Personally I’d love to see more of a living world like Ultima VII, Oblivion and Dwarf Fortress Adventurer mode.

Overall it greatly expands the number of players though, even for niche games.

Like I found out about Shadow Empire after playing Stellaris a lot and then finding Dominions 6 as another 4X game, and eventually Shadow Empire.

Shadow Empire (and Dominions for that matter) have a much smaller budget than Stellaris, but they are excellent games that I only found out about after enjoying the genre.

It’s good, but I wish it were even more like X-COM with loads of deaths and managing a roster of heroes rather than just a small party.

Especially since BG3 has done the small party adventure thing so well.

Shadow Empire without a doubt. Practically a one-man team, and yet a better logistics and supply system than any other game out there.

Shadow Empire - best strategy game I’ve ever played.

It’s more of a tactics game than an RPG really.

Like D&D X-COM.

BG3 has the same too.

I bought a new PC just to play Starfield (and BG3 with less issues).

It looks alright overall. But it’s pretty crazy that even 30xx cards can’t run it well (I had a 1070 though).

Imagine a realistic KSP with AAA graphics, like replicating historic missions and planned ones, etc.

Baldur’s Gate 3

Yeah, this post is like “Ghost of Kiev” levels of nonsense.

The CPU becomes the real issue though - which then means changing motherboard, which means changing RAM, etc. and then you might as well get an NVMe too etc.

Do that many people upgrade every generation?

I still use a 1070, so the GPU comparisons here aren’t relevant.

The main issue I hit was deciding between DDR4 and DDR5 RAM since we’re in an awkward transition phase - and that affects motherboard and so CPU choices too.

I understand their point - the bar has been raised a lot for indies over the year - localisation, controller support, ultrawide support, scalable UI and text, colorblind support, modding, multiplayer, etc. are all much more “required” nowadays, but that’s just the way things go - there was a time when even save-games weren’t necessary.

But saying it’ll harm the indie CRPGs is bizarre. This will greatly increase the audience for CRPGs as far more people try it out, and then want to try other titles when they finish it. I’d expect Solasta, Pathfinder, Pillars Of Eternity to all benefit in a few months (the only down-side being that none of these have multiplayer).

But I wish more companies would release their tooling as Open Source like id Software used to. It’d help to alleviate this a bit, even just auxiliary stuff for popular engines.

Yeah, BG3 has a much more interesting story it seems. Whereas D:OS2 was better for multiplayer and the GM mode really.

I’d recommend watching some videos on the BG3 backstory, particularly the Descent Into Avernus story and the Gith vs. the mindflayers.

Larian made one of the best RPGs ever with D:OS2 - that’s really what allowed them to take that gamble.

What I love is that it really focuses on gameplay and player choice and options.

It’s so fun to risk different rolls, etc. and different ways of doing things.

I just wish it had a day-night schedule, NPC schedules and a living world like Ultima VII / Oblivion, but it’s hard to balance with the hand-crafted quests.

But then they ramp the difference up to $10 once everyone is subscribed.

It’s already happened with games like Redfall - just pump out any crap to keep up the “content” numbers.

And then raise prices once you’ve got a large market.

In the end it’ll be like Netflix - mass-produced, low-quality games for a steep subscription - more aimed at sitting your children down to keep them quiet, than a high quality experience for gamers.

I haven’t played the Early Access yet as I don’t want to spoil it (but will set it up to test performance this weekend).

But D:OS2 was great on console - even split-screen! - just the inventory management is a little bit more of a hassle with a controller.

But note BG3 is delayed on Xbox due to Microsoft insisting on it shipping exactly the same for the Series S too, which struggles with the split-screen apparently.

Bought it last night on Steam to get the Digital Deluxe Edition bundled in the Early Access price.

It looks incredible.

My only concerns are moving the ability score points from races into just class choices might mean humans are left underpowered? I haven’t seen how the new D&D5e handles this though.

