Lurker > squexa

ctesjbuvf posted...

Do you all think Witcher 3 holds up it's power from last time? I think I would pick BG3 above it.

Witcher 3 in 2020 was in a perfect storm of Cyberpunk hype at a fever pitch and the positive buzz around the Netflix series just releasing. Witcher 3 in 2024 has to deal with Cyberpunk destroying CDPR's aura of invincibility, the whole controversy surrounding the Netflix series and newer games taking up mindshare.

I think in general, 2010s games will start falling off like the 2000s games did and people will be caught off guard again. These games are not old enough to be our nostalgic childhood games but also no longer new enough to be the hot new thing everyone's still talking about.

MacArrowny posted...

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/8081-whats-your-all-time-favorite-5-game
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/8813-whats-your-all-time-favorite-5-game

Skyrim barely dropping despite multiple new options is pretty good, actually! Though of course SMT5 would hurt P5 way more than any other game.

Eh it's not just about pure number of options. The 2 options in 2020 made up 9.71% while the 4 options in 2022 made up only 8.78% and Id argue the 2020 options hurt Skyrim more. DMC, MGS and FF all went up in 2022, while Persona, GTA and Skyrim fell. Persona like you said for obvious reasons since SMT is in the poll and Rune Factory and Yakuza likely affects it more than RE and Civ did. GTAV and Skyrim I think just continued their decline.

HaRRicH posted...

Skyrim does still do well with those polls about the best game with a 5 in in though and improved with those between 2020 and 2022, however.

Skyrim's percentage did fall in 2022 though. Just a small amount, but the other options also became more favorable to Skyrim.

Skyrim vs P5 could also be interesting. Skyrim was worth around 53% on P5 in 2020, maybe 54% if adjusted for rallies. P5 finally getting a wide release and Skyrim continuing to weaken especially with Bethesda's reputation in the gutter thanks to Starfield could make this much closer.

On a related note, I wonder how Persona 5, Dark Souls and Skyrim would rank now. Would people still take Skyrim over Dark Souls in a rematch?

So how would we rank the (presumably?) 5 strongest games of the past decade? BotW, Witcher 3, Elden Ring, TotK and BG3.

Edit: Potentially of course Mario Odyssey is in this conversation too

Ok I'm getting confused by these selections. A bunch of ports but no Jedi Survivor or FFXVI?

I see people say FFXVI is summer, but then why is Dave the Diver here?

With the year almost over, how do we think the strongest games of the year rank on this site. TotK being #1 should be clear but what about afterwards.

LightningStrikes posted...

I guess well have to agree to disagree but Id be surprised if Smash had gotten weaker. Like sure the DOJO hype was fun but how much did that actually cut through? And to join War in the not to be a sales figures person but, Ultimate had the biggest opening sales for an exclusive ever when it came out (a record I believe TOTK now holds), the hype was absolutely there for it, we just werent talking about it as much.

I think multiplayer games in general have gotten weaker. It's not necessarily just due to changing tastes, but also changing demographics. People more into multiplayer games have more reason to leave the site than people that are predominantly into single player games.

foolm0r0n posted...

I'm afraid this post shows this convo is completely over your head

I mean either you think Metacritic score is completely uncorrelated with how "good" a game is, in which case a game scoring in the 50s would have equal probability of being "good" as a game in the 90, so the collection of games scoring <70 Metacritic would be way better than those >85 due to sheer quantity. Or you think Metacritic score is actually positively correlated, in which case it's not illogical to use it as one of many factors used to curate games.

At the end of the day, it's literally just games. It's not some high culture thing. If you have fun and enjoy yourself, that's really all that matters.

So legitimate question. Only play Metacritic games above 85 for the rest of your life or only play Metacritic games below 70? There's a ton of games below 70 so you'd get a lot of bang for your buck.

foolm0r0n posted...

Here's what it is. If you're ok with having poor curation of the games you spend your time on, I don't believe that you legitimately have little time for gaming, since you're ok with spending your time poorly.

I guarantee I have less time to play games than you, which is why I value my game curation ability extremely highly. It's a huge bang for buck and I can't imagine spending my time on a top 10 list instead. That's just giving up on your standards, which is totally different than being too busy.

It took me a while to realize this post is ironic lol. Well played.

foolm0r0n posted...

