Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games
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It's no secret to anyone who knows me and has talked about games with me that I hate most modern FPS games.
I hate that most of them are either horribly linear (and I'm not talking story, I'm talking level design, that's mostly just a glorified corridor with backtracking not only being discouraged, but verboten), or huge swathes of busy work (I just barely managed to get through Far Cry: Blood Dragon, and that was like what, a third of a map size?) comprised of 17342 radio towers / bases / shitpiles to step in.
I hate how higher difficulty is achieved only by making enemies have better aim, do more damage, and seemingly know where I am at all times and shoot at me as soon as one pixel of my hitbox is outside cover. This is based mostly on Homefront (fuck you, it was free... somewhere, at some time), which I do know many people lambasted either way, but that's the game I had on hand to play, and from what I know it was pretty much as formulaic as it gets for a modern shooter.
I hate the fucking two weapon limits. This was the worst in Duke Nukem Forever, which I played recently. Disclaimer, it was through family share feature on Steam, and the person got it in a bundle with Spec Ops: The line, so I cannot blame them for buying it. Maybe it's not as bad in CoD or something, but why in the shit do I have to choose between a shotgun or a chaingun in a fucking Duke Nukem game? Are we going for realism? In Duke fucking Nukem? Oh, no, right, it's so that the level design can be lazy and they don't have to think about placing pickups. Limit the weapon selection, throw a few supply crates in, Bob's your mother's brother.
Which is, incidentally, why I hate regenerating health, too. See, I thought that it was just the fact that the health regenerates on its own making even less sense than the medpacks. But no. Turns out I was hating on it because it meant I don't have to think about it as much. I can just rush into any battle, knowing there are no lasting consequences for anything, I don't have to map out the level in my head and note pickups, it meant I was not engaged in the world, I was just riding the rail.
Now, to be clear, I'm not saying a game cannot be fun even with all that. I had fun playing Titanfall 2's campaign. But that's because they filled the gap with fun setpieces, mechanics and freedom of movement, which replaced the exploration in the sense that I still engaged with the world, I had to still pay attention to the surroundings to map out wallrunning routes, for example. There's no such things in Generic Military Shooter #8843, which makes me bored within 14 femtoseconds as a result.
But Onyx, you say, it's the multiplayer where it's at! Okay, fine. I heard of this game recently. It's called Ironsight, and it's pretty much "CoD multiplayer, but F2P". Fuck it, it's F2P, let's see what I'm missing, doesn't cost me anything. And... well... what the actual fuck? Am I blind, stupid, or both?
So ok, weapon limits, loadouts, perks, fine, I don't mind a lot of it in MP. No pickups means no locking the map like in Quake or UT, so I guess it's "charge and kill whatever moves". Yeah, right. The fuck is up with that TTK? Like, seriously? Where's the skill? There is pretty much no way to turn around a fight. Seriously. By the time I know I'm getting shot, I'm dead. No dodging since all weapons are hitscan, no time to find cover, no time to turn around and try to headshot the opponent to win despite your health being lower, nothing. Dead. Fucked. Respawn. Try again.
Is it knowing the map? The map that's designed like a modern environment, with 17 alternate routes and boxes all around? Now, don't get me wrong, it's not necessarily a bad map, but what is the point of knowing the fucking map if every spot on it contains 14 ambush opportunities while I have less health than a slice of Swiss cheese that already had extra holes punched in it, just for good measure?
I only managed to play two modes, team deathmatch, and "resource collection", which spawns NPCs that you have to kill and then pick up their drops for points. Sounds like a potentially good idea. But oh, no, wait. They always spawn in the open. Running out means you're viable to get killed within 2 seconds. Trying to defend the position means either trying to run out, again, and get killed within 2 seconds, again, or sitting behind cover, taking pot shots, and hoping someone will survive long enough to pick the shit up once NPCs died.
