Video Games Randomness - Prioritize specific game threads!

[Punisher]

Fragile Existence ,...ad it to your wish lists.

You're not the boss of me!

(Added anyway.)

[Punisher]

This would scratch a current itch I have. I've been looking at solo rpgs (like the ones discussed in the solo roleplaying thread in 'Gaming in General') and the Car Wars "Truck Stop" supplement popped into my head one day. Back in the day of old school Car Wars, Truck Stop was a way to add Semis and motorcycles to the Car Wars universe. Truckers were envisioned as the 'Knights of the Highway', doing their job and blowing past raiders and gangs to deliver their precious cargo.

Car Wars was/is one of my all time favorite games! It's probably tied with BattleDroids/Tech
I bought every version I could find including electronic ones like Autoduel. I also bought I76 because it was similar.
I went all in on the 6th edition Kickstarter but have only played at show demos.
I was very disappointed that they didn't just update and upgrade the original version. You could get some real stories going on and had room to have dozens of vehicles and pedestrians if you wanted.
2 years ago, I went ahead and bought everything they had for the original game.
Still trying to find a tabletop simulator mod for it. Unfortunately searcjing for Car Wars in the workshop also returns results for card wars. Even with "".
If I knew what I was doing, I'd just make it myself.
I still remember photocopying all the blank vehicles and spending hours/days/weeks just coloring them in with colored pencils.
I wish I could find more Car Wars type video games.
Sorry for the slight derail. CW is a topic I'm passionate about.

[Punisher]

Then again, I've played a few early access games that were better than some full releases despite never hitting 1.0.

7 Days to Die is a good example. Been in early access for over 10 years now.
No idea why though.

[Punisher]

One of those games is heading into Early Access on Steam on Jan 24:

I'm tentatively interested in checking it out at some point, but probably won't be jumping straight in at the EA launch.

I played the demo last year. A lot! IIRC, it had an 8 hour time limit. I hit that several times.
It's currently #1 on my buy list as soon as I can afford it.

[raydude]

Fragile Existence ,...ad it to your wish lists.

You're not the boss of me!

(Added anyway.)

Ever since playing games like Company of Heroes and Conquest:Frontier Wars (CFW) I have realized that I can never go back to vanilla RTS where I have to be the brains for every unit (sorry Beyond All Reason). So I have hope for Fragile Existence since it appears you can designate leader characters for bases. At the very least I want it to automate the supply of my fleet so I don't have to micromanage that. I'm hoping it will also expand to allow leaders assigned to fleets, a la CFW, but even if it doesn't, the logistics aspect of it could be appealing - again, something I thought CFW did very well. Putting it on my wishlist.

[raydude]

This would scratch a current itch I have. I've been looking at solo rpgs (like the ones discussed in the solo roleplaying thread in 'Gaming in General') and the Car Wars "Truck Stop" supplement popped into my head one day. Back in the day of old school Car Wars, Truck Stop was a way to add Semis and motorcycles to the Car Wars universe. Truckers were envisioned as the 'Knights of the Highway', doing their job and blowing past raiders and gangs to deliver their precious cargo.

Car Wars was/is one of my all time favorite games! It's probably tied with BattleDroids/Tech
I bought every version I could find including electronic ones like Autoduel. I also bought I76 because it was similar.
I went all in on the 6th edition Kickstarter but have only played at show demos.
I was very disappointed that they didn't just update and upgrade the original version. You could get some real stories going on and had room to have dozens of vehicles and pedestrians if you wanted.
2 years ago, I went ahead and bought everything they had for the original game.
Still trying to find a tabletop simulator mod for it. Unfortunately searcjing for Car Wars in the workshop also returns results for card wars. Even with "".
If I knew what I was doing, I'd just make it myself.
I still remember photocopying all the blank vehicles and spending hours/days/weeks just coloring them in with colored pencils.
I wish I could find more Car Wars type video games.
Sorry for the slight derail. CW is a topic I'm passionate about.

