Nikki is a shockingly competent hoyo-like (so Breath of the Wild but MUCH clunkier) hiding a gacha game about making an insane number of pulls to build an outfit while you play dress-up. Also, the overall metaplot among the franchise is Evangelion levels of batshit insane. But, at its core, it is still a ridiculously predatory gacha game.

There is a ridiculous amount you can do without spending a single cent and if you have strong self control it is worth looking into but… if you have strong self control and no addictive personality/genetic traits a bump of coke every so often is fun? And there are MUCH better games out there to spend your time on.

And it looks like the Stardew side is just letting IN call itself “cozy”?

But yeah. At this point I think most people can probably find a farm/town sim that is a better match to their specific interests than Stardew, but Stardew Valley is still basically “Harvest Moon but actually good” and pretty much revitalized the entire genre singlehandedly. It is very much the jack of all trades in that it does everything really well but doesn’t excel at any one thing. Also the background plot is shockingly dark but most people will never pay enough attention to realize that.

Oh, and many of the romanceable NPCs are very much coded as underage so nobody tell Chris Hansen. Again, it is one of those things you only pick up on if you actually listen to their dialogue and think through what kinds of jobs they had before being swept off their feet by the new farmer in town.

Nah. Modern day gooners are all based on how Arsenal fans just can’t stop touching themselves. Like, if you ever go to a game there is an entire section dedicated towards group edging.

In all seriousness, I have no idea what the actual origins of “gooning==masturbation” is. But the word “goon” mostly just is a synonym for thug or henchman. So a lot of groups used it because they are the bogeymen and blah blah blah.

Woo, time to see how many gooners are actually on lemmy.

The modern “video game essay” format came out of people on the Something Awful forums who were REALLY into Silent Hill. It was Japanese style horror in a Western setting with a lot of fairly heavy themes and implications so it was the perfect confluence of weebing out and “it is dark so it is deep” level discourse. And what started as people writing thousands of word arguments for what the shovel being at an 80 degree angle in that shed meant became people making 60 minute youtubes on what it meant that Heather ALSO saw the titty nurses and how it represents her repressed lesbian urges. And 3 hour videos about Pyramid Head that would make even Freud roll his eyes.

And… basically all of the later Silent Hill games REALLY sucked. The Room has its defenders but pretty much everything after that is universally panned and with good reason. Up until last year-ish with the remake of 2.

Which was a different kind of shitstorm. Because now you had all these essayists who were The Keepers Of Silent Hill lore (one of the most famous ones wrote her master’s thesis on SH2 I want to say?) seeing the greatest of the games being remade. And by fucking Bloober team? Pretty much every essayist had keyed in that Bloober have some very questionable themes in some of their games. Uhm… trigger warnings but

So it was the mix of “This is MY game and MY story and how dare they change it” combined with “Also they picked the bogeymen that I hated on so hard last year that I could buy a car”.

And then… Bloober kind of made a masterpiece? Like, most of their changes are fairly loved/appreciated and everyone but the most hardcore of the SH2 Video Essayists loved it.

But now we have Silent Hill f that very much DOES feel like a cash in and a way to make a Fatal Frame but with a more marketable IP. But also… Fatal Frame fucked hard?

Either way? The most important thing ever is to never stop saying that Silent Hill (the town) is really smokey because it was built on top of a coal mine that caught fire and has been smouldering for decades. That is some real Silent Hill fan lore that not many people know but is really cool to share.

You can basically ignore stances (Rise of the Ronin was TN experimenting with making that not an option). Just pick the stance you like (usually medium) and MAYBE swap to heavy against oni if you feel like you need to. Conceptually it is basically one handing or two handing (or… half handing?) a weapon in a Souls game. You aren’t swapping mid fight and are more deciding as you approach an encounter. That said… Nioh 3 by all indications is gonna make that integral.