Luck. It's all fucking luck. You have to be lucky enough to get a drop on someone instead of getting dropped on. You have to be lucky to survive long enough to run out and get the resources. There is no fucking skill because every fucking noob can kill you within 2 seconds with a freaking water pistol. Yes, it's more realistic than Quake. But it's no. Fucking. Fun.
Or I'm just old and stupid.
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@onyx Overwatch would probably be a change from what you're used to, but based on your rant I think you'd enjoy it. A mildly related aside: What's your opinion on TF2?
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@pie_flavor played Paladins until they fucked up the F2P model, I found it fun. I know how similar to Overwatch it is, so yes, I'd like Overwatch. I won't buy it though, I'm heavily in "fuck microtransactions in paid games" camp and actively boycott any game employing that model (and if anyone wants to fight me on this, can do, but please start a new topic for that, I'll come and play).
TF2... yeah, I think I missed the bus, the skill level of existing playerbase seems to be way above me and I feel useless. Nothing against the game, mind, I'm sure I'd enjoy it if I didn't suck as bad, and I sadly don't have the time I'd have to invest to "git gud" now. If I played it when it was new, I'd probably still play it now.
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@onyx Trust me, you do not notice the microtransactions. I have never felt like I've had any less of a game because I didn't spend money on it. Generally I agree with you on that point but they've obscured it behind a wall of it's-only-lootboxes, and even then you only get cosmetics from them. The only exception to the lootbox rule is Overwatch League team swag. Paladins is a different story, what with their cards and purchased heroes, but in Overwatch every single player is on equal footing gameplay wise every game. I'm not bashing your boycott, and if that's still bad enough for you to say no then I can see where you're coming from, but it is cosmetic only and even then it's not direct purchasing and you can easily get them through not too much gameplay too.
Be careful not to feel outclassed in TF2 and Overwatch. They've got skill-based matchmaking, so the more you lose the farther down the skill level of your opponents go until you hit your stride, and the inverse if you keep winning. I have been hovering around the silver-bronze border of Overwatch since I bought it, but so is everyone I play against, so it's never not fun due to skill differences (especially in Overwatch, for example if someone cheats the system by grouping up with a high skill player then the opposing team will get a similarly skilled player as well).
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@pie_flavor said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
cosmetics
Since I really don't want to drag this out here, all I'm going to say is: the industry already proved that slippery slope is not a fallacy in this particular case. And at least a sizable amount of players employing a zero-tolerance policy is the only way these fuckwits can possibly be stopped. I chose to be in that camp in this particular situation.
@pie_flavor said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
skill-based matchmaking
I didn't know TF2 does this. Might give it another go at some point, though I mostly prefer a more relaxing form of MP these days. I'll get that bloodlust at some point again though, I guess TF2 might be a good candidate to try again.
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@onyx said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Since I really don't want to drag this out here, all I'm going to say is: the industry already proved that slippery slope is not a fallacy in this particular case. And at least a sizable amount of players employing a zero-tolerance policy is the only way these fuckwits can possibly be stopped. I chose to be in that camp in this particular situation.
Not Overwatch. I don't really know how to say it other than 'not Overwatch'. Kaplan is acutely aware of exactly how giant of a flamewar he would incur if he tried anything like that. It's like someone telling you that at any point Gmail might start charging a monthly fee for their services. Like, they are motivated to hell and back by profits, but it's just something this particular company with this particular product would never do. The game design also really doesn't permit it. Part of the vision is that even footing thing I was talking about earlier - there are no loadouts, no items, not even stuff acquired during gameplay. There's just you and your character. Price-locking a character would have giant ramifications on team play, on community toxicity, on balance issues, etc. There's just no way it would ever happen, and I say that not as an unwilling-to-see-the-truth fanboy, but as something intended to be taken at literal face value which you would also know for sure if you had been following the game like I have.
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@onyx said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
I hate the fucking two weapon limits. This was the worst in Duke Nukem Forever, which I played recently.
Duke Nukem Forever stole that, and about 26 other gameplay mechanics, from Halo. Then has the balls to add in a scene where Duke Nukem makes fun of Master Chief.
