This is the last podcast of 2023, as the gang just talks about the year that was and the upcoming 2024 in a long, unscripted episode.
Episode 707: Goodbye 2023
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Episode 640: Spacewar!Episode 640: Spacewar!
This week has a lot of followup to the entire situation with Activision/Blizzard, and also a lot of news items that weren’t a part of the official news feed. According desky.ca in addition, this week’s Gaming Flashback is recognized as the first computer game, Spacewar!
The news feed includes:
- Microsoft is watching Activision/Blizzard to ensure ‘the right people’ are in charge when it takes over
- Witcher 3 director and Cyberpunk 2077 veterans announce new studio and ‘AAA dark fantasy‘ RPG
- Nintendo Switch Sports online play test registration now open
- 3DS and Wii U eShop purchases end in March 2023
- Focus Home Interactive to acquire Metal Slug Tactics dev Leikir Studio
Let us know what you think, now that the Comments section works again!
Episode 278: Second Chance to Win Borderlands 2Episode 278: Second Chance to Win Borderlands 2
This week’s episode has heated arguments between Jordan and Jonah, as this new podcast runs a little long. However, there are tons of news items to make up for the lack of a new show last week.
The news items include:
- Bethesda’s Hines unexcited over next-gen console launch
- Borderlands 2‘s melee skill tree for Zer0 “thanks to them ignoring” Pitchford
- EA’s Gibeau brags he has not green-lit any single player games
- Valve responds to angry indie developers over $100 Steam Greenlight fee
- Crystal Dynamics: Lara Croft had become “unrelatable“
- City of Heroes may be saved from shutdown
- Ron Gilbert blames point and click adventure stagnation on DOOM
The contest continues – just mention what your favorite game from the 2000’s was – and a winner will be announced next week.
Evolution of RPG’s – Gamers Don’t Want an End?Evolution of RPG’s – Gamers Don’t Want an End?
I remember a day when old RPG games had either a level cap or a definite ending. From Pool of Radiance to Secrets of the Silver Blades to Final Fantasy the game had a final boss or stage and often had some type of level cap. Today, gamers don’t want it to end, they’d rather have the option to wonder around aimlessly or completing minor quests in order to soak up every ounce of money they spent on the title.
Now even Bethesda is saying “we’ve learned our lesson” from the whiplash of ending their game title and capping levels. Gamers want to go back and re-try content they missed, they want to run side quests and talk to everyone in the world they want to grind themselves to über powerful levels and become a god in their fantasy world. Can you blame them?
You can’t really blame them for wanting to maximize the content, although it’s slightly more evolved than RPG’s of old. Perhaps it was World of Warcraft and other MMORPG’s that brought us to the stage in life where we all want to squeeze every last RPG dime out of the title. As a kid I wondered the world of Hyrule and covered every tile of graphical color, burned every bush, bombed every stone looking for all the content. However, even Zelda had an end with scrolling credits – you didn’t just land on a platform with your master sword and a dream.
Other titles have used level caps to limit you and draw you into the next release of the game. This was popular in the D&D world because the game is designed to target specific levels of difficulty. They may only allow you to gain level 10 because the enemies are no tougher than level 13, allowing the challenge to be good but not overwhelming. If they allow you to get to level 50 they’d have to design the game so all the enemies grow powerful along with you — that’s not always a desired result.
Final Fantasy is a popular franchise that typically allows you to grow infinitely powerful depending on how much time you want to spend repeat killing the same enemies. Gamers aren’t always into the grind, they just want to grind “enough” to make the challenges a little more do-able.
Today, however, with larger storage capacity, larger development teams and the desire to build more value into your gameplay experience titles have dozens of side quests and sub-plots that are totally optional. The result of so many sub-quests results in a player who is much more powerful at the end of those quests compared to a player who sticks to the narrow path of the main plot. So, games much grow dynamically challenging to keep the fun per dollar high.
Do you like your RPG’s to have a definite end and a high but capped level?