Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Blue Prince is a roguelike puzzle masterpiece

mssv.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 122 posts

Re: Blue Prince is a roguelike puzzle masterpiece

#51

Post by [deleted] »

DanielVZ wrote: post #43
square_usual wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I generally have the same frustration with roguelites as you seem to: every time I start a run, it feels like I'm gambling whether I'll have any fun at all. A bad seed or start can mean losing in ways that feel unfair or boring, like in balatro if you get a bunch of bad hands and bad jokers, you struggle through rounds and hands until you either lose or get an interesting combination. I don't need that kind of gambli…

One common mantra about most roguelites is that every run can be a successful run if you play your cards right. Some will be harder, in others you’ll become unstoppable, but the general idea is that once you get good enough you should be able to win runs. I’m not sure if this holds and is extremely dependent on how balanced the game is, but I think it’s a sane way to approach the genre since it pushes you to improve…

[deleted]

Re: Blue Prince is a roguelike puzzle masterpiece

#52

Post by gs17 »

egypturnash wrote: post #27
taeric wrote: post #20

I just picked this up. Curious if this will be one I can play with the kids while we are going to bed in the evenings. For a long time, that was prime time to play Slay the Spire, as it will get them to go to sleep. :D

It's got a bedtime story kind of vibe.

With the shifting rooms, it's almost dream-like.

Re: Blue Prince is a roguelike puzzle masterpiece

#53

Post by jncfhnb »

adrianhon wrote: post #37
CyberDildonics wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is 'article' is just an advertisement

OP here: Is there anything that makes you say that other than the fact that it’s positive and I received a review key? I’ve written about plenty of games I didn’t enjoy that I got for free (e.g. for judging awards) including games that were very well-received, like Viewfinder and Pacific Drive.

Posting a review for an arbitrary game to HN definitely smells like advertising to me. I don’t think you would be posting an article like this to HN that shat on a relatively unknown indie game you didn’t like.

How is this _not_ advertising in your mind? Surely you don’t think random people on HN are invested in your take on this game. What purpose did you intend if not to promote the newly released game?

I feel you’re trying to say you weren’t paid to advertise this game, which I believe, but it is 100% what you’re doing.

Re: Blue Prince is a roguelike puzzle masterpiece

#54

Post by jncfhnb »

chongli wrote: post #44
skyyler wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At this point, times have shifted, and meta-progression is usually considered an aspect of modern roguelikes. There was a trend of calling them "rogue-lites" but that's faded and now games like ADOM and DCSS are "Classic roguelikes" It's not a hard and fast rule or anything, just what I've observed in gaming discussions.

That’s a shame, because meta-progression ultimately undermines the spirit of these classic games. Roguelikes were designed to play like arcade games in that you’d always start over from scratch and try to get a high score. Most attempts ended in failure but as you got better at the game it was reflected in your score. Even after players achieve a high degree of expertise they still find the games challenging to win a…

Eh, idk. Theres an argument to be had that meta progression tends to cap in most of these games so eventually it becomes a stable thing.

Although generally I find the meta progression of things goes too far and starts off too weak.

Re: Blue Prince is a roguelike puzzle masterpiece

#55

Post by npinsker »

jncfhnb wrote: post #53
adrianhon wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OP here: Is there anything that makes you say that other than the fact that it’s positive and I received a review key? I’ve written about plenty of games I didn’t enjoy that I got for free (e.g. for judging awards) including games that were very well-received, like Viewfinder and Pacific Drive.

Posting a review for an arbitrary game to HN definitely smells like advertising to me. I don’t think you would be posting an article like this to HN that shat on a relatively unknown indie game you didn’t like. How is this _not_ advertising in your mind? Surely you don’t think random people on HN are invested in your take on this game. What purpose did you intend if not to promote the newly released game? I feel you’…

A lot of people do this, no? It doesn't seem more offensive than any of the other handful of self-submissions per day; certainly it's less so to me than all those tech blog posts by companies. Also Blue Prince is a puzzly, escape-roomy game that's one of the highest-profile indie releases this year, so probably more in tune with HN's taste than most games.

I like that a link aggregator serves to surface things that people don't necessarily have investment in. I thought the article was well-written and I'm more interested now in what he has to say in future. (I guess the advertising worked...)

Re: Blue Prince is a roguelike puzzle masterpiece

#56

Post by detaro »

gs17 wrote: post #31
detaro wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if you play on PC through Steam, Steam at least has a notes function in the overlay nowadays: https://www.polygon.com/2023/4/28/23702656/steam-beta-update...

Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure adding Game Pass games to Steam isn't really compatible with that. It looks like there was a "notes" app for the Windows "Game Bar", but it's no longer available.

possible, yeah, from what I've heard the launcher is weird for those.

