeple]

Rayman 2: The Great Escape and Tonic Trouble are coming to the Nintendo 64 Nintendo Classics app on Dec 17 for Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack members

[wind stump]

Go.
Do a crime.

[wind stump]

Water physics!

[astral steeple]

Nice

[river veldt]

i think a new Sonic game is gonna be revealed at the Game Awards

[visual hill]

whoa, been a while since Rayman had a retro re-release

and for Tonic Trouble, I think it's the first time it happened. That game was made on the Rayman 2 engine (same for Donald Duck Goin' Quackers too... I had that one as a kid)

[ripe escarp]

You should play Rayman Revolution

[visual hill]

I did that in 2022

[ripe escarp]

It's Rayman 2 but good

[visual hill]

it's cool, but the overworld breaks the game's pacing

they managed to make it feel like an AAA slop game before it was cool

[ripe escarp]

Damn

[visual hill]

it's also 30 FPS and lacks widescreen out of the box, but you can fix that in PCSX2

(due to this, the Dreamcast version is a lot better if you play on OG hardware, but the difference is less stark on emulation)

I have yet to play Rayman 3 personally, although I did watch my brother play a part of it when I was young. We had it on a CD bundled in a games magazine around 2007

[ripe escarp]

The final boss is a turret section

[rugged flax]

Dorf Fort is on sale 20% off on Steam right now if anyone is looking to buy it

[dense crypt]

"I don't feel so good..."

[wind stump]

even free it's not worth it

[mossy flume]

Speaking of Dort Fort, I just discovered that they've finally added cloud saves?

[mossy flume]

Oh, nope, unfortunately

[wind stump]

well you try saving using precipitation!

[astral steeple]

Geoff Keighley - "Tune into The Game Awards tomorrow to find out the mystery free game coming to the Epic Games Store"

🤔

[river veldt]

Minecraft

[astral steeple]

lol

Has to be something huge

[light gate]

Imagine if it was this.

Jokes aside, probably some rando triple a game. Or Expedition 33.

[visual hill]

E33 is too new/selling too well to be offered for free just yet

the "big game" offered by Epic is usually 2-3 years old

e.g. Death Stranding in 2021 (or was it 2022?)

[rancid herald]

the big game is civilization 7

[visual hill]

maybe, but I'll be sad if it is (I don't like that genre )

[green fulcrum]

Man, I'm gonna be working at that time :(

[slender wolf]

sometimes you get a "big" games sooner if it's either a game with tons and tons of dlc and/or one that isn't selling well, i think

like sims 4 they eventually just made free because the money is all in the dlc anyway

not just free via EGS, it's just free forever now

like fortnite, it's a platform for microtransactions

i feel like some games with Xbox Game Pass (like most of the Age of Empires series or Forza anything) heavily lean into microtransactions too to make up for being "free"

sure, the base AoE is free with game pass... but there's like a dozen DLCs, and those aren't free.

[hushed onyx]

Which base Age of Empires are you talking about?

[visual hill]

AOE4, I assume

[bitter stream]

Cause, like, all the AOE games are expansion based, they don't have microtransactions in the modern sense of the word

[hushed onyx]

Oh, I would have assumed Age of Empires II, since that's the one people seem to care most about

Although I was seeing some stats that showed Age of Empires 4 was close in player count earlier today, so IDK.

[bitter stream]

oh that's good news

AOE 4 seems good

but i've played AoE 2 since i already had it

[slender wolf]

Both 4 and 2

[slender wolf]

Yeah, I mean, Sims also focuses on expansions over micro transactions, I was just kinda considering them somewhat interchangeable

[robust latch]

There was a microsoft support post years and years ago asking how to get the original AoE2 working on i think windows 7. DirectX error.

The MS support tech told the person to update to AoE3

[hushed onyx]

[slender wolf]

Both are ways to monetize a game and work fine even if the game is free

In some ways they work better with a free game since you have a larger audience

Anyone with game pass can play the base age of empires ii and decide if they like it enough to buy the dlc

[hushed onyx]

The thing about Age of Empires II, though, is that the DLC is really optional. If you want to play all of the campaigns (and Age of Empires content!), sure, but the top civ for highly-skilled players on the ranked ladder is...Chinese, a base game civ all the way from 1999. And a number of the other base game civs are quite competitive (especially since the base game now is Definitive Edition).

