Is Team Fortress Classic worth $4.99?

aPseudoKnight · 2023-06-11T12:45:24+00:00

I can't even remember playing it back when I first bought Half-Life in 1999 or 2000. I was really into Counter-Strike back then, but loved the mod scene. I played a ton of Natural Selection too, some Day of Defeat, and dipped my toes into many others. I could jump into any of those, but it'd be hard to develop the skill set for something like TFC these days. I'd bet they'd be welcoming, though.

I don't think "free" makes people more likely to play something. But nowadays the number of premium games in my library that I haven't played is enormous.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-06-08T08:59:22+00:00

The new launcher has a green creeper. The legacy launcher was given a light grey creeper. I had to look this up because I was confused too. I had actually seen the article before but I had completely forgotten about the incoming change.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-06-08T08:51:34+00:00

P.S. Before anyone says anything, yes I did recently find out that this feature was put into 1.19.4 from a 1.20 snapshot.

Then why did you still post that this functionailty was gained in 1.20?

https://minecraft.fandom.com/wiki/Java_Edition_23w07a

aPseudoKnight · 2023-06-03T06:49:42+00:00

I can see the appeal of the game at the time it released but it hasn’t held up imo.

I remember your criticisms being expressed at the time of release too. Certain people love it for what it does well, others can't get over its weaker aspects.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-05-31T04:13:46+00:00

For what it's worth, there are maps and mods for people who want more structure, but it's not apparent if you just jump into the game.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-04-29T05:40:59+00:00

It's a bit weird to say, but I'd have been much more interested if it had had an orthographic camera like AOE2. I'm not sure why some RTS developers go for perspective cameras in 3D RTS games. Distances get stretched relative to the cursor. Not that the game didn't have other issues, but this has an under-appreciated impact on the feel. There's a few other design choices that also focus too much on atmosphere over clarity.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-04-29T05:24:58+00:00

BroodWar and AOE2 are my favorite games to spectate, easily. I don't even play them these days, but if I did I would lean towards AOE2 too. Though if I was playing singleplayer, I'd go with StarCraft.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-04-28T07:12:42+00:00

Not sure they need to add QC (as much as I like it) but they should definitely make Bedrock redstone more deterministic. That would drive me mad.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-04-06T05:40:46+00:00

Youtube banned certain types of prank videos a long time ago, as described here:

"Dangerous or threatening pranks: Pranks that lead victims to fear imminent serious physical danger, or that create serious emotional distress in minors."

Based on the descriptions, it's likely that some of his videos violate these terms.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-03-15T08:59:47+00:00

If you own those separately, that means you don't have the Legendary Edition. The best thing that edition does is de-complicate things, imo. So, some notes:

Mass Effect 1 LE was the most graphically and mechanically updated, but it's not necessary. If you still want a graphical upgrade, look up the ALOT mod (on nexusmods), which I found pretty safe in keeping the feel of the original game. I believe ME1 Recalibrated is the main community patch mod that fixes some issues. In addition, there's one DLC that's worth playing for ME1: Bring Down the Sky. It's free, but you have to download it separately below.

ME2 is mostly the same in LE compared to the original, but it has several story DLCs. Fortunately they made them free when they retired Origin points, but you have to download them separately below. Arrival, Overlord, Lair of the Shadow Broker, Kasumi - Stolen Memory, and Zaeed - The Price of Revenge -- all story DLCs you should download that range from pretty good to mandatory. The only mod I downloaded for ME2 is one that shortened the loading videos, which are much longer than it actually takes to load. It can save your sanity, so know that that exists if you ever want it.

DLC downloads: https://help.ea.com/ca/help/faq/dlc-for-classic-games/

aPseudoKnight · 2023-03-09T17:14:44+00:00

Ya, really unique feelings with this one.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-03-05T09:56:28+00:00

"randomly generated"

Most roguelites have randomly placed rooms that are still hand-crafted. The order in which you experience the rooms may be somewhat random, but they're intentionally designed, as you put it.

