If a game is terrible in terms of fulfilling what it advertised itself to be, IMO that makes it a terrible game.

I think that’s kind of an odd perspective because many (if not most) people will discover a game without knowing any details about how it came to be and what was—and wasn’t—promised.

I’m a big Mega Man (mostly Classic) fan. I think MN9 was judged way too harshly. It’s not a bad game in its own right, not markedly great either, but certainly a passable and enjoyable one nonetheless.

People were hoping for another Mega Man X but of course it was never going to be exactly that. They need fangames and ROM hacks for that, not someone who could lose pretty much everything (job, work, money) if they stray too close to Capcom’s IP. I don’t know exactly how much Comcept promised and how much was hype built up by fans, but somewhere along the way expectations became misaligned and people were pissed and disappointed.

But yeah, going into it without any big expectations certainly helped me enjoy it.

Tunic is such a great game. I don’t think you’ve messed anything up — the game is just a bit convoluted in its puzzles and clues. Have fun!

Not to mention “stick it to 'em” when he’s doing exactly what Epic hoped for — engaging with their platform. It doesn’t even matter if you’re using Hero Launcher or not even playing it, it’s a +1 in their system and that’s what they care about.

I have no idea how accurate this info on FindLaw.com is, but according to it, you don’t need a lawyer in small claims court (in the US). And according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_claims_court there are many other countries with similar small claim courts: “Australia, Brazil, Canada, England and Wales, Hong Kong, Ireland, Israel, Greece, New Zealand, Philippines, Scotland, Singapore, South Africa, Nigeria and the United States”. I know the list of countries is not even close to covering a large amount of Steam users, but I suspect that us Europeans are covered in other ways, so there’s that.

The Wikipedia page also mentions the lawyer thing, by the way:

A usual guiding principle in these courts is that individuals ought to be able to conduct their own cases and represent themselves without a lawyer. Rules are relaxed but still apply to some degree. In some jurisdictions, corporations must still be represented by a lawyer in small-claims court.

And I don’t think you need to sue Valve in the US. I think they’re required to have legal representation in the countries in which they operate, which should enable you to sue them “locally” in many cases. Again, not an expert, so I’m making quite a few assumptions here.

Yeah, you’re right. Sorry. I’ve edited my comment to reflect that. I didn’t read OP’s image but rather the news post by Valve on Steam, but missed the part that said: “the updated SSA now provides that any disputes are to go forward in court instead of arbitration”.

it’s certainly not GOOD for Steam users to not be able to complain without lawyering up.

But doesn’t the change open up for litigation in small claims court? (Again, I’m in no way knowledgeable in US law, so I’m just asking.)

If, for example, I want to return a game in accordance with the rules and they won’t let me, I’m not gonna lawyer up and sue them from the other side of the Atlantic.

While supposedly being a lot cheaper than litigation, arbitration isn’t free either. Besides, arbitration makes it near-impossible to appeal a decision, and the outcome won’t set binding legal precedent. Furthermore, arbitration often comes with a class action waiver. Valve also removed that from the SSA.

I’m far from an expert in law, especially US law, but as I understand it, arbitration is still available (if both parties agree, I assume), it’s just not a requirement anymore [edit: nevermind, I didn’t understand it]. I’m sure they’re making this move because it somehow benefits them, but it still seems to me that consumers are getting more options [edit: they’re not] which is usually a good thing.

I can dig both, but I much prefer precision platformers.

Cloud Saves may be difficult to deal with, depending on what games you play.

Elysium is definitely the slowest, but time saved carries over, so if you’re fast on Tartarus, you’ll have more time in Asphodel, which is relatively short in terms of number of rooms, and subsequently more time in Elysium.

And as someone else mentioned, it saves time to be aggressive too, so never be idle and try to anticipate where enemies spawn. Enemies without shield (or when the shield is gone) can be stun-locked, so just hammer away at them.

Maybe I’m forgetting how much time and practice I’ve put into going faster, but if I can do it — everyone can, that’s for certain.

