Context: I recently have been playing Vindictus with internetrules.
curi:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Vindictus/comments/a08v6u/game_akin_to_vindicus/
do you know any of the games suggested in comments there?
internetrules:
no. one game that i thought was kind of like playing vella specifically, is metal gear rising revengeance
curi:
o ya i think i saw a vid of that game b4. looks like a too-easy single player game meant to make you feel powerful was my impression.
internetrules:
yeah that seems about right, in harder modes i think its alot harder tho
curi:
i’d be surprised if it was actually very hard
i find single player games normally way too easy even if they have 4 difficulty modes and u use hardest
internetrules:
i remember playing it 3 years ago and getting really stuck on some boss fights on the second highest difficulty. i cant really tell exactly how hard it was tho cuz i think i was probably really bad at games back then
curi:
sometimes they are hard if you’re playing on console and the controls suck … if you count that
internetrules:
it also has like 1 move which your are suppose to use like 50% of the time called offensive defence, its kind of like a dodge with maybe a second of invuln.
it was a move pretty ez to use and abuse
curi:
i played assassin’s creed odyssey on my PC with xbox controller – it was totally designed for controller, not keyboard/mouse, and i think that worked better in general. and seriously 2 of the hardest parts of combat were
1) some awful button mappings u can’t change
2) some glitches where ur move doesn’t hit, i think cuz wolves and certain other animals have broken hitboxes
u get 8 abilities but only 4 at a time and there is a swap button. and the swap button is really really hard to hit during combat. it’s dpad down (while also holding left trigger). you have to either stop moving or use your right hand (which is what i usually did)
it’s really disruptive to gameplay to be trying to hit dpad down with ur right hand while running backwards and hoping nothing attacks u cuz u can’t hit dodge button cuz u moved ur right hand
and ur moving ur hand around to different places while trying to still hit the right buttons
it’s like taking ur hand off the keyboard and back on repeatedly and trying never to typo
always put it back in the right place
also dpads on modern controllers have horrible design
so u often hit the wrong direction b/c it’s not 4 separate buttons
so it’s not really suitable for in-combat use b/c of shitty button quality
i think the xbox one is even worse than the switch pro controller one
u try to hit down but u get left or right a fair amount
so then, pretty often, u switch melee weapons when u wanted to swap abilities
so u get fucked over
so yeah THAT was the hard part
also really hard was changing arrow types
that was on dpad left. even further away
and you have to toggle it multiple times
and you have to watch ur arrow thing to see when u toggle to the ones u want
cuz it’s just going thru a list in order
so u have to look away from combat and hit the like worst button on the controller some specific number of times
and if u hit an extra time u get to keep going to cycle back to the one u want
internetrules:
I really like the dpad on the steam controller, it’s basically just 1 sensor that sees where your pressing, and then it can also feel when you push into it
File Transfer: 56487136803__3AA370CD-DC84-4B56-AD8D-F8A0E4F439CF.jpeg
i guess the joystick could be considerd the dpad as well, it depends how you bind it, theres alot of customization for the controller
curi:
no joystick = dstick
dpad specifically means not the stick, the pad, where it’s just 4 directional buttons + diagonals. like original nintendo
except that xbox and switch dpads today are much worse build than original nintendo one
they should just give u 4 small buttons, that is way better
that’s what joycon have
it’s so much better
even if the buttons didn’t suck the assassin’s creed controls would still be terrible tho
b/c seriously how are you supposed to press stuff below ur left thumb during combat? stop using dstick or move right hand? both options suck
it’s so easy to fix
u hold left trigger to bring up the abilities
just let u double tap it to swap abilities
there are lots of other options but yeah the developers are idiots
i literally just didn’t use half my abilities unless it was one of the hardest fights
wasn’t worth the trouble
and the only reason i swapped arrows was for the non-lethal ones. the special arrows for doing dmg were not worth the hassle
and it got super easy after a while on hardest mode
internetrules:
how could they fuck up the controlls that much? dont they have like play testers and stuff?
curi:
in short, play testing in the industry is a really bad job where you waste your time
and its mostly used to fix some of the worst bugs
and to try to make up for hiring bad programmers
they basically don’t trust play testers with design decisions or balance
and the higher level ppl in charge of that stuff are idiots in most companies / for most games
like way way way worse than jeff kaplan
who really isn’t that good at balance stuff (actually he’s not in charge of it, but there is someone who is)
there are some special end game bosses
a cyclops and a minotaur
but u can kill them by staying away and shooting arrows
super ez and stupid
and u can basically spam short dodges with no stamina limit and be invincible over 80% of the time
and if any of the dodges happen to actually dodge an attack, u get several seconds of slow motion to counter attack in
during which i think you’re invincible too
internetrules:
how are the people in charge of playtesting idiots?