I get what you're saying and it's more logical than Nook's strategy for sure. But the argument is deeper than that since metacritic is actively harmful and bad even as just 1 ingredient in your formula.

That's a much bigger argument so no need to get into it now. But obviously some factors are straight up bad, so consider that aggregates could be one of those bad factors.

I legitimately don't get this gatekeeping. I really don't have that much time for gaming these days and there's only so many games I can play. I also don't consume much "game media" and know the personal tastes of every random gaming influencers or whatever. I already have a massive backlog so I'm going to be pickier for games that are outside my comfort zone. I don't like CRPGs at all so I don't know why I'd spend the same amount of effort checking out all the random CRPGs with 50s on metacritic as BG3.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

See I also don't think this has any value outside of data collection because what games get high or low scores on the AGGREGATE often just follows industry trends.

Right now, the industry loves big, open world games with a ton of exploration and freedom of choice in what to do. This is something I absolutely hate. A 96 aggregate for, taking the obvious example, Tears of the a Kingdom means nothing to me, because I know that the reason the game is getting such high scores are for things I don't like and the game isn't appealing to me at the things that I personally value. While I know this is why it gets these scores, say I didn't. I would find this out by actually reading the reviews, and knowing what those reviewers value, and I would realize it didn't align with me.

A review's number is worthless if you don't actually read the review. Since an aggregate is just a number and the score itself has no text behind it, it's meaningless.

Sure, I obviously don't buy every game with a high Metacritic, but I give it a second look if it's sufficiently high. I have zero interest in CRPGs, but I still gave a second look to BG3 to understand a bit why everyone's going gaga over it. Still have no interest in buying BG3, but I've discovered many all time favorites just from checking out why some random game I've never heard of is scoring so high. Neon white is probably my favorite game of the past 5 years and I probably would not have checked it out otherwise.

foolm0r0n posted...

How do you actually know this? If you only play 85+ aggregate games, you'll never know what you're missing

I don't understand this dichotomy of either you only use metacritic to make every decision or you never use it.

Metacritic is very useful for weeding stuff out when used in conjunction with other factors. If a game I know nothing about gets 96 on metacritic, it's a hell lot likely I'll give it a second look than if it got 66. But that doesn't mean I won't ever play a game with 66, since it could also depend on word of mouth, are my friends playing it, is it a company/genre I like, is it on gamepass, did it get patched post-launch, etc.

This is like Nier Replicant's situation all over again

To raccoon city

I was in this exact same situation 2 years ago and for me, I had trouble getting into the older games because they felt dated but I really liked Judgment and Lost Judgment.

It's worth pointing out that LaD7 is really long at least partially because it's uniquely turnbased, so the other games are faster.

wallmasterz posted...

Congratulations, this was a test to see who I will legally adopt and you won, Charlie Bucket.

Perhaps youve heard of me, my name is Bill Gates.

Thanks Bill. Don't screw up Starfield.

wallmasterz posted...

No kidding. 66 votes and zero for Microsoft. I will assume anyone who votes Microsoft now is just being a contrarian lol

Well, I just voted for Microsoft because I'm interpreting both Xbox and PC gaming as Microsoft.

It depends on when the Switch "2" is releasing and how it's even being positioned. I still think there's a solid chance it'll be akin to a GameBoy Color, where it's still counted as being part of the Switch family.

_SJimW_ posted...

I have seen zoomers who grew up with 06 have a fondness for it, but they're not that sizeable of a group

The real winner of the 3D Sonic series has been Unleashed (the 360/PS3 version). A combination of the nostalgia cycle, people appreciating how ambitious its level design and scope was compared to everything that followed, and the 360 version looking pretty damn impressive on Xbox One X/Series X backwards compatibility probably helped it a lot.

Sonic 06 is weird because its reputation started off so absolute rock bottom low that even having some nostalgic zoomers feels like an improvement. Just really a question of how to quantify "improvement". It also helps that we had so many other bad Sonic games afterwards like Forces and Boom that helped take some of the heat off 06.

Sonic Unleashed and heck, Sonic 06. Feel like Unleashed is now in the "good Sonic games" camp while 06 has somehow gotten reevaluated as being misunderstood or underrated.

What about tetra?

