Every article tag can be clicked to get a list of all articles in that category. Every article tag also has an RSS feed! You can customize an RSS feed too!
Latest Comments by TheSHEEEP
The latest teaser for the action adventure 'Undead Horde' from 10tons is out
5 April 2018 at 3:54 pm UTC Likes: 2

So I can FINALLY fulfill my destiny and enslave nations with necromancy!

Wait a moment: Are those chickens at 0:18?

Civilization VI: Rise and Fall is a solid and focused expansion
5 April 2018 at 5:32 am UTC

Quoting: LungDrago
Quoting: TheSHEEEP
Quoting: rkfgI think comeback mechanics are quite important in any more or less competitive game. Otherwise, why even play if you're clearly losing half into the round?
Exactly. You shouldn't.
If a game is lost, quit and try again in another match.
What point is there to artificially prolong the experience if there is no chance you could win anyway?

On the other hand, your approach leads to those kinds of games where an early advantage is unsurmountable, so one player gains the upper hand 10 minutes in and the other one just surrenders immediately. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and preferences. I, for one, don't care about games that keep ending at the start and no one gets to play the rest of the game ever, so I have to agree that comeback possibilities are an important part of a game.
Not really. Once you gain the upper hand, you also have to keep it. It is surprisingly easy to fall behind after a lead in a game like Civ. All you need to do is follow some good decisions with some bad ones. And if you are in the lead, the other players can and should start doing something about you - if they don't, it's all the more reason they deserve the loss.
And this is still Civ we're talking about. A lead early game doesn't mean too much. A lead by the end of the mid-game is pretty much a win, yeah. But by that time you already played a few hours, so I'd not call that missing out "the rest of the game".

All that a weak comeback mechanic would do in such a situation is to mask the reality of who will win this game. And if all you want to do is not to know who's in the lead to prevent quitting, well, just hide the scoreboard.

While a strong comeback mechanic would possibly change who will win, which as I wrote before would mean that the worse player could end up being the winner, which is just fully unacceptable on many levels.

Of course, all of that assumes roughly the same skill level among players.
If you want to play with some friends, and all are on entirely different skill levels, then

A) you shouldn't play against each other in the first place
B) you should play co-op
C) you can do setups so that it is 1vs2 or the best player has some handicap, etc.

All of those are based on player choices, not the game trying to enforce some kind of bad racing game rubber-banding.

Robocraft Royale could see Linux support if their release goes well
4 April 2018 at 1:04 pm UTC

Quoting: ArdjeI've seen all battle royale movies. They rock.
The term LMS predates the movie a lot though, as it was already a standard gameplay feature in unreal tournament... I reckon quake2 and quakeworld (the quake1 version) already featured it as a mod. And it took a long time before the movie became a cult hit.
So yes, LMS has been the long time term for LMS style games until PUBG called LMS battle royale as if it is a completely new gametype.
The thing is that LMS typically stands for small maps and Unreal Tournament style fast-paced gameplay.
Battle Royale goes far beyond that, with certain survival elements, a large area, the distinctive narrowing of the survivable area, etc. It is also pretty slow as far as gameplay goes (honestly, 70% of the time you typically spend waiting around for something to happen, and then it all goes very quickly).

I mean, you still shoot the other guys and in the end there is just one (team) left standing, but I'd say it does deserve its own name for all the differences.
I'm actually kinda happy it has its own name. Otherwise, LMS would end up taking on a new meaning in the public eye and people would be surprised and angry if a new LMS came that was "only" like Unreal Tournament.

Civilization VI: Rise and Fall is a solid and focused expansion
3 April 2018 at 1:43 pm UTC Likes: 1

Quoting: oldrocker99Got it, played for 30 minutes or so, and realized that I would prefer playing Dominions 5, which is far, far deeper. No game (and I've been playing solo since 2009) has the depth, the enormous variety of strategies, and the amazing (labeled, and a whole lot of people complain about the perfectly serviceable graphics) variety of units.

And it is Worth. Every. Penny.
Haha, yeah.
No comparison there.