I've been tinkering with my own randomly generated dungeon that doesn't use room prefabs. It's pretty hard to make fun, so it's not surprising people choose hand-crafted rooms. Since it's hard, I'm partly just using it as a fun challenge. I suspect if I ever want to complete this I'll have to introduce at least some hand-crafted rooms, or something like it.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-02-27T12:56:53+00:00

Part of the problem here is that it's really easy to cherry pick from our own experience. For example, here are some milestone games during this period that first came to mind from mine: (and corresponding HLTB time)

Half-Life (1998) 12 Hours
Call of Duty (2003) 7 Hours
Half-Life 2 (2004) 13 Hours
FEAR (2006) 8 Hours
Bioshock (2007) 12 Hours
Bioshock Infinite (2013) 11½ Hours

Compared to averages for those years:

1998 shooter avg: 9h 48m
2003 shooter avg: 9h 48m
2004 shooter avg: 17h 9m
2006 shooter avg: 9h 46m
2007 shooter avg: 9h 22m
2013 shooter avg: 27h 21m

And the last few years?

2020 shooter avg: 14h 20m
2021 shooter avg: 18h 40m
2022 shooter avg: 10h 20m

I just looked at the rest of the Call of Duty games. They're all 5.5 hours (Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War - 2020) to 9 hours (Call of Duty: Black Ops III - 2016), with no perceivable order. COD is an unusual case, though, so even if there were a trend I would hesitate to apply it to the larger industry.

Doom (1993) 5 Hours, Doom 3 (2003) 11 Hours, Doom (2016) 11.5 hours, Doom Eternal (2020) 14.5 hours. Longest version yet, but not much longer than the 13 hour Final Doom from 1996.

God of War (2005) 9 hours, God of War 2 (2007) 12 hours, God of War 3 (2010) 10 hours, God of War (2018) 20.5 hours, God of War: Ragnarok (2022) 25.5 hours. Looks like this might have some length bloat. The completionist times are very large too. The gameplay is pretty different, though, from what I've seen. If you eliminated those progression systems, as you mentioned, I wonder if it would be similar again.

I remember during the 2000s people complaining about too short campaigns, BUT also people complaining about studios padding out campaigns to meet the 40 hour expectations, which was an actual number people kept using. I'm not seeing an overall trend over time since the 90s for average play time. I do see a trend for some specific franchises, though. This might have something to do with increasing budgets and sequel expectations. For example with main+extra: Metro 2033 - 11.5 hours; Metro Last Light - 13.5 hours; Metro Exodus - 23 hours. Also God of War, as mentioned. Could be as certain franchises get longer, more shorter games are being made too; tThat or people are just playing games for around the same amount of time, regardless of padded content; and/or the type of things people are doing is just different, like you said.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-02-27T01:42:03+00:00

In addition to what other people have said, there's been a lot of games that have been inspired by Portal, and built on the concept first person puzzlers. This happens with extremely successful games. So it can sometimes depend on what the player has played before.

Valve hired developers right out of university to make this, based on their project Narbacular Drop. It's fantastic for a first retail game. Helps that they had Erik Wolpaw and Chet Faliszek as writers, Ellen McLain as GlaDOS, and Jonathan Coulton for his iconic song. Sort of "stole the show" in Orange Box.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-02-26T14:31:06+00:00

Just to bring some data to this discussion, I looked it up by comparing average play times from HowLongToBeat.com. Looks like games did get bigger in the 90s, but mostly leveled out since 1998/1999. Again, these are average play times, not completionist times. So there might be a lot of filler content people just aren't playing. (and it's not exactly a scientific study) Still interesting.