curi:
the balance and design ppl are bad at games
they are casual newbies who probably don’t see the problem with standing still to swap abilities during combat
cuz they are playing on normal and take no dmg anyway
they are like “well i was just using 4 abilities, that is plenty for me, but if ur an advanced player u can swap, so that seems fine”
they don’t realize shit like u have to either repeat ur heal in both sets of 4 (losign a slot) or else u have to be able to switch back really fast
cuz ur heal is fuckign important
it heals u like 60% in a game where a lot of stuff will hit u for 30% of ur life
internetrules:
and do most of the people playing the game not notice cuz they are casual as well?
curi:
and as far as playtesting basically the programmers do this:
they write a stupid bug
they don’t notice or test what they wrote themselves
some playtester has to try their code and see it doesn’t work
then they write a quick thoughtless fix and don’t check if it works
and send it back to the playtesters
and sometimes they will keep failing to fix something a dozen times
and make the playtesters check if their fix worked every time
and never check it themselves or figure out wtf they are doing
they just keep trying something and hope it works, and let playtester check it
and sometimes they forget to change anything at all and playtesters still test it again
that happens too
or they spend all day on reddit
but want to pretend to work
so they mark it as they tried to fix it instead of telling their boss they didn’t get to it this week and being asked to come in on saturday
so then the playtester has to test it again cuz the lazy guy lied
or they do shit like
there are 10 bugs
they go thru and fix some
then mark them all done
cuz like, they tried, and they wanna be done now
so some get playtested again with no fix
ppl are like that
the playtesters are low paid and are not valued
no1 cares about wasting their time
no1 thinks they have brains
everyone is like “well they are getting paid to play video games, so lucky”
but they are just repeating boring crap a lot cuz they have bad tools to go straight to the right part to test it
so it takes way too long
and then there are the intermittent issues
where no one knows exactly how to make the bug happen
so sometimes they just have to play for hours, cuz sometimes you get it after 10min and sometimes 6 hours and sometimes 3 days.
the rarer the bug, the worse it is, the harder to fix
so now imagine the process i was talking about where they keep not fixing it and being lazy and shit
or putting in some code they HOPE will work but didn’t test, and let playtester test it
but with a bug that has a 10% chance to show up per hour you play
so you could play all day, not see it, and have to do it again tomorrow cuz it could easily not be fixed
and you end up having to test and report that bug 10 times before it gets fixed
so you spend 2 weeks on it
that one stupid bug
except it’s not 2 weeks in a row, it’s spread out over time more b/c you keep having to wait for the fixes
programmers often need a few days per fix, even tho they only spend 30min on it, b/c they have other things to do too
so everyone is always task switching. the programmers have 50 bugs to fix and the playtesters have 50 bugs to test
so ppl keep switching what they are working on and forgetting things
which makes everything take MORE total time cuz it’s less effective/effficient, and it spreads things out over time more
so if you spend 2 weeks on a bug, it could be over a period of 3 months
or more
you see hints about how this works with OW
where a bug is put on PTR
and ppl notice it day 1
and wonder how the playtesters missed it
and half they time they DIDNT
they reported it
it just takes months to fix
which is why blizz then releases the PTR to live with the bug still in if it isn’t a MAJOR bug
and then fixes it in the next patch a month after the first PTR goes live, 2 months after the playerbase saw the bug, 3 months after internal testers already reported it
oh and the worst part
ppl re-break things
or break other things that aren’t what they were trying to change
so you get some bug fixed, finally, and then later someone is changing something else and his code effects it and it breaks again
b/c the programmers don’t even know what the code they just wrote will do TO THE WHOLE GAME – it could fuck up some random thing somewhere b/c the code isn’t very well isolated/separated – then basically they are constantly making playtesters replay the whole game to see if anything broke
and the playtesters are bored as fuck and not paying attention and just go through the motions and test specific things on a list they are told to test + play thru the main story and see if something breaks like a quest won’t complete or they get stuck somehow
or some other obvious big issue
ppl are bad at things. it’s not just video game dev. it’s basically almost everyone is bad at almost everything, that’s how the world works. this is not really some horror story compared to other industries. my sister works in fashion and like talks with factories in china and tries to get clothes produced. i don’t really know anything about it but i can just predict, on general principles, that there are huge, ridiculous inefficiencies there too
and ppl being bad at stuff is is why assassin’s creed is super trivally easy on normal mode and easy on nightmare.
internetrules:
and so most programmers are bad, and cause a ton of bugs? how much of a demand is there for actually good programmers? do people realize most programmers are bad?
