partious

Considering the userbase of this thing is pretty much entirely fairly dedicated retrogamers, the available cases are surprisingly uninspired/bland. I know the contents are more important than the case, but hopefully we'll see some more interesting case options in future.  

I'd love to be able to get an 80s home computer style case (with working keyboard) or just something with a bit more charm or relevance to retro computing/gaming hardware designs than the charmless little plastic/aluminium boxes we currently have to choose from. 

I much prefer the original games' pixel art to the graphics of this. To be honest, this type of artstyle in updates of pixel games does kind of give off the sort of "we cheaped out/don't have pixel artists anymore" vibe that the psp era 2.5D games like the psp GnG, Megaman X, Castlevania etc did, but that might just be a matter of preference. That said, this artstyle is definitely preferable to that 2.5D stuff.

This is one reason why I can't quite relate to the xbox gamepass hype on gaming forums. Most of us seem to have pretty shocking backlogs of unplayed games that we actually decided we were interested enough in to pay for. There are more games out there that I'm actually interested in than I have time to play.

Games can generally be picked up dirt cheap if you wait even a few months so a monthly subscription to temporarily access a selection of games from Microsoft that might have a few you want to play but not others you want to play doesn't quite strike me as the deal of the century it's being presented as on forums. What do you do when the game you actually want to play at the moment isn't on gamepass? Buy it and "waste" your gamepass subscription time?(at least if you have unplayed games on your shelf you're not paying a monthly fee not to play them). Don't buy it and spend your bit of free time playing some gamepass game you're less excited about because it's "free"?

I used to think psplus was a good deal with its "free" games until I realised I'd been paying it for about 6 years and played about 4 games from it(I'm not an online gamer). 

Also, people talking about freebies as "backlog" and acting like they feel obligated to play/complete things they got for free makes no sense to me. I get all the epic and twitch games but have played almost none of them. I don't consider them my "backlog".

The cheap gold to gamepass conversion was pretty much the only thing tempting me to go with an xbox this gen. As someone with a big backlog I'm not remotely interested in full price gamepass. Most of the games on it are regular sale fodder anyway. I'd rather buy a good game in a sale and own it than pay hundreds over a few years to MS for a subscription and be left with zero games if I ever stop paying. 

This is beyond whatever might be considered a "reasonable" charge for playing your games online and basically means xbox is only really for people who are happy to pay full price for gamepass and its added features or only play offline. 

Also, I'm surprised there are no reassuring quotes from your friend and mine "Phil" in this thread. 

10 minutes ago, Nathan Wind said:

@partious They're available on Amazon at the moment.  It's where I got mine.

Ah ok. It seems amazon.co.uk was just hiding it from my search results because I'm in a country they don't ship it to. It shows up in the search if I enter a UK post code. Didn't know they did that. 

I bought a The C64 on an online marketplace but when I asked him to confirm that the "barely used/like new condition" item worked before sending it, the seller said he would then the next day claimed it was in fact broken and cancelled the sale . I suspect either he was a scammer and knew it was broken all along or he realised that it seems to be hard to come by right now and figured he can sell it for more money. 

Due to my location I don't have any chance of getting another. Where did you get yours @Nathan Wind? reading online it seems they're hard enough to obtain these days even in Europe and America.  

I'm not usually interested in these modern emulation devices (snes mini etc) but I found it appealing in the case of this thing because of the keyboard, the general hassle of using old home computers vs hooking up a snes or megadrive and the fact that I live in a place where the c64 wasn't a thing at all so original hardware isn't easily obtainable either. 

34 minutes ago, gizmo1990 said:

 

Well look, I totally disagree with that sentiment and don't believe what I'm suggesting in anyway means that. But hey as you say, that's your opinion.

 I think your point was reasonable.

While I also think there are still interesting things to be written about the period you mentioned, in terms of whether there's a market for a more niche/in depth retro magazine, I'd say it's unlikely since it's now a niche within a niche and the low hanging fruit with wider appeal is probably the difference between making money or not.

There's barely a market for any paper gaming magazine these days. 

In terms of 360 or PS3 being retro because they're now x years old, I'd be inclined to wonder what can be written in 2021 about such "retro" games from the era of social media and online games journalism etc that isn't a google search away.

C64s and Spectrums etc are before my time but I enjoy reading about the scene and the period in gaming because it's so different from nowadays. 360 and psp, not so much.