@onyx said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Maybe it's not as bad in CoD or something, but why in the shit do I have to choose between a shotgun or a chaingun in a fucking Duke Nukem game?
Because it came out after Halo changed the entire FPS genre, but before the resurgence of "classic" FPS games like Rise of the Triad remake, or Wolfenstein: The New Order. I guess somehow you blinked and missed it, but for a period of about 15 years, every FPS basically borrowed every Halo mechanic.
@onyx said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Which is, incidentally, why I hate regenerating health, too. See, I thought that it was just the fact that the health regenerates on its own making even less sense than the medpacks. But no. Turns out I was hating on it because it meant I don't have to think about it as much. I can just rush into any battle, knowing there are no lasting consequences for anything, I don't have to map out the level in my head and note pickups, it meant I was not engaged in the world, I was just riding the rail.
It's all about surviving from encounter to encounter. In a game with an inventory system, you'd stop and heal up between every encounter anyway, so the game just automates that. And it's also specifically to prevent players from camping pickups on a map, since pickups are stupid.
@onyx said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Now, to be clear, I'm not saying a game cannot be fun even with all that. I had fun playing Titanfall 2's campaign. But that's because they filled the gap with fun setpieces, mechanics and freedom of movement, which replaced the exploration in the sense that I still engaged with the world, I had to still pay attention to the surroundings to map out wallrunning routes, for example. There's no such things in Generic Military Shooter #8843, which makes me bored within 14 femtoseconds as a result.
Titanfall, which you seem to praise here, is a much better example of a modern FPS. The last 3 or 4 Call of Duty games (before WWII) had Titanfall-type movement mechanics also, which really injected a lot of life into the genre.
(Apparently CoD: Advanced Warfare and Titanfall simultaneously came up with the idea that every soldier gets rocket-boots that enable stuff like wall-running and double-jumping, and were released virtually simultaneously. I'm guessing there was a lot of "healthy borrowing" between the two developers. Meanwhile Tribes had jet packs for everybody back in 1997, if you want to be crotchety.)
@onyx said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
But Onyx, you say, it's the multiplayer where it's at! Okay, fine. I heard of this game recently. It's called Ironsight, and it's pretty much "CoD multiplayer, but F2P". Fuck it, it's F2P, let's see what I'm missing, doesn't cost me anything. And... well... what the actual fuck? Am I blind, stupid, or both?
Shitty free-to-play games are shitty. News at 11:00.
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Thread fork respected. More recommendations:
Doom, though I haven't explored anything besides the campaign so I'm not sure if there's something that would make it fall on your shitlist.
The Borderlands series is golden.
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@onyx Why don't you come at this from the other direction. What games do you like? What kind of game do you want to play?
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@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Duke Nukem Forever stole that, and about 26 other gameplay mechanics, from Halo. Then has the balls to add in a scene where Duke Nukem makes fun of Master Chief.
That was a separate rant I'd make if the whole post wasn't a novel already.
@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
I guess somehow you blinked and missed it, but for a period of about 15 years, every FPS basically borrowed every Halo mechanic.
Oh, I know that's how it went. It's still bullshit in most cases.
@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
It's all about surviving from encounter to encounter. In a game with an inventory system, you'd stop and heal up between every encounter anyway, so the game just automates that.
And that's why I said that I eventually understood why I don't hate the system itself, but the style of gameplay it seemingly gave birth to. I don't want to comment on Halo itself since I haven't played it, but it may have worked perfectly there. Doesn't mean other designers know how to make it work though.
@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Titanfall, which you seem to praise here, is a much better example of a modern FPS. The last 3 or 4 Call of Duty games (before WWII) had Titanfall-type movement mechanics also, which really injected a lot of life into the genre.
The thing is, apart from those two examples, I don't see many of them doing similar stuff, or at least not competently. And I'll admit that after trying MW I got soured on CoD so I haven't touched it since.
@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Shitty free-to-play games are shitty. News at 11:00.
