A wasteland that one can throw a stone across doesn’t feel like much of a wasteland to me. I don’t want realism, just big enough that I can suspend my disbelief. I want to get immersed but a “town” with six people isn’t a godsdamned town.

My go-to “too big” is True Crime: Streets of LA. If memory serves it’s a decent chunk of LA at 1:1 scale.

It’s far too big and there’s not much to do. It doesn’t help that the game is dross.

I would argue that Fallout 3’s map is ridiculously tiny.

I’m not American. Fuck that cesspit.

Whataboutism, eh?

They can both suck, it doesn’t have to be equal.

A story that is dragged perpetually out for money rather than concluded when it has run its course? Count me in!

Whilst I can’t be bothered to look it up on my phone - we have hard data that disproves this link, last I checked.

Saints Row (2022) had some of my flavour of silliness.

Which is fair enough and totally reasonable - it was purely in the context of that comment it seemed odd. You had a device that actually uses the architecture that Macs use and one that used an architecture that they don’t but… yeah. It’s not important, it just made me chuckle.

…and groan about the march of time.

But the Switch and beyond use ARM, the architecture Macs have used for the last five years? It just seemed an odd thing to mention given how long it’s been since Macs used PPC. I know they used to, but I’m old enough to have used 68000k Macs too so of course I remember that time.

I’m confused by your first sentence - the last machines they made that used PPC were in 2005. To me it reads like you’re correcting me but saying exactly the same thing…?

The fact that Macs stopped using the architecture twenty years ago makes it bit of an odd connection, I would argue. As you say, the 360 used the architecture far more recently and over 84 million of those were sold. It’s not like it was some obscure device.

Mac haven’t used PowerPC since 2005.

Hotline Miami. Frustrating and tedious.

I generally don’t take gaming recommendations from people I know because I’ve been burned too many times.

I played Atomic Heart on Game Pass around the time it came out and… I cannot recommend it. The actual game was really rather dreary.

They’re definitely fun and I enjoyed them but knowing how long they are I wouldn’t start them again. I had a similar thing with GTA IV!

I think the thing I miss most about this game is how much it did with hardware from 2005. It looked great, played well, had a decent length but also didn’t outstay its welcome.

I’ve played through it at least twice. I doubt I’ll ever replay City or Knight as they were amazing but far far too long.

I don’t think the Burberry strategy is going to work for you guys.

Let’s not forget that games leave Game Pass so there’s an element of FoMO

I don’t really care much about that side of things, I simply don’t feel the value proposition to me personally is sane at the price points new games on consoles cost. The disc can be the key for all I care, but by the time I pick it up second hand I expect a fully patched experience.

If I can’t buy Xbox games second hand then I’m done with the platform going forward. Release prices take the absolute piss.

I’m glad it’s not just me. It’s a lonely experience.

Randy, you molest your employees with that mouth?!

Most of their customers don’t listen to them. Not hear and disregard, never listen in the first place. Have no interest in game industry gossip.

I guess I’m not premium enough to give you my money, Randy.

Game development as a service.

A fair point but I was meaning from a cultural vandalism angle.

Final Fantasy VIII, why are you crying?

Arguably copyright is worse.

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Here’s the link to the actual content: https://gbstudiocentral.com/news/gb-pixel-art-jam-2025/

Wolfenstein (2009): uses Return to Castle Wolfenstein footage. I’ve not played the 2009 game but I immediately felt that there was a bit of graphical disparity there!

That was the point of my question, to be honest. I don’t understand. Cheating in a single player game to experience it I get. Unlimited ammo, all unlocks, that kind of thing - it lets the game be played differently. But against other players it seems completely pointless from my perspective.

It’s an entertainment option, not a self-imposed obligation. Should I be trying to systematically polish off my watch list too?

I added them because they seemed like things I might like to watch when in the right mood. It’s not a to-do list.

I have a library of games. There is zero obligation to play any of them. They are all simply there as options for when I feel like gaming.