Burst counters are all about figuring out what moveset you want. I personally love yellow (?) yokai because I rush forward. Which is baller as fuck but ALSO means that even if I parry too soon I have good odds of intercepting the attack and getting the punish. Whereas other people prefer blue for blocking or red for attacking.

But yeah. The Niohs are HORRIBLE for tutorialization even beyond the boss design. TN have gotten a lot better with integrating tutorials into gameplay (especially in Stranger of Paradise and Rise of the Ronin) but they ALSO still insist on having a mandatory void mission that then just dumps all that info and more into you and mostly undoes the “Hey, that guy hasn’t seen you. Sneak up on him” training.

It took me up until the penultimate core boss in Nioh 1 to realize that I was an idiot for not using the special attacks. What went from hit and run with a katana became just holding r1+square to melt enemy HP with dual swords or doing massive ki damage with a katana or flying across the room with the kunai wit chain and so forth.

But once you figure out what parts of the game you can ignore and what matters? Oh there is nothing like that.

Yeah. ER’s overworld is really not one you are meant to explore*. It is a lot closer to the Ubisoft design philosophy where the idea is you are going from point A to point B and find POIs (caves, mines, etc) along the way. So it is more that you should always more or less be walking in the direction of the grace sparkles and just do caves as you find them.

Outside of the good shit that you read about online to get more bell bearings or special weapons.

That said: I will always argue that Nioh 2 is the true best Souls. And that is a lot closer to Demon Souls in that there is no interconnected metroidvania world and it is all discrete (often repeated) levels. But the combat is without parallel and, after the initial horrible bosses (fuck Hino Enma. Although she is more Nioh 1), they are REAL good. Reminiscent of Dark Souls 2 in that it often feels like a duel between two knights (well, samurai) but actually done well.

Staying vague since they are one of the big bads but: Nioh 2 has a recurring enemy. Eventually you fight them when they are truly at the peak of their power and it is a BRUTAL fight. But it works so well because you have mastered the game by then so you are constantly rushing forward to counter their perilous attacks, getting in quick swipes, dodging all of their attacks, etc. And the narrative build up is SO good. It honestly feels like a Yakuza/LAD boss in that “In a different world we could be friends. In this world you have slaughtered countless innocents. But I like your vibes and that attack you just did is so fucking sick”. Yes, Team Ninja actually made Pursuer/Forlorn/Aldea WORK.

*: Until the DLC… where exploring too soon breaks every single NPC quest the moment you cross a bridge

You need more Lunacid in your life. It has a LOT of modern game design and sensibilities but feels like exactly what we remembered KF to be.

And they did a demake/prequel using the actual King’s Field game creator.

Nah. Us Soul Boy Beta… anyway the Souls fans had it easy. It was the Armored Core sickos that REALLY popped the fuck off when 6 was announced.

Welp. That put the kibosh on my “I should replay Hollow Knight, huh?”

Because, again, it is about managing risk.

Pickpockets and muggers are a thing. Depending on how worried you are, you might consider only carrying just enough cash for the day but… good luck functioning on holiday in a foreign land without your phone. So you take precautions. You avoid the giant masses of tourists but you also avoid the super dark alleys. And you always keep a hand on your valuables.

Same thing here. There are plenty of activities where just having a layer of VPN is a great protection (all those linux ISOs, for example…). But I am also aware that were I to do anything where being identified is a serious risk to my safety? I am using alternative methods. And so forth.

So when someone says

NEVER trust a VPN.

And you reply

The only exception to this is IMO ones that (I like)

You are actively giving bad advice and leading to the kind of shit this thread is about. People who didn’t do basic research who thought they were safe and… hopefully are just at a bit higher risk of getting a letter in the mail from the MPAA.

I think DS1’s very structured first half is pure genius. Asylum and Taurus demons teach you about situational awareness and the value of using movement to manipulate your enemy and make openings. Capra teaches you to carry a god damned shield and that sometimes you have to trade health for progress. Gargoyles are DPS gates that also encourage actually summoning. Iron Giant exists… And O&S are your final exam that makes sure you were paying attention (and also you have Brolaire… if you play offline. Otherwise you just get endlessly invaded). I think it does fall apart in the back half but most of that game does.