The thing is, from the all the gameplay footage of CoD I saw in various videos... Looks pretty much like the same thing to me
@pie_flavor said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Doom
Forbade myself from reinstalling it since I need to sleep at some point in time. You dun gud id, you dun gud.
Also, I suck too much for nightmare difficulty. Holy shit is it hard!
@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Why don't you come at this from the other direction. What games do you like? What kind of game do you want to play?
I mean, my point wasn't to find games, if that were the case I'd say so. I wanted to vent for one, and try and see if someone can convince me that I'm wrong about the stuff I listed
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@onyx said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Since I really don't want to drag this out here, all I'm going to say is: the industry already proved that slippery slope is not a fallacy in this particular case. And at least a sizable amount of players employing a zero-tolerance policy is the only way these fuckwits can possibly be stopped. I chose to be in that camp in this particular situation.
I'd say that depends on the game. I'll admit that that kind of marketing can be really bad, and that I've spent more money on Path of Exile than anyone should ever spend on a game, but in their case it's their only revenue model. I wish they'd kill off the boxes, though.
But yeah, the most recent Doom, the new Wolfenstein games (Though the latest is less good, admittedly)... you have some options. I'll always recommend Warsow, despite it being dead.
@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Titanfall, which you seem to praise here, is a much better example of a modern FPS. The last 3 or 4 Call of Duty games (before WWII) had Titanfall-type movement mechanics also, which really injected a lot of life into the genre.
(Apparently CoD: Advanced Warfare and Titanfall simultaneously came up with the idea that every soldier gets rocket-boots that enable stuff like wall-running and double-jumping, and were released virtually simultaneously. I'm guessing there was a lot of "healthy borrowing" between the two developers. Meanwhile Tribes had jet packs for everybody back in 1997, if you want to be crotchety.)And now my friends complain that there aren't any modern military shooters anymore. Which makes no sense at all. They're all terrible games.
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+1 to the OP.
I too liked Titanfall/Titanfall 2 for the free-running movement, but they both also suffer from the low TTK (IMO). The fast movement in the first one did offset that a bit though, for instance, one could move erratically enough with weird paths to foil e.g. annoying campers. Still, running around a corner into somebody seems mostly a coin-toss. I felt that the second one slowed things down a bit, though. :-/
What I hated about them (and hate about about a lot of the moderny shooters) is the concept of unlocking weapons in multiplayer. It essentially guarantees that you will suck when you start out, and not only because you don't know the maps/meta/etc - you aren't actually given the same choices as the other (already more skilled) players. (I felt like you could go through the things in TF rather quickly, though, so that was nice.)
Gone is the possibility of playing an hour or so every now and then for fun; rather, you have to grind your way to the top-tier equipment. Some are better about it, but others (new Star Wars BF2) are a bloody unfun grind.
Recently, Lawbreakers looked fun, but it was apparently pretty much dead on arrival.
Regarding Overwatch. I played it for a while, ended up finding it chore to play. It's fun when you end up with a decent team and matched opponents, but as soon as that's not the case ... bleh. Also, if you have an off-day or just want to goof off for an hour, you'll end up dragging the team down. It's harder to play it just for fun, instead of "seriously".
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@cvi said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Regarding Overwatch. I played it for a while, ended up finding it chore to play. It's fun when you end up with a decent team and matched opponents, but as soon as that's not the case ... bleh. Also, if you have an off-day or just want to goof off for an hour, you'll end up dragging the team down. It's harder to play it just for fun, instead of "seriously".
Accurate. It's a very competitive game, even in casual mode, and there is very tight team integration that you don't see in similar games like TF2 because there are only six players on your team and strengths are balanced to really make you play as a team. I like it, others like it, others don't.
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@pie_flavor said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
The Borderlands series is golden.
The Pre-Sequel isn't as good as the other two; they didn't quite get the feeling of engagement right (though the ice mechanic is nice). I'm still playing #2, and some of the levels in #1 are pretty good as well. They're all totally about loot boxes, but the drop rate for interesting guns is enough to keep you hoping.
