mannon
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Post by mannon on Jun 23, 2015 9:30:25 GMT -5
TDB gave us a handful of story missions and 2? strikes so a couple hours of "content" there. Oh but wait. 100% reused assets for the enemies and 95% reused assets for the maps so we actually got very little there. New raid. Okay that's a thing. I still haven't played it, but it's there. New MP maps. I'll give you that. And new items. I still don't see how this is worth $20. There are plenty of whole games with more content at a higher quality than that for less...
HoW has better content. Not necessarily more come to think of it, but better.
Also... CoD DLC's have been overpriced for a long time. They make you pay a lot for a few maps and it's kinda BS. The money they rake in off those DLCs must be huge. I also just find that really annoying. Once upon a time multiplayer first person shooters gave you the map tools and the fans built their own maps. End result was lots of crap, but also a ton of solid, high quality maps, all for free. Now... nope. They make shitty maps or just touch up an old one, charge us a huge fee for them, and laugh all the way to the bank...
But, meh... Once upon a time DLC was cool. You could expand your games and get great value out of it. Now it's just a big fat cash in where you pay premium prices for a middling amount of shitty content. wooo...
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qupie
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Post by qupie on Jun 23, 2015 9:40:13 GMT -5
Well it seems your gripe is with DLC in general then. I am a gamer who plays a single game for a long period of time, you are clearly a different brand of gamer. I also never picked up a smaller game (like the $20 ones) so I can't really compare there. I was always very glad new DLC came out, and for me it was always great value (even with COD) because I put allot of time in a single game.
I can see how you think DLC is expensive, as it is more expensive if you compare it to full games. I am not really bothered if it is not the same value as the core game (which would be hard to accomplish, as you would need at least as much content in DLC's as there is in the core game for $40, because you are automatically reusing some stuff)
I agree that some new worlds to play story missions in would have been good though. It never bothered me much, but I can see how it bothers other ppl. On the Taken I don't agree though. I actually like the idea from a lore standpoint, and I think it is just as much work to completely change those enemies as to redesign new ones. Don't really think laziness was the drive to do it this way, I think lore was.
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Post by iw5000 on Jun 23, 2015 9:49:39 GMT -5
CoD map packs are rip offs. They typically run $15 for the individual pack, and if you pre-buy early one, you get the four map packs for $50 (a $10 discount). Here's the thing, even with the discount (making them $12.50 per drop) for what is 3 to 4 MP maps, you typically only get the last set of maps in July or August, when the game is almost over. And worse yet, CoD the past few years puts these new maps in isolated playlists, which people tend to not play right away. You end not using them for a month or two, and wait until they drop into regular playlists. So you really don't get your money's worth.
That said, in some cases, there is great value with CoD. Like with Treyarch. Their DLC map packs not only had some new multiplayer maps, but also typically contained new zombie maps too. And let me say this...some of those BO2 DLC zombie maps were freaking incredible stand alone games on their own. The Romero map, the Alcatraz map, the WW1 trench map...all of these were great games on their own, and well worth the money.
"Value" is mostly determined by what you get out of it. I think this is the point people missed with my earlier comments. I played the hell out of those Treyarch DLC zombie maps, as well as MP maps, so for me...that $12.50 was a steal. I personally felt it was a $50 value to what I got. Maybe even $60 value, which is the value of buying a new game. Yeah, that much. Even the Destiny 'Dark Below', which I paid $20 for.... I felt that was good value. I played the Crota raid with friends a ton, and then played it solo even more. For the time & play I got out of it, it felt like a $40 value buy to me. $40 > $20...so props to me.
House of Wolves? My playtime is spotty. When I am on, I am solo. So what I am getting for my $20? Not much. I got to play the story missions 3x with my three characters. No value, same maps in reverse. I got a new social area. Blah. New guns or armor? Haven't used a single one yet. A new strike? Ok, got that, it's ok. The good stuff, PoE and ToO? Playing solo, I can't use either of them (except the lv 28 PoE which is boring easy). As I said before, based on my playstyle these days, .... I paid $20 and feel like I am getting $2 worth of gaming value right now. It's a flop to me. Doesn't mean it sucks for someone else, but for me, it does. HoW has been a bust so far for me. Hopefully I can change that, because as this keeps going, I feel my interest in Destiny waning.
When you are hooked, it's fun and momentum keeps you going in that routine. When you lose it (like my above example), it can be very easy to lose interest and it happens fast.
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wings
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Post by wings on Jun 23, 2015 9:55:35 GMT -5
But, meh... Once upon a time DLC was cool. You could expand your games and get great value out of it. Now it's just a big fat cash in where you pay premium prices for a middling amount of shitty content. wooo... And that is why I keep mentioning about DLC lockouts to those without it. Just read the Weekly Heroic is The Shadow Thief having thought one of the Bungie developers stated they were changing their tune with the frequency of DLC being in rotation. I've already done this six times for Nightfall already, so why make it the Weekly Heroic so soon when a lot of people just don't need the Strange Coins any longer? At least Cerberus Vae III has burns now and no Angry to actually feel it adds to variety, yet this is vanilla content.
