heywood on 6/9/2018 at 20:24
Quote Posted by Judith
I always felt the line-of-sight visibility systems in Dishonored and new DX are pretty vague, although both LoS and light-based visibility systems have problems of their own. LoS relies either on cover system or verticality, and the alertness system in games like DX:Mankind Divided requires you to have enemy awareness markers on, if you don't want your gameplay to be constant trial and error. I think Thief and light-based system was more clearand elegant; enemy barks system was much better than any floating icons from Dishonored or new DX. On the other hand, visibility meter puts great restrictions on aesthetics: you need mostly a nighttime setting, and the lighting should be simple enough to include paths or patches of darkness, so players can move through them undetected.
Light-based stealth with a light sensor provides a degree of certainty (of not being seen) that is ideal for a ghost play style. But as you pointed out, it constrains level design. You have to create dark areas so dark that the player can hide in plain sight from guards at close range, while still having enough light sources around in the general area so the player can see where they're going. Unless the levels are extremely well designed, it can feel pretty artificial. The system used by DX1 feels more realistic and immersive to me, but it wouldn't be so great in a pure stealth game where you are heavily punished for being detected. Dishonored plays a lot like DX1, except that it really encourages you to go vertical to exploit the guards that don't look up.
I don't agree that you need to have enemy awareness aids in Mankind Divided. The first thing I did in Mankind Divided was turn off the player aids including the radar. Alerted AIs usually bark, and you can see when they are alerted because their behavior changes. Turning off the radar did make it tougher than Human Revolution to stay stealthy, but I didn't do any more saving and reloading than normal, I just played more carefully. I applaud Eidos Montreal for making it optional, because I couldn't help but stare at the thing when playing Human Revolution, and it was more immersion breaking than busting out of first person to take cover.
EvaUnit02 on 6/9/2018 at 20:57
Quote Posted by Jason Moyer
I think Bethesda bought them because of their strengths and the background of their team with immersive sims, so hopefully they'll do something "new" but with the same design principles.
(
https://www.oneangrygamer.net/2018/08/culture-clash-how-arkane-got-stuck-between-two-competing-ideologies/67581/)
To date Arkane has received the big publisher equivalent of being "stationed in Siberia" after losing face:- working as a satellite studio and not on home-grown projects.
Quote:
With Arkane Lyon’s flagship series put on hold, and with no other game approved to start production, the studio was broken into multiple teams. The first worked on Wolfenstein 2 DLC with Machine Games, while another team aided with the development of Wolfenstein Cyberpilot. A game as per a source that is “not great”. Meanwhile, any team members who weren’t working on Wolfenstein projects were left to prepare a project for a new and original game. A game, that as of July 2018, has yet to be officially green lit.
Dishonored 2 launched at bad time of year, when heavy-hitters like CoD come out. Franchises with less clout fall throw the cracks. Bad word of mouth from launching unoptimised on PC didn't help either. I don't think the marketing push for either Prey or Dishonored 2 was strong, both games bombed out of the gate. Death of the Outsider sold really poorly too.
heywood on 6/9/2018 at 21:52
D2 is a very good game. I know the PC performance issues hurt its reputation at release, but I expected it to bounce back. It's holding a rating of 7/10 on Steam, and I think it deserves better. D1 is a 10/10 after all, and D2 isn't worse.
Mankind Divided is sitting at 6/10, and it deserves better too. Yeah, the story is weak. But 6/10?
And then there is Prey, which is a damn good game, critically praised, holding 9/10 on Steam, and it was launched when it didn't face much competition. And still the sales were soft.
If these games can't keep a AAA studio going, this game genre may be dead.
Judith on 6/9/2018 at 22:28
Dishnored 2 is unoptimized to this day. I upgraded my CPU/RAM combo recently, and I still see framerate going below 60 fps quite often. DX:MD is solid, but it's pretty much unfinished game. I have no idea what the hell they were thinking, with last mission ending like it did. It's obvious that it's an incomplete product. It still got a lot of recommendations from the press.
icemann on 7/9/2018 at 05:18
Quote Posted by heywood
If these games can't keep a AAA studio going, this game genre may be dead.
I think its just that those sorts of games appeal to a niche of gamers. I know that here at TTLG it will look like everyone loves immersive sims since that was Looking Glass Studios bread and butter, but elsewhere their obviously not as popular (otherwise sales would have been better).
SubJeff on 7/9/2018 at 13:58
Wasn't Dishonored really popular? Sales were great, no?
Renault on 7/9/2018 at 15:40
Yes, but as Eva mentioned, the timing of the release was bad with other games coming out, and then the large amount of technical problems with the PC version.
henke on 7/9/2018 at 15:50
Just finished it! :D
Yup, that was good. Some great level design, the Clockwork Mansion, Stilton's Manor and the Duke's Mansion being highlights. Overall I enjoyed it more than the original, tho Prey is still their highpoint for me. Now I'm really bummed out they they don't get to make these ImmSims any more, tho I guess I still have Death Of The Outsider to look forward to. :/
My favourite moment in the last mission was when I came across this fireplace in the corner of a hallway and for some reason I had the feeling there was a secret passageway in it. I looked around, found a nearby lamp to twist and sure enough a passage opened. "How the hell did I know that?" I wondered. Then I looked around me and realized I'd been there before, in the first game! :D
EvaUnit02 on 7/9/2018 at 19:04
Quote Posted by SubJeff
Wasn't Dishonored really popular? Sales were great, no?
Bethesda do shitty jobs at advertising their games too, outside of their core Bethesda Game Studios developed games. Prey, Dishonored 2, The Evil Within 2, Wolfenstein 2 = all flops that ended up in deep discount sales within 3 months of release.
I fully expect Rage 2 to be another flop. Doom Eternal will likely sell on word of mouth alone, unless they do something stupid like releasing alongside a mega franchise instalment like Call of Duty or GTA; or dump the game onto market in an unfinished state.
heywood on 7/9/2018 at 19:06
Quote Posted by SubJeff
Wasn't Dishonored really popular? Sales were great, no?
Dishonored did great. So did Human Revolution. But those were 6 and 7 years ago.
D2 sales were weak. Same for Mankind Divided. Even Prey was a sales disappointment.