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Penny Arcade - Comic - A Double-Edged Khopesh

DogDog Registered User, Administrator, Vanilla Staff admin
edited November 2017 in The Penny Arcade Hub

imagePenny Arcade - Comic - A Double-Edged Khopesh

Videogaming-related online strip by Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins. Includes news and commentary.

Read the full story here


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Posts

  • BlackDoveBlackDove Registered User regular
    But if the world is indeed indistinguishable from hell, which I can certainly attest to, then that time saving deal would only condemn me to suffering in that hell. The game is a wanted distraction.

    Ubisoft miscalculated, and now that I have pierced the veil, I no longer need to buy time saving microtransactions.

  • Golden YakGolden Yak Burnished Bovine The sunny beaches of CanadaRegistered User regular
    This was a weird one.

    H9f4bVe.png
  • V1mV1m Registered User regular
    Golden Yak wrote: »
    This was a sane one.

    more like

  • Steel AngelSteel Angel Registered User regular
    Golden Yak wrote: »
    This was a weird one.

    The joke is that Gabe is very dumb and doesn't like thinking.

    Big Dookie wrote: »
    I found that tilting it doesn't work very well, and once I started jerking it, I got much better results.

    Steam Profile
    3DS: 3454-0268-5595 Battle.net: SteelAngel#1772
  • DrogeistDrogeist Registered User regular
    edited November 2017
    Hehe, I love this one! Time-saving microtransactions can definitely be a double-edged sword (or khopesh). Once the player understands that they're paying more money to "save time" (i.e., spend less time playing the game), it's a reasonable next step to figure that you could save both time and money by not playing (or buying) the game at all.

    Game designers take heed! You have (hath?) wrought the very tools of your own destruction!

    Also, Tycho is reading a book called "Wizard Hats", which I found hilarious for some reason.

    Drogeist on
  • YoungFreyYoungFrey Registered User regular
    Tycho is reading a book called Wizard Hats.
    ctli6cjfqz7x.jpg

  • SadgasmSadgasm Deluded doodler A cold placeRegistered User regular
    Pfft, thats silly, once you're dead it wont matter if you wasted your time or not because you wont remember any of it.

  • jwalkjwalk Registered User regular
    honestly? they don't care if you play the game or not. as long as you buy it.
    if you buy the game, then pay again to not play it? all good in the hood to them.

  • jwalkjwalk Registered User regular
    Gears of Battlefield Duty: Final Destiny of Grand Theft Madden 2018: $60
    Time-Saver DLC that Finishes the Game Instantly : $19
    = WIN!

    horse armor now, that's a different story.

  • PreacherPreacher Registered User regular
    Honestly Jim Sterling has the right of the ultimate argument about "time saving" micro transactions, its flat out the developers admitting playing the game is bad/not fun on purpose. Like Shadow of War's micro transactions are to get past the absolutely bullshit grindy parts they put into the game to sell micros.

    I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.

    pleasepaypreacher.net
  • RatherDashing89RatherDashing89 Registered User regular
    Back at the very start of the monetezation train, Day One DLC, I somewhat defended it, saying that, in the end, if the game you got was still worth the box price, it didn't matter when new content came out. Of course, back then DLC was at least typically real content, like mini expansions. But I've since realized the flaw of "it's okay as long as" thinking, because eventually that "as long as" won't be true anymore.

    Because we're certainly at the point where the existence of additional paid "content" absolutely affects the quality of the base game you buy. I think we've reached the epitome of that idea with games that are intentionally dull to play to encourage you to pay to play less. Essentially the ability to pay to skip content is admitting that the original content is worth negative dollars.

  • ironheadironhead Registered User regular
    edited November 2017
    Jim Sterling said it best. "If you're paying to skip stuff it implies the stuff isn't worth playing".

    ironhead on
  • TychoCelchuuuTychoCelchuuu PIGEON Registered User regular
    guys has anyone heard what jim sterling has to say about all of this

  • Jakk FrostJakk Frost Registered User regular
    A bargain at twice the price!

  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    I get this sort of thing with the freemium stuff. And I would understand why a person that wants to focus on just the story in a single player game might want to skip past bits. But that latter one seems like it'd be just as achievable by putting the game on easy.

  • Jakk FrostJakk Frost Registered User regular
    Preacher wrote: »
    Honestly Jim Sterling has the right of the ultimate argument about "time saving" micro transactions, its flat out the developers admitting playing the game is bad/not fun on purpose. Like Shadow of War's micro transactions are to get past the absolutely bullshit grindy parts they put into the game to sell micros.