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mannon
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Post by mannon on Jun 23, 2015 10:03:25 GMT -5
I'm a gamer who plays a lot of games, some more than others, and have been playing games since the 80's.
That's the thing. They are already reusing assets, they should be able to give us more content for the same value as the core game and they aren't even doing that. We're paying a premium price for less value, and the content it-self is 90% reused assets... TDB and HoW didn't bother me all that much because I bought in from the start. I knew the risks and didn't care. I knew I'd be playing Destiny for at least a year.
TK is different. TK is where Bungie needs to lure me back. I need TK to be more than just another DLC. I need it to be Destiny 1.5. Looks like what we're getting is just Destiny 1.2.5...
As for the new assets, just as much work to change those enemies? Come on... They didn't even give them highly detailed new textures, just basically wiped out the textures with some weird black shader effects and stuff. Their new abilities are a thing, but that just comes down to some different entries in a database and some playtesting. Like 5 minutes to create and a few hours to test and tweak per changed enemy. The raid is clearly a lot of work if it's anything close to VoG quality, (which it-self was still very buggy as released and is still a bit buggy today)... which I kinda doubt.
I'm not saying TK is crap. It's not out yet, who knows. But it has a LOT to live up to. Basically if I'm spending $40 on it I'm giving up buying another full game on PS4, (or two or three on Steam). TK needs to draw me back into the game and just some more lore (which will 90% be grimoire only) isn't doing it for me. I want places to go, new things to see. And I'm getting tired of reskinned enemies and no new locations.
Thing is I'm not stuck with just PS4. I have many opportunities and when I look at PC I see tons of value I can purchase for $40. Hell if I just go to the PSN store during a sale there's quite a bit of value there to be had for $40.
TK has to earn my money. It just comes down to that. If it doesn't reinvigorate Destiny even more than HoW did then I'm out.
In the end I suspect I'll get it, because I want it to be good. Because I want to keep playing Destiny. But I'm going to be really, really annoyed if I buy it and feel let down. And if I do I don't know if I'll be back on board for even Destiny 2, much less other DLCs. TK would be a watershed moment even if it didn't cost $40, but since it does there's even more hinging on it. I damn well expect it to be better than TDB and HoW combined. And I think we deserve it.
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jun 23, 2015 10:06:28 GMT -5
Are you using the XONE stereo headset or something else? Both Tim and I had issues with our older generation headsets, and once we switched to the XONE stereo headset things are back to normal. Also sounds like you won't be playing a lot for the next a few weeks either. Hopefully we can do some catch up together once we are both (fully) back I have the older generation one Looks like it's time for you to buy the new "standard issue" one as well. It is good enough and is reasonably priced.
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Post by iw5000 on Jun 23, 2015 10:11:19 GMT -5
I think for a lot of us, it's not so much the money issue($20, $40 or $80)....
..it's also an issue of TIME.
if we spend x$ on a new game, or the Destiny TK DLC, we are going to naturally want to get our money's worth and invest our time. Play it and try to play it hard. And for a lot of us, we want to spend that time wisely when playing the hell out of it. Looking ahead at Destiny next fall, do I want to do the Taken King DLC, and then follow that up with the subsequent two follow up DLC drops? Do another Sept to July '16 Destiny grind? Right now, I am not so sure (but i'll flip flop 50 more times before then) Maybe I don't want to do the same routine again, just with a new boss raid (a harder Crota) reskinned monsters and maybe some leveling tweaks to ease the grind pain? If they are treating the TK as a sort of/hybrid new Destiny game, I want a new game feel. This may not be that? I guess we'll see as we get closer.
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qupie
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Post by qupie on Jun 23, 2015 10:26:05 GMT -5
I didn't really look at them that well, but it seemed to me the looks of the enemies also changed, not just the color. I am not in the gaming industry, but is designing new enemy models that much work in the first place? From a laymans point of view abilities (looks and balance) and AI seem to be the most work (and the combination of these two). But I could be totally wrong.
I do some medical 3D modeling though, and rendering something an artist made doesn't really seem too hard to me. Maybe I am greatly underestimating this, but creating the model of a dreg can't really take longer than a week or two for an experienced artist? Making the movements fluid etc seems to be the most work to me.
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Post by TheHawkNY on Jun 23, 2015 10:33:38 GMT -5
I didn't really look at them that well, but it seemed to me the looks of the enemies also changed, not just the color. I am not in the gaming industry, but is designing new enemy models that much work in the first place? From a laymans point of view abilities (looks and balance) and AI seem to be the most work (and the combination of these two). But I could be totally wrong. I do some medical 3D modeling though, and rendering something an artist made doesn't really seem too hard to me. Maybe I am greatly underestimating this, but creating the model of a dreg can't really take longer than a week or two for an experienced artist? Making the movements fluid etc seems to be the most work to me. It probably is a lot of work to do all of the animations and the AI. I'd assume a lot of it is preventing it from glitching - they have to make sure it is designed to work correctly in every environment they put it in. Then when you put it in context of the larger project, with new areas, weapons, etc. it's probably very difficult to test to make sure everything works together as a cohesive product.