 I bought the wii u fairly soon after release and it really did feel like a golden era of Nintendo games/creativity. It completely rekindled a fairly dead interest in modern gaming(I had completely skipped the ps3/360 but never stopped playing snes/megadrive etc). I can see how the switch might be the "best console ever" if you didn't have a wii u, but if you did I honestly think that aside from a couple of exceptions, the first party switch exclusives are pretty lacklustre.

3d World is out soon on Switch. Probably the best game I've played in the past 10 years and in my top 5 of all time. Most people here who play it for the first time this year will point to it as another reason the switch is the best console ever but for me it's a port of a great wii u game I played years ago, so not quite as exciting. 

That said I think rereleasing every wii u game full price on Switch was completely the right move for them, since they may as well be brand new games as far as most switch owners are concerned.

As for the question in the OP, nope, I only care about the quality of the games. More tempted to say goodbye to playstation (and xbox lol), as I've never been less interested in what those guys are peddling than I am now and I can play indies just fine on my aging gaming pc. 

On 14/01/2021 at 08:58, Wiper said:

 

 

Still, none of that's enough to make me write them off - the most bothersome thing for me, ethically, is the damage to game archiving/availability that comes with their laser focus on emulation sites, and that's not enough to push me over the edge. The thing that would make me write them off would be if they turn out to have a crunchtastic and/or abusive working culture in the vein of Naughty Dog or Ubisoft, the same attitude I take with other developers and publishers.*

 The free pass that Japanese companies get from people concerned about this recent "crunch" issue just because the western games media don't seem to have the ability to cover them as easily as EA/Ubisoft or at all (and Japanese games journalism died about 20 years ago) is borderline willfull ignorance. 

It's Japan. Unless you explicitly know that a company is a rare exception to the rule, you should start from the assumption that they're pressured to do a totally unreasonable level of overtime.

On 04/01/2021 at 06:33, bplus said:

Is it any good? The review scores are low, but I'm thinking that's just because these sort of games were falling out of fashion.

 

I tried mxt mototrax (most unmemorable name ever!) On my pc, it seemed good, but I had to configure pad manually and I'd prefer it on a console.

I quite like Nitrobike on PS2 but I'm not massively hard to please when it comes to arcade racers.

It's been a while but I think I didn't get on with the Wii version as much because I'm not a big fan of wii motion controls.

11 minutes ago, Danster said:

The thread will still be there, it's just hidden from everyone but Mods. Users can't delete any posts, if you really want to remove your content from the site then you need to go through and edit your posts blank. If people really want it back then ask a kindly mod to restore without the OP changed.

I certainly wouldn't care about that particular thread enough to do that (my own contribution was a half baked opinion which was quickly disproven by @Wiper ), but I think the policy of letting thread starters delete (hide) everyone's posts should probably be reconsidered.

Shit thread or not (and no, it probably isn't a massive loss), I've always found giving thread starters the ability to delete an entire thread of other people's posts a bit misjudged. People should be allowed to delete their own individual posts and thread starters should be allowed either delete or edit out the content of the opening post if they want to, but I think when someone bothers typing and posting something it should be on the understanding that it won't be deleted unless it goes against the rules or they themselves decide to remove it.

1 minute ago, John0 said:

Where is this "I hate Hades" thread? I can't find it...

OP deleted it.

Sega announce that they're porting some of their much loved classics to PS5 and Series X. All the games the fans have been waiting for. Sonic the Hedgehog 1! Altered Beast! Bonanza Bros! Columns 1! They're all here!

Outrun 2? Afterburner Climax? Daytona 2? Scud Race? Sega Rally 1/2/3? Never heard of em, but you might get Outrun 1 in 2024 after we've ported(an emulator running) Golden Axe and Columns 2

I think it's really a non-issue for most people who enjoy playing games that were made both more and less than x years ago.

Individuals can use "retro" however they like, and depending on their age retrogaming might mean the spectrum, the 360, or anything in between.

Magazine and game publishers can continue to use it however they suspect will maximise sales.

I don't think it's worth the effort even wasting time trying to define "retro" games and think it would probably be better if we could move towards just talking about playing "games", even if we've been sold a new console since the game in question's release.

I am often quite negative in any "general state of gaming" type threads as those threads are just for navel gazing opinions anyway and I do feel fairly negative towards modern (non-indie) gaming trends and market forces.

