I think at this point we've played enough games that we set on a golden shelf that if something doesn't live up to that ideal, we get disappointed. That's even if, on its own, the game is great.
Star Wars: Battlefront
- Thread starter ghostryder
- Start date
Re 2:
yeah, games are actually a lot cheaper nowadays, even thought the cost to make them keeps rising exponentially. (The Assassin's Creed games have had 1000+ people working them at certain periods, for example.) If they sales numbers hadn't been much higher today, it just wouldn't work. On PS2, a game that sold 500K was a pretty big success, on PC at the same time selling 250K was very good. Nowadays you need to sell 5 million (conservative amount) to break even! I've been a part of projects where an extra 6 months in development means you have to sell a few million more to break even...
Re 3: Hmm... you may be onto something. The time spent on games... the effort to learn and play... might create sense of ownership. Could be!
Re My game: melee will be real-time, but our "hook" is that you will not have direct control of the crew you send in to scavenge. You can tell them "go into that room" or "shoot everything that moves" but if there's something (&%#%¤ scary in the room, they might not obey you and run away instead. We did it this way because it creates a more realistic relationship, since you're giving orders from a console on your ship (much like Gorman in the APC) but it's also easier to do technically. Having direct control of units demands a huge number of features to be implemented and the game is more about exploring the unknown than tactical combat. (Heh... maybe I should start my own thread. Sorry guys!)
Haha, that gets even worse when you actually work with them. A lot of the magic disappears and you find it hard to immerse yourself in games the same way because all you see is the scaffolding behind the scenes.
Solo4114
Master Member
Actually, I think it's more akin to the "sunk costs" fallacy at work. You have the up-front investment of money, which is around 3x the amount it costs you and a date to see a film. Then you have the time/emotional/energy investments trying to learn to play the game. After that, there's a "give it a chance" phase for some folks, and the farther along you go, the more you may want the game to just...be...better, dammit!! There may also be a social aspect to it, in that someone you trust has recommended it, and you want to see the enjoyment they see.
"Ownership," I think tends to come into play as a result of the long-term patronage of a company or a particular franchise, or even a single game. Particularly those with online components (or those that require online gameplay to fully enjoy), there's definitely a sense of "The company owes me." With franchises that you've enjoyed, the "ownership" sense usually comes into play when the story isn't satisfying, but you've been supportive of the game for ages. Mass Effect 3 is a classic example. I didn't play it, but I've never heard anyone complain about the technical competence of the game. The thing people hated was the big reveal that (A) the ending didn't matter and you just got different colored lights, and (B) your actions did not lead to myriad different possible outcomes after all.
I should PM you about this for further detail, but just from my own personal preference, I'd say include a turn-based mode, if you're going to be controlling multiple characters. Actually, take a look at the three non-FPS Space Hulk games. The first one in particular had an interesting feature regarding turns vs. realtime. Anyway, I'll PM you more info.
I just remembered one thing I forgot to mention about the whole pre-order thing. A lot of people think devs/publishers just want to "lock you in" with an order but there's actually a lot more to it. It's not commonly known (so the Gods of Game Industry Secrets may be sending lightning bolts my way as I write this) but many companies use pre-order statistics to gauge how much they should invest in a title going forward. You can often calculate overall sales pretty accurately by looking at pre-order numbers (i.e. X number of pre-orders means Y number of overall sales and product health). Naturally, it's dependent on your game not causing a huge controversy like Aliens CM a few years ago. A so-so pre-order campaign can actually affect how marketing depts deal with your game. (You will sometimes have more senior marketing reps vying for "bigger sales" titles than others just for the prestige involved).
Do that! (Though a turn-based option will not work for what I have in mind. You don't control individual characters at all.)
another gameplay peeve: flying starfighters in all other modes do not behave the same as they do in Starfighter mode. They're a lot more fragile, and the bounding boxes (I think they call them) are much bigger around obstacles, so you cant get as close to objects as you can in Starfighter mode. I'm always hitting things that I wouldn't have otherwise.
I also cannot see troops that are on the ground, Granted, my TV is not ten feet wide.
I also cannot see troops that are on the ground, Granted, my TV is not ten feet wide.
Solo4114
Master Member
I have a 54" plasma, and I had trouble seeing and targeting troops on the ground, too. I think the air support component of Battlefront 1 was pretty poorly implemented. Plus, half the fighters you wound up flying didn't even make sense for the combat role they'd play. Like, why would you fly an A-wing in a ground mission at all? X-wings I sort of get, but even then, because of the shielded walkers, they were largely useless.
I would also force everyone to fly in 1st person view.
Speaking of flying in the 1st person view...
Last night I finally had the opportunity to try out the Battlefront: Rogue One X-wing VR mission, with the Playstation VR, and absolutely loved it. While the Playstation VR isn't quite up to the specs of the newest Oculus or Vive headsets, and performance is limited on the PS4 vs. a high-end gaming PC, it was still an extremely enjoyable experience.
I was especially surprised at how good the tracking works, via the Playstation camera. You aren't just sitting in the X-wing cockpit, with your head on a fixed swivel. You can lean around, look down at yourself (in appropriate rebel pilot gear, of course), and even lean around your seat to look behind yourself at your R2 unit and such.
Of course, it makes the game feel completely different once you get into the action. Where I had never been particularly happy with the Starfighter mode previously, it really comes alive in VR, where you can look all around quite naturally, and visually track your enemies. I found myself getting distracted quite often, destroying a TIE in front of me and then watching the wreckage stream by around me as I flew through the debris.