Re: Blue Prince is a roguelike puzzle masterpiece

#57

Post by jncfhnb »

npinsker wrote: post #55
jncfhnb wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Posting a review for an arbitrary game to HN definitely smells like advertising to me. I don’t think you would be posting an article like this to HN that shat on a relatively unknown indie game you didn’t like. How is this _not_ advertising in your mind? Surely you don’t think random people on HN are invested in your take on this game. What purpose did you intend if not to promote the newly released game? I feel you’…

A lot of people do this, no? It doesn't seem more offensive than any of the other handful of self-submissions per day; certainly it's less so to me than all those tech blog posts by companies. Also Blue Prince is a puzzly, escape-roomy game that's one of the highest-profile indie releases this year, so probably more in tune with HN's taste than most games. I like that a link aggregator serves to surface things that p…

Do a lot of people do this? I don’t actually feel like this happens much here.

Idk. I feel it has a bad smell to be doing this at a game’s release with a review copy.

Again I’m willing to believe in good faith that there aren’t behind the scenes incentives here. But it would feel a lot more genuine to drop this at least a few months later imo. It _feels_ like advertising.

And frankly the juxtaposition of the glowing tone and then negative comments here has really thrown me about the whole thing. Whereas before I would just say it’s a difference of opinion, now there’s a question of intent to deceive. Meh.

Re: Blue Prince is a roguelike puzzle masterpiece

#58

Post by adrianhon »

jncfhnb wrote: post #53
adrianhon wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OP here: Is there anything that makes you say that other than the fact that it’s positive and I received a review key? I’ve written about plenty of games I didn’t enjoy that I got for free (e.g. for judging awards) including games that were very well-received, like Viewfinder and Pacific Drive.

Posting a review for an arbitrary game to HN definitely smells like advertising to me. I don’t think you would be posting an article like this to HN that shat on a relatively unknown indie game you didn’t like. How is this _not_ advertising in your mind? Surely you don’t think random people on HN are invested in your take on this game. What purpose did you intend if not to promote the newly released game? I feel you’…

I do think random people are invested in my take on this game, yes. If they weren't, it wouldn't have been upvoted. It's actually very difficult to get links on the front page of HN, the signal to noise is quite high.

I post around a third to a half of the articles I write on my blog to HN – the ones I think people here will like. Sometimes they hit and sometimes they don't. Three weeks ago I wrote about Odysseus, a very ambitious larp, that was popular here:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43414992

And last year I wrote about my thoughts on The Sphere in Las Vegas:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40858165

As for things I disliked, I wrote about Tonight with the Impressionists, a VR exhibition in Paris:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40745133

I think you are saying that anyone posting a positive article about something you don't know about on HN is a shill, which seems quite strange. Sometimes people genuinely like things and want to share their thoughts on why.

My final note is that Blue Prince is not a relatively unknown indie game. It was included for free on PS Plus and Xbox Game Pass at launch – quite unusual. It was also previewed by quite a few publications and is almost certainly going to be shortlisted in a lot of game of the year lists.

And to be clear, I have not been paid to write this article. There are no incentives involved whatsoever.

Re: Blue Prince is a roguelike puzzle masterpiece

#59

Post by kbrackbill »

throwerofstone wrote: post #5

After playing the game for 10+ hours and dropping it out of sheer frustration, I came to the conclusion that I must have been playing a vastly different game than the people praising it. The first hour was great. I was constantly encountering new rooms and solving puzzles. The many times where the game decided to give me nothing but rooms leading to dead ends was annoying, but I still had things to explore in the nex…

I'm about 8 hours in and really enjoying it, but I feel like I can see this in my future. For now I have so many puzzles/threads going that even if one doesn't work on a run because of RNG I'm still making progress somewhere else, but I could see that drying up a bit as I solve more things and want to focus on something specific.

The puzzles for resources you mention are by far the worst part for me. I really wish there were a way to say "I get it, I know how to solve simple logic puzzles and do basic arithmetic, just give me the stuff".

Re: Blue Prince is a roguelike puzzle masterpiece

#60

Post by chongli »

jncfhnb wrote: post #54
chongli wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a shame, because meta-progression ultimately undermines the spirit of these classic games. Roguelikes were designed to play like arcade games in that you’d always start over from scratch and try to get a high score. Most attempts ended in failure but as you got better at the game it was reflected in your score. Even after players achieve a high degree of expertise they still find the games challenging to win a…

Eh, idk. Theres an argument to be had that meta progression tends to cap in most of these games so eventually it becomes a stable thing. Although generally I find the meta progression of things goes too far and starts off too weak.

Yes, because the goal of the game designer who adds meta progression is to increase the number of players who actually finish the game, at least when it comes to the "true progression" style meta progression.

There is another approach based on unlocks, where the player unlocks new characters or game modes rather than having a single character get more and more powerful with each run. Some people prefer these unlocks but others don't. I saw one streamer, Jorbs, who got a brand new game and immediately looked up a save file hack to unlock everything from the beginning because he so detested unlocks.

Post reply on HN