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Microsoft completes $69B deal to buy Activision Blizzard

theguardian.com

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Re: Microsoft completes $69B deal to buy Activision Blizzard

#551

Post by 8n4vidtmkvmk »

ThatPlayer wrote: post #550
chongli wrote: post #546

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That may be the case but other genres, such as shooters (first and third person), have found ways to get around it. Fortnite, for example, has nowhere near this issue whereas Quake 3 is plagued by it. The 100-player battle royale structure of Fortnite is one mechanism I think helps to mitigate the problem of overwhelming skill gap. This kind of thing hasn't really been tested in RTS games, which usually focus on 1v1s…

Fortnite's solution has been bots, which is not very popular because plenty of people think they're above bots. Or think that bots cheat (which is true in Starcraft). Or in fighting games, they don't play like humans so you end up learning bad habits.

They didn't cheat on sc2 did they? They did in sc1. But regardless, with the breakthroughs in AI recently, I don't think they'd need to cheat on a hypothetical sc3.

Re: Microsoft completes $69B deal to buy Activision Blizzard

#552

Post by ThatPlayer »

8n4vidtmkvmk wrote: post #551
ThatPlayer wrote: post #550

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fortnite's solution has been bots, which is not very popular because plenty of people think they're above bots. Or think that bots cheat (which is true in Starcraft). Or in fighting games, they don't play like humans so you end up learning bad habits.

They didn't cheat on sc2 did they? They did in sc1. But regardless, with the breakthroughs in AI recently, I don't think they'd need to cheat on a hypothetical sc3.

I know in SC2 the harder AI would get free resources.

I think "playing like a human" can still be an issue depending on the game. Until people want to play against AIs, there's not a lot of work put into making AIs human-like rather than just AI players.

Also there still Starcraft 1 AI tournaments which are interesting. https://youtu.be/gqggsFpTAt8

Re: Microsoft completes $69B deal to buy Activision Blizzard

#553

Post by hx8 »

IcyWindows wrote: post #344
hx8 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm more concerned that I won't have access to the games because I don't play on Xbox or Windows.

You can play via cloud streaming on other devices.

That's just playing on Xbox/Windows with extra steps.

Re: Microsoft completes $69B deal to buy Activision Blizzard

#554

Post by LikesPwsh »

kungito wrote: post #536
chongli wrote: post #507

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not the GP but I’ll give my take: The long term value for an RTS is with the multiplayer. The problem is that the games are incredibly demanding to play. It takes a lot of practice and experience to get good enough to get off the “bottom rung” of the online ladder, just to be able to reach close to a 50% win rate. Many gamers find this too stressful to deal with. They end up quitting the game and moving on to somethi…

I'd say it's like this for any older game which still has a multiplayer community regardless of genre. There just isn't a big influx of new players and the bad ones give up.

Randomness is a big mitigator.

In MtG or LoL, a worse player than the opponent might still win 40% of games (luck of the draw or teammates), even ignoring matchmaking systems.

Players can aim for losing less over time, while still having a chance to win any particular game.

In SC or chess any chance of success against a better player is effectively zero.

Re: Microsoft completes $69B deal to buy Activision Blizzard

#555

Post by dagw »

pphysch wrote: post #523
bigboy12 wrote: post #509

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ms bought Nokia - out of business Ms bought Skype - useless as Zoom won the Covid era MS bought Lynda.com- who? MS bought LinkedIn- does anyone pay $90 a month to use it? MS bought Danger - the best tactical keyboard mobile phone. DEAD MS bought Halo vr system a $3509 pos that never got an update Ms buys stuff , never making stuff.

Who made/makes VSCode?

VSCode was an in house MS project

Re: Microsoft completes $69B deal to buy Activision Blizzard

#556

Post by dagw »

sitkack wrote: post #548
vissidarte_choi wrote: post #547

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And then, MS bought GitHub, OpenAI...