There were moments when I felt slightly queasy, while looping around in wild circles, but hardly as much as I would expect would be the case actually maneuvering like that in space. The resolution is noticeably lessened, due to the need to render in stereo on the PS4, and I did notice a little more LOD pop-in than normal, but the frame rate stayed high, and it always felt smooth. Personally, I would make the trade-off any day, for the dramatic level of immersion that you get in VR.
I don't know if I would go out and buy the Playstation VR and camera just to play this one VR mission (which is free DLC), but I likely would for the upcoming Battlefront 2, which will likely have much more VR content. I highly recommend giving it a try, though, if you have the opportunity.
Last night I finally had the opportunity to try out the Battlefront: Rogue One X-wing VR mission, with the Playstation VR, and absolutely loved it. While the Playstation VR isn't quite up to the specs of the newest Oculus or Vive headsets, and performance is limited on the PS4 vs. a high-end gaming PC, it was still an extremely enjoyable experience.
I was especially surprised at how good the tracking works, via the Playstation camera. You aren't just sitting in the X-wing cockpit, with your head on a fixed swivel. You can lean around, look down at yourself (in appropriate rebel pilot gear, of course), and even lean around your seat to look behind yourself at your R2 unit and such.
Of course, it makes the game feel completely different once you get into the action. Where I had never been particularly happy with the Starfighter mode previously, it really comes alive in VR, where you can look all around quite naturally, and visually track your enemies. I found myself getting distracted quite often, destroying a TIE in front of me and then watching the wreckage stream by around me as I flew through the debris.
There were moments when I felt slightly queasy, while looping around in wild circles, but hardly as much as I would expect would be the case actually maneuvering like that in space. The resolution is noticeably lessened, due to the need to render in stereo on the PS4, and I did notice a little more LOD pop-in than normal, but the frame rate stayed high, and it always felt smooth. Personally, I would make the trade-off any day, for the dramatic level of immersion that you get in VR.
I don't know if I would go out and buy the Playstation VR and camera just to play this one VR mission (which is free DLC), but I likely would for the upcoming Battlefront 2, which will likely have much more VR content. I highly recommend giving it a try, though, if you have the opportunity.
alil off topic, so with the limited games for the PS4 VR and VR add-on content would you say its still worth buying?? im really hoping they support this and it doesn't just fade away...
That's kind of what I figured. I preorder something if it's something I really want (like Fallout 4). I don't do it as much now because there are almost no demos put out before the game anymore. To me that means that they were losing sales because people tried things and then didn't buy the game.
The lack of demos today is more often down to lack of development time and cost. With the interwoven complexity of games today, making a demo demands a great deal of resources and both devs and publisher will usually rather polish the game more than devote 1+ months to making a demo.
Ah okay, I still miss demos though! I remember a lot of games I bought because I got the demo with PC Gamer. I definitely remember getting X-COM and TIE Fighter because of the demos.
I'm creating content for VR and AR applications these days, and most of my VR experience has been with the Vive or Oculus, but I am pleasantly surprised to see how close the PS VR comes to the high-end PC sets, for less money, and with less trouble to set up. Still, you are likely to spend $900+ for the console, VR set, camera, and controllers.
If you already have the PS4, with the camera and the Move controllers, spending the $400 for the PS VR might be more worth it. Then again, if you already have a gaming PC with the specs for VR, and use Steam, and have space to utilize for room-scale VR, for $800 you could get the Vive. There is a lot of content available via Steam VR, and the experience is technically better on every level.
So, which is better, and which is worth it, is totally subjective. The Battlefront VR mission is pretty awesome, and totally the closest thing ever to feeling like you are actually flying around in an X-wing, and that alone could totally be worth buying for a hardcore fan with the money to spare.
Still, I would not personally recommend spending on any of the current VR options unless you are really into VR, and don't want to wait for the inevitable new options that will come to market in the coming years. I think we're still another hardware generation away from VR ever becoming mainstream enough, and therefore a big enough market, for serious money to go into VR content. One of the big steps that will make VR a lot more viable is making it un-tethered. PS VR handles the cables pretty well, but wireless headsets are going to be a huge game-changer in the coming years.
The PS VR has sold surprisingly well, however. It was nearing a million units sold, as of a few months ago, which is substantially more than all the Vive and Oculus units combined. Sony seems highly committed at this point, and is claiming they will have over 100 VR titles available in the next year or so. If it continues to sell, it will continue to get supported.
I too have the PS VR, but I have yet to try the Rogue One VR mission. I agree, the 1080p PSVR resolution is far from "enough". Most content looks 480p, some looks horrendous like the Room demo(Resident Evil 7).
Will not buy an upgrade until we have 8192/8K resolution headsets.
Holy fudge cake Batman!
Video games in the early 90's in Sweden = 600-700 SEK
Video games today = 600-700 SEK
Going to the movies in the 90's = 60 SEK
Today = 100-150 SEK
random peeve of the day:
in the random animated background/filler screens when you're not playing: Threepio is a way bigger a-hole to Artoo here than he has ever been in any other film or tie-in. I know others are way ahead of me in wanting him to shut up, but he reaches my limit on this one. Chill, dude!
(he also is not animated in at all an AD way)
in the random animated background/filler screens when you're not playing: Threepio is a way bigger a-hole to Artoo here than he has ever been in any other film or tie-in. I know others are way ahead of me in wanting him to shut up, but he reaches my limit on this one. Chill, dude!
(he also is not animated in at all an AD way)
Similar threads
