Max (@maxplay.bsky.social)

13 Nov 2024

I just remembered my sticky post from twitter, so I had to post it here as well. Just in case, you need an idea for a game with at least one customer.

Yea, but none of those is an immersive sim, tho.

Next Fest is full with slop. Like literal low-effort-"I have no idea what I'm doing"-slop. Let's take the soulless slop machine to make soulless slop.

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It's just not the same and it looks extremely ugly. I don't want to pay for something where more work was done describing how an image should look like than someone actually painting it. Same goes for music or text. Why do you give me so much to read when you clearly didn't want to write it?

Sorry for the rant, but every Next Fest got worse and it's harder to sift through the slop (and handmade games that are clearly not for me, sorry guys)... maybe it's also Valves fault? Steam clearly knows what I like, but it doesn't give me stuff like it.

Next Fest is full with slop. Like literal low-effort-"I have no idea what I'm doing"-slop. Let's take the soulless slop machine to make soulless slop.

"Some game assets are AI-generated." - Some??? All of them! "All AI-generated assets were reviewed, modified and integrated to fit the desired visual style that the developer intended" - yeah, but it still sucks, though? It's overly detailed, uncanny, soulless and often just looks plain weird.

AI people always compare AI to tools that are used in the arts, like photoshop or even "camera vs. painting", but it's clearly not the same. The camera does capture the information directly as is without any artistic filter while the painting is clearly an artistic decision in every line.

Max reposted

Bluesky

@bsky.app

no kings includes billionaires who think they’re kings

Josh Sternberg@joshsternberg.com

Meta took down the No Kings instagram; TikTok banned the Musk documentary account for supposedly violating its political posting policies. A reminder that platforms are owned by the wealthiest of people, control the means of media distribution, & put their thumbs on the democracy scale as they wish

Stack Overflow really chose the worst visualization of their survey data and you have to interact with the menu and a toggle to see results in proper graphs. What were they thinking? Oh, wait, it was probably some AI "thinking".

22 Sept

Everything I know about hacking, I learned from Bioshock.

So, I finished 007 First Light today. I must say that I was pretty hyped for it. I love the Bond IP and the Hitman series and IOI doing a Bond game was a match made in heaven for me. And don't get me wrong here: It is an amazing Bond game, probably the only one that sells "being Bond", but...

Hitman is my favorite stealth game. I love stealth overall and immersive sims of which I consider Hitman adjacent, but not directly a part of and sometimes First Light tries to act like it is part of that group when it really isn't. It's sometimes closer to Uncharted in that regard.

So anyway that were my two cents on 007 First Light. Would I buy it again? Absolutely. Did it impress me as much as it could? No, not at all. Did I have a great time? Sure did! Would I recommend it? Of course, but be aware: Just because it's IOI, don't expect Hitman gameplay.

The shooting part was fine, but it wasn't as snappy as in Hitman and the gadgets sometimes activated when I actually wanted to shoot. The gadgets were great, btw. no complaining here. Although I found, I always used the same ones. My final complaint is also one of the biggest disappointments:

Stealth is not nice. I was seen in places where I was sure that I couldn't be seen. The cover was not snappy like in Hitman and so, it wasn't always clear when you are in cover and when you are not. And once you were seen, you usually had to kill everyone. Also you couldn't move bodies.

I'm not complaining about interactivity here, but on purpose: Everything in Bond serves a purpose and should be used one way or another. If there are multiple "routes" you have some options on what to use, but usually there is not much choice. And that kinda saddens me. But that's not all for me:

I really disliked the combat. Which is sad, because that's another thing that the game has a lot of. Melee combat in games is not my forte in the first place, but sometimes you get dropped into situations where you are in combat and have no way to react. Button mashing works too well in my opinion.

In Hitman, you basically get an objective (usually kill X and Y) and then you are dropped off into a safe area. X is roaming around a mid-security area or even within the crowds while Y is stuck in its fortress. That's how Paris, Bangkok, Colorado, Hokkaido, Miami, Santa Fortuna, etc. are designed.

From that point on, you are free to roam in that level and explore it. Understand the paths, the interactions, the story progression and then you plan and make your move. Bond doesn't have that. Never. I get that it is a linear game, but storywise so is Hitman.

...as a Hitman player (especially WoA aka the Hitman Trilogy), I must say that I'm kinda disappointed. First Light feels buggy, and nearly all aspects of it are worse than Hitman. The visuals, writing and acting are great, but that's not what the game makes it a Bond game that could also be a film,

no what irks me about it is that: Yes, we have sprawling levels that stretch on, but playing through the game is extremely linear. Yes, you have a couple of choices in how to approach you objective, but it's not sandboxy. Why do I go to an amazing hotel and can't explore it and do as I see fit?

29 Aug

I saw Spider-Man: Brand New Day today and it really felt like it was an adaption of the Insomniac games. Not in terms of story, but in terms of movement, gadgets and combat. There were scenes where I felt like I was playing the game on my PS.

29 Aug

That's either good on them for being faithful to a game of the franchise or good on the game for being faithful to the movie character. Either way, I loved it.