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qupie
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Post by qupie on Jun 23, 2015 10:39:26 GMT -5
Yeah that is what I thought. The actual art/design of the contours seems like a walk in the park compared to that imho.
Like adding those new shanks, the 3d models for that were probably very easy, but making them behave differently seems like a harder task to me (sniper keep distance and get clear long fire lanes, exploders try to get close and avoid clear lanes of fire (don't know if they actually do that, but that would be good AI))
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mannon
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Post by mannon on Jun 23, 2015 10:56:35 GMT -5
Except we're not talking about brand new AI. We're talking about the same AI's with different parameters. Bungie doesn't have to code a fresh AI from scratch just to change a few key behaviors. Nor are they reanimating all those reused models. They're reusing the same models... they're going to have the same animations. Maybe they'll have a new taunt animation or something, but 90% the same. The AI will be the same code just with some different parameters from the database. They built Destiny to be modular not hard coded. They don't even need programmers for this, just artists for the textures and stuff, and designers to do the re-scripting, oh and some new sound effects for good measure. Maybe they ask for a tweak or small addition that requires some new code, but over all adding these new enemies seems like very little work to me. Tweaking them to work properly and all the testing to look for problems probably took more work than creating them did.
New 3D models can be a decent amount of work depending on how detailed the full resolution models are before being reduced to the realtime polygon count. Then there's the rigging and animating, tying those animations together with the AI, ect. Reskinning an old enemy and rescripting it is far less work than building a whole new enemy from scratch... hence why Bungie is just doing that and to date has given us zero new enemies built from scratch since launch. ZERO Even the bosses are nothing more than reskins. I mean Crota just a glorified knight... Atheon, basically just a giant minotaur... although at least they had different models. Oryx... well he's got wings so they had to add some animations, but still just a knight. Bungie's boss design mostly equals take a normal enemy, make it huge, give it a new model, lots of HP, and do some fancy scripting. None of them are truly unique. Not a single one...
For me a large part of it is I want to feel like the developer actually earned my money. I want to feel like they actually put some quality man-hours into it for my money. To me that's generally more how I measure "value" rather than my time. I'll spend my time however I spend my time. Truth be told I could stop buying games now and not go a single weekend with nothing to do for five years or more. My Steam library is that absurd. Some things I'll spend tons of time on and some things I'll just poke at. I can't really measure value that way, because I don't have time for everything.
Instead I'm more generally interested in the quantity, and quality of the content. I look at the amount of work that went into it, and the attention to detail. And if I get to play it then I also consider how well it actually works and what I really get out of it. Sometimes what I get out of it can save an otherwise overpriced bit of content. I basically feel that way about TDB and HoW. I don't think they were worth the full $20 a pop, but hey I didn't have to pay quite that much anyway, and I took my chances. In the end I don't regret it so hey... money well spent I guess. Not as well spent as I'd like by comparison to some other things, but not bad.
TK on the other hand has to get me excited. It needs to be 2/3 the value of a full and complete new game to justify $40. And what I'm seeing is a lot of reused assets...
I'm still waiting for Destiny to become the "HUGE" universe Bungie claimed it would be. Right now it's still really small and on top of that neither TDB nor HoW expanded it much. Sure we got the social space in The Reef, CE, and PoE, but even that isn't much considering the social space is basically just one big room with NPCs and the other two are single activity locations you can't use for anything else. That along with the extra rooms and hallways of the story missions, (which are only accessible in those missions) barely scratches at Destiny's borders. The game is still as much a prisoner of it's limited space as Humanity is in their last city, and Bungie still isn't expanding it.
TK doesn't look like it will either. If year 2 is just more year 1 I can skip it. I want to be won over. I really do. But I want Destiny to wow me again the way it did when I fired up the beta. If it's not going to there are other games out there that will instead, and they will get my time, and money.
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qupie
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Post by qupie on Jun 23, 2015 11:31:47 GMT -5
I think they actually had to do the rigging and animating over for those enemies didn't they? I think the 'lazy' argument is a cheap shot. Maybe it is true, I don't know, but it didn't feel like that looking at the stuf I have seen.
As for new area's. We are actually getting two brand new patrol areas. Agreed on the bosses though. For one or two it is perfectly fine, no problem, might be well fit into the lore. With the hive for example, bigger seems to be better. But every single boss? That gets repetitive. The new expansion had some slightly different ones, but not enough if you ask me.