[slender wolf]

Yes, this is very true, it's not pay to win

[bitter stream]

I suppose so for Gamepass? but you pay a lot for gamepass, idk if it's really "free 2 play" haha

[slender wolf]

I was always careful to say "free with game pass"

Not free in the traditional sense

PC game pass used to be $10/month, now I think it's $16

[bitter stream]

that's... not free at all?

i wonder how much it is here since they raised the price again

[slender wolf]

Well, yeah, there's not an elegant word in English for "no extra charge with a subscription service" really. "No extra charge" is three words

Anyway you are correct game pass is expensive

[bitter stream]

Perhaps that says more about how subscription services are often saddled with extra charges haha

[slender wolf]

When it was $10 a month I think it was still a no brainer value though

[bitter stream]

yeah, i can understand that

especially if you don't have a collection already

right now though...

[slender wolf]

Biiiig price hike

[slender wolf]

PC game pass is about the same price as premium

It's hidden down below

It's got similar game count to ultimate, but doesn't work on consoles and doesn't include streaming

[astral steeple]

Even ultimate at its current price is super worth it

A bit pricey but still worth the value overall

[slender wolf]

It doesn't include console only games but otherwise the game list is very similar to ultimate

Including day one cod

[hushed onyx]

At that price, wouldn't it be cheaper to just buy Age of Empires II if you end up playing it for more than a month or so?

[slender wolf]

Yes, but the plan includes like 400 games, and they're always adding more.

Many of them are $70-80 games like cod and doom dark ages

[hushed onyx]

That rather makes it less attractive because I'm unlikely to play more than one or two games in a month.

[slender wolf]

Fair

[quiet swift]

Aw. Larian has said that game awards statue in the desert isn't for a Divinity game

[astral steeple]

Realistically though they need to add more og xbox and 360 games to game pass to make it even better lol

So many great games missing

[fickle garnet]

[fresh bane]

They said they don't have any plans for Divinity Original Sin 3 specifically

[hushed onyx]

Also, in practice I have such a large backlog of games I could play or replay that purchasing new games other than updates to games I already have (i.e., something like Stellaris 2) doesn't really make sense.

Even if I asked for such a new game for Christmas

[fickle garnet]

I'll hold onto whatever hope I can

I'd be so happy if it was a new Larian game, even if it wasn't Divinity

[quiet swift]

[bitter stream]

wait, if not Divinity? then what lol

[hushed onyx]

Traveler! 😛

[fickle garnet]

It could still be Divinity, just not Original Sin 3

[astral steeple]

Pretty sure the statue straight up is identical to the divinity logo

[fresh bane]

I wouldn't just straight up say it considering the game awards are one day away and those are leaks some people may not wanna know about...

[visual hill]

I remember the DOS2 hype when I freshly joined Manechat in 2017

[fickle garnet]

Larian should make a Sci-Fi game, that'd be cool

[bitter stream]

idk if t here's as much market for sci fi

it just seems like fantasy sells better

[fickle garnet]

Maybe

I just think it'd be neat

I still love fantasy tho

[bitter stream]

yeah of course

[river veldt]

anyone have any slightly last minute game awards predictions

[bitter stream]

when is the awards again?

[fickle garnet]

Sometime tomorrow (idk the exact time )

[river veldt]

tomorrow at 6:30 Central time

[bitter stream]

ah, so that's about 11:30 am my time. hmm, probably will have to catch the vod

[slender wolf]

I have a dentist appointment tomorrow.

I don't care about the game awards tho

[cerulean herald]

<t:1765499400:f> or in <t:1765499400:R>

[icy crescent]

That's 8.30am for me? Damn i gotta sleep early tonight

Or not sleeping at all

[bitter stream]

haha sleep early! or catch the vod later

[smoky sonnet]

ace combat 8 (pretty please)

[mossy flume]

Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic remake, let’s gooooo

[uneven epoch]

game awards has that thing with orchestra playing the music of goty nominees, doesnt it? itll be middle of night for me so ill be sleeping, but ill have to look up kcdII's segment later, sounds fun

[green fulcrum]

I'm looking forward to it this year. Every single nomination has a fantastic soundtrack to boot, and most of those soundtracks are orchestral or metal. It's gonna be an amazing orchestra this year, might even beat 2023's if they do it well.