Best of all? I can play without anyone else.
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Maybe I'm old and stupid too, but about the newest FPS I play these days is Quake III. For many of the same reasons you listed, I don't seem to like modern FPS's.
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@onyx said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
And I'll admit that after trying MW I got soured on CoD so I haven't touched it since.
(Assuming you mean "Modern Warfare" and not "MechWarrior"-- speaking of gaming rants, how about people who initialize every game even when there's like 18 games that share the same initials?)
I like the sci-fi games a lot. Infinite Warfare still has a lot of players, I think there's a big crowd like me who:
- Don't want to follow them back to the boring cookie-cutter WWII game era
- Think it's really fucking distasteful to use the Thousand Yard Stare to sell a fucking video game, jesus guys
@magus said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
And now my friends complain that there aren't any modern military shooters anymore. Which makes no sense at all. They're all terrible games.
It went WWII, Modern, (short incursion into Vietnam courtesy the Battlefield: Bad Company series), Future, (short incursion into WWI courtesy again to Battlefield), now it's reset back to WWII.
@cvi said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
What I hated about them (and hate about about a lot of the moderny shooters) is the concept of unlocking weapons in multiplayer.
In CoD, the best (like... statistically proven best) weapon is usually the second unlock, and rarely past the third unlock. I assume that's done intentionally to reduce the feeling you're talking about.
I don't remember how well Titanfall did the same concept. I do remember all the mechs were roughly equally powerful, with the latest to unlock being the crappiest.
@pie_flavor said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
I like it,
We get that you like Overwatch, we'd all like you to shut up about it now.
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@mott555 said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Maybe I'm old and stupid too, but about the newest FPS I play these days is Quake III. For many of the same reasons you listed, I don't seem to like modern FPS's.
Have you tried the new Quake? It's supposed to be pretty faithful.
I was always an Unreal Tournament man myself. Fuck that Quake III noise.
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@blakeyrat I'm probably the only person who loved UT99 and UT3, but wasn't a huge fan of 2004. They were awesome games. UT3 still looks better than most games that come out, as far as I'm concerned, and had amazing-feeling weapons. Just the right sort of sound and impact.
I do also like Quake, because of the freedom of movement you can access. I need to try the new one...
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@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Don't want to follow them back to the boring cookie-cutter WWII game era
I agree in general, but I put greater focus on mechanics than the setting, and I find a great majority of newer FPS games lacking in that department.
+1 for UT, love it to death.
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@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
In CoD, the best (like... statistically proven best) weapon is usually the second unlock, and rarely past the third unlock. I assume that's done intentionally to reduce the feeling you're talking about.
I don't remember how well Titanfall did the same concept. I do remember all the mechs were roughly equally powerful, with the latest to unlock being the crappiest.I don't remember if there was any consensus (statistical or otherwise) for Titanfall, though I remember that a lot of people claimed that the initial weapon you got was actually the best (not the smart gun, the rifle; I thought the smart gun was quite fun, despite sucking at using it ... I never really understood why people thought it was overpowered).
Personally, I preferred one of the later guns (I had to look it up - it was the C.A.R.). Another reason I don't like the concept of locking weapons behind a barrier is that I want to try out the different weapons to see what sticks. I think that one of the Crysises did this a bit better - you were able to pick which weapon you wanted to unlock, rather than being forced through a certain path.
The most recent StarWars battlefront was pretty bad at this, though (IMO). I don't remember seeing a lot of later-level players using any of the early weapons.
Also: one more vote for UT. Spent a lot of time in the original. :-)
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@cvi said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Personally, I preferred one of the later guns (I had to look it up - it was the C.A.R.). Another reason I don't like the concept of locking weapons behind a barrier is that I want to try out the different weapons to see what sticks.
Well but yeah there's like 50 of them. Even if you try each weapon for just one round, you'll probably end up unlocking weapons as fast as you can effectively try them anyway.