I agree that TK is not going to be an auto buy for many ppl. I will probably just buy it because there won't be any of those competitors around in September. BO3 is the next big thing for me, and I am going to wait for the reviews after AW. Really hoping it is more like Titanfall, with big maps and lots of verticality etc. Because that is really needed to make that additional movement speed/freedom shine. If it is like Titanfall, I really hope they give it some credit 10 years from now though, because for me, that was an eye opener.
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markopolo
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Post by markopolo on Jun 23, 2015 11:49:29 GMT -5
[RANT]
I still don't get the whole "It sucks because it's just reskinned current baddies?" argument. How can Oryx have an army of Taken and have them look different? They're not "new" enemies... they're enemies with new abilities... just by going off what I think I remember seeing in the video: teleporting Boomer Knights... Psions that split like amoebas. How can the Taken King bring us new characters? He takes them, not brings new enemies. If he brought us new enemies, he wouldn't be the Taken king... would he?
[/RANT]
But I need to share this.
I hope this was just my students $hitty ps3.... I hope I hope. I hope it was just this one time hellabad experience....
Everyone wants Destiny to be a grandiose massive world with 50+ planets with 50+ missions and 50+ strikes with 50+types of exotics and 500+ inventory spots... everyone wants the DLC to be a new game.
It's not happening right now. Sorry. Blame the PS3ers... Blame the Xbox360ers. It's so hard to run when you have a broken leg... and that's what's going on.... They are holding Bungie back, down, and all inbetween. They are the ones shackling Bungie from developing the game to its full potential. Don't blame Activision... don't blame Bungie; blame those who still are using lastgen consoles.
Trust me... anyone who plays on a PS4 or XboxOne needs to do this to appreciate what they have.
Destiny is hella bad on PS3... hella hella hella bad. I'm not exaggerating... it is bad. I saw it with my own eyes last just now ... one of our students for fun brought in his PS3 for his class to game. With the tech's blessing, I asked him to load up Destiny. With our school's decent internet that generally powers 800+ students googling, youtubing, and accessing networked drives, it took him 2 or 3 minutes to load the game to the Destiny "press X" screen and 10 minutes to load the game to the 3 character previews. I told him to stop and he looked at me with a crazy look, telling me this was actually the quickest he's ever loaded in. I mean... I get annoyed when I sparrow into the Rocketyard and there's a 3-5 second loading circle... 15 minutes to get to the planet selecting screen? Holy $hit I'd shoot myself in the gosh darn golly gee whiz face. It might have been his PS3... it might have been other factors... but wow: almost 15 minutes to load up to see a ship hovering over Venus... mother of the sweet baby RNGebbuz.... I couldn't handle that. And loading into a level.... ay caramba... I had to walk away... I was getting nauseous.
THAT is what is holding Destiny back from fulfilling its creativity. The last gens just can't handle it. They can barely handle loading up the game within 5-10 minutes... they can barely handle getting 4 more armour and 10 more weapons in their vault space... and people want Bungie to give them sweeping animations, awesome sound and graphics, being able to access their vault from their ship... ha. People want this massive world. Ha. People are letting their imaginations circlejerk all over the place... and I freely admit that I am one of them... Ha. Until an hourish ago.
Never again. Seriously... after seeing how Destiny was on PS3, my hopes and dreams went down the $hitter. It was torture. I want to go home and hug my PS4. I want to kiss my headset and controller and apologize for every time I've dropped them.
Why is all the cool shit not happening in Destiny: blame the lastgen Consoles.
If you're not taking last gen into consideration with anything Destiny related in the near future, you're building yourself up for disappointment. Until Bungie makes different games (one for newgen and one for lastgen) nothing awesome is going to happen. I'm shocked we got a new area and the vault space that we did get, after seeing how bad it was
Try it yourself if you have the opportunity, newgeners... PS4bros: try to get yourself on to a PS3... XBrOs: try to get on to a 360. You'll hope you don't have the same experience as me... I knew it was bad, but not that bad.
I hope for nothing anymore if this is what it is like on the PS3.