Also how alignment is handled, because the original Baldur’s Gate was awful for playing an Evil party. And that also meant a Paladin never faced any real hard decisions or trade-offs to keep their vows, etc.

I’d recommend Pathfinder over Pillars Of Eternity, it has a massive sale too!

Yeah - Hogwarts, TOTK, Baldur’s Gate 3 and Starfield is quite an amazing run.

I’ve had mine since launch, I’ve used it less this year since my company cut all travel, but I’d definitely recommend it.

Mainly I use it as a home console, since I don’t have another console and it’s great having all the Steam library right there. I set up Heroic Games Launcher and play Rocket League quite often.

I’d thought of getting an Xbox before as it’s also okay with Game Pass for just playing something on the TV to relax. But it seems that’s really going to end up like Netflix with the decreasing quality and increasing price, and paying 500+ EUR to be locked into that doesn’t seem great.

Then what really sealed the deal was when I visited my brother and we couldn’t watch the World Cup on the Xbox. Like you have some of the best hardware in the world, and can’t stream video because they lock it down so much. Whereas the Steam Deck is so versatile.

It’s one of the best games ever made. Especially the Thieves’ Guild missions.

Probably nothing, there’s no huge sales on anything I want.

Maybe Bugsnax as it’s cheap though.

Ideally MS would have done this by actually competing and growing the industry by funding thousands of new studios and experimental projects.

Instead they’re just trying to turn existing, well-funded and developed games into exclusives, and handing billions to Bobby Kotick.

Descent ?

Ultima VII - with the FOSS Exult engine, it’s old but has AI schedules, and stuff that really reminded me of TES.

Baldur’s Gate 1 - it’s quite old and much more linear in many ways than TES, but the semi-open world was still great. The Pathfinder games are also quite similar for a modern alternative. Avernum is also a little bit similar for the open world aspect.

Thief 1 + 2 - first-person stealth games, this directly influenced Oblivion. The Dark Mod also has some good newer maps.

Deus Ex (especially the original 2) - first person immersive sims.

Kingdom Come Deliverance - the closest to TES overall.

Daggerfall (Daggerfall Unity), Morrowind (OpenMW), Oblivion - if you haven’t played them already.

Arx Fatalis (Arx Libertatis) and Ultima Underworld - share some aspects with TES although are much more dungeon crawlers.

The Legend Of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom - quite different but the large open world and focus on exploration is amazing.

The UK still has a version of this where it is illegal to withhold passwords or encryption keys from the police - https://www.saunders.co.uk/news/prosecuted-for-your-password/

Emulation is CPU bound, not GPU bound.

But no shit you’d expect a $3000+ computer to be able to play it well.

I’m surprised they didn’t buy Embracer instead, or even just loads of small studios like Iron Gate Studio, etc.

BG3 comes out the week before too.

I mean literally the first-person camera.

Like you the fact you’re moving a crosshair makes it much more noticeable. It’s the same on desktop for 60Hz vs. 120+Hz too.

I don’t care so much though, I doubt I’ll even hit 30 FPS on my potato.

It’s a bit rougher in an FPS, but not a deal-breaker if the game is good.

Jerboa is better than the official web UI at the moment.

There’s a load of engine re-implementations and forks like OpenXCOM, OpenMW, Exult, OpenTTD, OpenRCT2, Arx Libertatis, Thief The Dark Mod, ZDOOM, OpenRA, etc.

It reminds me of Chris Roberts’ Point of No Return Entertainment which failed terribly lol

Why play SoC vs. CoP btw?

I’d add the Zelda games too, especially TOTK. They’re not quite as immersive but TOTK has a great focus on fun and creativity, although the balancing drops off badly in the mid-late game as the late-game armour upgrades are really OP.

Then there’s System Shock, Prey, Bioshock, etc. even Alien: Isolation to some extent, but I don’t like those games that never give you time to rest and do some non-combat stuff.