ChaosTonyV4 posted...

Damn, a whole month? Seems like everyone is going to Japan this year, and you went all out.

I can't speak for anyone else but the yen's really weak right now so it's a fairly optimal time to go to Japan

TomNook7 posted...

The real question is whats the coolest thing you ate while you were there?

Full fugu course probably, although it didn't have much of a taste.

MacArrowny posted...

FF14 is massive in Japan

Among the hardcore otaku yes, but hardly among the mainstream. The brand definitely has become some thing just for the MMO otakus at this point and perhaps Squenix is content with that.

I just got back from a month long vacation to Japan and it's crazy to me how much FF has become a non-factor here. I didn't even realize FFXVI released since I saw maybe one small ad for it at a department store my whole time there.

Meanwhile, I get blasted with TotK, Splatoon 3 and Switch Sports ads several times a day.

KamikazePotato posted...

I just checked and Skyward Sword Wii has a 93 on metacritic???

Skyward Sword came out at a weird time. It was made in response to TP's common criticism of having a giant empty world and reviewers got convinced that SS "solved" the problem by making overworld smaller but denser where random enemies can be puzzles (ignore the empty sky). I remember some reviewers got so impressed they thought other games are going to adopt this style.

Then Skyrim launched the same month and those takes started aging very badly very quickly.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

Incredibly boring list.

Why even bother making it if it's just going to end up the same generic crowdpleaser you'd get on every other site? Seems like a waste of energy.

It's great to get one as a snapshot in time for what "we" think is the standard canon in 2023. I wish gaming has an equivalent to the Sight and Sound and do something like this periodically to see how the entries change over time.

MacArrowny posted...

Two From games in the top 10 and a third in the top 20 tho (the list would be much better with Elden Ring in the top 10 instead of one of those two).

BotW is the only one in the top 10 that'd be a contender for my own. It's a fine list, I guess. I'd be more interested in a "best 100 games of the 21st century" list than this. All-time is pretty awkward in its age-related biases at this point.

Think it goes to show that those games would be even stronger without the other entries existing.

For example TotK is coming this week and there's no way BotW and TotK wouldn't start having an adverse effect on each other. Very few people would put both of them in a top 10 list, so a portion of current BotW voters will stick with BotW while another will go with TotK instead. It's possible TotK will pick up support from people not that into BotW, but neither BotW and TotK would get as much support individually as BotW gets now.

swordz9 posted...

Mario Odyssey somehow insanely low for the best Mario game

Mario suffers from too much votesplitting. This style of polling benefits games in series with fewer entries.

https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/article/best-video-games-all-time/amp

The greatest games of all time ranked by 300 "developers, streamers, directors and journalists in the business" chosen by GQ magazine.

Top 10:
10. Half-Life 2
9. Dark Souls
8. Portal 2
7. Metal Gear Solid
6. Mass Effect 2
5. Witcher III
4. Bloodborne.
3. Tetris
2. The Last of Us
1. Breath of the Wild

andylt posted...

A random question but it's one I've been thinking about. The plots of RPGs often involve challenging corrupt and unaccountable authority on behalf of the commonfolk- it's become a gag that you wind up killing god, the ultimate authority figure, at the end of so many stories. I'm fond of the genre, but I find that for some reason medieval JRPGs in particular seem beholden to pro-monarchy angles, despite monarchy at its core representing the same inequality and injustice the parties usually wind up fighting against.

Whether it's a secret princess, a young prince learning what it means to lead his country, and/or helping the rightful heir reclaim their throne from an evil usurper, the same beats are hit again and again. Maybe it's simply part of the set dressing of the era, obviously these tropes extends far beyond RPGs and video games as a whole, but does anyone have examples of solid gaming stories that involve monarchies without having a 'good' one to place on the throne and save the day? It doesn't have to be JRPGs but that seems to be the genre that features monarchies most prominently.

It's very uncommon and I think part of it has to be because most RPGs by design emphasize exceptionalism. You usually have a small band of "chosen people" that are the only ones that can affect the fate of the world. Many of them have literal god given divine powers that puts them above 99% of humanity who would be lost and powerless without the benevolence of the player party. Introducing anti-monarchism in an innately pro-exceptionalist world becomes complicated and contradictory unless its fairly low fantasy or it's an intentional deconstruction or something.