No worries, I loved Car Wars as well. I didn't go in on the Kickstarter because it seemed like a pale imitation of OG Car Wars. I loved Autoduel and can't imagine why no one else has tried to redo that game. Except for this one:
Autofire looks interesting. I'm hoping the dev hasn't abandoned it.

[Anonymous Bosch]

This would scratch a current itch I have. I've been looking at solo rpgs (like the ones discussed in the solo roleplaying thread in 'Gaming in General') and the Car Wars "Truck Stop" supplement popped into my head one day. Back in the day of old school Car Wars, Truck Stop was a way to add Semis and motorcycles to the Car Wars universe. Truckers were envisioned as the 'Knights of the Highway', doing their job and blowing past raiders and gangs to deliver their precious cargo.

Car Wars was/is one of my all time favorite games! It's probably tied with BattleDroids/Tech
I bought every version I could find including electronic ones like Autoduel. I also bought I76 because it was similar.
I went all in on the 6th edition Kickstarter but have only played at show demos.
I was very disappointed that they didn't just update and upgrade the original version. You could get some real stories going on and had room to have dozens of vehicles and pedestrians if you wanted.
2 years ago, I went ahead and bought everything they had for the original game.
Still trying to find a tabletop simulator mod for it. Unfortunately searcjing for Car Wars in the workshop also returns results for card wars. Even with "".
If I knew what I was doing, I'd just make it myself.
I still remember photocopying all the blank vehicles and spending hours/days/weeks just coloring them in with colored pencils.
I wish I could find more Car Wars type video games.
Sorry for the slight derail. CW is a topic I'm passionate about.

FWIW, I've recently been enjoying Death Roads: Tournament, which may scratch a similar thematic itch for you:



Splattercatgaming provides a helpful video overview of how it plays below:

[Punisher]

Thanks for that link!
Hard to see if it's turn based but I hope it is. I also hope it's not just arena battles. It's free so worth trying out at least.
I agree about 6th edition. Don't get me wrong, my wife and I enjoyed the few demo games we played but it's just not the same. I think if you originally played mostly arena battles it is closer to that but we only used those as tutorials and gor new players. Are go to was a long campaign. We eventually built up to a transport empire with multiple rigs, helicopters, boats, many vehicles and 2 tanks.
I think we played for about 3 years after school while in high scool.

[Blackhawk]

Then again, I've played a few early access games that were better than some full releases despite never hitting 1.0.

7 Days to Die is a good example. Been in early access for over 10 years now.
No idea why though.

It's a perfect example - I have 158 very fond hours in the game, and it's still in alpha.

[Max Peck]

Hopefully this works out well for them...

Volition devs regroup as Shapeshifter Games after Embracer shuttering

Veterans from Saints Row developer Volition have regrouped five months after the studio was scrapped by Embracer to form Shapeshifter Games.

As spotted by TechRaptor, the company broke cover on Linkedin and described itself as a "co-development studio" aiming to "create a more sustainable environment for developers to do their best work."

Shapeshifter said it's already working with a "top publisher" on an upcoming franchise and is looking to expand.

"Shapeshifter is a new co-development studio that was started by pulling together a group of experienced developers from Volition," reads the post. "Shapeshifter is always searching for talented developers to help us grow. Please reach out, we would love to hear from you."

Rob Loftus, formerly principle producer at Volition, is overseeing Shapeshifter as studio director. Loftus acknowledged the industry is still going through the wringer, but expressed hope that more studios like Shapeshifter might arise as a result.

"It's been five months since the closure of Volition, but I'm grateful to post that a group of us have re-formed as Shapeshifter Games," he wrote. "The industry climate remains tough and I know I'm fortunate to reconnect with colleagues and turn the page on a new adventure. I'm hopeful for more groups like us and for the brighter days ahead."

Loftus is joined at Shapeshifter by former Volition devs including Alex Cline (designer), David Andsager (software engineer), Matt Madigan (studio head), Brian Traficante (creative director), Darren Dienst (designer), Chad Dodson (level designer), Bryan Dillow (designer), and Jeff Touchstone (level designer).