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jun 23, 2015 11:57:33 GMT -5
I am definitely getting TTK. Having been a fan of Bungie, I have enough faith in their ability in creating solid subclasses and introducing good AIs due to their track record. I have my doubts in their ability of creating Raids though, but I am hopeful that they have gained enough experience from VoG and CE. More importantly, they have 9 months to make this new Raid, it is not unreasonable to assume that it will be definitely better than CE (a low bar that is easy to beat, and Oryx should really be more fun than Son of Oryx ) and even better than VoG (little bit of a stretch). So the big 3 - new subclasses, new AIs and a new Raid, are all expected to be solid, enough for me to pay the $40 I finally got a chance to watch some impression videos on Black Ops 3 and I must say that I am intrigued (I am one of those unfortunate players who can easily be influenced by hype, sigh). I was seriously thinking about skipping CoD this year, but I am not so sure any more. The main reason is I like what I see on the movement front. Bros who have seen my posts in the past probably noticed that I am a big fan of richer movements in the combat sandbox, and Black Ops3's movement system seems to be getting the best of both Titanfall and CoD AW. It has the wall running and double jump from TF, plus hover (or anything you can take advantage of from the movement "meter"), and it does not have the major weakness of CoDAW, the jerkiness. It seems to be a much more "natural" system for players to get used to, for players of all "schools": 1) old school players who just want basic run and gun can just the the system to move aggressively, 2) TF fans can appreciate the fluidity of moving from point A to point B using various routes. The new "specialist" idea is also interesting. You have 9 to choose from, each has a unique weapon and a unique ability that can be deployed during combat. Say a Chinese girl who can whip out a one-shot kill pistol called the Annihilator or boost the rate at which she earns progress towards scorestreaks for a short time. Sounds familiar? Maybe she is the ancestor of Gunslinger With TTK and Halo taking most of my time during the fall, I am going to wait a few weeks before deciding on Blops3. If I end up getting it, most likely I will join the Xmas noobs this season
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markopolo
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Post by markopolo on Jun 23, 2015 12:03:26 GMT -5
After reading more about this eurogamer interview with Luke Smith (the guy in the dev video who says that we want to wear Oryx's a$$ like a hat)... 3 things have come to mind
1) Luke Smith better be hellatalented otherwise his a$$ is fired. Out of a cannon. Throw acid showers. Into nuclear waste. 2) DeeJ has some serious damage control to do on thursday. There are a lot of pissed off people and right now, I can't blame anyone after this interview 3) I went from "wait and see" to "definitely buying it" to "definitely going to buy it just not now because I want to see what they'll give me if preorders are low" to "DeeJ's BWU will make or break whether I get this DLC... hell, whether I shut down Destiny for good" I did it to CoD, I'm doing it to TF2 on PS4 and I'll damn well do it to Destiny if I don't like what I hear on thursday."
DeeJ better knock it out of the fucking park in 48+ hours
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wings
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Post by wings on Jun 23, 2015 12:13:26 GMT -5
Everyone wants Destiny to be a grandiose massive world with 50+ planets with 50+ missions and 50+ strikes with 50+types of exotics and 500+ inventory spots... everyone wants the DLC to be a new game. It's not happening right now. Sorry. Blame the PS3ers... Blame the Xbox360ers. It's so hard to run when you have a broken leg... and that's what's going on.... They are holding Bungie back, down, and all inbetween. They are the ones shackling Bungie from developing the game to its full potential. Don't blame Activision... don't blame Bungie; blame those who still are using lastgen consoles. Ah now you're beginning to sound like someone from Reddit. I like to see proof as to why previous generation consoles cannot cope with larger inventory spaces because I'm sure it's more of an issue of how the game is coded since I can carry 500 items in my backpack in Borderlands 2 with no diminishing performance on the Xbox 360. Borderlands 2 only starts stalling when there are more than 700 items in the backpack so I use mules I keep in Sanctuary that have that much. Whose decision was it to release Destiny on previous generation consoles? It's not previous generation users at fault here, Bungie and Activision should have gone with current generation only to help encourage players to make the upgrade. Also, if Bungie or Activision really cared for technology limitations by platforms, there'd be a PC version out. I'd have bought that instead of the version for the Xbox 360 but then I'd be complaining that Xbox One and PS4 users are holding the game back because they have middle range tier specs compared to my rig. I'm sure you'd want to be spared the lecture there. If we had space battles, new planets could be awesome and our ship choice could be something other than cosmetic. So may be I can rescue the Exo Stranger from Titan with my Slipper Misfit ship and pretend I'm playing Star Fox.
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wings
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Post by wings on Jun 23, 2015 12:15:30 GMT -5
1) Luke Smith better be hellatalented otherwise his a$$ is fired. Out of a cannon. Throw acid showers. Into nuclear waste. He's been a douche since the Halo days. No change there.
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mannon
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Post by mannon on Jun 23, 2015 12:53:44 GMT -5
New models for the bosses would need to be rigged, but to existing skeletons so not exactly from scratch and the animations could easily be recycled so you only need new ones for new movements or appendages, ect. (EG: Oryx's wings...) Slapping a new model on an existing enemy and rescripting them to behave slightly differently and have more health is really no big deal. Modders have been doing that for ages.
As for TK, yeah okay so it fits the lore to reuse old enemies. Bravo. But which came first, that story or the need to reuse assets? I argue that reusing assets is THE reason the Taken exist. It's a thinly veiled excuse. It's Gen 1 Skorpion and Sub Zero, gen 1 Ryu and Ken. It's making up BS to fit your budget. I don't hold that against them, necessarily. It's what we got in the last two DLC's. It makes sense for a DLC to reuse what you can to push your budget as far as you can. But this is double the price and the first big DLC that wasn't part of the original guardian edition. This is launching year two. This is what is supposed to keep us playing this game for another year. TK should be epic. It should not be more of the same +50% more content. It should be giving us some of the things we've been begging for since launch. The only place where it does that as far as I know is the third subclass. (Are there new patrol areas? I haven't heard of these, if so that's a good thing!)