[arctic fern]

https://theindiestone.com/forums/index.php?/topic/88501-build-4213-unstable-multiplayer-released/

[craggy vine]

Can I just say how wicked the steam workshop is. I look for mods on my macbook, and subscribe to them there. Then I go onto my gaming handheld and the mods are just there. Like it is crazy easy.

[arctic fern]

Its crazy eazy to get mods yeah
Making them work however...

[craggy vine]

Yeaah depends on the mods

Easy to get mods!
Oh now I have too many and it won't stop crashing

@clear glacier l4d2 be like

[clear glacier]

me just playing the l4d2 theme on guitar rn

[craggy vine]

[green fulcrum]

I love how this applies not only to game mods, but also to Discord/Reddit mods.

[craggy vine]

pfff

[teal sonnet]

dang this year was truly legendary for gaming

https://youtu.be/7RpWks5qh_4

What a really nice trailer

If they really announce half life today, holy fuck, what a way to end the year for gaming

[sacred grove]

Tyler McVicker says it won't happen at TGA, but I guess we'll see

[astral steeple]

Need some good announcements from the game awards ngl

[sacred grove]

I bet they'll announce Deltarune

oh wait

I bet they'll announce Silksong

wait no. umm

GTA6? Elder Scrolls 6?

[wind stump]

N1RV-ANNA

[unreal idol]

I'm just gonna watch with friends

[wind stump]

(it's not fucking happening)

[peak berry]

build a AR

[worthy rose]

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/clair-obscur-expedition-33-budget-was-under-10-million-report/1100-6536874/

[little badger]

A few trailers have leaked before the game awards

[wind stump]

OH NO!

Anyway...

[little badger]

[rancid herald]

Anything good?

Speak friend

[little badger]

TR1 remake

[wind stump]

English?

[rancid herald]

A what remake?

[little badger]

||Tomb raider 1||

[river veldt]

spoiler that, homeslice

[wind stump]

ahhh

[little badger]

What would you do if a new Mario game got announced tonight

[river veldt]

lol idk

i doubt it will be though, Nintendo don't really take the game awards very seriously

[rancid herald]

Why… why reply to me

[little badger]

What do you want to see oaf?

[rancid herald]

Who knows

Spyro 4

[astral steeple]

Can marble blast ultra get a remake lol

Goated game

[rancid herald]

MechWarrior 5 ComStar

You play as a telephone repairman in the 31st century

With guns

[river veldt]

supergiant games posted this on twitter

[unreal idol]

I'm not really looking forward to anything specific, I'm just watching it because friends have invited me to

[young creek]

Nintendo will sue them for that picture 😂

[visual hill]

did you try PlatinumQuest recently? It got some big updates since last year

I'm looking to try Marble It Up! once it goes on sale too

[river veldt]

marble games remind me of vinny's scream

https://youtu.be/brt1gCgVN_Y?si=kcr0_AevTmo-3Kqy

genuinely turn your volume down

it's such a primal scream

[fresh bane]

https://bsky.app/profile/wario64.bsky.social/post/3m7q4c6ynkc2e

Wario64 (@wario64.bsky.social)

Deus Ex Remastered is delayed

Likes

140

Bluesky · Dec 11, 2025, 5:34 PM

Good

[wind stump]

TURNS VOLUME UP

[river veldt]

HC NO YOUR EARS

[wind stump]

HC YES

[visual hill]

s_volume 1

[wind stump]

every time someone says "hc no" this plays in my head

[wind stump]

Return to Lobby or Return to Lobby?

[mossy flume]

[little badger]

Are you hoping for some mass effect tonight

[mossy flume]

It would be nice, but I wouldn’t expect to see it today

[little badger]

If we do then it’ll just be another teaser, or maybe even a release date

[mossy flume]

Nah, we’re years from a release date I suspect

Like I’m thinking 2028 is when we’ll see it

[little badger]

At least we still have the old games to go back to until then

[green fulcrum]

Remember guys, since I'm working tonight I will miss the whole show, so please please PLEASE ping me if there's any mention of Spyro, Sonic, anything RPG-related (especially turn-based), and if somehow Half Life 3 is announced? (Had to add that in.)