curi:
they tried to make diablo 3 hard on max difficulty btw
that was interesting
they promised it’d be super hard
they said they playtested it, did their best to make it as hard as they could beat
then doubled the hp and dmg of the enemies
so it’d be harder than their own skill level
and on launch it was actually hard. i liked it. fun game. i didn’t think it was as hard as it was supposed to be, but i liked it.
the playerbase complaiend so much that 10 nerf patches later the game was boring and easy
50% of players think they should be playing the hardest stuff that blizz said was for the top 2% of players
and they try it, die, and then complain
cuz they want to think they are good
so blizz has to make the hardest mode easy so everyone can think they are good
assassin’s creed is the same issue
if the hardest mode was hard, lots of ppl would play it, die, and feel bad and get mad
so you can’t put in a hard mode. it cannot exist.
the game company cannot admit there is anyone better than the guy who sucks but beats “hard” mod
there are far more arrogant ppl than skilled ppl to sell to
and so most programmers are bad, and cause a ton of bugs? how much of a demand is there for actually good programmers? do people realize most programmers are bad?
yeah this is well known, it’s why google is paying $300k/year USD or more to thousands of programmers
b/c there are not enuf good programmers and u have to pay a ton to get some
it’s competitive to get them
but the game dev industry decided instead of trying to pay salaries to compete with google, mostly they will just underpay ppl who want to make games
so they get a lot of ppl fresh out of college and they have high turnover, ppl give up and leave
internetrules:
i was talking to a guy in general chat in OW [Overwatch] who was bronze and always blamed his team and matchmaking for him losing, i guess thats the kind of guy who would complain at not being able to finish the hardest difficulty
curi:
him and another half of hte population
it’s so many ppl
in general games are actually easy software to make
and are mostly copying the same crap as the last game
so it’s well known how to do it
they aren’t designing any new code that wasn’t in some other game
and they buy the physics engine and the 3d graphics code and shit
they don’t even write that
they just use unity or havoc or whatever
internetrules:
and then you have traditions in making games, which means the game wont be super terrible, and it will actually be marketable?
curi:
and then they have software devs who can’t even write decent pathfinding
pathfinding with A* is trivial enough to be like a homework assignment for a college freshman.
and then you get game releases like Pillars of Eternity that can’t fucking do it
and the enemies can barely move
and i’m not joking
guy glitched an end boss on a pillar and shot it to death
just a pillar. no walls on either side
but it couldn’t move directly forward and got stuck
meanwhile in my own game some enemies got stuck trying to go up a narrow path and none of htem would go a small distance around where there was plenty of open space
so they are all just running into each other at a tiny chokepoint instead of going around
and i just mass aoe spell them
and then think to myself
this is stupid, i could have written better AI than this when i was in high school
cuz i guess unity didn’t come with pathfinding included
so they never got it to work decently?
and so some of the fights that are supposed to be hard are actually a joke
internetrules:
i remember you talking about a game where the max party size is 6, and a guy beat the game with just 1 person on hardest difficulty, do you know what game that was?
curi:
the balance scaling in that game was awful too
on max difficulty it starts out hard at the beginning, esp while ur learning
and stuff has a ton of hp, dies slow
but at later levels everything was dying so fast i couldn’t really even play with my spells – like low level vindictus today with all ur gear on – that i didn’t finish the game
there are mods for the game made by players. it’s somewhat moddable. so i looked into it and no1 ever made a “give enemies 5x the hp mod”. everyone is so bad they didn’t care? idk
the sequel had a mod to give more enemy hp
but it was only like 50% more hp or something, you couldn’t just type in a number
soloing a 6man party RPG is a LOT of games
that’s common
internetrules:
oh
curi:
the only thing making it less common is that a lot more party RPGs, especially recent ones, are 4 characters max instead of 6
just like by default you can solo party RPG games more than 50% of the time
on hardest mode
it tends to just work
in majority of games
also in a ton of games it gets EASIER once you level up some
and the start is actually the hardest part when u do that
internetrules:
i remember you talking about how people who like the game the most, have the easiest time, cuz they do side quests, then main story gets easier cuz higher level
curi:
usually the AI is super bad so u can lure enemies 1 at a time
or peak a corner, shoot htem, hide, repeat
stuff like that
also required bosses are usually not super hard b/c they don’t want ppl to get stuck
yes!