As for last gen holding current gen back, that only goes so far. Yes, the game is bad on last gen. Okay I accept that. But that doesn't have to hold everything back. Memory issues can creep in here or there, but there are ways around it. For example, vault from orbit which you mentioned... well, why not? Last gen can access vault from the Tower or the Reef same as I can, why not orbit? It's no more taxing, in fact it's considerably less taxing because you don't have to load a map full of NPC's and other players. How about vault space? Sure there's a limit on what you can load up at once, on the other hand if you don't load up the art assets until you look at the details it should take VERY little memeory just to store the stats and thumnails of each weapon in your inventory. SRSLY! I've played games on PS1 that had vast inventories available. Even if we ignore that what else could be done, oh well we could segregate your vault into groups on different tabs and load them exclusively. That alone could triple your vault space with NO impact on resources used... Yeah last gen is bad but memory is NO excuse for vault space. I don't fucking buy it.
What about more locations? Again you load into locations mutually exclusively. You don't load Mars and Venus. Last gen has enough HD space for expansions. Hell I have tons of games on my PS3 HD. So I don't see any reason last gen means we can't have new areas. New enemies are the same thing. You load mutually exclusive sets of enemies into memory to control resource usage. This is why there is literally nowhere you can fight more than two factions at a time. They don't coexist. The closest you have is PoE, but that makes you run off to the airlock between factions. Ever wonder why? But does that mean we can't have new enemies? No. You just can't plop them down everywhere. But you could put them in new missions and such. The suicide shanks and other enemies with new models prove that. They use as many resources as actual new enemies would. Only they're a lot easier to create.
When it comes down to it, yes supporting last gen puts some limitations on the game. X number of enemies, Y number of factions per area, Z size areas, ect... But it's not an excuse for every limitation in the game. There are tons of ways to get around those limitations, (things done in other games for decades).
Also... what new AI's? They're reusing existing enemies and giving them a few new abilities. That would entail at the most just a few patches to existing AI's if not mere scripting. Hell I'd be willing to bet many of the enemies in the game already use the same AI just with different parameters. Why build 20 AI's to do basically the same thing? Acolytes and Dregs, for example. They do basically the same thing, have pretty much the same limitations. Why would you script separate AI's instead of just altering a few variables to change their behavior? Now flying enemies probably do have a different AI, as would tanks. Honestly all the bipedal enemies could probably run on the same AI, though I'm guessing they have more than one.
This whole interview thing is putting me in a bad mood and I haven't even read it yet. heh I'm just really skeptical of TK right now. It seems like a big excuse to reuse and recycle as much content as possible to keep us squabbling for the scraps. I wanted the "comet" to be so much more. I wanted it to make up for the lackluster DLCs. Guess I was expecting too much...
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jun 23, 2015 13:12:46 GMT -5
Can't argue that $40 is a bit pricy, not to mention $80. However, I still think the price is reasonable enough. I also just realized that there is another major reason that made me decide to buy TTK: the guardians with only 2 subclasses feel incomplete Kidding aside: I feel that I need to defend the solidness of AIs in Destiny. IMHO they are really good, way better than AIs in other FPS games I played. Acolytes and Dregs are definitely different enough for example: while both can be pushovers in regular settings, boomer Acolytes in Arc Burn situation are a huge threat, and melee Dregs with Lightswitch can be quite a handful. At this point we know very little about the new AIs. They can be anywhere between very interesting and hugely disappointing. That said, I think the idea of adding a dimension to existing AIs has a lot potential on the interesting side than just being lazy. Instead of trying to come up with a completely new race where it is difficult to be entirely creative, adding new dimensions could transform the existing races into something quite fresh in a much easier way.
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mannon
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Post by mannon on Jun 23, 2015 13:44:51 GMT -5
I'm not saying the AI is bad. I'm saying it's modular and extensive. I'm saying Bungie went into this knowing that before they built the world of Destiny they had to build the tools to create it and they made those tools as versatile as they could so that they wouldn't need to build a new AI from scratch for every single enemy type. Acolytes and Dregs are different enough for what? For the game? Sure! But they don't need complete mutually exclusive behavior sets. What convinces you that they are different is mostly down to different graphics, animations, weapons, and stats. Those are all just variables, and nothing that needs to be hardcoded.
Flying enemies likely have a different AI. Shanks and servitors may share an AI core. They also barely have any animations. Wizards on the other hand have more animation which may or may not be a different AI. (It's a lot of work to add animations to an AI without them, but not that much work to take them away from one that has.) Tanks probably have a unique AI. Shiriekers on the other hand may have no AI at all. They could just be scripted entities like oracles, but they could have a simple AI or be dumbed down shank/servitors.
At any rate new enemies does not equal new AI's as far as I'm concerned. Unless it exhibits some truly new behavior it's just tweaks to existing AI's. Good AI's, yes. But the same AI's we've killed thousands of times and will kill thousands more before TK is released.
