@spaced92: Yeah, after playing Enemy Unknown, it seems like it's just a crappy engine.
The graphics are in no way challenging for any remotely new hardware but for some reason there are tonnes of graphical bugs & it looks like slow load times in the new one too. That either comes down to incompetence/inexperience of the devs (which doesn't seem likely for Firaxis) or an engine that's really tough to optimise.
Having seen some gameplay footage from the new Xcom, it looks like there are a lot of the same bugs here that never got fixed last time. That being the case, they really should have switched to a new engine. I know it doesn't matter so much for a turn-based game but it still makes me hesitate to pay full AAA price when it doesn't exactly live up to AAA expectations in terms of performance.
@nlafayette: I think it's a lot less about Square Enix trying to screw over the customers for more cash & more about them not having trust in Io to deliver a blockbuster product.
AAA games take longer to make & cost more money than they used to. That's a reality of modern game development. When games get delayed & go over budget, that's more of a risk for the publisher. An episodic model allows the publisher to recoup some of their costs before the game is completed. There's no real benefit to the consumer here except that maybe a game gets made instead of being cancelled.
I think the flak that Io is getting mainly comes down to sacrificing what could have been a great vision for the next Hitman game & instead being forced to go down the episodic path because the publisher made them. Personally I think that breaking up a story by having weeks or months between episodes is never a good thing. I'd rather wait for the full game to be made & play at my own pace. Will the game I end up playing be better or worse because of the episodic model? I don't know. I do know that there are enough great games that are finished & there's no way I'm paying for one that isn't. I don't want Io or the Hitman franchise to die but I want to see this model fail & die. I want Square Enix & other publishers put gamers first & have faith that we will pay for great games if they're willing to make them without the compromises.
Definitely waiting til all eps are out. I've learnt from Telltale games & Life is Strange that waiting for the next ep sucks. In an age where people are moving away from the traditional TV structure & binge watching series at their own pace, why is the games industry suddenly moving towards episodic models? Not because it serves the consumer.
Jim Sterling did an episode of the Jimquisition a couple of weeks back that had some inside sources talking about why episodic games are appearing now. It's worth watching.
@Utnayan: Based on that, I'd say that a few people were allowed to play a beta build & that they all published articles as soon as the embargo allowed them to.
Unfortunately it does read like a hype piece but it's probably due to restrictions placed on what they're allowed to say rather than being a paid for ad. Even so, a deal where they're not allowed to talk about any problems with the game is of no help to the consumer. The fact that this "new AI" sounds very familiar to anyone who's played the previous games doesn't help either. Leaving bodies lying around has never been a good idea in Hitman games.
Rather than simply calling them liars, let's unpack this. Nope, they haven't left out any AA or lighting effects for console parity but what about the bones of the game?
In the infamous E3 demo everyone was impressed by the character reaching out & closing a car door. Not because closing doors is cool but because it represented attention to detail. If the little things help immerse the player in the world then surely the really important things must be fine tuned as well! In the beta car doors still close but the character model no longer animates to reach out. The trash filled streets look beautiful but they don't react to the player. You don't leave footsteps in the snow, trash sacks don't tumble down if you touch them or shoot them.
A game truly developed for the PC from the ground up should have a dynamic environment that changes with the player's actions. It should take advantage of multiple threaded cores, high speed RAM & the latest graphical hardware. The Division looks pretty enough in screenshots & even running around the streets but on closer inspection it's easy to tell that it has the bones of a console game with a little PC polish on the surface.
@rhenom: My G510S is serving me pretty well, I cannot live without my little monitor telling me my FPS & temps etc. anymore! The grouping of the G keys on the left is pretty useful as well.
I'd like to try some Romer G switches (without those ridiculous key caps on the 910) but I won't give up my Aida64 system monitoring on the keyboard.
@billzihang: I'm imagining a dystopian near-future where we don't own products, merely the license to use them. Then Nintendo can totally sue people for damaging their products. I fear we are not far off.
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