    I would argue there's more to it than that though. There was a time when the grindy parts were fun (even without the rose-colored glasses), but the rapid growth of the internet has led to the rapid decline of attention spans and an exponential growth of the instant gratification mentality. People don't want to work for things in-game anymore, they want to get to endgame and be "teh uberest strongest one" that all others bow down to. There's no feeling of satisfaction in hard-won levels, skills, or gear anymore.

  • RatherDashing89RatherDashing89 Registered User regular
    edited November 2017
    I read through the newspost and am still unsure whether the skins being referenced are a crafting material (like, hyena pelts I guess?) that come from loot boxes, or alternate costumes (perhaps the ability to make all in game hyenas look like Shenzi, Banzai, and Ed?).

    Further thoughts: I personally tend to like grinding in games, especially if the grinding activity is fairly fun. (I actually liked mining in Mass Effect 2! I know, right?) So I don't begrudge games for having it. Nor to I begrudge people not wanting to do it. Like easy modes, it's easy to say people are cheapening their own experience if they don't have to "earn" the ending. But then, we are talking about a leisure activity. If people want an easier or less grindy experience, far be it from me to say games shouldn't contain it. Easy modes are a good thing that doesn't really diminish the experience of those who want a harder game. And grinding should be a bonus, not a requirement to advance.

    But. When you are talking about *paying* extra for that easy mode is where things become different. If you want a lighter experience, and a game wants to give it, great! But what we have here is paying for less...

    I have just started playing the first Total War: Warhammer. I am bad at Total War. So I play on Easy or Normal at the hardest. The campaign has two victory conditions: a long victory and a short one. This is like if you achieved the short victory and got the choice to pay for your victory screen now or keep playing until you won the long victory and got a victory screen for free...

    RatherDashing89 on
  • dennisdennis aka bingley Registered User regular
    guys has anyone heard what jim sterling has to say about all of this

    I'd rather hear what Rod Serling has to say about all of this.
    Picture if you will a video game that you pay to not play. A meditation on value and on values. On sale now, in... the Twilight Zone.

  • ziddersroofurryziddersroofurry Registered User regular
    edited November 2017
    Prediction
    by Zid

    Publisher and gamer faction's:
    DLC wars will gain in traction.
    Soon a post-apocalyptic waste
    will be what's left of gaming taste.

    Rubble crushing glowing hot
    the shark card-powered killer bots
    our corporate masters command will slaughter
    and all our blood will turn red the waters.

    Immense fireballs will light the night
    proving human greed's ultimate might
    as artistry's pale shadow looks on in sorrow.
    Microtransactions today, our doom tomorrow.


    (Really, tho-I'm not a fan but I love how freaked out some people are getting over it).

    ziddersroofurry on
  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    Jakk Frost wrote: »
    Preacher wrote: »
    Honestly Jim Sterling has the right of the ultimate argument about "time saving" micro transactions, its flat out the developers admitting playing the game is bad/not fun on purpose. Like Shadow of War's micro transactions are to get past the absolutely bullshit grindy parts they put into the game to sell micros.

    I would argue there's more to it than that though. There was a time when the grindy parts were fun (even without the rose-colored glasses), but the rapid growth of the internet has led to the rapid decline of attention spans and an exponential growth of the instant gratification mentality. People don't want to work for things in-game anymore, they want to get to endgame and be "teh uberest strongest one" that all others bow down to. There's no feeling of satisfaction in hard-won levels, skills, or gear anymore.

    I don’t see it. Games like Dark Souls and Super Meat Boy are extremely popular.

  • PreacherPreacher Registered User regular
    Eh I don't know what rose colored glasses of past game grinding you're looking at. I played EQ 1 back in the day, and the grind there literally was just a hate fuck, you'd sit in the same location for hours, and if someone fucked up you could lose all progress in a single wipe.

    I don't think modern attention spans have anything to do with shitty games extending their game time by adding in bad time sinks that don't teach you anything other than "oh wow that's a new way to waste my time." Like Shadow of War took the fun nemesis system from shadow of mordor and added some really bad grindy gameplay to it on top of that it takes a while to grind levels against orcs that were fun to fight the first time but when you've seen the variation of different ones it just feels like even lamer D3 bosses.

    I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.

    pleasepaypreacher.net
  • TofystedethTofystedeth Registered User regular
    Yeah, a lot of the grindy bullshit we did for fun back in the day we did because that was what there was to do. Game design has changed a lot in 30 years. They don't call it grinding because it's fun.

    steam_sig.png
  • Jakk FrostJakk Frost Registered User regular
    Yeah, a lot of the grindy bullshit we did for fun back in the day we did because that was what there was to do. Game design has changed a lot in 30 years. They don't call it grinding because it's fun.

    No, when it was fun, we called it "leveling".

  • PonyPony Registered User regular
    edited November 2017
    Some people enjoy grindy bullshit in their game. Some people have the privilege of time in their lives to spend 120 hours on one game fucking around doing that shit.