I'm not a fan of people camping in a game's thread and incessantly posting about how terrible it is etc while others are enjoying the game.  I'm not suggesting we prevent people from doing so but in my experience reading people nitpick and whine about a game while you're playing through it really doesn't add value to the experience. Sometimes it's best to avoid the forum discussion if you're somehow enjoying a game that the group has turned on.

Most recently experienced this while playing through and enjoying Cyberpunk on PS4 after buying it on release day and reading the thread here.

That thread was particularly bad because you had some posters labelling anyone who dared enjoy their experience with the game as "apologists", "corporate bootlickers" etc. Whatever about general negativity, what does being caught up in that hysterical nonsense add to anyone's enjoyment of a videogame?

The forum's non-indie game of 2021 will be a 2013 Wii U game.

The forum's indie game of the year will be whichever high production value roguelike/metroidvania releases in the latter part of the year.

The constant stream of free pc games from epic, twitch prime and a bunch of other places, and the number of games I've built up have had several effects. It's completely put me off buying random stuff in steam sales. It's prevented me from buying various full price indies on switch after realising I've already got them on epic/twitch. More recently, it's a major factor that's making me rethink the importance of even getting a ps5/series x since I'm not into the aaa cinematic stuff.

Gamepass would look a lot more appealing if it wasn't for all the free(to keep) pc games I get every month.

This seems as good a thread as any to ask this. Are there any other games magazines that are worth reading these days?

I read Retrogamer and Edge, are there any others worth a read?  Single or multiplatform is ok.

1 hour ago, sir podger said:

a chicken warming chamber

Well it's certainly a more exciting prospect than reduced load times.

2 hours ago, Tomcat said:

 

It's partly explained by the fact that there's barely a PS5 anywhere - my local used shop has a digital one for which they want 97,000 plus tax.  Other shops are selling a few to customers chosen at random in a lottery until January 31st.  The Xbox Series is even rarer.

 

There have been many months when it was hard to find a Switch - the Lite, not so much - but they available now.

The next gen console launches in Japan seem to have been a case of just halfheartedly getting a small number of consoles out there so they could technically say they launched in Japan. Don't think there's been a single xbox restock since release and I suspect the launch day number of units was utterly tiny too. PS5 stock too is clearly in significantly smaller numbers here than in the UK/US. The transformation of Japan from what seemed to be the centre of gaming until the mid 2000s to a total afterthought now is interesting.  Also, Japan's a bit of a scalper's paradise whenever any in demand item releases.

Still though, shortages or not, for the mainstream here, gaming is Switch and free to play mobile grinds during your commute.

I think it's fair to say that nowadays there's a major difference in console gamer age demographics between Japan and Europe/America. A whole lot of Japanese adults are content with mobile games. In my experience, a Japanese teen/adult even owning a PS4 etc is usually a fairly accurate sign that they're a fairly "hardcore" gamer/fan of western aaa games. The other teens/adults have their phone games and all kids and Monster Hunter fans have a switch. Not sure where the gal game otaku adults moved after vita, but I'd guess Switch and mobile again.

48 minutes ago, vezna said:

 

Stock Informer

 

This answers my question about the uk rrp too. Seems similar enough to the Japan price. I guess the US prices are just cheaper than everywhere else.

What's the cheapest rrp including tax of a 3070 in the uk(I know there's no stock)?

Whereas the next gen consoles are even more sold out/impossible to buy in Japan than elsewhere, these cards seem fairly readily available in all the pc parts shops I've checked. Cheapest 3070 I've seen is about 65000yen (£464 pounds) including tax. I've read $500 as the US rrp so 65000yen seems pricey but maybe the $500 is before tax and the rest is just the usual Japan markup..)

What's the difference between the "cheaper" 3070's and the ones that cost 100+ more?(ram etc seems to to be the same).

4 hours ago, Marlew said:

@Yiggy @partious

 

Why would you base your conclusions on this one negative impression, rather than the widespread positive response? There's not much rationale there beyond confirmation bias, you understand.

 

It's also disrespectful to frame those who shared positive experiences as wilfully ignoring reality, simply to fit the narrative you've chosen. You see the irony.

 

Merry Christmas. 

 

Relax, I didn't conclude anything about the ps5 controller, just said I found the impression interesting. I stand by my appraisal of switch hd rumble.

Merry Christmas to you too