Square-Enix sells all of its Western game studios and their games to Embracer • Hacker News Board

Re: Square-Enix sells all of its Western game studios and their games to Embracer

#171

Post by marginalia_nu » Mon, May 02, 2022, 9:08 PM UTC

smcl wrote: post #162

marginalia_nu wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It probably isn't for everyone, but at least for me it's among the better games I've played in recent years.

Quite possibly, I'm definitely keeping an open mind though. Just for context, I had written off the FromSoftware games because I disliked the idea of a game tormenting me, and I've given Elden Ring a shot and I love it. This might seem a bit silly but I'd previously been playing it safe and only trying things I think I'd like rather than rolling the dice and leaving my comfort zone. So I'm now in the state of mind of…

It's honestly fairly similar to From's games in several ways, except it's a first person shooter.

At face value, it's ridiculously hard, everything kills you almost instantly. The game is figuring out how to cheese the game, the more you cheese it the more the game unfolds. The game expects you to do this, and rewards you for it, arguably even more so than FromSoft's games do. Jank is a core gameplay mechanic. If you manage to bullshit your way into a location where you really shouldn't be able to go, odds are it has a super powerful weapon or a secret or whatever.

It really forces you to engage with the game as it is rather than going through the motions of playing a first person shooter.

Re: Square-Enix sells all of its Western game studios and their games to Embracer

#172

Post by brendoelfrendo » Mon, May 02, 2022, 9:12 PM UTC

henriquecm8 wrote: post #128

Reubachi wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Deus Ex is done. A finish to the Jensen story would rely upon Eidos Montreal being able to produce more than one game every 5 years. Since Mankind Divided, they've released only a Guardians of the Galaxy game. MD was a great game, which was according to Eidos Montreal kneecapped by "Square rushing it out". Human Revolution was an even greater game, but still slightly kneecapped by "Square rushing it out".

They release two games, Guardians of the Galaxy and Shadow of Tomb Raider. And helped with Avengers.

Yeah, neither of which were small games, for the record; SotTR was a huge effort, if not the high point of the new TR games. And Guardians of the Galaxy was well-received, and even won a Game Award for best narrative (I won't comment on the relevance of awards shows; let's just call it "peer recognition" for their efforts).

Guardians also failed to meet Square's sales expectations, though Square is notoriously hard to please. Tomb Raider (2013) moved 3.6 million in its first month, and was considered a disappointment... but not so much of a disappointment that they didn't green-light 2 sequels.

Re: Square-Enix sells all of its Western game studios and their games to Embracer

#173

Post by oneoff786 » Mon, May 02, 2022, 9:15 PM UTC

dayvid wrote: post #139

oneoff786 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linear games are better in my opinion. Linearity isn’t the problem though. Mario is linear and very fun. Tomb raider just sort of takes away you doing anything. You have no real agency for a lot of it. Just told what buttons to press indirectly and then you do it.

They require different design skillsets or experiences. Elden Ring and Zelda are designed to be more non-linear and they work, but have completely different strengths and focuses vs. a linear approach. More based on creating an engrossing world and mechanics that allow you to play most sections out of order and create your own adventure vs. the control you have over story nuances when you make a linear title (e.g. Ha…

I feel elden ring really failed on the non linear aspect to be honest. It was frustratingly open ended up front, and then very linear at the end.

I started the game, went to margit, found him too difficult, and then, with no particular alternatives, pretty much explored the entire map aimlessly, wishing for a clear direction on level appropriate content. It was hard to find the next thing to do. I didn’t want to skip through things with ashes or multiplayer. I didn’t want to farm.

By the time I actually found this content there was nothing left to do besides warp to bosses and murder them, or look up the obtuse quest lines and warp around to complete those. A huge floor on character progression is finding the flask upgrades. But since they’re just lying around you just go from having none of them to quickly finding more than you need for 80% of the game.