    Some people do not. That's okay.

    I don't think a game necessarily needs to cater to one audience exclusively over the other at a design level, and clearly it doesn't if they're able to include ways to mechanically bypass that stuff.

    However, selling it to you as extra DLC is fucking garbage. It should be a god damn setting in the game. A cheat code. Making it something people who have spouses and kids and jobs and lives have to pay extra for because they don't have the luxury of time to grind out a hundred extra hours of video game like a responsibility-free teenager is fucking garbage.

    I'm 34 years old. I have shit to do. Your game costs god damn near a hundred dollars at full price. Making me pay extra atop that because I have other shit going on in my life besides being a Gamer can fuck off.

    If someone likes dicking around in the desert for 160 hours chasing collectibles, that's cool. I don't want to take that experience away from them. But don't make me pay extra money because I don't want to play AAA video games this way.

    Respect my fucking time. There's a reason why AAA games have pushed me towards indies and casual games, and it's because they're all fucking time sinks. When a developer comes out at E3 and says "our game has hundreds of hours of content and the story is 70 hours long!" I'm like fuck you! Fuck you! I have a job, asshole!

    Pony on
  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    edited November 2017
    Horizon Zero Dawn nailed it. There’s a ton of collectibles that weren’t necessary but it doesn’t feel like a grind at all. I kept finding myself saying “Just one more” late at night because it was actually fun to keep going.

    Quid on
  • CambiataCambiata Commander Shepard The likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered User regular
    This is a solid video game joke.

    I am exactly the sort of gamer that does enjoy grindy bullshit, if that grindy bullshit is part of a story and characters that I fall in love with.

    My ability to strangely enjoy grindy bullshit is probably why I recently took up knitting and can't stop thinking about how I can do ONE MORE ROW before bed.

    But yes, selling it to you for monies is bullshit, and I say this as someone who frequently defends game companies paid DLC.

    "If you divide the whole world into just enemies and friends, you'll end up destroying everything" --Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind
  • McFodderMcFodder Registered User regular
    Pony wrote: »
    Some people enjoy grindy bullshit in their game. Some people have the privilege of time in their lives to spend 120 hours on one game fucking around doing that shit.

    Some people do not. That's okay.

    I don't think a game necessarily needs to cater to one audience exclusively over the other at a design level, and clearly it doesn't if they're able to include ways to mechanically bypass that stuff.

    However, selling it to you as extra DLC is fucking garbage. It should be a god damn setting in the game. A cheat code. Making it something people who have spouses and kids and jobs and lives have to pay extra for because they don't have the luxury of time to grind out a hundred extra hours of video game like a responsibility-free teenager is fucking garbage.

    I'm 34 years old. I have shit to do. Your game costs god damn near a hundred dollars at full price. Making me pay extra atop that because I have other shit going on in my life besides being a Gamer can fuck off.

    If someone likes dicking around in the desert for 160 hours chasing collectibles, that's cool. I don't want to take that experience away from them. But don't make me pay extra money because I don't want to play AAA video games this way.

    Respect my fucking time. There's a reason why AAA games have pushed me towards indies and casual games, and it's because they're all fucking time sinks. When a developer comes out at E3 and says "our game has hundreds of hours of content and the story is 70 hours long!" I'm like fuck you! Fuck you! I have a job, asshole!

    I agree to a point, but if that hundreds of hours of content is actually all content, I'm fine with that.

    I sunk over 200 hours into Zelda, but that took me over 6 months. I enjoyed all of it! That game pretty much justified the purchase price of the Switch for me, and was very good value.

    If half of it had been sitting in the same bokoblin camp wiping them out again and again then yeah, forget that.

    I'm all for good long games, as long as they are good. It's not like you've got one month to finish it and then it disappears forever, spend your time where you want.

    Switch Friend Code: SW-3944-9431-0318
    PSN / Xbox / NNID: Fodder185
  • JackBeenJackBeen Registered User regular
    edited November 2017
    I agree with McFodder, including his example of the new Zelda game.

    That was a game I sunk a LOT of hours into and didn't regret any of it.

    But, if the game was a lot of farming goblin kills (wipe forest / wait / they respawn / repeat) then that's not fun. Some games I've played have felt like this... where in order to enjoy the game I must do an insane amount of boring repetitive farming of rats or whatever.

    As far as AC: Origins goes... I'm cool with the gamplay. I'm pretty much doing every side quest I come across, and enjoying all of the small missions. Sure, I sometimes go out and kill some hyenas or rob a copper-shipment... but it's not that often that I have to stop playing the regular game for that often. And robbing copper-shipments is fun :-)

    Then again, I also did the "Seer" skills-upgrade-path of vendors selling materials. Which perhaps made my life easier than people that MUST hunt and steal every material they need.