the GOOD players tend to play more, do more stuff = get more powerful items, more levels, etc = have easier time while being more skilled
sux
internetrules:
im pretty sure that was a problem a ton of people were complaining about with the first southpark game
which if even the casuals complain about it, then its prob waaaay to easy
curi:
that game had shitty combat
the point was the south park stuff
jokes, dialog, etc
combat was mario rpg style which is boring
but ya i did max difficulty and beat it in one day np and if i had done more sidequests it’d just have been easier
but i enjoyed the game
cuz i didn’t have the mindset of it being about combat or skill
i just saw it as kinda like watching south park tv show…
what happened with diablo 3 is instructive
the general complaining resulted in everything being easier
but it’s not just that
also specifically everything that killed ppl got complaints
whatever ppl were dying to, they called unfair
internetrules:
i remember when i was playing that game that it was kinda hard cuz the mouse i was using while playing it, had its like rightclick button really fucked up or something, so i couldnt use it to like take less damage when people attacked me or something
curi:
so all the hardest things got super extra nerfed so they would be “fair” meaning ppl don’t die to it much
so every difficulty spike got removed from the game
so there was nothing scary in the game anymore
nothing where ur like “oh shit, i gotta be careful with that”
they removed everything that requires changing ur strategy, being defensive, playing safe, etc
like damage reflect is a good example
it was one of the random modifiers that elites could have
they’d roll a few random things
internetrules:
did older games do a better job at difficulty? alot of people talk about how old games were really hard. like Xcom and old school plat formers
curi:
and damage reflect was one of the most deadly
it’d turn on and off
and if u attack during reflect u take like 10% of the dmg u dealt
which is a ton, enemies have more hp than players
so ppl were constantly killing themselves
b/c they didn’t check mods b4 attacking, or didn’t pay attention to if reflect was active
or didn’t attack a little then heal then a little more
they just do burst dmg carelessly
so they had to nerf the fuck out of that so it wouldn’t be dangerous anymore
a lot of older games were harder but also ppl were worse at games then
some old games used difficulty to make up for shortness
they could fit way less art on a disk, had worse programming tools, worse computers, etc, so games then were often way shorter and smaller
so they’d make it hard so u don’t finish too fast
or so u spend more quarters in arcade
but also the gamer audience in the past was early adopters
ppl who care about computers and stuff
nerds
so the avg player was a lot better, more patient, etc
now it’s more mainstream and the random idiots have a lot more money than the tech ppl
b/c there are way more of them
and if you think shit like diablo 3 or assassin’s creed is bad
it has NOTHING on farmville and candy crush
which are what girls play
who could not play assassin’s creed on easy
who would be hard stuck bronze in OW
and those games are HUGE and bring in a ton of money
it’s also what older ppl play
like my parents could not play diablo 3 no matter how ez it is
but they could candy crush
so the REAL mainstream is shit like candy crush
assassins’ creed is just mainstream OF GAMERS
who are 95% male
and 90% under 40
(i made up the stats but u get the idea)
and who have played games for hundreds of hours before
the mainstream of society is 52% women, a lot of old ppl and a lot of little kids who suck at games b/c they get 1 hour of screen time per week (and esp the little girls are commonly AWFUL cuz they get NO HELP to stop sucking, whereas the little boys will get help from their friends or even parents or other resources to learn to play) … and so on … and they make candy crush and farmville ppl rich and would have a hard time playing any game you or I would even consider
mobile gaming is huge b/c ppl have 5 or 10 minutes to waste here or there, it’s not really even similar to what you think gaming is, or even what xbox players think gaming is.
internetrules:
it seems like turn based games could work as mobile
as like actual hard games that you could play
curi:
ppl are impatient and don’t want to strategize, which they find even harder than hitting buttons in real time games
strategy THINKING would be the WORST thing u could put in a game if u want it to be mainstream
that’s probably why the ipad boardgame-like turn based battle games i liked (like battle of the bulge) went out of business
internetrules:
how about for a game that skilled players like in a mobile form?
curi:
there are niche games – ones aimed at smaller groups – but even those are generally too easy for me b/c i’m too much of an outlier
like with boardgames, i’m a really strong chess player so i tend to be way too good at boardgames compared to other ppl
cuz skill carries over
and it’s similar with lots of turn based strategy stuff
and the AIs to play with are always so shitty
even tho the knowledge of how to make much much better AIs exists. it’s available. but game companies basically never seem to do it
is it ok with you if i post this conversation online?
i’ll put your name as internetrulez? how should i spell it?
internetrules:
anything is fine for my name
execpt [my real name]
curi:
ok but tell me spelling
internetrules:
internetrules no caps
curi:
k
i got in a big argument the other day with a guy who didn’t understand not capitalizing all internet names >>
he was like u always capitalize proper nouns
like the iPhone????????
internetrules:
i remember that in discord
curi:
ya