Like… dark souls would just be a worse game if every door and elevator was open from the beginning. It would just be confusing and frustrating if you started making “wrong” explorations.

I would greatly have preferred elden ring with pretty much the entire open world cut and instead just a tour of the legacy dungeons. The open world just compounded on some of dark soul’s weaknesses. Like finding even more cool weapons that you can’t practically try without farming a ton of upgrades and changing your build.

Re: Square-Enix sells all of its Western game studios and their games to Embracer

#174

Post by ineedasername » Mon, May 02, 2022, 9:15 PM UTC

trey-jones wrote: post #75

bennysomething wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the ex rare Goldeneye Devs said in an interview that the N64 not having a cd drive lost them that generation. I think he's probably mostly right. Cartridges were not only an anti piracy move, it saved on cost of console manufacturing (the N64 was still sold at a loss). As you point out N64 games were originally a lot more expensive than playstation games. Also Nintendo were really restrictive with who could de…

Somehow the pros of N64 carts (mainly loading times and onboard game saves) were never really talked about. I had an N64 (which I purchased together with Goldeneye circa 1997). I can remember a feeling of thinking I had made a mistake because PS1 seemed much bigger and I had a feeling that it must have been better. But looking back, I feel like N64 had the better set of games. But maybe that's just because it's what…

There were definite advantages to cartridges. I remember a few occasions where PS1 memory cards ate my save data, which never happened on N64. And I remember tedious disc swapping and long load times on a few games: Riven had a few discs and you'd have to switch when traveling from one area to another, and those were always fraught with the potential for game crashes.

On the other hand discs allowed much larger games. There was a crazy amount of variety on the PS1, though as a result also a lot of crap to sort through. I was a Nintendo-first fanboy at the time, but when the PS1 dropped in price to about $100 I picked one up, trading in N64 games I no longer played to help fund the purchase. I think it was around the time FFVII came out because I remember reserving it for day-1 release.

Ahh simpler times, working manual labor while in school. Sometimes I'm nostalgic for those days of unskilled (relatively) non knowledge-based work. It was much less stressful, even if the pay was crap.

Re: Square-Enix sells all of its Western game studios and their games to Embracer

#175

Post by brendoelfrendo » Mon, May 02, 2022, 9:24 PM UTC

didibus wrote: post #154

That's interesting and hopefully for the best. Square always did best Japanese style games, and maybe this lets them focus more on what they're good at. Eidos is such a good game studio, but I feel Square was just not letting them shine. Crystal Dynamics is also pretty descent, but that Avengers game what the hell happened? I think they're just not the right studio for a game like that. Now I don't know much about Em…

I don't think there is a right studio for a live-service game with micro-transactions etc., etc., etc., and I blame Square for taking what could have been a tightly-focused game and making it into something big, bland, and expensive. Not to say that Crystal Dynamics couldn't have done better, just that I think Square is obsessed with making a live service game happen (see also: Outriders; Babylon's Fall) and they're letting that blind drive hurt their studios.

Re: Square-Enix sells all of its Western game studios and their games to Embracer

#176

Post by jameshart » Mon, May 02, 2022, 9:38 PM UTC

TillE wrote: post #29

gundamdoubleO wrote: post #22

Hopefully a new Deus Ex game might be a possibility again.

The thing about Deus Ex is that there's nothing particularly special about the "IP". Anybody could make a near-future cyberpunk conspiracy-oriented immersive sim, and call it whatever. The modern Deus Ex games were really average, and (as detailed in the recent hbomberguy video) failed to grasp the key principles of level design that are required to make games like that work.

> Anybody could make a near-future cyberpunk conspiracy-oriented immersive sim

Pretty sure CD Projekt disproved that theory

Re: Square-Enix sells all of its Western game studios and their games to Embracer

#177

Post by Macha » Mon, May 02, 2022, 9:38 PM UTC

falcolas wrote: post #7

The Embracer Group's portfolio is becoming scary big. They're really scooping up development studios left and right. I appreciate that they're not doing much with them right now, but it makes me concerned for the future.