But if one cheats then it’s not a real win?

I meant multiplayer games in general. People do it in games with no loot mechanics.

What’s even the point of cheating in multiplayer?

Another vote for KeyWe!

so how do you know you’re going to enjoy the games you’re buying if they sit in your library past the refund window?

Knowing that about any given media before consuming it is an impossible ask, so that’s a bit of a deadend to start with. I make my purchasing decisions based on a combination of developer reputation (e.g. FTL was great and Into the Breach was awesome too), reviews (not from any major game sites, I’m talking about friends and similar), and experience with the genre.

Also, as I’ve said elsewhere, I’m spending less than the cost of a pint of beer. Any given game doesn’t have to deliver all that much to justify its cost.

Even if I don’t enjoy it, perhaps my wife will, or eventually my daughter.

Do you not worry they may end up being unplayable bloat “polluting” your library?

I don’t really understand the concept of what you’re asking. I understand the words but the emotional meaning is completely lost on me. There’s a load of assumptions underpinning it, from what I can see. Is someone else supposed to be looking at my library and drawing conclusions about my character based on it? If so, I couldn’t possibly care less. Or is it a convenience thing, like finding a game would be hard? There’s text search and there’s not an insurmountable quantity regardless.

Or something else? I don’t get what you’re asking, sorry.

Or do you have a super broad taste and you enjoy everything?

I don’t know how broad the average taste is, I’m afraid I have no point of comparison. I’ve played most genres over the last 30+ years and there’s only a few I find tedious (sports games, medieval fantasy-themed stuff, simulation-focussed stuff). What is a normal breadth of taste?

I really enjoy looking at my library and going: “Damn, I could launch any of these games right now and have a great time!” which wouldn’t be true if I have a bunch of shit I don’t enjoy playing and can’t refund.

Whilst I have some stuff that I wouldn’t enjoy, most of what I have was bought because it had some appeal to me. I don’t buy many games, I’ve just been buying them for decades so it adds up.

I prefer having a large selection so there’s always potentially new fun things hiding in my collection. Knowing everything about it removes some of the mystique, essentially.

It’s also worth noting that I don’t know what I’ll enjoy anymore. When I was a child I really enjoyed management games, for example, so on the one hand they have nostalgic appeal, but on the other I have enough to manage in my life now so find them exhausting. There’s also an element of enjoying things that others don’t - I spent a lot of time playing Godus and listening to audiobooks. People do not like that game!

You can perhaps start to see why I don’t like the concept of a “backlog” - my perspective isn’t built that way!

I really don’t think it’s a particularly hot take. The very term “backlog” normally refers to obligations. Plenty of people suffer from productivity guilt and applying that kind of framework to something that by its very nature is designed to be unproductive feels like a dreadful idea to me.

The “point of the product” isn’t to provide theoretical novel entertainment value by sitting, unplayed, on my digital shelves. Bold take here, but I’d suggest the point of a video game is to be played.

I see it as its job is to provide an option for entertainment. To use another flawed analogy, whilst ideally I’d like to wear everything in my wardrobe at least once I don’t feel bad that my jeans see much more use than my tuxedo. I don’t avoid buying a pair of shorts because I already have plenty of shirts. My goal is to have a good selection of options available in the hope that I’ll never find myself short of something suitable.

I grew up playing games in the '90s. I remember running out of new things to play. It was miserable!

So I make a point of having a large library so there’s always things hiding in there that I might enjoy. The last thing I want is to have played everything in my collection. The very notion of a “backlog” is strange to me. It’s a library or a collection, not an obligation. Trying to min/max it doesn’t feel particularly healthy framing to me.

Fair enough - I’m only aware of the sales where things are discounted enough to trigger my IsThereAnyDeal notifications!

I may need/want to buy with the same money.

Most of my purchases are when the price is low enough to essentially be a rounding error in my spending. I’m rather stingey like that!