Volition closed its doors after 30 years in August 2023. The studio was essentially bulldozed by a restructuring program enacted by parent company Embracer Group, with the Swedish conglomerate looking to cut costs after bringing its free-wheeling M&A era to an abrupt end.

[Daehawk]

That was posted somewhere in here..Ill let Isg find it ...But still sad news as I loved them for their Freespace series.

[jztemple2]

Newly released free prologue:

[jztemple2]

Then again, I've played a few early access games that were better than some full releases despite never hitting 1.0.

7 Days to Die is a good example. Been in early access for over 10 years now.
No idea why though.

It's a perfect example - I have 158 very fond hours in the game, and it's still in alpha.

Good gosh that's right, I've owned the game for ten years and have just four hours in it, just waiting to hit full release I guess

[Max Peck]

That was posted somewhere in here..Ill let Isg find it ...But still sad news as I loved them for their Freespace series.

The closure of Volition is old news. I posted an article about that in the Saints Row thread back in August 2023. This article is about the new studio being founded by some of the Volition veterans.

[raydude]

I played around with Autofire for a bit.
It's got an Autoduel/Car Wars vibe that I like. The turn-based implementation is nice in that you have a choice of only 1 input and that choice instantly advances the turn. So for example, you can choose to go forward, forward, shoot front weapon, swerve right, hard turn right, and each one of those moves advances the turn. It's a nice way to keep that fast-paced vehicular combat feel while allowing you to take your time and think about your moves.

The game doesn't do a good job of showing you all the moves you can do with your car, so definitely press escape to bring up the in-game menu then click help. It will open a text window that shows the key commands using numpad or other clusters on your keyboard. I found that the numpad keys were most intuitive for me.

numpad 8/2 accelerate/deccelerate. You can also hit spacebar to keep the car going forward at the same speed. Keep hitting 2 and you'll go in reverse.
numpad 7/9 makes your car swerve left and right. Swerving moves the car 45 deg diagonally but doesn't change the facing
numpad 4/6 makes the car do a 90deg turn left or right
numpad 1/3 makes the car do a hard drift turn which changes the angle by 100deg or so but has the car drifting in the original direction. Do two of these in a row and your car has done a 180 deg turn but is now stopped.

Here's how the game looks when you're in combat. Well, technically this is a "introduce the boss" scene, but the only difference is that normally you have a 3/4 view above and behind your car.

Lower left shows your cars armor on all sides and the interior "hit points". If you let damage go to zero on a given side any additional damage on that side goes to the interior of the car. You can pickup armor plates which add +40 armor to a given side. You start off the game with only single shot guns to the front and rear and can pick up weapons from crates and destroyed vehicles. Most of the weapons take 1-2 turns to reload after firing. After you fire a given weapon it will show you a number that indicates the number of turns before the weapon can fire again.

In the center is your speedometer and the blue squares around it show your "handling" meter. As you do maneuvers your handling meter goes down. If your handling meter goes below your speed then you lose control and your car's speed goes down way fast. In this game speed is life - the faster you go, the more turns you can take moving around and shooting before the enemy cars fire back at you. I got to the point where I could go 75 mph head on to someone, fired my front weapons, then my side as they drove past, then my rear, turn and hit them with the weapon on the other side, and then swerved to fire my front weapons again. In the meantime they got off like maybe 1-2 shots at me. Of course, after all that I'm usually at a dead stop and so this really only works if facing off against 1 car. For multiple cars it's better to keep your speed up and try to use the environmental obstacles.

The game also has specials like smoke screens and oil slicks. Once I laid a smoke screen behind me, spun around and then waited for the enemy car to drive out of the smoke and shot him. Good times. The game environment also has minefields, oil barrels, and other obstacles you can make other cars run into - or you can run into them yourself if you're not careful.

Unfortunately the campaign is not much of a campaign. There are no quests to do besides the initial ones and it's not even a roguelike because when you die you restart with the initial weapons. There is definitely a promising game in there, especially if the developer fleshes out the campaign and adds quests. Hell, even courier type missions ferrying people and goods from town to town would be cool.

