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The tragic end of Telltale Games

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181–190 of 202 posts

Re: The tragic end of Telltale Games

#181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

quake, unreal tournament, tribes, battlefield, planetside.. Deathmatch with many players. Same thing pretty much, but with more action.

> Same thing pretty much, but with more action. That's exactly why we play BR games. These days I play mostly PUBG. Before that, Day of Infamy. Before that, Insurgency. Notice a trend? Each one of those games has a lot at stake (relatively speaking) when you get into an engagement. If you die, you sit out for a while. They're about communication and coordination between players on the same team. PUBG (and Fortnite, t…

Battlefield usually annoyed me when I would spend minutes traveling back to the scene of the action. In Fortnite I would spend minutes just trying to find anyone on the map at all sometimes. It feels like I'm doing a lot, lot more of the unfun stuff (traveling) than the fun stuff (shooting and outmaneuvering the opponents). I just can't get into it myself.

I'll just keep playing Quake (actually I'm mainly playing puzzles and graphic novels right now) until people get tired of Battle Royale modes and need a break from them.

Re: The tragic end of Telltale Games

#182

Don't work in the games industry. This is the par story for game companies. Every little detail of this story I saw repeating on loop in a decade of working in games. The artists grabbing assets to stuff into their portfolios before two years of professional work disappears into a black hole, the ppl moving families across country to be laid off months later, the crunch, the over promising, it is all text book. The g…

I can't even play anymore. I've seen firsthand how the industry treats developers, and I cannot bring myself to send money into the pockets of the fratboy shitheels that run it.

If only there was a way to obtain a game without doing that...

Re: The tragic end of Telltale Games

#183

Don't work in the games industry. This is the par story for game companies. Every little detail of this story I saw repeating on loop in a decade of working in games. The artists grabbing assets to stuff into their portfolios before two years of professional work disappears into a black hole, the ppl moving families across country to be laid off months later, the crunch, the over promising, it is all text book. The g…

A huge problem with GameDev is that there's a huge group of 20-somethings fresh into the job market with tech skills who think of it as their dream job and are fully willing to be abused and exploited in order to work in the industry. It takes years for them to be burned out, at which point there's another batch of eager young go-getters willing to fill their void. This dynamic means that even at the worst companies…

Guilty thought: it's probably good for the rest of us that these kids lock themselves into the dumpster of game dev, otherwise they'd be undermining labor markets elsewhere.

Re: The tragic end of Telltale Games

#184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

quake, unreal tournament, tribes, battlefield, planetside.. Deathmatch with many players. Same thing pretty much, but with more action.

BR is a very different type of game and especially Fortnight has VERY different game play. It plays nothing like quake or ut. It's much closer to counter strike but with a higher level of tension.

Also, add a giant map and an exploration/preparation period where most players are searching for weapons before fighting anyone.

Re: The tragic end of Telltale Games

#185
post #15

Sometimes you simply got to let the data speak for themselves: https://imgur.com/a/2tR4WVX It's so strange how the prestige around the brand was not correlated to the sells numbers. It so strange how their demise was so unexpected by the press and gaming communities when the writing was on the wall long ago.

That image cannot be viewed on mobile. The resolution is too low to read any of the text even when zoomed in.

Re: The tragic end of Telltale Games

#186
post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Game dev is a meat grinder. While making games is a great way to learn programming, and is a lot of fun, the working conditions make it an untenable career choice for most.

If you are young, single and healthy, and can work on important parts of a game (engine), do it for 1-2 years, have a blast, ship an AAA game, then escape to more stable FAANG, where you will be a highly paid guru. You can even write a book or two then, documenting your tricks and achievements.

You’re talking about Bob Nystrom, right?

http://gameprogrammingpatterns.com

Re: The tragic end of Telltale Games

#187

Don't work in the games industry. This is the par story for game companies. Every little detail of this story I saw repeating on loop in a decade of working in games. The artists grabbing assets to stuff into their portfolios before two years of professional work disappears into a black hole, the ppl moving families across country to be laid off months later, the crunch, the over promising, it is all text book. The g…

Just as a counterpoint - I've worked for 4 years now as a programmer at one of the biggest publishers in the industry, and honestly, the work life balance is great, the pay is ok for the region(plus I get decent amount of shares every year), the work is varied, interesting and I like both what I do and people I work with. I think the last time I did overtime was 2 years ago, and even then it was only for a week aroun…

Dice?

Re: The tragic end of Telltale Games

#188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have been gaming literally my entire life save for the first couple years, spending thousands of dollars on games every year, and I have never watched any of those “gaming personalities.”

If it helps add another data point to the mix, I can confirm parent's comment on these personalities and their influence within the gaming community. A number of them often provide in-depth critiques and unexpected insights on game design that take the form of comedic video quasi-essays, and they rack up huge subscriber counts.

Skipping through a “No Commentary” playthrough usually tells me all I need to know about a game before purchasing it, without any subjective opinions of someone else.

Re: The tragic end of Telltale Games

#189
post #113
post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All the games followed the same basic gameplay roadmap. Event happens -> Talk to other characters -> Another event happens Usually the events were cutscenes or QTEs (timed button presses) that you either pass or get a gameover if you fail too many. Now this wouldn't be an issue if the games were marketed as such but instead they tried to present them with the taglines "Your choices have consequences" while it was cle…

I haven't played any of these games either, and the kinds of "press a button in time to make stuff happen" events you describe are something I really hate in games, so I don't think I will. That said, your description of the illusion of choice in the story... sounds like every story-based videogame ever. I've been playing games since the 90s, and I can't really think of any such games off the top of my head where you…

There are actually quite a few games that I enjoy because your actions actually mattered in the game, and I highly recommend you try it if you enjoy a good story.

Heavy Rain and Detroit: Become Human are excellent examples in that your choices actually matter. For example, it's possible to lose a character much earlier on and drastically change how the whole story plays out, or choose an action which entirely changes a few 'stages' you proceed to. There are also a lot of different versions of the ending, either by showing totally different ending scenes, or tweaking some scenes with different characters, or additional cutscenes that change the whole meaning of the ending.Gameplay was also very satisfying for both games, from the things you can do in each stage or the Quick Time Events (QTE) which also change how the story plays out.

In comparison to Telltale's games which are supposed to be about how your choices matter, the only thing that gets affected are some throwaway dialogue and maybe a few short scenes. QTEs are also laughably simple and nearly impossible to fail, and if you do fail you just restart in the last scene anyway.

Re: The tragic end of Telltale Games

#190
post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fundamental difference between all of those games and what I would consider a battle royale game is you only get 1 life. As an aside, I loved Tribes 2 construction mod.

Last I recall from playing unreal 2004, there is a slider to select how many life players have when starting a death match. Battle royale was available, long before battle royale was cool. There were also a lot of other gameplay available on top of death match, all built in: team death match, assault, onslaught, capture the flags, domination, etc...

No, you need the blue circle, looting and big maps as well. Just having one life is not enough.
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