I'm just not seeing this loads of content in TK. TK is more like what I would have expected for the other DLC's considering that Bungie called them "expansions"... a term they most definitely did not live up to.
Here's my thing. When I buy an "expansion" to a game what I'm used to getting is basically a whole new mini campaign with entirely new areas and enemies. This is not merely old fashioned. There are modern games doing this with their DLC as well. Just look at Borderlands 1 and 2. You get an whole new story in a whole new area and there's even new enemies and stuff. Not 90% reused content like Destiny. It's like we're buying CoD map packs with only 1 new map and the rest are just imported from previous games. Or you have a series you really like and they release a movie that's supposed to continue the story but the whole thing except the last 10 minutes is just the series recut into a movie. It might be fun, it might be enjoyable, but damn they sure are stretching this rehash stuff out. How many times can I watch the same animation of Optimus Prime raising his arm with a different background? How many times can Airwolf blow up the same jet with the same rocket in different episodes or do that same weird helicopter half loop de loop?
I want something truly new dammot. Is that really so much to ask? Well maybe some other game will provide it instead... who knows. I'm definitely not preordering until I see something to get me excited, though.
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jun 23, 2015 14:32:21 GMT -5
One thing we can expect for sure is that there won't be anything ground breaking from TTK. It is an DLC, and an arguably overpriced one. That does make me appreciate more on Halo 5's gesture of offering all DLC maps for free. When you are an underdog (343i in this situation), you try to do some nice things to win fans. Not like Luke Smith who spent the entire interview trying to shove $80 price tag down the fans' throat for something that even $40 is questionable. I am sure the majority of the active year 1 players are going to get TTK. However, if it is an disappointment, the fans are going to say enough is enough and won't get into whatever they are planning for the subsequent DLCs (which we can count on as subpar vs. TTK if year 1 trend continues).
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jun 24, 2015 11:13:26 GMT -5
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wings
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Post by wings on Jun 24, 2015 11:36:52 GMT -5
One thing we can expect for sure is that there won't be anything ground breaking from TTK. It is an DLC, and an arguably overpriced one. That does make me appreciate more on Halo 5's gesture of offering all DLC maps for free. When you are an underdog (343i in this situation), you try to do some nice things to win fans. Not like Luke Smith who spent the entire interview trying to shove $80 price tag down the fans' throat for something that even $40 is questionable. I am sure the majority of the active year 1 players are going to get TTK. However, if it is an disappointment, the fans are going to say enough is enough and won't get into whatever they are planning for the subsequent DLCs (which we can count on as subpar vs. TTK if year 1 trend continues). I'm wondering what the player count is like because if it is dropping, and given the competitors for players' time and money with upcoming around, then why is this priced so high and Luke Smith decided to be a smug doughnut too? Do they think their reputation from making Halo gives them a free pass? I've noticed a reduction in activity on my friends list and on LFG sites. I can basically wait a whole day to sign up for 34 PoE, ToO and Crota and still see a place hasn't been taken up. That didn't happen even a few weeks back.
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Post by TheHawkNY on Jun 24, 2015 12:48:18 GMT -5
Wow, that PS exclusive Warlock armor is HELLA UGLY. That chick looks like she's crippled.
So here's the thing about all the great ideas that seem simple to implement. If they are great ideas, and they were simple to implement, they probably would be implemented. It's not like they don't care about the quality of the game. They care even more than we do.
Also, regarding Luke Smith - honestly, that's not even his fault. He's the creative director for TTK. It's his work, and clearly he's proud of it. He probably has no experience doing interviews. Also, he likely makes six figures, and is overall the wrong person to doing the interview. Blame whoever approved him doing the interview, and failed to appropriately prepare him for how to answer the questions he was asked.
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Post by iw5000 on Jun 24, 2015 12:54:36 GMT -5
I really think this DLC's shelflife is considerably less than the Crota DLC. Just going by my friend's list too, few are playing this. I do think Bungie underestimated how much fun people had with the raid stuff. And while I haven't done the lv 34/35 PoE, ...from what I saw with the easier versions, it's just not going to replace a raid. PoE isn't the same fun as a Raid.
And expecting ToE to replace things like VoG and Crota? I don't know. People who signed up to play Destiny, I don't think they are here because of the PvP.
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Post by TheHawkNY on Jun 24, 2015 13:07:52 GMT -5
I really think this DLC's shelflife is considerably less than the Crota DLC. Just going by my friend's list too, few are playing this. I do think Bungie underestimated how much fun people had with the raid stuff. And while I haven't done the lv 34/35 PoE, ...from what I saw with the easier versions, it's just not going to replace a raid. PoE isn't the same fun as a Raid. And expecting ToE to replace things like VoG and Crota? I don't know. People who signed up to play Destiny, I don't think they are here because of the PvP. I disagree. Most people I know thought that the Crota raid wasn't fun at all. It was just a bunch of cheeses to learn. Meanwhile, PoE is lots of fun, not just a bunch of cheesing, and changes every week. I just wish they'd change the 35 the same way they change the 32 and 34 every week (they could leave Skolas at the end, that's fine). I don't think they expected ToO to replace a Raid. I don't think most players are playing Destiny for the PvP. I do think it's a nice addition to the game, even though at times it makes me want to pull my hair out.