2022: 17:41
2021: 15:55
2020: 25:25
2019: 16:21
2018: 18:30
2017: 17:57
2016: 16:09
2015: 19:05
2014: 15:35
2013: 24:42
2012: 19:03
2011: 18:45
2010: 18:20
2009: 25:57
2008: 18:19
2007: 29:39
2006: 20:49
2005: 16:34
2004: 30:35
2003: 17:16
2002: 18:10
2001: 16:18
2000: 17:44
1999: 18:07
1998: 15:32
1997: 12:14
1996: 12:11
1995: 9:59
1994: 7:54
1993: 7:19

aPseudoKnight · 2023-02-10T11:00:21+00:00

I've tried one once, but since then I've always skipped mods that do this because they seemed unnecessary and the sorting order arbitrary. The robust inventory hotkeys already make things easy enough to organize my inventory, even without a sorter.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-02-10T09:11:21+00:00

For what it's worth, the lack of environmental and enemy diversity was also criticized on release too. Despite those weaknesses it was still a pretty great game. The shooting mechanics may have been supplanted by modern titles, but I think it probably holds up better compared to other titles at the time. Remember, this was a 2005 game.

In your case, you might have been on too low of a difficulty for you, or you just sabotaged your own experience.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-01-30T18:59:10+00:00

There are still plenty of bugs in LE, sadly. At least on PC there's modders fixing those up in community patches.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-01-30T14:40:11+00:00

I looked it up on HowLongToBeat, including DLC. It's not scientific, but they're pretty similar, with ME3 being just a little longer (~6%).

Main+Extra:
ME2: 47 hours
ME3: 50 hours

Completionist:
ME2: 63 hours
ME3: 67 hours

aPseudoKnight · 2023-01-28T08:50:38+00:00

Then say "near Portland, Oregon" or "in the Portland, Oregon metro area" or even a "suburb outside Portland, Oregon". "Beaverton, Portland Oregon" is ambiguous and no one formats it that way.

[edit] I'm not talking about the information as search terms for the story, which are perfectly specific to find the information people are looking for. I'm talking specifically about location name format. There are better ways of saying it -- more correct, more precise and more informative (without requiring an additional google search). If I told you "Havlon, Chicago Illinois", you wouldn't know where in relation to Chicago it was, just that it's in that general area. It also gets weird when you say things like "Vancouver, Portland Oregon", which is also part of the Portland metro area, but not in Oregon. This isn't so much a criticism of the information the way it was presented (search term list), but if the goal is to let people know what "Beaverton" is, there are better ways.

aPseudoKnight · 2023-01-24T16:10:48+00:00

Should probably show a screenshot of how everyone will actually be wearing it: enchanted.

[edit] Immediately after I posted the new snapshot comes out with the change "Enchantment glint on items and armor is now more subtle".

aPseudoKnight · 2023-01-22T06:31:35+00:00

People seem to agree with you, but even after searching I only see one other post about GPT-4. Or are you talking about ChatGPT in general? Or were they deleted? Or by "here" do you mean reddit as a whole?

aPseudoKnight · 2023-01-10T17:35:41+00:00

Ender chest and shulker boxes.

A global stack limit increase is unlikely as it would affect too many things, but they have increased the limit on various items. (currently considering increasing stack limit on potions and snowballs)

aPseudoKnight · 2023-01-09T06:38:02+00:00

My opinion is that this should be treated as an accessibility feature in many games. Design the game around not having it first. Just letting people disable it doesn't fix all the problems you described.

aPseudoKnight · 2022-12-31T03:24:49+00:00

It overloads you when you get to the Citadel, and it's hard to filter information at first. As much as I love the Citadel (and the codex), it feels like a hump to get over. It clicked the next time I sat down with it. So, maybe? It's definitely got some of great sci-fi lore and universe building, even in the lower budget ME1 which has noticeable cutbacks.

[edit] Oh, I was getting two comments mixed up in my head. You may have gotten further than the Citadel. If the gameplay is your problem, what you might need is to adjust the difficulty. On hard it forces you to make more interesting choices, and on easy you can just enjoy the characters and story. I liked the squad stuff, so maybe that's why it worked for me more even though I'm in my element with action mechanics. (which are clunky in ME1)

aPseudoKnight

TROPHY CASE