The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
Penny Arcade - Comic - The Rub To Race Ratio
Dog
Registered User, Administrator, Vanilla Staff admin
Registered User, Administrator, Vanilla Staff admin
Penny Arcade - Comic - The Rub To Race Ratio
Videogaming-related online strip by Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins. Includes news and commentary.
Unknown User on
+6
Posts
Just sayin'.
Landing in a random crew and throwing their shit overboard, dropping the anchor for no reason, shooting all their cannonballs away, etc.
Attacking other players and stealing their loot, however, is not griefing, and never will be.
...or has he?
Griefing is when a player does something to intentionally ruin the experience of another player.
Griefing is taking your baby into a movie theater.
Wait...
Unless the game makes it impossible to log out and relog in a new location, anything done to an enemy team seems fair game to me.
You were doing so well up until the end. Taking your baby theater isn't doing something to intentionally ruin the experience of another player. It's simply not giving a damn whether or not it ruins their experience, so that you can have your experience.
Griefing is taking your baby into a movie theater and chucking the dirty diaper up a few rows.
It's No Man's Sea. Basically.
I'd say even that depends. If you're constantly killing the same people on purpose (spawn camping) I'd qualify that as griefing. The spawn system is definitely one they need to fix up a bit.
Nah, Sea of Thieves never really promised more than what there was and at least you can interact with people turning it at least into a reasonable party game. You can't even get THAT much out of No Man's Sky.
I'd take this "bare-bones" content over yet another variation of a boring battle royale game any day of the week.
Yeah, I find it head-scratching to read posts about reading reviews saying there isn't content. It's like playing a sports video game (or, hey, even something like a Quidditch one) and saying there isn't content because all it does is let you play a match. Or SNES Bomberman. All this missing content probably won't matter very much to you if you like the basic loop. I know I didn't imagine watching Jerry, Mike and his family playing and having a blast doing the same basic tasks over and over.
I find it a little less head-scratching due to the full $60 price when while yes, I do find its idea more enjoyable than some because of the multiplayer content, I'm aware of games with much more content that cost less. I don't think this should affect review scores but I do see it as a reasonable factor for if one should buy the game over another. I mean, I know I for example would rather play Don't Starve Together rather than this due to the content but very different game which is probably the main thing this has going for it. How many actual good multiplayer Pirate games are out there these days? (seriously, someone needs to do a game like Sea of Thieves except with some inspiration from Pirates! Gold content.)
My understanding (having never played it) is that this game is very much a sandbox where you drop in and you have a whole world to work with, and not much structure or framework to it. You do what you want to do, and play how you want to play, and there isn't necessarily a carrot on a stick dangling in front of you to keep your interest. You have to find your own things to keep your interest.
An analogy that might fit (based on me never having played this game). I imagine it's the difference between buying a LEGO kit, with a set of instructions that tell you how to build some super badass castle that looks very intentionally/professionally designed when you're done with it versus getting a big rubber bin of loose pieces and being expected to just use your imagination to build whatever you want with what you are given.
One is a guided experience with a tangible end-result. The other is a self-made experience with a result that cannot be easily gauged on any sort of scale, other than personal satisfaction.
It's tough to do a good pirate game because there are so many ideas important to the setting. It usually starts with open world or at least open exploration which can be a big hurdle from the get go. Then you need a melee system, ranged combat systems for at least naval battles but ideally also boarding actions, systems for non-pirate ships so there are actual targets to pirate, and because merchant ships to prey on need a reason to exist some economic sim has to be underneath that. It's a lot going on and even one part missing can be noticeable. I enjoyed Black Flag more than other AC games but it felt lacking as a pirate game at times due to a lack of merchant ships to plunder for meaningful loot.
And that's just the mechanical bits. There's still the issue of gameplay experience and the pirate fantasy can mean very different things to different people. For a lot of people it's the idea of cutting ties to your old responsibilities and cares and going where the seas and opportunity take you. For others it's the opportunity to go nuts with no fear from authority figures. The latter are the types more likely to enjoy what Sea of Thieves seems to be right now while the people hoping for a more carefree nautical roadtrip are more miserable.
Steam Profile
3DS: 3454-0268-5595 Battle.net: SteelAngel#1772
Arch,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_goGR39m2k
Hmmm yes, i agree. It is just about time for Puzzle Pirates to have a resurgence of popularity.
I will never stop banging this drum.
Honestly? I'm not sure its as hard as people make it out to be. Ubisoft would have been perfectly capable of it in Black Flag. Problem is they had that whole thing where there had to be an AC every year. I'm willing to bet if they specifically went back to that game and actually reused a lot of that, they could make a pretty stellar pirate game that way but too often companies seem to abandon all but the bare bones. They seem too afraid to properly reuse and add on to stuff they used in previous games in an expanded setting. At best they'll take out parts that were popular and do the simplest thing they possibly can to make money (I'm almost 100% positive that's what Ubisoft is doing with their upcoming Pirate game to be frank). I could of course be wrong but well, its often the impression companies give from their actions.