But an entirely different design philosophy (and target audience) ;)
I think the only element those two have in common is that they are turn-based.

Civilization VI: Rise and Fall is a solid and focused expansion
3 April 2018 at 12:12 pm UTC

Quoting: rkfgI think comeback mechanics are quite important in any more or less competitive game. Otherwise, why even play if you're clearly losing half into the round?
Exactly. You shouldn't.
If a game is lost, quit and try again in another match.
What point is there to artificially prolong the experience if there is no chance you could win anyway?

If the comeback mechanic is weak, it will keep you in the game somewhat, but change nothing about the outcome. That is pointless for any kind of competitive play.
I do see the point in cooperative play, though, or some casual matches.

If the comeback mechanic is so strong that a player that simply played worse is suddenly a significant challenger, then that is just absolutely unfair. And could be abused, too!
The better player should always win and a too strong rubber-banding can make that simple rule invalid.

Quoting: rkfgDon't forget that it also improves the gameplay for the top players (if you multiplay). They can't just sit and skip turns but should always be ready for an unexpected challenge.
If I was the better player, then my gameplay surely wouldn't be improved by knowing someone else is still competing just because the game handed out freebies.
Generally speaking, I mean. I know they are not exactly freebies in this case. I wouldn't mind that much in some casual matches or co-op. But if I was out for some actual skill-based competition, then any form of rubber-banding should at the very least be optional.

Civilization VI: Rise and Fall is a solid and focused expansion
3 April 2018 at 11:19 am UTC

This sounds mostly interesting, but to be honest, one thing I don't like at all:
QuoteFailing to earn a golden age or even falling into a dark age isn’t all bad, however, as it gives you a chance to choose dedications (sort of objectives) that, if completed, add massively to your era score. Civilizations in dark ages, if they get enough points for a golden era, enter what is then a heroic age where they may get even more boons. It works as a good system of keeping games dynamic and gives civilizations who have fallen behind a chance to catch up.
This sounds like the kind of handholding that I absolutely loathe.
If you play bad, you should be last and not get bonuses for some strange kind of rubber-banding to push you back into the game that you rightfully lost due to wrong decisions.

What kind of "lesson learned" is that if your bad play is rewarded in such a way?

I can only hope that in practice all this does is reduce snowballing a bit, as the games do tend to be over once one player gets ahead in score a lot.
And that fulfilling such dark age conditions is not a given.

Robocraft Royale could see Linux support if their release goes well
28 March 2018 at 4:56 pm UTC Likes: 1

Quoting: ArdjeIf Battle Royale is the same as Last-Man-Standing, can we please call it LMS? I am too old for hypes.
Last Man Standing is too sexist, I guess.

Battle Royale certainly isn't new, though.
The movie came out in 2000, and that is where the name comes from. At least that is what I assumed and what Wikipedia seems to confirm: Wikipedia link
QuoteVideo game adaptations of the battle royale survival concept became popular in the mid-2010s, with games such as Day Z, H1Z1: King of the Kill, PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds and Fortnite.

Then again, I don't know just how old you are ;)

BATTLETECH to launch in April, Linux version will be 2-3 months behind
28 March 2018 at 9:50 am UTC Likes: 3

Awesome! Means linux gamers get a fixed and patched version!

Unity has published the C# source for the UnityEngine and UnityEditor
27 March 2018 at 2:47 pm UTC

Quoting: tuubiIn any case, GDScript seems much closer to Python than JS based on code snippets.
Indeed, it is. Edited my post.
No idea how I came up with JavaScript *shrugs*

I like it for prototyping, but if I had to write something production ready in a game that I know will have certain performance bottlenecks, I'd rather write in something fast as Mono to begin with.
You can't write every piece of code that has a performance impact in C++, especially not if you are planning to deliver a game with modding capabilities (so you will use the same API modders will, more or less).
Plus, writing in a scripting language is just way faster, which is also worth a lot - otherwise you could just write the whole game in C++, and who does that any more?