    JackBeen on
  • JackBeenJackBeen Registered User regular
    edited November 2017
    I will also add, that I was almost tempted to get that "time saver" from the store when I first installed the game.

    Because when I saw them selling it I immediately thought "oh cr*p... they made resource gathering HORRIBLE just so we'd spend the money" so I had fears of dealing with tons of hours of boring repetitive actions.

    But I skipped it, and I'm happy to say the resource gathering isn't bad.

    Of course, what IS annoying is that when the "tips" show up upon my death or fast-travel... that "hint" about "Maybe you want to spend money in our shop" comes up a bit tooooo often. Like Internet Webpage advertisements often.

    JackBeen on
  • NSDFRandNSDFRand FloridaRegistered User regular
    Jakk Frost wrote: »
    Preacher wrote: »
    Honestly Jim Sterling has the right of the ultimate argument about "time saving" micro transactions, its flat out the developers admitting playing the game is bad/not fun on purpose. Like Shadow of War's micro transactions are to get past the absolutely bullshit grindy parts they put into the game to sell micros.

    I would argue there's more to it than that though. There was a time when the grindy parts were fun (even without the rose-colored glasses), but the rapid growth of the internet has led to the rapid decline of attention spans and an exponential growth of the instant gratification mentality. People don't want to work for things in-game anymore, they want to get to endgame and be "teh uberest strongest one" that all others bow down to. There's no feeling of satisfaction in hard-won levels, skills, or gear anymore.

    I don't agree. For my friends and I who grew up before the internet was widespread we just happen to be adults now with limited time due to work and/or academia. So there are no more entire weekends spent grinding early FFVII, Suikoden, or Chrono Trigger to make the late game beatable.

    I'm much more interested in story or game play. So I end up really liking game play focused stuff like Hitman 2016 or Telltale games.

  • HevachHevach Registered User regular
    edited November 2017
    NSDFRand wrote: »
    Jakk Frost wrote: »
    Preacher wrote: »
    Honestly Jim Sterling has the right of the ultimate argument about "time saving" micro transactions, its flat out the developers admitting playing the game is bad/not fun on purpose. Like Shadow of War's micro transactions are to get past the absolutely bullshit grindy parts they put into the game to sell micros.

    I would argue there's more to it than that though. There was a time when the grindy parts were fun (even without the rose-colored glasses), but the rapid growth of the internet has led to the rapid decline of attention spans and an exponential growth of the instant gratification mentality. People don't want to work for things in-game anymore, they want to get to endgame and be "teh uberest strongest one" that all others bow down to. There's no feeling of satisfaction in hard-won levels, skills, or gear anymore.

    I don't agree. For my friends and I who grew up before the internet was widespread we just happen to be adults now with limited time due to work and/or academia. So there are no more entire weekends spent grinding early FFVII, Suikoden, or Chrono Trigger to make the late game beatable.

    I'm much more interested in story or game play. So I end up really liking game play focused stuff like Hitman 2016 or Telltale games.

    Two of the three games you mention I remember being entirely doable at natural levels - though FFVII you could paint yourself into a corner with leveling up materia, I only hit a wall on the optional bosses anyway, and Chrono Trigger by the time you do most of the sidequests Lavos is probably a cakewalk, depending on how you engage phase one since that part has variations.

    And really that's where I've always judged a grind: at what point do I stop progressing in the game and only progress in numbers?

    Chrono Trigger, that was when I went for harder endings on new game plus. FFVI it was never. FFVII it was about two thirds of the way in, but I feel like I could have avoided it with better planning. WoW last time I played it happened a few days after I hit 70. STO it didn't hit for a good month after I hit Fleet Admiral.

    Shadow of Mordor it never happened. Shadow of War it hit like a brick wall with that damn defense bullshit. After putting in 15 hours with no end in sight, I have to admit I downloaded a trainer and slogged it out the shitty way with cheats. And even with god mode, infinite focus, and unlimited arrows, it was fucking tedious bullshit.

    Hevach on
  • dennisdennis aka bingley Registered User regular
    Hevach wrote: »
    Shadow of Mordor it never happened. Shadow of War it hit like a brick wall with that damn defense bullshit. After putting in 15 hours with no end in sight, I have to admit I downloaded a trainer and slogged it out the shitty way with cheats. And even with god mode, infinite focus, and unlimited arrows, it was fucking tedious bullshit.

    I have to admit, this is really fucking unfortunate. I loved SoM and was really looking forward to SoW. However, I'd forced myself to wait until a sale. Very glad I have, now, as this sounds like something I don't need in my life, much less something I'd pay for. Maybe they'll eventually see the light and fix it/bundle the DLC with the GOTY version or something.

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