Hotmail, DOS, Windows NT (Dave Cutler from DEC)

I don't think NT belongs on the list as it was entirely developed in house. Sure the lead developer had designed an OS while at DEC and NT built upon his experience from that, but it was still a entirely new OS

Re: Microsoft completes $69B deal to buy Activision Blizzard

#557

Post by jollofricepeas »

amourgh wrote: post #527
bigboy12 wrote: post #509

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ms bought Nokia - out of business Ms bought Skype - useless as Zoom won the Covid era MS bought Lynda.com- who? MS bought LinkedIn- does anyone pay $90 a month to use it? MS bought Danger - the best tactical keyboard mobile phone. DEAD MS bought Halo vr system a $3509 pos that never got an update Ms buys stuff , never making stuff.

Linkedin is used by every recruiter.Most of the recruiters pay. It has captured most of employment traffic

And enterprise sales teams use it a ton as well.

LinkedIn serves a few purposes:

- It’s where Fortune 500 middle management networks and brags about professional accomplishments.

- Its where enterprise sales people get leads and network with those middle managers

- It’s where recruiters go to find talent of any type

Re: Microsoft completes $69B deal to buy Activision Blizzard

#558

Post by dagw »

njovin wrote: post #54
eigenket wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mostly its because Activision/Blizzard is such an obviously shitty terrible company that any deal that sees cool IPs taken out of their hands is seen as a positive thing.

Which games has MS shown good stewardship of? Halo is a shell of what it once was and has snubbed the players with false promises in recent iterations (couch co-op used to be a staple of Halo but they reneged on their promise to include it with the latest). AFAIK they haven't had any good exclusive IP for Xbox in a while. They've had a few dynamite hits (ex. Sunset Overdrive) but haven't followed up on any that I'm a…

I don't know if you count it as a game, but Flight Simulator? Sure there was a decade or so when nothing happened, but I think they more than made up for that.

Re: Microsoft completes $69B deal to buy Activision Blizzard

#559

Post by aiscapehumanity »

bigboy12 wrote: post #509
MobileVet wrote: post #441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

RTS is such a great genre. I know everyone loved StarCraft but I enjoyed Warcraft II and 3 more… along with C&C, Red Alert and Age of Empires. Not sure why. Warcraft 3 was a great balance between micro and macro management due to the Hero concept. SC always just felt like a game of numbers… but I am sure I just wasn’t as experienced. Regardless I would love it if the genre stayed alive and I am glad Age is continuall…

Ms bought Nokia - out of business Ms bought Skype - useless as Zoom won the Covid era MS bought Lynda.com- who? MS bought LinkedIn- does anyone pay $90 a month to use it? MS bought Danger - the best tactical keyboard mobile phone. DEAD MS bought Halo vr system a $3509 pos that never got an update Ms buys stuff , never making stuff.

MS AI research plus big game IP is a future investment

Re: Microsoft completes $69B deal to buy Activision Blizzard

#560

Post by chainingsolid »

chongli wrote: post #507
endorphine wrote: post #494

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> love RTS games, but they're probably never going to achieve the level of success they have in the past. You can still make them, but like arena shooters, movement shooters, and fighting games, they really are from a different era that modern players struggle to come to terms with Interesting take. Why do you think that is? They just fallen out of fashion or something else?

Not the GP but I’ll give my take: The long term value for an RTS is with the multiplayer. The problem is that the games are incredibly demanding to play. It takes a lot of practice and experience to get good enough to get off the “bottom rung” of the online ladder, just to be able to reach close to a 50% win rate. Many gamers find this too stressful to deal with. They end up quitting the game and moving on to somethi…

I taught a friend to play multiplayer Supreme Commander. And your outlining of the "on boarding" problem is spot on. They ended up getting through it because they already where a good RTS player and I 1v1ed them for a while (didn't abliterate them every match, and slowly ramped up the difficulty while providing constructism). However most new players don't have access to 1 on 1 coaching!
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