And if it's Spyro, take all of those pings and quintuple them. I do not want to miss hearing about that.

[cerulean herald]

[young creek]

Will be asleep

Ping me if they announce Hollow Knight 3: Shoelace

[little badger]

Well sega did say you don’t want to miss this

hehe

[smoky sonnet]

it's gotta be zoteboat

[green fulcrum]

...Whoa.

[little badger]

https://www.youtube.com/live/d-BDeU3R5ic?si=8nSgB-igLojRFABF

Twitch https://www.twitch.tv/thegameawards

[hushed onyx]

If you consider how, like, the music was by some rando and, IIRC, the voice acting was also just randos, it does seem like it would have been pretty cheap to do…I dunno about under $10 million, though, that’s really tight.

I guess being French some benefits costs would be offloaded?

[quiet swift]

I believe that's a factor, and from what I've read that's also not including advertising/promotion, as that was handled by the publisher

[unreal idol]

I wonder if the Bill Clinton kid will make a return

[little badger]

Apparently it now costs 1 million for a 3 minute trailer at the game awards.

[mossy flume]

I could buy that

TGA's viewership is astronomical

~154 million people in 2024

[river veldt]

i feel like a million bucks isn't too much for what game awards is tbh

[mossy flume]

Indeed

It's quite a bargain for that kind of platform

[little badger]

I can’t remember how much E3 charged per trailer

[mossy flume]

LAWL

Holy shit

TGA actually gets MORE viewership than the fucking Super Bowl

[little badger]

Really?

[mossy flume]

Super Bowl set a new viewership record of 127.7 million in 2025

[little badger]

Midnight if we get any mass effect news tonight. I owe you a mango

[mossy flume]

191.1 million unique viewers, reportedly, but average viewership at about 127.7 million

TGA is fucking competing for one of the most viewed media events

That's insane

[little badger]

What were the numbers last year on the TGA?

[mossy flume]

154 million counted livestreams in 2024

[little badger]

Is that the total amount of livestreams last year?

[mossy flume]

For the third time, yeah

That's the viewership that TGA is reporting

And probably the best metric they have to work with

[little badger]

Wow

Let’s see if this year breaks it

[little badger]

What are you hoping to see?

[mossy flume]

Honestly, I dunno

[cerulean herald]

Expedition 34

[mossy flume]

I was so focused on Metroid Prime 4 that I haven't actually thought of anything else that I want right now

[little badger]

How is it

[mossy flume]

I give Metroid Prime 4 about a 8/10

Pretty good

[little badger]

[quiet swift]

You mean the expedition 60 DLC

[cerulean herald]

true

[quiet swift]

[toxic seal]

[quiet swift]

This is the evolution of Pinkie pie after consuming too much sugar

"Nom."
"Zapzapzap..."
"aaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAA"

[toxic seal]

Pinkie has the same superpower as Satou from MHA

[quiet swift]

[little badger]

Pre show starting now

[rugged flax]

[quiet swift]

Shit, I could be there physically, it's like 30 min away

[toxic seal]

Quick go before it ends, rush the stage and say hi Manechat

[little badger]

[toxic seal]

Don't do that

[quiet swift]

shepherding, the game?

...with glowing rocks?

[little badger]

Dog

[quiet swift]

This took a turn o_o

[toxic seal]

Breath of the Wild... Dog

[river veldt]

mario kart's got this right

nvm i was close

DOUG

[quiet swift]

oy, the stream's laggy, at least on youtube

[mossy flume]

Hi Bowser

Yeah, it's stuttering

[river veldt]

yeah watch on Twitch it's always ahead

[little badger]

It’s really bad on twitch YouTube is much better

[mossy flume]

Ew, fuck twitch...

Ugh

[river veldt]

im watching my beloved Jerma watch it

[mossy flume]

Doesn't Twitch also force ads?

[river veldt]

idk

[quiet swift]

i am watching the ads right now, so yes

[mossy flume]

Gross

[river veldt]

i havent gotten any ads yet

[mossy flume]

No go, then

[little badger]

Looks dark souls ish

[river veldt]

oh now it's stuttering

[little badger]

Do we all have snacks for the show?