28 Aug

So, I watched the GTA trailer thingy and the most impressive thing the hair. The rest was just more GTA, but now it's in the land of the alligators with state of the art rendering. Did I miss anything?

16 Aug

I think, it's finally time to meet Hanako at the Embers. Thank you for giving me such a great time in Night City, CDPR.

store.steampowered.comDimhaven - The Lost Source on SteamAre you ready for an adventure? Challenges, exploration and puzzles in a narrative driven experience, pick up your camera and test your wits in this first-person mystery by the team behind Quern!

17 July

I have big issues with pixelated textures in 3d. Usually, I find them off putting, mostly because pixel sizes are mixed wildly between objects, destroying any visual coherence that you might have in good pixel art. I just played the Dimhaven Demo and am pleasantly surprised by the texture work.

I also want to add that I know that point filtered pixelated textures on 3d meshes that look coherent is not a simple task. I'd say, it's easier to just do "traditional" texturing than pixelation. A friend of mine and I tried that in a Global Game Jam entry.

globalgamejam.orgLaughable Heist | Global Game JamA 3rd Person "Stealth" Game where you play as a clown infiltrating a bank. You weapon of choice: laughing gas!

17 July

We absolutely did not expect the texturing to be that hard, even with tooling for it. And I think we would do better now, but still... we know the pain. In case you want to actually play the game: globalgamejam.org/games/2024/l...

After seeing sooo many bad attempts at pixelated textures in modern games, my favorite always was the System Shock Remake. It's subtle, but it looks so nice. Now Dimhaven is more bold in its texturing, but it looks like everything fits.

17 July

I really enjoyed the demo and will buy the game, but the visuals were really what impressed me the most. The puzzles were great (even if I was a stupid platypuzzler sometimes), but the visuals really made it special for me.

16 July

Sometimes life is like that...

@nathangrayson.bsky.social

12 July

Earlier that day, Cyberpunk 2077 crashed while I was trying to aim at a target. I bet it was some null pointer that slipped into the UI while fetching the target to show the HUD for. That happens sometimes. Now imagine that would happen to your cyberware IRL. Good thing this is a sci-fi game...

Max reposted

Nathan Grayson

10 July

id's frankfurt office, which mostly focuses on the id tech engine, has been hit by layoffs. I've been told that half were let go today, in line with other locations earlier this week. this follows concern that the engine itself could be on the chopping block (which id and microsoft have refuted)

Aftermath@aftermath.site

Layoffs hit id Software Frankfurt aftermath.site/xbox-layoffs-i...

Max reposted

OneBGS - Bethesda Game Studios Union

@bethesdaunion.bsky.social

8 July

Unfortunately, HR made our office manager take this down almost immediately. They said because it's in a common area, it had to be removed. We've used common areas for many things as a team, including fan works, but HR seems to believe that a Celebration of Service is inappropriate.

OneBGS - Bethesda Game Studios Union@bethesdaunion.bsky.social

Those of us in Rockville were inspired by the Dallas team's vigil for those let go Monday and made our own Celebration of Service. We set it up this morning in the common area of the first floor at 9am today.

Max reposted

OneBGS - Bethesda Game Studios Union

@bethesdaunion.bsky.social

7 July

One way you can show Microsoft your concern is here through the XBOX Player Voice feedback platform: feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/ide...

Max reposted

Pipapo Games

@pipapogames.bsky.social

24 June

Are there ever too many stickers for one map? 😅 Map Map - Out Now on Steam 🗺️📍 s.team/a/2702260/ #indiegame #gamedevs #cartography

Max reposted

Pandaras Box

@pandaras-box.bsky.social

15 June

Slimey Plush Platypus #art

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Freya Holmér

@freya.bsky.social

2 June

so my debate with the AI startup guy went about as expected

24 May

As always with Unity: Why can't I choose local git as an option? Why is "source control" considered "online" from the get go? Why can't I link that later? Even Visual Studio allows this.

24 May

And Visual Studio to the rescue: After creating the Unity project and opening the code in Visual Studio, you can create a local (or remote) git repository in place.

22 May

I just setup my first ever github pages deployment from scratch (and I had no idea what I'm doing). But I've built this tool for Tunic that I wanted to be able to share online and since it's basically a static website with some Typescript logic, I needed to deploy that somehow.

@pronounced-ing.bsky.social

22 May

If you haven't played Tunic, go play it, it's great. If you have finished it and want to see my work, go take a look: maxplay.github.io/TunicText/

Max reposted

Celeste Ng

8 May

Had convos w/ multiple people in the past 4 days who DID NOT KNOW that 1. AI doesn't "think" or know anything; it's a probability machine 2. It was created using massive amounts of work stolen from actual people including me 3. The environmental costs are astronomical Spread the word, every time!

store.steampowered.comImmersive SimSteam Store Hub

4 May

None of the games on this page are immersive sims: store.steampowered.com/tags/en/Imme... This makes me irrationally angry...

Max reposted

Aysha

@ayshaufarah.bsky.social

2 May

Idk man I feel like even if AI scraped from 100% ethical sources, had zero impact on the environment, and produced gorgeous work, I’d still think you were a bitch for using it