[Daehawk]

Raydude maybe you'd like Crossout

Its still free. Been playing it off and on for a few years. It was all I had to cling to after Autoduel died.. I haven't played in a few years though so Im out of the loop on it.

[Blackhawk]

I played around with Autofire for a bit.
It's got an Autoduel/Car Wars vibe that I like.

Thanks for this - just spent three bucks on a copy. As another old-school Car Wars aficionado (including the truck stop expansion!), I'm always happy to see a new implementation.

As for Car Wars itself (the tabletop game), if anyone who liked it hasn't, check out Gaslands. It's the same basic idea, although you play with Matchbox/Hot Wheels cars, which many people customize (although the rules are designed to scale - you can always print out paper cars or pull out your Car Wars set to play.) Best of all, it's cheap.

[Daehawk]

Why isn't there a PC game for this...sorta Interstate 76 style.

[gbasden]

I don't know if this has been mentioned or posted about before, but I think it's a pretty cool concept, at least if you are a Sony player... The Sony Access Controller is great for aging gamers (like me)

The XBox Adaptive Controller is similar and has been out for at least a year.

[Unagi]

I played around with Autofire for a bit.
It's got an Autoduel/Car Wars vibe that I like.

Thank you, I've been wanting a Car Wars/Autoduel like for quite some time.

"Death Roads: Tournament " looked tempting but was so much more a deck-builder, and this looks more like what I was wanting.

[raydude]

I played around with Autofire for a bit.
It's got an Autoduel/Car Wars vibe that I like.

Thank you, I've been wanting a Car Wars/Autoduel like for quite some time.

"Death Roads: Tournament " looked tempting but was so much more a deck-builder, and this looks more like what I was wanting.

The dev has definitely got the beginnings of a good game in there. I'm hoping they get more exposure and maybe open it up for early access or get some additional funding/resources to flesh out the game more properly and in a timely manner. I love how I can hit spacebar and the turning keys quickly once I rev my car up to cruising speed and drive it in quasi-real-time but then instantly drop into turn based by simple virtue of not hitting any keys and just thinking.

[Max Peck]

Just after I bought my Amiga 500, I got a C64 in order to play 2 games that weren't available (yet) for the Amiga: Elite and Autoduel. Totally worth it.

[coopasonic]

January is coming to an end and not only did I not finish any games in January, I didn't really even start any. Palworld is the only new thing I played in January and since it is early access I don't count it. I know there is a bunch of stuff coming in March, but I really wish they could pace game releases (that I care about) better!

[jztemple2]

A couple of articles of interest:
The original Deus Ex has a spiritual remake in stunning new Steam FPS

Deus Ex is one of the definitive PC games. From its instantly recognizable visual and sound design (you can still hear that death scream, can’t you?) to its pioneering immersive sim mechanics, and its in-depth, politically charged narrative, Ion Storm’s 2000 masterwork set the template for the likes of Dishonored, Prey, and of course the prequels Human Revolution and Mankind Divided. 24 years have passed since Deus Ex first graced our PCs, and although JC Denton lives on through infinite memes (“what a shame”) there’s a gap where the augmented conspiracy thriller used to be. But perhaps no longer. Channeling early ‘00s visuals, crisp, immersive sim-style systems, and some flashes of Resident Evil, an upcoming Steam FPS feels like the spiritual return of classic Deus Ex.

Welcome to Deep State, a wonderfully stylized new FPS game from independent developer Frogman Interactive. You play the powerfully monikered Rex Cutter, a former CIA agent searching for the truth behind a mysterious black project. Conspiracies, aliens, shadow governments – all the hallmarks of the original Deus Ex are here. In fact, if you squint your eyes, Deep State looks almost exactly like Ion Storm’s classic, right down to the inventory screen (which also pays homage to the iconic ‘watch zoom’ from GoldenEye).

