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[Damiac]

Heh, when I was younger I was kind of the same way with some of the games with collectibles.  Playing the game long after it had moved from fun to frustrating, because for some reason I HAD to beat the game completely. (Part of this was not having much money for games as a kid, so I made sure to wring every last bit of fun out of the ones I had).

I suppose it's allowed me to learn a good lesson and avoid worsening come of my own obsessive/compulsive behaviors, at a certain point when I realized I wasn't actually having fun, I just stop playing the stupid game.  80% complete, 100% complete, none of it matters if you're not having fun, and letting yourself get into that frame of mind can be very destructive (I know people who bankrupt themselves trying to have "complete" sets of sunglasses, all the DLC for various games, things like that).

When I was younger I also had a lot more tolerance for the non-action parts of games, like talking to people in towns in RPGs and stuff like that. I just wanted to consume every bit of content.  Now I just want to get into the action. I try playing older RPGs and I just can't be bothered to talk to people and look around for quests, I can barely be bothered to optimize my equipment (unless it's actually fun to do for some reason).

Now most people as they get older say they have less time for gaming, thus their patience with time wasting stuff is also less.  While I certainly don't have quite as much time to play games as I did when I was a kid, I still spend a good portion of my time playing them (4-5 hours a day during the week, almost all day on the weekends).  So I certainly have time to talk to the townsfolk AND get some action in, I just don't want to anymore.

But once in a while something comes around that pulls me in.  Alpha Protocol did, I wanted to talk to everyone I could,  I got invested in the story line.  Maybe part of the issue is people who write stories and dialog for games aren't typically aiming too high.

[MrRoboto75]

So when an inkling in mario kart 8 or whatever gets hit by a blooper, why doesn't it just die?

[Kagus]

It's probably just echoing previous posts in the thread, as well as not being strictly related to gameplay, but...

Ubisoft pushing their UPlay thing on Steam. There are a number of their games I'd be willing to play, despite all the flaws, if it weren't for having to go through all the hoops Oopsiesoft apparently felt were necessary.

Also, damn... Maybe if they dropped the extra DRM shit and their UPlay obsession so they could open up their customer base, they'd be able to survive putting their games on sale now and again... Like, geez.

[AzyWng]

I think making their games something other than a bunch of 100% completion bait is equally important, but I’m not too sure if one can really take priority over the other when both are such significant issues in their games...

[deathpunch578]

It's probably just echoing previous posts in the thread, as well as not being strictly related to gameplay, but...

Ubisoft pushing their UPlay thing on Steam. There are a number of their games I'd be willing to play, despite all the flaws, if it weren't for having to go through all the hoops Oopsiesoft apparently felt were necessary.

Also, damn... Maybe if they dropped the extra DRM shit and their UPlay obsession so they could open up their customer base, they'd be able to survive putting their games on sale now and again... Like, geez.

why do we still have DRM? it does nothing to stop piracy and fucks over people that bought the game.
big pet peeve is when multiple games have the same name, it makes it impossible to find the actual game you're looking for. I'm trying to find strife the doom clone with rpg elements but keep finding strife the moba.

[wierd]

I think I have that in my collection somewhere.

Has it been declared abandonware yet?

Yes, I definitely have it.  Strife from Rogue entertainment, 1996.

[Culise]

I think I have that in my collection somewhere.

Has it been declared abandonware yet?

Yes, I definitely have it.  Strife from Rogue entertainment, 1996.

No worries. It doesn't have to be declared abandonware to be abandonware.  It just needs to have no one to speak up in its defense.  Unfortunately, given that it's sold on Steam as "the original Strife," I think the 800-lb gorilla in the room would have something to say.  At least, this assumes this is the Strife we're talking about and there isn't a *third* game by that name running around somewhere.

Well, that's not to say you can't find it still on certain abandonware sites, but I don't really consider it real abandonware anymore if it's been rereleased.

[wierd]

Ok then, don't need to share. He can totally get it from Steam.

(Me, I will stick with my *ACTUALLY* vintage dos set.)

[Darkmere]

The steam version does include the game's .WAD file that can be used in the new-engine doom ports. Almost no one makes updated assets for it, but if you are looking for a fresh take on the classic experience, it's worth grabbing DOOMsday or whatever your port of choice is.

[Kagus]

Speaking of, I'm curious to see how 3DRealms' new game Ion Maiden is going to turn out. I've liked what I've seen so far, and I think it's charming that they went back to the original Build engine. Now that's some real "back to basics" for ya.

EDIT: Oh, right, gaming peeves... Weapon/equipment stat screens that display inaccurate or incomplete data. Vermintide, I love you man, but god damn.

[AzyWng]

Funny you should peeve about that of all things when we were just now talking about old games, where there were no data screens for weapon stats...

[milo christiansen]

In the olden days, that info was in the manual.

As a child, every time I cracked open a new game box and found the manual smaller than the time before I died a little inside. The manuals used to be wonderful little (and sometimes not so little) repositories of lore, instructions, hints, and tips. Just the thing to read on the car ride home.

[Kagus]

It's also worth noting that the manuals were just as prone to misinformation as the ingame help, what with different production times, major patches and last-minute changes before release.

But yes, manuals were great. I could spend ages digging into the stats and mechanics listed in a manual when I was away from a usable computer... Slightly less interesting to just re-read the installation troubleshooting guide these days.

And then you get overachievers like Majesty and whatnot which had whole little stories printed in along with the rest.

The problem with this comes from games like Diablo and StarCraft, where the manuals and their lore/stories serve as permanent evidence of the retconning in later titles. Troublesome, that...

[Rolan7]

Man, I have fond memories of reading the Caesar 2 and Age Of Empires 1 manuals on car rides.  Particularly useful for Caesar 2 since there was a lot to understand.
And of course, the Sim Earth Bible~

I'm peeved that Steam (or game platforms in general) clearly can tell that you're idle, but continue to increase play-time anyway.  I'd like for the stats to be at all accurate for my own curiosity, but instead they inflate the numbers basically.  I have a lot of real hours in games like CK2, but also a lot of fake ones from falling asleep or leaving the game running due to the significant load time (and low resource usage when paused).

[Kagus]

Sim Life also had a hefty textbook accompanying the two floppy disks the game was packaged on. Ironically, a digital version of that manual would likely take up more space than the installer and game data...