Paratroopa1 posted...

Maybe but I think that's a huge gamble. GotG worked not just because of its pedigree but because it a type of movie - a sort of Star Wars-esque space fantasy comedy - that people really wanted to see and were willing to buy into. Kid Icarus just isn't gonna have the kind of mainstream appeal necessary. I don't think you can sell it, even if all us video game nerds think it's a good idea.

Aside from Mario and Pokemon I think Zelda is the ONLY other franchise that has both the name power and the conceptual juice to really work. Everything else is too hard to sell to people who aren't weird video game nerds like us.

I can see the world where the good Kid Icarus movie exists but I think it'd flop.

Kid Icarus would be a massive gamble if we randomly got one today, but I'd say a standalone Dr. Strange, Ant-man, GotG, etc movie would be a massive gamble in 2006 without the MCU as well.

If a NCU happened, we'd get a bunch of Mario movies, DK movie, Zelda, probably Kirby and ideally Pokemon (if there's no licensing issues) which culminates in some kind of Smash Bros movie, which could maybe feature and introduce Pit and some other Smash characters. If the Smash movie's a huge hit, then I don't think a Kid Icarus movie following that (with the expectation that it'll somehow tie into Smash 2) would be that much of a gamble. Illumination also has fairly reasonable budgets so you don't really need to make MCU levels at the box office to be a success.

Of course, there's also opportunity cost and whatnot. The Mario universe is big enough that perhaps it's just easier and safer to adapt that instead of tapping other Nintendo properties.

Paratroopa1 posted...

My opinion is that people vastly overestimate the number of Nintendo franchises there are that this would actually work with

Aside from Mario/Donkey Kong, you've got Zelda, Metroid, Kirby, Star Fox... Kid Icarus? Animal Crossing? Splatoon? I'm already being really generous here, since Kid Icarus and Star Fox are basically dead franchises (I'm not even bothering to mention F-Zero, fuck it) and Metroid would be a really tough fit - I could see Samus being a kind of straight man who's just taking her mission really seriously while everyone else is making jokes but that's about it.

There's Pokemon, but it's kind of its own thing and I have absolutely no idea what its legal status would be here.

Like I don't know, I'm just not seeing it. I want to see a Zelda movie for sure, but beyond that I'm not sure what you would do and I'm not sure how you would have them all team up and have it still be cool.

Helping smaller franchises would be the benefit to a NCU though, right? A major advantage of the MCU is that it brings attention to otherwise D list franchises like GotG nobody would have cared about. If Nintendo can hypothetically bring people to invest in a Smash movie (and that's a major hypothetical), then people will turn out for a Kid Icarus movie.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

You should have been worried about Starfield when they showed it and it was just Fallout.

Fallout in space is all I need. I just hope it's not Fallout 76 in space.

I don't care about Redfall at all but I'm honestly getting worried for Starfield

GuessMyUserName posted...

another big one is voice acting, as some companies have started asking VAs to allow their voice for training modules (to which many have said a resounding f*** No). because a what then? the actor is no longer needed when you own their voice and can just make them say what you want

Again, you are using another artistic discipline and VA is an especially interesting example, since that's a very high profile job but also doesn't really employ that many people.

When I think of the front line of AI disruption, it's jobs like paralegals, data entry professionals, customer service, etc. Jobs that are low profile and aren't very artistic but will suffer greatly from AI. Going a bit further and most white collar jobs from accountant to programmers will be at risk. Is it ethical in the future for a gaming company save money on VAs by using an AI software. What about if the same company saves money on filing taxes by using an AI software instead of hiring an accountant?

Are people outraged by AI disruption in general or just the artistic disciplines, specifically the high profile ones?

I keep seeing these discussions in relation to art, but not other topics, even though artists aren't arguably even the most directly affected.

Is it ethical to use a customer service AI chatbot based on ChatGPT/Bard/etc that replaced a bunch of human operators? What about using a law office that replaced most of their paralegals/legal assistants with AI? What about using a website that makes money by using AI (trained on potentially non-open source/copyrighted material) to give targeted ads to its users?

Is it specifically art that people have ethical concerns about or do some people think AI (or AI trained on non-open source material) in general is unethical?