12 years later, classic roguelike FTL has a huge unofficial expansion

Faster Than Light is the game that made stress, pressure, and the imminence of total annihilation feel like fun. Before Bethesda’s space opera Starfield, or beloved roguelikes such as Hades and Dead Cells, FTL propelled us into the deepest recesses of the cosmos and left us to fend for ourselves. Engines malfunctioned. Airlocks were breached. Entire crews were unceremoniously ejected into the vacuum of the universe. But after enough playthroughs and some hard-learned lessons, Faster Than Light transcended its sharp learning curve to become one of the richest and most rewarding games of 2012. Now more than a decade old, FTL remains one of the best in the roguelike genre, and it’s got a gigantic unofficial expansion – enough to fill a fan-made sequel – available right now.

Created by Subset Games, later of Into The Breach fame, Faster Than Light is a roguelike by way of a frantically paced strategy game by way of overwhelming cosmic fear. As the captain of a high-velocity starship, your job is to manage all of the various subsystems, defeat bandits, pirates, and other enemy vessels, and somehow keep everybody on board alive. Anything can – and frequently does – go wrong, creating a desperate struggle for survival where even your own ship seems determined to kill you. Rated 10/10 on Steam based on more than 55,000 user reviews, FTL has certainly stood the test of time. But there’s plenty more to come.

FTL Multiverse is a total overhaul mod for Faster Than Light that’s just arrived in its latest, greatest, and most expansive version. Created by the eponymous Multiverse Team, it contains 200 new ships, 800 new enemy ships, new weapons, new crew types, combat rebalances, an overhauled UI, and new combat augments.

If that’s not enough, Multiverse even adds additional quest lines and expands on the existing Faster Than Light lore. If you’ve been longing for a reason to go back to FTL, or you’re trying the game for the first time and want to make it bigger and better, Multiverse is absolutely essential. You can get the latest, massive version right here.

[Sudy]

[jztemple2]

New driving gameplay trailer for Taxi Life: A City Driving Simulator





And the original Official Trailer, if you missed it:

[Jaddison]

New driving gameplay trailer for Taxi Life: A City Driving Simulator





And the original Official Trailer, if you missed it:

Do you get assaulted and robbed? Do obnoxious drunks and worse, drunk influencers, get in and cause havoc?

[Blackhawk]

The devs have claimed that it's going to have VR support. A game like this - just like ATS - isn't all that interesting to me on a screen, but great to play in VR. Hopefully they follow through on their promise.

[Daehawk]

Is it just me with my out dated PC or are games not optimized well these days?

Fortnite and Paladins take forever to just start up. I can click the game and go get some food and come back and its still not loaded up. In the old days you clicked on a game it started. Now I seem to sit and wait and wait on games to get going.

[coopasonic]

Is it just me with my out dated PC or are games not optimized well these days?

Fortnite and Paladins take forever to just start up. I can click the game and go get some food and come back and its still not loaded up. In the old days you clicked on a game it started. Now I seem to sit and wait and wait on games to get going.

From double click to ready up in Fortnite was 68 seconds for me just now and it felt a bit slower than usual.

[Anonymous Bosch]

Is it just me with my out dated PC or are games not optimized well these days?

Fortnite and Paladins take forever to just start up. I can click the game and go get some food and come back and its still not loaded up. In the old days you clicked on a game it started. Now I seem to sit and wait and wait on games to get going.

FWIW, I think Blackhawk aptly addressed this with you earlier…

Reinstalled this thinking Id play a little of the holiday stuff. Nope. It wants to play in some off resolution in a box..I try to set it to 2560x1080 and it says my video card doesn't have enough memory to run it in that that resolution. Huh? I have a 970 with 4 gig...I used to run it in that res on lower cards with 2 gig.

As someone who has often done my gaming on outdated and donated hardware, I get it. But part of the problem is your monitor, not the card. 2560x1080 uses about 1/3 more resources than 1920x1080 - it's literally rendering a 1/3 more of the world than a standard monitor. It also means that system requirements are useless - the recommended specs are always going to be too slow to run it well, as they're calculated for a standard resolution. Ultrawide and 4k monitors are both great things - but only if you're someone who can afford the hardware to actually run games at the much higher resolutions.