I think part of the point of the unlock is to reduce the decision paralysis when you first drop into a new game's new equipment screen and see like 58 icons there and you have no idea which they do. Most people who just bought a $60 game want to PLAY GAME not spend 37 minutes researching equipment in the help files.
@cvi said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
I think that one of the Crysises did this a bit better - you were able to pick which weapon you wanted to unlock, rather than being forced through a certain path.
Some of the CoD's, and all of the Battlefields (I believe?) do that.
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@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Some of the CoD's, and all of the Battlefields (I believe?) do that.
Battlefield 1 has some of that system, there are several items locked behind level progression.
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@dragoon said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Battlefield 1 has some of that system, there are several items locked behind level progression.
Ah, I guess I don't remember there being level-gates on items. I do remember they're freakin' expensive so it's a real investment if you just want to try out a gun, which was annoying to me.
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@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
I think part of the point of the unlock is to reduce the decision paralysis when you first drop into a new game's new equipment screen and see like 58 icons there and you have no idea which they do. Most people who just bought a $60 game want to PLAY GAME not spend 37 minutes researching equipment in the help files.
Maybe. I'm a bit more cynical and think that it's probably just there to extend the time people play the game. Grind for a few more maps/hours => new unlock => feeling of being rewarded.
In the end, it's probably a bit of both.
Either way, I don't like the nagging feeling that I get every now and then that I'm being conditioned to play a game more instead of playing because I'm actually having fun.
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@cvi just... One... More...
Turnmatch...
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Mainly, the thing I miss is weapon roles. Most weapons in games now are just normal shooty-type things that are different only in a few numbers.
What I liked about UT was the variety of weaponry. You manage that shock-combo midair on Morpheus without getting sniped? That feels gooooood. Even the idea that you might be sniped midair is incredibly exciting.
And then you have Quake: The weapons all do different things and have different uses and effective ranges. You swap to LG at short range, fire a few plasma shots as they get further, and then maybe fire a rocket toward where they're about to be.
I don't want 312 different SMGs.
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@onyx said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Which is, incidentally, why I hate regenerating health, too. See, I thought that it was just the fact that the health regenerates on its own making even less sense than the medpacks. But no. Turns out I was hating on it because it meant I don't have to think about it as much. I can just rush into any battle, knowing there are no lasting consequences for anything, I don't have to map out the level in my head and note pickups, it meant I was not engaged in the world, I was just riding the rail.
Regenerating health completely ruined the difficulty of Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Particularly since there are air vents everywhere you can hide away from the enemies in. Pop out, shoot 2 or 3 guys, hide, wait 30 seconds, repeat.
Granted, that's perfectly acceptable in the lower difficulty settings since it's not a FPS game, but it should have been removed (or heavily nerfed) in the highest setting.
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@anonymous234 I'm pretty sure Serious Sam did this for its "Tourist" difficulty ages before it was cool.
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@cvi said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Maybe. I'm a bit more cynical and think that it's probably just there to extend the time people play the game. Grind for a few more maps/hours => new unlock => feeling of being rewarded.
Depends on the game. In the Call of Duty series, those unlocks come pretty quick. (Like I said, if you used each weapon for 1 round, you'd probably unlock weapons as quickly as you could trial them.)
In Battlefield 1, they're a lot more spread-out/expensive.
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@magus said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
What I liked about UT was the variety of weaponry. You manage that shock-combo midair on Morpheus without getting sniped? That feels gooooood. Even the idea that you might be sniped midair is incredibly exciting.
And still compared to Starsiege: Tribes? Yawn. That was a multiplayer game.
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@anonymous234 said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Granted, that's perfectly acceptable in the lower difficulty settings since it's not a FPS game, but it should have been removed (or heavily nerfed) in the highest setting.
You could just not do it and challenge yourself.
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@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
@magus said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
What I liked about UT was the variety of weaponry. You manage that shock-combo midair on Morpheus without getting sniped? That feels gooooood. Even the idea that you might be sniped midair is incredibly exciting.