[quiet swift]

I have ice cream

[toxic seal]

YouTube seems to be working better

I have cookies

[river veldt]

i have gatorade and a poptart

[robust latch]

i ahve 4 rolls of pre made cookie dough

i really should make a giant cookie

[little badger]

Oooh

[mossy flume]

Yeah, YouTube seems fine now

[river veldt]

Dark Ages has lots of good accessibility options

DOOM WIN !

HUGO

[mossy flume]

You're about ten to fifteen seconds ahead

[cerulean herald]

cap from the future

[mossy flume]

Guess I just won't chat during this

[little badger]

I would watch twitch but it’s currently looking like 360p

[smoky sonnet]

audiosurf mention in 2025 was not on my bingo card

[green fulcrum]

Have fun with the stream guys, let me know who wins what, I'm kinda interested in all the big award winners.

[rugged flax]

YouTube engineers rapidly spinning up more streaming servers:

[cerulean herald]

too much ppl are watching
hey, some of you cut ur internet or smthn so i can have a smooth watch smh

[river veldt]

what's everyone's animal of the year

[quiet swift]

[cerulean herald]

Pony

[quiet swift]

Ah, duckov

[river veldt]

pony is obv number one for me

giraffe maybe second

[toxic seal]

Something that legit may help is watching a co-stream. Additional commentary from whoever's commentating but clean video

[river veldt]

that's what im doing Prof

[little badger]

Flute guy!

I restarted stream and it’s fine now

[quiet swift]

you're like 10+ seconds ahead, blade

[river veldt]

i never know any of these people lol

[quiet swift]

Liquid is the only one I know, but only through WOW and not sure if it's the same ones

Wait it's on prime?

[rugged flax]

2x speed on youtube to run out the buffer, you'll fall back to 1x afterwards

[quiet swift]

Prime's more up to speed, and no chat boxes

And probably less busy since it's new lol

[river veldt]

weird looking game

[quiet swift]

Looks interesting

ooh steam demo

[river veldt]

UMA

[little badger]

Horse game mentioned!

[quiet swift]

🐴

[little badger]

YAY

[random steppe]

It felt very death-strandish, I dig that aesthetic

[river veldt]

UMA WIN !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[quiet swift]

That was no contest there, lol

[river veldt]

lfg

[toxic seal]

HORSE WIN LET'S GOOOO

[cerulean herald]

🐴

[little badger]

most of our fans love MLP

[cerulean herald]

ume-zing award

[little badger]

[quiet swift]

[unreal idol]

The way she said umamusume

Halp

[quiet swift]

I feel like @green fulcrum would know what this is

[toxic seal]

OohMAHmusumay

[river veldt]

im still coming down from Uma win

[little badger]

Turn based game

[quiet swift]

I think I know too but have forgotten the name, lol

Oh, not that one

Ayo what's this

[little badger]

You hoping for some Diablo news?

[quiet swift]

Shrug

That trailer voice sounded like James Spader

Oh the first bloodbath award

[little badger]

33

[quiet swift]

The crowd, lol

[little badger]

[green fulcrum]

Know what what is? I can't see the stream, I'm at work

[quiet swift]

🇫🇷 🇫🇷 🇫🇷 🇫🇷 🇫🇷

[river veldt]

lol duh

[toxic seal]

VIVE LA FRANCE

[river veldt]

holy moly

[little badger]

Wait is that Yanis

[river veldt]

very french

[green fulcrum]

I'm guessing E33 won something?

[quiet swift]

Was a turn based game, it was for solasta 2, I was thinking that other one that you liked a lot

[random steppe]

then it starts

[unreal idol]

That man is very french

[cerulean herald]

won best indie

[green fulcrum]

Ah, good, I was looking forward to that one

[random steppe]

Get used to french people reading notes tonight

[little badger]

Or Japanese

[river veldt]

he should be holding a cigarette and black coffee

[green fulcrum]

Deserved, though frankly most of the nominations for that one deserved it.

[quiet swift]

ah, I was thinking pathfinder

[green fulcrum]

Pathfinder too

[rancid herald]

man

what is this

wait

the audience is in the background... is this a blue screen?

[random steppe]

Europe is colonising TGA this year, be ready.