Didn't feel like fooling with it so deleted it.

That's a problem. You no longer have the patience to 'fool with' games, but PC games usually require fiddling. Especially if you're wanting them to do something non-standard (like running on ultra-widescreen monitors.) If you're not willing to troubleshoot and fix games, you'd honestly be better off switching to console gaming.

[Jaddison]

Tried the Suicide Squad game and after an hour I knew it wasn't for me. A lot of platforming and my ancient reflexes are not up to snuff, i can handle Borderlands but not this. I think a lot people will enjoy it though as it seems well done overall.

[Daehawk]

Saw a video comparing this Suicide Squad game beside Batman Arkham Knight game from 2015 and the 9 year old game looked a lot better graphics wise. Both are done by Rocksteady too. But this SS is looking really bad .

Couple videos comparing them. Its getting a bit ripped for it. But its not just graphics.

Spoiler:

Spoiler:

[Jaddison]

Saw a video comparing this Suicide Squad game beside Batman Arkham Knight game from 2015 and the 9 year old game looked a lot better graphics wise. Both are done by Rocksteady too. But this SS is looking really bad .

Couple videos comparing them. Its getting a bit ripped for it. But its not just graphics.

Spoiler:

Spoiler:

I thought the graphics were decent I just am not amenable to the multi-jump use the shift key then the ctrl key then shift again quickly to do the super duper movement stuff and each character needs a different pattern.....I just knew I would have more frustration than fun.
since i did not get too far in I cannot comment on some of the other critiques of the game.

[Blackhawk]

A lot of what's in those videos seems nitpicky. They feel like someone's going into the game trying to prove their opinion by picking and choosing which elements they want to compare. They don't seem to account for the fact that the games are trying to convey completely different styles, completely different themes, and completely different mechanics. They don't make it clear what platforms they're comparing (are they both on the same platform?) They don't distinguish which version they're using, either. This is the release version of SS. Are they comparing it to Arkham Knight as it was released, or Arkham Knight as it now? The release version of AK was such a mess that they publisher completely pulled it from sale. It was notorious for low-res, blurry textures, performance so bad that even high end cards couldn't run it, and so on. If they're comparing SS as released to AK after nine years of patches and optimization, that's an issue. Likewise, if they're running AK on hardware nine years more advanced that what it was designed for to SS on release-date hardware, that's another issue.;

It's also telling that the second video showed the author's settings for one game, but not the other. Even within that, I can see several settings for SS that will actually reduce visual fidelity (target frame rate at 120 with DLSS, chromatic aberration, film grain, blur.) These will all make the textures less crisp, more blurry, etc. But he doesn't show his Arkham Knight settings...

On top of that, if you look at his page, nearly every single video he's got posted is a "Look how bad [topic] is!" That creator makes his money by building dissatisfaction with whatever he's talking about. He literally gets paid to make things look bad.

I'm not saying Suicide Squad is good. I have no idea if it is. It's a DC game, and I'm a big DC fan, but the early content really looked like they were forcing this set of characters into a gameplay style that didn't fit them at all. I know all of those characters, and this game doesn't fit them, anymore than a 4x title would be a good match for Batman. In other words, the game doesn't really make me want to play it, let alone be defensive over it, but those criticisms are meaningless nonsense meant to get people angry, not inform.

Stop letting people manipulate your emotions to their benefit.

[Smoove_B]

Stop letting people manipulate your emotions to their benefit.

But then how else will they get you to share videos?

[jztemple2]

If you've played any sort of sci-fi military game (XCOM, Halo, etc) you've probably come across a Gauss Rifle. Ever seen one in real life? No, well then here you are:

[Daehawk]

Ive seen that. Not powerful enough. You'd need a backpack of batteries with todays level of tech to throw the slug hard and fast enough to kill.

[Blackhawk]

The barrel length and weight are a bigger issue. I know that the Navy has tested them for a variety of applications.

[GreenGoo]

Sure, but put one on your EV and suddenly: Car Wars!