ER definitely suffers from the open world nature of the game. Theoretically, Stormveil (?) castle is your first legacy dungeon and it is really good for that… Some of us found the back path and did Raya Lucaria (?) first and dealt with the hell of a bunch of kids with M-16s hosing you down the moment you stick your head out from behind cover. But the various bosses still do a good job of teaching mechanics.

But I really think the secret is the Spirit Ashes. No matter what your build, you can find an ash to complement that. Yeah, they fall off as you near endgame but… you have mimic tear then. And then, if you are smart, you grab Tiche and realize knife mommy is best girl.

All that said? I think the Niohs actually have the better system where you can summon NPCs based on player builds fairly freely. But Nioh also has some of the worst boss progression in the sense that TN seems to think Hino Enma (bird lady who is hard to hit, inflicts status effects, and has a grab that heals her…) is the third boss you should fight…

But yeah. As much fun as “git gud” is, it just really annoys me because people’s need to say they are super hardcore sexy super gamers just ignores all the work that the devs of these games put into teaching mechanics and providing alternatives. And Elden Ring REALLY suffered from that with all the sweaties who insisted you should play with no summons and low vigor… and then got pissy that it was hard.

If you’re a toxic dipshit, sure?

Or we can actually be mature adults and realize that From (and most of the good souls devs) actually put a LOT of work into gradually ramping up difficulty, teaching mechanics, and adding alternatives so that pretty much anyone can beat any non-DLC boss without a human summon.

Homie. Your response to “don’t trust companies. Take precautions” is “Well ackshually trust this one” and, upon being reminded that other companies used to have good marketing and even practices, was to double down.

Word it however you want. Either way: Don’t stan for corporations and protect yourself.

You want your Vigor to be at the soft cap (40 if you are Gud, 60 if you don’t like driving nails into your proverbial winky). Grab a tower shield and spec for that and it will carry you to Malenia, Mohg, and Elden Beast. Learn to dodge and you are good all the way up to the final DLC boss. And actually use the spirit ashes (and not just the mimic tear).

While I think some of the endgame bosses are more than a bit much due to their long attack chains with multiple delays in a given combo, pretty much everything else about ER is some of the most accessible Souls’ing ever to be seen. Its just that people think they are hot shit just because they beat Ornstein and Smough back in the day and try to glass cannon it and… don’t do that.

Also probably don’t play it on a potato. Which is the point of the thread.

OH. And don’t be afraid to respec with the gal who likes bad boys. Most of the endgame bosses have MASSIVE weaknesses and Malenia is kind of notorious for how fast she melts against a stagger build or an arcane bleed build.

Again, how many companies say one thing one quarter and another the next? Let alone a decade later.

I am not saying to go uninstall your PIA stuff right now. I am saying to act with the understanding of what your risks are if they are compromised and how important you would be in the event that they are.

Because companies are not our friends. We may have aligned interests but you have to always operate under the understanding of what capitalism IS and what their interests actually are. And while it is fun to aggressively define yourself by what you consume? To play on a fairly misogynistic “joke”: PIA isn’t gonna fuck you no matter how hard you stan for it.

You mean the court case from almost ten years ago?

Yeah, that sounds safe. I mean, Google is still all about Do No Evil, right?

I always preferred the HLL model of sweaty milsim over Squad but…

A decent number of games have tried (US-)Vietnam over the years and it just doesn’t work. Because people think of the Vietcong versus GIs in jungles or ambushes in towns and along the river. And… the problem with that is it was a ridiculously asymmetrical fight. Like, yes, some troops did have AKs but mostly they were using WW2 era weaponry and maybe SKSes And firing precision shots through a jungle was a whole thing.