[rancid herald]

is the presenter lady just 50 feet tall?

[river veldt]

i think it's just perspective

[quiet swift]

badgerborne

[little badger]

What can be worse than Europeans?

[rancid herald]

this game feels crazy

[little badger]

Furry vr?

[rancid herald]

drug trip the game

but seriously

like it's weird, she takes the card, and then hands the statue to the winner, who randomly appears form the right side of the screen

it's bizarre

[quiet swift]

AND THEN JAPAN ATTACKED

[little badger]

What have you been playing Tchernobog?

[quiet swift]

WoW, BallxPit, tempest rising, lately

[random steppe]

What is this?

[little badger]

Nice.

[toxic seal]

Got Lollipop Chainsaw vibes

[river veldt]

what is the game here

[rancid herald]

drug trip, the game

[little badger]

2

[quiet swift]

Oh finally, gameplay

[random steppe]

I mean I like the video. That was fun

[rancid herald]

werewolf???

[little badger]

Main show is about to start everyone

[rancid herald]

this isn't the main show?

[little badger]

Pre show

[river veldt]

no this is preshow

[rancid herald]

is that why the presenter is 50 feet tall?

[little badger]

[river veldt]

oaf it's just perspective

[mossy flume]

Has anyone ever figured out what the difference is between the "preshow" and main show, given that they both do trailers and awards??

[rancid herald]

we mustn't mention her height lest she crush us

[mossy flume]

I really have no idea what the point is

[rancid herald]

preshow => presenter is 50 feet tall
normal show => presenter is normal sized
after show => presenter is now a hobbit

[mossy flume]

Oh good, TLoU was the only sane answer

[river veldt]

i didn't watch season 2 was it good

[little badger]

Streaming overlord

[rancid herald]

what was the category?

[toxic seal]

Best video game adaptation

[rugged flax]

best adaptation

[mossy flume]

Best game adaptation

[cerulean herald]

best adoption

[mossy flume]

best

[quiet swift]

Apparently her name is Sydnee Goodman and she's 5'6

She must be wearing massive platform shoes

[rancid herald]

yes but her scale is set to 10

[river veldt]

she's on like a platform above the people guys

[little badger]

Can’t wait for the new tomb raider.

[toxic seal]

No cap she's 50 feet tall

[river veldt]

im not sure why you guys are confused

[cerulean herald]

nah im pretty sure shes hovering mid-air

[little badger]

[quiet swift]

Oooh E33 music

[river veldt]

okit's finally starting

[quiet swift]

Red petals = E33

[little badger]

🇫🇷

[rancid herald]

or diablo 3

[quiet swift]

oh shit

[rancid herald]

diablo 3 x E33

[quiet swift]

It's the boss battle music

[mossy flume]

It's stuttering again

ffs

[little badger]

You on YouTube midnight?

[mossy flume]

Yes

[rancid herald]

be game awards
poorly optimized
oh yeah that checks out

[mossy flume]

How did TGA mess this up

[river veldt]

Jerma just said the golden microphones look like a tf2 item

[quiet swift]

@mossy flume do you have Prime? Working flawlessly here

[cerulean herald]

the TGA is a smol indie company pls udertsand

[mossy flume]

Not without ads

[little badger]

[mossy flume]

Oh right, that's Peacock Theatre. Went there earlier this year for the Final Fantasy concert.

[little badger]

Was it good?

[mossy flume]

Yeah, it was awesome

[rancid herald]

I probably should play E33 sometime

[river veldt]

me too

[little badger]

Here is the hype trailer

[quiet swift]

yes

[little badger]

it’s Tetris

[astral steeple]

It's apparently a "special" game

[little badger]

I know was just kidding

Hello Geoff

[toxic seal]

HATSUNE MIKU

[river veldt]

geoff

[cerulean herald]

greg

[rancid herald]

as you can see, the presenter is now normal sized

[toxic seal]

I never doubted you

[river veldt]

im sorry for doubting you Oaf

Jerma's pissed because Gonzo might not shoot out of a cannon

[rugged flax]

E33 crew looking agressively French

[little badger]

Oh my

[fickle garnet]

Guys, it's half-Life

Sorry, i'm delusional

[toxic seal]

Oh poor Geoff