Tencent, Embracer and Microsoft. The industry definitely feels like it's consolidating into fewer players.

Re: Square-Enix sells all of its Western game studios and their games to Embracer

#178

Post by Melatonic » Mon, May 02, 2022, 9:43 PM UTC

Reubachi wrote: post #78

ianbutler wrote: post #61

Pretty please can we have the final installment of the Adam Jensen Deus Ex trilogy now. Left us hanging in the middle of what might be one of my favorite neo noir, cyberpunk series because open world story driven games were losing out back then. There's clearly an appetite now given recent releases and their success.

I think Deus Ex is done. A finish to the Jensen story would rely upon Eidos Montreal being able to produce more than one game every 5 years. Since Mankind Divided, they've released only a Guardians of the Galaxy game. MD was a great game, which was according to Eidos Montreal kneecapped by "Square rushing it out". Human Revolution was an even greater game, but still slightly kneecapped by "Square rushing it out".

People say that every time and (thankfully) so far we have kept getting Deus Ex games. For all their flaws I have enjoyed every single one q uite a bit.

Mankind Divided I thought was highly underrated. Cyberpunk 2077 was sort of close to what I think some people wanted out of the ultimate Deus Ex game (depending on your playstyle) but obviously had problems as well.

Personally I would like to see something massive and not just another boring "open world" focused game - Deus Ex really shines with a strong story driven plot. I have always wanted to see a true co-op functionality in a Deus Ex game and I think that could be hugely popular online especially if they regularly released new missions and content.

Re: Square-Enix sells all of its Western game studios and their games to Embracer

#179

Post by Wowfunhappy » Mon, May 02, 2022, 9:43 PM UTC

garaetjjte wrote: post #105

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When it's done well, I'm willing to embrace the cinematic nature of these games. Like a movie, the game is taking me on an adventure, but unlike a movie, I am responsible for whether my character succeeds or fails. If I don't jump at the right time, or deal with the attacker coming up behind me, my character will die and it will be my fault. Sure, I'm aware somewhere in the back of my mind that everything has been la…

>my character will die and it will be my fault. About that... Tomb Raider 2013 has probably the most gruesome death animations I ever encountered in video game.

So, I actually suspect that this was intentional, and kind of clever.

When games don't have a penalty for dying, players will sometimes fall back on a trial-and-error approach, where each individual attempt stops being meaningful. Some experiences, like Celeste, are designed around this type of gameplay loop, but it usually doesn't work well in a cinematic experience.

The most common penalty for dying is lost progress, but this also doesn't work well for cinematic games, because the experience looses its magic once you know what is going to happen.

So Tomb Raider takes a different approach. Checkpoints are frequent, but the death animations make you really, really not want to die!

I'm very squeamish, so I always had to close my eyes when I died. But even the chance that I might see something was a good incentive!

Re: Square-Enix sells all of its Western game studios and their games to Embracer

#180

Post by bsder » Mon, May 02, 2022, 9:44 PM UTC

Volundr wrote: post #133

bluefirebrand wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The gameplay of the original Nier is dogshit though. That leads to poor reviews, which leads to poor sales.

Not sure I'd say dogshit but not near as smooth as automata. Plus the story of the original game took a looooooong time to get going combined with the ability to lock yourself out of the true ending without knowing or discovering it for like 75% of the game is definitely going to limit the audience.

The controls are terrible. The combat is super repetitive. You transition between areas very slowly. You can lock yourself out of endings without even intending to. You can accidentally throw yourself into forced events super underleveled. You have to grind like hell for some of the materials. I can go on and on.

"Dogshit" might be a bit hyperbolic, but not by a lot.

Nier: Automata is a good (not great) game from Platinum wrapped in a juicy Nier narrative layer that elevates it to a very good game.