It was incredibly rare that these were standing fights. They were bloody ambushes that either ended in slaughter or… kind of just wandering away. And while that could be REALLY REALLY interesting from a gameplay standpoint it also breaks the milsim model of “every ticket matters”

As for those standing fights? They really weren’t that different than any other cold war conflict except that the ridgeline might be a wall of jungle.

Also… look, playing HLL pretty much guarantees you are dealing with, at best, rampant racism because “They were racist back then”. As someone who has tried to find some fun shooters over the years… going to Vietnam IMMEDIATELY reminds everyone that it is still perfectly okay to be mark wahlberg levels of racist towards Asian people. The number of videos on games like Rising Storm that just have random “ha ha, spawn at ching chong” from even “respected” youtubers is just infuriating.

So… not really happy this exists

I’ve been to a few conferences that did things like this (that predates “AI”) and it is actually a REALLY good idea that encourages people who are just there to give a talk or who are socially awkward to actually network.

The key is that it needs to only make suggestions and not actually send calendar invites. And it needs to be opt-in until at least one human says “Yeah, that is a good idea. See if Fred wants to meet some time tomorrow” and only then do the other parties get a push/email asking if they are free.

And this is why I am so obnoxious any time someone says “I found this plugin to block fandom wikis” or “I have this plugin to fix youtube embeds”.

Code is only as safe as the people you trust to review it. And no, being open source doesn’t matter in that regard. Yes, it theoretically increases the number of eyes on but how many of those eyes who ACTUALLY look at the code are doing it with every release AND understand how to spot a vulnerability or a… whatever this is.

Same with VPNs. NEVER trust a VPN. And sure as fuck never use a free one for anything remotely sensitive. Understand what your risk of exposure is and that, at the best of times, you are trusting a company to be telling the truth that they aren’t keeping a log of every single thing you nutted to.

And before someone says “That is why I do everything over tor!”: Maybe also understand the concept of digital fingerprints and WHY it is that Google is able to know someone is pregnant even before they are late.

Understand the risks and consequences of every action you take and act accordingly. And understand that there really is no one size fits all solution.

Well, the good news is that batshit insane pricing is coming to the entire world… Although there is “hope” that basically everyone will decide that physical distribution isn’t worth the hassle and everything becomes digital and all of the “We are going to price this to not piss off the people bringing discs into the country” goes away.

And I am not going to at all pretend I am immune to this. But it is important to think of the actual practice independent of the game and company. Because… what you described is effectively “I am okay with this if it is a game I like but not if it is a game I don’t”. Which is 100% true but it also is what has fueled so much of the shittiest behavior in the industry.

I don’t have much faith in this for a LOT of reasons, but that aspect isn’t necessarily bad.

Bloodlines 1 was… interesting. The problem is that the coolest clan to play as was Malk but Malk also only really “worked” as a second or even third playthrough when you can understand all the fourth wall breakages. In a world where the budget of the game would line it up with (let’s say) a 60 USD price point but it was actually 50+DLC=60?

That actually seems perfect to me. The people with a lot of faith/hype pay full price. The rest of us get the game at a discount and then buy the DLC on sale in a few months.

That said? I am not familiar with Lasombra but Toreador are basically the charisma clan and… most CRPGs are best played as a charisma/diplomacy build anyway. So… yeah. Feels kind of bad?

Like, I will always think locking NG+ behind DLC (hi Sega/RGG) is a ridiculously shit feeling thing to do. But also? It sort of makes sense that the people who would even care about NG+ are the ones who are really into the game.

But I think a better example is how a lot of ARPGs will wait for the DLC to add the advanced classes that either require a lot more piano playing or who are just a radically different design philosophy (often minion masters) that the game just wasn’t actually built around.

Which I think gets back to Day One DLC always feeling bad but actually making a lot of sense if you understand the game dev lifecycle. Like, I’ll never like it but I also acknowledge there isn’t a lot of value in “We finished up the DLC during QA but aren’t going to sell it for a month so that people don’t get pisssy”