And still compared to Starsiege: Tribes? Yawn. That was a multiplayer game.
Still the most fun travel system in any FPS I have ever played and nobody even tried to replicate it.
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@dragoon said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Still the most fun travel system in any FPS I have ever played and nobody even tried to replicate it.
Just like Bethesda has been steward of the "Gamebryo-style RPG" genre for decades, each game selling millions and earning tons of awards, and yet nobody else has ever tried to replicate it. Even now that they haven't released a fantasy one since 2011, and Fallout 4 strayed pretty far from the formula.
I just don't get the games industry.
In the film world, they don't even let an animated feature about insects working hard make it to the theater before another studio attempts to replicate it.
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@anonymous234 said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
@onyx said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Which is, incidentally, why I hate regenerating health, too. See, I thought that it was just the fact that the health regenerates on its own making even less sense than the medpacks. But no. Turns out I was hating on it because it meant I don't have to think about it as much. I can just rush into any battle, knowing there are no lasting consequences for anything, I don't have to map out the level in my head and note pickups, it meant I was not engaged in the world, I was just riding the rail.
Regenerating health completely ruined the difficulty of Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Particularly since there are air vents everywhere you can hide away from the enemies in. Pop out, shoot 2 or 3 guys, hide, wait 30 seconds, repeat.
Granted, that's perfectly acceptable in the lower difficulty settings since it's not a FPS game, but it should have been removed (or heavily nerfed) in the highest setting.
Play 100% stealth on highest difficulty. That's fun and a challenge.
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@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
@mott555 said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Maybe I'm old and stupid too, but about the newest FPS I play these days is Quake III. For many of the same reasons you listed, I don't seem to like modern FPS's.
Have you tried the new Quake? It's supposed to be pretty faithful.
I was always an Unreal Tournament man myself. Fuck that Quake III noise.
I forgot there was a new Quake. I hardly play games anymore and haven't followed the news on this.
Yep, I'm officially old. My top-played games these days are Quake 2/3, Age of Empires 2, and the original Doom and its variations. I'd still play Halo 3 if I could but the Xbox Live lobbies are empty these days.
Now I wish I had a lawn so I could scream at today's gamer kids to get off it.
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@mott555 Just find a free to play game with micro payment lawn boxes
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@mott555 Apparently if you play as Visor, it still has no speed limit.
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@onyx said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
I didn't know TF2 does this. Might give it another go at some point, though I mostly prefer a more relaxing form of MP these days. I'll get that bloodlust at some point again though, I guess TF2 might be a good candidate to try again.
If they did, it's a recent addition, because it certainly didn't for the 8 (2008-2016) years that I played it, or when I played it again for about a month after the last major update at the end of last year.
I know they recently change their competitive mode to use the same matchmaking that CS:GO does, but that was literally two weeks ago.
Overwatch, on the other hand, does have skill-based matchmaking in its QuickPlay and Competitive game modes, but QuickPlay gets less picky about skill matching the longer you're in the queue.
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@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
I was always an Unreal Tournament man myself. Fuck that Quake III noise.
I always preferred UT over Q3.
It's a shame Epic basically killed Unreal Tournament 4 by moving the entire UT4 team over to making the Fortnite Battle Royale game mode.
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@powerlord
the last update was in september
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@mrl Yeah, there's an achievement for playing the entire game without raising an alarm.
But there's no indicator to see if you've triggered an alarm. If you accidentally do it and don't notice (which is easier than it sounds), you'll only know when you finish the game and the achievement doesn't unlock. Then you'll have to replay the entire game once more.
Same goes for completing the game without killing anyone. You have to check each enemy every time you knock them out, because sometimes they just die for no reason.
Amazing that a big and experienced development team can miss such an important and easy to implement feature.
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@anonymous234 said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Amazing that a big and experienced development team can miss such an important and easy to implement feature.
YMBNH
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@anonymous234 said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Amazing that a big and experienced development team can miss such an important and easy to implement feature.