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wings
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Post by wings on Jun 24, 2015 13:08:33 GMT -5
Also, regarding Luke Smith - honestly, that's not even his fault. He's the creative director for TTK. It's his work, and clearly he's proud of it. He probably has no experience doing interviews. Also, he likely makes six figures, and is overall the wrong person to doing the interview. Blame whoever approved him doing the interview, and failed to appropriately prepare him for how to answer the questions he was asked. Luke Smith used to be Community Manager for Bungie during the Halo days. He could have worded his answers better for a start, I mean fancy admitting that the Pound Sterling is foreign to him. What does he want? Destiny players to mock the obvious there?
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hebbnh
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Post by hebbnh on Jun 24, 2015 13:16:21 GMT -5
I think you're right on the PvE side, IW. The attraction just isn't there with PoE like it was with raids. I think some of that has to do with the smaller fireteams. Inevitably some people who used to have a group of 4 or 5 other people to raid with regularly are stuck on the outside looking in now. 3 people from that group can run PoE together leaving the 1 or 2 others kind of out on a limb, and rather than go the LFG route they just skip PoE altogether. After a couple weeks of that they get bored or frustrated and move on to something else. To me a lot of the fun with the raids was just BSing with our group, goofing around and having things like that "Scorpion mode" incident happen. Obviously the content was fun enough on it's own the first dozen times or so, but after doing it 3 times a week for so many weeks that part of it started to get old. The BSing with the group was always entertaining.
As far as PvE vs PvP goes, I think quite a few PvE diehards have probably started to focus more on the PvP side since Trials started, as PvP now offers something worth playing for. I know I have. I know THebb has. I know Post has. I've probably spent as much time in PvP as PvE lately working to get my crucible and faction rep up and earning crucible marks so I can buy a "perfect" set of PvP gear, not to mention all the weapon rerolling and leveling I've been doing.
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wings
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Post by wings on Jun 24, 2015 13:40:42 GMT -5
I think you're right on the PvE side, IW. The attraction just isn't there with PoE like it was with raids. I think some of that has to do with the smaller fireteams. Inevitably some people who used to have a group of 4 or 5 other people to raid with regularly are stuck on the outside looking in now. 3 people from that group can run PoE together leaving the 1 or 2 others kind of out on a limb, and rather than go the LFG route they just skip PoE altogether. After a couple weeks of that they get bored or frustrated and move on to something else. To me a lot of the fun with the raids was just BSing with our group, goofing around and having things like that "Scorpion mode" incident happen. Obviously the content was fun enough on it's own the first dozen times or so, but after doing it 3 times a week for so many weeks that part of it started to get old. The BSing with the group was always entertaining. As far as PvE vs PvP goes, I think quite a few PvE diehards have probably started to focus more on the PvP side since Trials started, as PvP now offers something worth playing for. I know I have. I know THebb has. I know Post has. I've probably spent as much time in PvP as PvE lately working to get my crucible and faction rep up and earning crucible marks so I can buy a "perfect" set of PvP gear, not to mention all the weapon rerolling and leveling I've been doing. I don't mind PoE but I've played a bucket load of Horde in Gears of War 3 and played some in Left for Dead 2 so I guess I've been spoilt there. I don't feel the need to re-run level 28 PoE like I did with Horde in Gears of War. I could mix up the mutators, choice of base and level and it's still pretty fresh despite doing the same core things over and over. If you haven't already, buy the Dead Orbit rocket launcher and get some +heavy ammo boots for Trials as this will give you four rockets. That feeling when your opponents spend all their rockets on your teammates only for you to hold back and clean house is pretty awesome.
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mannon
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Post by mannon on Jun 24, 2015 13:56:26 GMT -5
I only partially buy that. If you had a group of 5 for raids and now have to split it into a group of 3 and of 2 then really that isn't any more difficult to get together than the 5 man raid. Whether you got 5 for raid or 2 for PoE you're 1 man short. If you were willing to LFG for raids why not for PoE? I really don't think there is any argument to be made for PoE being somehow less accessible than raids other than the lack of saved checkpoints. It's far more accessible.
I will still grant you the social aspect, though. It's certainly cool getting 6 of your friends together for the same activity, especially one where you can all actually stay together unlike Crucible where you'll get split up by deaths and spawns if nothing else. But, I for one applaud PoE being 3 man for a change because a whole lot of other players have been the ones on the outside looking in because they couldn't get 5 other friends together for raids. I'm not saying I don't want any more 6 man raids. But it is nice to have some end game content that is designed for 3... really really nice!
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