Drawing inspiration from speedrun builds is great, so maybe check some of those (linked earlier) out. There are builds for different play styles, so I’m sure you’ll find something that works for you. :)

I’m not too good at high-heat runs, but I usually enable Tight Deadline level 1 and 2 first, and Extreme Measures 1 and 2, which is already 6 heat without much of a difference in difficulty. Extreme Measures 3 is a bit wild, IMO, but I guess it’s just a matter of practice, and then that’s 9 heat. Middle Management isn’t too bad either, and that’s 2 extra heat.

Other than that, I usually go for Malphon (fists/gloves) with Aspect of Demeter and a build with Ares’ Doom effects on attack and cast, Athene’s dash and special, which usually gives me access to their duo boon: Merciful End which triggers the doom effects when I dash into an opponent of use my special. It’s insanely powerful.

The Hades community on speedrun.com has some good guides and forum posts on builds — and videos of speedruns obviously, there’s a lot to pick up from them as well: https://www.speedrun.com/hades

The first game is a masterpiece. I had so much fun discovering all the nooks and crannies of the story. And then doing speed- and challenge-runs afterwards. There’s content and gameplay for years of playing.

Plus it’s singlehandedly responsible for my kids getting deep into Greek mythology.

That’s great. Don’t get why they’re not announcing it, but whatever, I’m glad it’s gone.

I pretty much stopped reading at:

Genre terms exist to prime expectations for players.

What a ridiculously self-centered claim. Genre terms (and other categorizations) exist because language users use them to make things easier to communicate about. I can only imagine the author of the article going: “Well, actually a tomato is a fruit, not a vegetable” when talking to a chef about gazpacho, or “a penguin is not technically a bird because it doesn’t fly” when someone says that a penguin is their favorite bird.

MFer needs to learn about cognitive categorization, prototype theory, etc. It doesn’t need to be 100% the same within a category — then the category is too specific and is absolutely useless — it just needs to be similar enough that most people (that aren’t necessarily experts in the subject) understand what you’re getting at.

That opening run of Tunic was great! It’s such a great game — nice to see it get some more exposure.

Edit: Spelling

I played Everything today. That was both hilarious and wonderful. Like Proteus and Mountain it’s definitely not a game for everyone, but if some silliness and philosophy doesn’t scare you away, you’re probably going to enjoy it.

Edit: If you’d rather just watch it as a short film, then that’s possible too: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/previews/SrNsE3Jo-dYsrOfVj or you can let the game play itself for you if you’d rather just lean back and take it all in. Just leave the game unattended for a while and it will start playing itself. Settings for autoplay can be edited in the game’s settings menu.

Intro screens and the like can usually be dealt with easily in many games. Look up the game on PCGamingWiki — it’s usually much easier (and less malware prone) than pirating.

Sleeping Dogs is probably as close as you’ll get. That’s a great game btw.

High On Life. I’m usually not big on FPSs, but the writing is so dumb/hilarious that I’m still having a blast. Also, that dino love story b-movie that’s on the TV in the living room — I gotta check that out IRL.

I’d argue that it’s for all skill levels — and you can always make your own levels.

It’s free, so there’s no reason to not give it a go.

Edit: Meant to reply to https://feddit.de/comment/4718792 but messed up and hit the wrong Reply button in Sync. Leaving it as is as to not cause confusion.

I’m pretty sure it’s available on GOG. I bought it some years back because it looked interesting but I never got around to actually playing it. I’ll have to give it a go.

I think the source code download is automatically added by GitHub when you create a release in a project, and I don’t know that there’s any way to remove it. So I don’t think the “source code” download is necessarily intentionally misleading, but apart from that, yeah, you’re absolutely right. It is a bit of a shitty way to use GitHub.

If you’re into difficult platformers, then the original Super Meat Boy is 90% off ($1.49, regional prices on steamdb: https://steamdb.info/app/40800/

So far:

• Trombone Champ
• Wasteland 3

Been having a blast with Trombone Champ. It’s so incredibly dumb, silly and hilarious. And apparently Max Tundra has delivered a couple of remixes for it, which was a nice surprise.

That’s a damn fine collection. I have 1000+ hours in Super Meat Boy and Spelunky 2 alone. If you haven’t got Spelunky 1 (aka. Spelunky HD, aka. the first Spelunky on Steam), you should try that too. IMO it’s a much better (i.e. more fair) game than 2. 2 is a fine game, don’t get me wrong, but the first one is phenomenal.