I know Dishonored and sequels told you whether you done goofed after each level. Did Squeenix fix that oversight for Mankind Divided?
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@anonymous234 said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
But there's no indicator to see if you've triggered an alarm. If you accidentally do it and don't notice (which is easier than it sounds), you'll only know when you finish the game and the achievement doesn't unlock. Then you'll have to replay the entire game once more.
Dishonored had that exact problem, as well as a lot of confusion over whether killing the plague-zombies counted towards the "no kills" rule. Fortunately it told you at the end of each level, not just the end of the game. Unfortunately, each level is like 3 hours of play.
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@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
Depends on the game. In the Call of Duty series, those unlocks come pretty quick.
Fair enough (I never really played any of the CoD games). The progress speed in Titanfall was tolerable enough, for example.
Still, it feels like I'm enjoying these games despite the unlock mechanic, rather than it adding to the experience (small reward boosts aside).
Same goes for a lot of the achievements. Few enough of them are truly worth that label anyway.
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@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
@anonymous234 said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
But there's no indicator to see if you've triggered an alarm. If you accidentally do it and don't notice (which is easier than it sounds), you'll only know when you finish the game and the achievement doesn't unlock. Then you'll have to replay the entire game once more.
Dishonored had that exact problem, as well as a lot of confusion over whether killing the plague-zombies counted towards the "no kills" rule. Fortunately it told you at the end of each level, not just the end of the game. Unfortunately, each level is like 3 hours of play.
The original Dishonored was kind of lenient though if you tried to go for the "no kills" achievement at the same time as the stealth achievement. It's all in engaging the fewest amount of enemies that you could. Enemies which don't detect you don't need to be silenced and hence won't drown in a puddle somewhere. Also, the "no alarms" rule was quite clear - if somebody spotted you they'd attack whilst yelling.
Of course, you'd still better keep your savegames close and your body piles well-hidden...
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@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
how about people who initialize every game even when there's like 18 games that share the same initials?
Yeah, twats
@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
In CoD
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@jbert said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
@blakeyrat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
@anonymous234 said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
But there's no indicator to see if you've triggered an alarm. If you accidentally do it and don't notice (which is easier than it sounds), you'll only know when you finish the game and the achievement doesn't unlock. Then you'll have to replay the entire game once more.
Dishonored had that exact problem, as well as a lot of confusion over whether killing the plague-zombies counted towards the "no kills" rule. Fortunately it told you at the end of each level, not just the end of the game. Unfortunately, each level is like 3 hours of play.
The original Dishonored was kind of lenient though if you tried to go for the "no kills" achievement at the same time as the stealth achievement. It's all in engaging the fewest amount of enemies that you could. Enemies which don't detect you don't need to be silenced and hence won't drown in a puddle somewhere. Also, the "no alarms" rule was quite clear - if somebody spotted you they'd attack whilst yelling.
Of course, you'd still better keep your savegames close and your body piles well-hidden...
I did two playthroughs of DX:HR trying to get the no-kills achievement. I then found out that the enemies killed by your helicopter pilot at the end of the last-but-one mission count against you, and the only way to get the achievement is to let her die a few chapters earlier. I have not tried for that achievement again.
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I'm actually finally playing the original Deus Ex proper (I know, I know, heretic, it always kinda slipped away when I had the time to focus on it, and now it's on hold for reasons again), trying to do a non-lethal run and holy crap is it a pain. Especially since I set it to realistic difficulty, meaning that every mistake really hurts. I might just start killing the bastards...
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@pleegwat said in Wherein Onyx is an old crumudgeon who doesn't understand modern FPS games:
I did two playthroughs of DX:HR trying to get the no-kills achievement. I then found out that the enemies killed by your helicopter pilot at the end of the last-but-one mission count against you, and the only way to get the achievement is to let her die a few chapters earlier. I have not tried for that achievement again.
I got the achievement on first try.
Also AFAIR I was never in doubt if I killed someone or raised an alarm, so I'm a little surprised by complaints in this thread.