Actually that's the thing that always annoys me with the yearly model. They have opportunities to add whole new features to a project and save those features for future projects to make building similar projects easier but they rarely take advantage of that and often yank things out instead for microtransactions, DLC and the like.
I feel like at some point he's done that in the comic.
Now something with Eve Online level economic depth set in the Age of Sail would be interesting as hell.
That would be a pathetic sports game. It's clear you don't play them because this is a very bad analogy. Actually good sports games have things like multi year franchises where you have to retire old players and draft new ones. Or create a fresh team and attract talent as you get better. Online fantasy leagues where you not only create the teams, but then you play the games each weekend. Or even a story mode career where you follow a player through the drama of the matches they get into in and out of the field. A sports game that released with "Play a Match" as the only option would be (rightfully!) laughed out of the industry.
To compare this to Sea of Thieves, why isn't there an instant action battle mode where you can face 5 or 6 fully crewed ships in a battle? Or an "around the world in 60 days" mode where you're in a race with other ships to get loot and then get to a certain place first? Or a Privateer vs Pirate mode where some ships are there to protect a fleet and kill pirates vs the other team who's there to loot the fleet and escape alive. Even if you take the framework of "everything is PvP", they've done basically NOTHING with it.
That's a fair point. I can see it being a game where you just pass on it if you're not getting it with your Pass.
In other words, an xp treadmill, right? Don't we have enough games like that already? Don't we have enough games where a newbie/casual comes in and is vastly underequipped compared to the regular players?
I feel like it's kind of refreshing that they seem to be making the progression just mainly about cosmetics and keeping the actual abilities on a level playing field. Would be a shame to see it turn into yet another MMO.
You see, the thing about analogies is that they're not meant to be picked apart. As I said above, it's a fair point about it not being worth $60. But for a Game Pass game, it seems not pathetic at all.
Also, I note you focused solely on the sports analogy and not on the SNES Bomberman one. Didn't need any campaign there. Same is true with MarioKart battle. My friend and I were fanatics. We played so very many battles on Block Fort in the N64 version. All of the other battle tracks more or less sucked so it was a one-track game for us. We only played the races to unlock everything. Once that was done, it was Block Fort battle all the time for us.
Mario Kart Battle was indeed a ton of fun... but also they had racing modes and a Grand Prix campaign mode. And later Mario Karts added hidden characters and Kart customization to add to the depth. I think even the part that's supposedly fun about Sea of Thieves is not doing it right. You have to luck into a confrontation with one ship to get a battle started. Why isn't there just a battling mode? Imagine if SNES Bomberman was about wandering empty battlefields and occasionally running into hostile Bombermen to fight (there's an analogy for you to not pick apart). That'd be bad is what it would be.
I already addressed that above.
I'm not really sure I can agree with you on "depth." Yes, it added a lot more unlockables. Unfortunately, that's what a lot of AAA studios have decided passes for "depth" these days. It's like saying Chess or Go don't have depth because you never unlock new pieces or special moves.
Have you actually played a significant amount of time in this game or watched people who have? Because what you're describing is not what I see. The G&T play Sea of Thieves twitch streams can be rewatched. Go do that and then tell me what you think the experience is like.
Sometimes it's very populated, some times it's not. You seem to have a certain video in your head as the only way this goes and I assure you that's not the case. Youtuber SidAlpha says he ran into a single ship in a 2-3 hour play session, for example.
(If you take pvp out of Sea of Thieves anyway, there's barely enough content variety left over to fill a bucket)
It is called Skull and Bones.
For $60.
That's Sea of Thieves right now.
It's a $60 water simulator.
That is Sea of Thieves, it's super fun, and the fact that all progression is purely cosmetic is why I even paid any attention to it to begin with.
Also if WoW had no levelling I'd like it better.
So, are they gonna add tons of new content in 2 weeks? I don't think so. If they had the content now they would have released it now. Even if they add new quests and new enemies and new ships and fix some of the issues in 3-4 months, it will be a ghost town by then.
(GG-G-G-G--G-GHOST PIRATES)!
We've been conditioned to think that our time-wasting hobby is not a time-wasting hobby as long as there are bars to fill and numbers to increase. Plus, you know, how can we feel a sense of superiority over people who haven't been playing as long if there's no progression?? (I don't feel that way, but I think many do.)
(Edited to fix typos.)
-Tycho Brahe
That's the one where you play as the ship, right?
Puzzle Pirates was the first thing I thought of. I played in the beta, part of my username here stems from that time, and this same issue came up. People justifying griefing because "It's pirates". And I say this as someone who was in a crew that frankly did do a lot of griefing, but it was fascinating to watch how the devs responded and tweaked the game to account for it.
El Pollo Diablo had no mercy for griefers.