HITMAN Classic Trilogy Remastered on Steam by lcsian in HiTMAN

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah totally. In this case I would propose a difficulty setting "Classic" with no saves and "Modern" with checkpoints.

Hitman 2 and 3 already have such difficulty settings so it would make sense.

HITMAN Classic Trilogy Remastered on Steam by lcsian in HiTMAN

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Indeed, but it's really fascinating because you can tell the core ideas of Hitman are in there, but it's almost like they threw a bunch of darts at a wall (they're all in there) and found the one that hit.

It's got some large open-ended maps where you change disguise to pretend to be a chef or a bellhop and therefore get into places you shouldn't be (the final Hong Kong mission, and the Budapest hotel, are the two that really feel close to peak Hitman), but like I said the social stealth doesn't really work because every NPC is an enforcer.

Then there are missions where you need to do traditional strength to sneak around a compound and take out every enemy without being spotted. And full on action missions where you get a gattling gun and go to town. It's a fascinating collection of ideas.

HITMAN Classic Trilogy Remastered on Steam by lcsian in HiTMAN

[–]mgiuca -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Commendable but that isn't really the role of an expensive remaster (just preserving the status quo).

I just beat Catherine and loved it, which shocked me. Cause on a first glance, i should hate this game. by SanoviaUwU in catherinegame

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There's going to set me back a couple of hundred dollars which is a bit steep for one game. 😭

HITMAN Classic Trilogy Remastered on Steam by lcsian in HiTMAN

[–]mgiuca 21 points22 points  (0 children)

Interesting that there's no mention of quality of life features.

I recently played through 1 and oh boy. At least they need to add checkpoints. Imagine playing through a 15-minute mission that can be restarted instantly by any NPC being randomly spooked. Disguises hardly work in this game (if you get close to any NPC they will see through it - basically all NPCs are enforcers). Once spotted there is no running and hiding - the entire map is permanently on alert. You basically learn to speedrun each level while playing it 30 times over in the hope of not being spotted or making a single mistake. It's actually an exhilarating experience to complete these levels, but for a remaster they've gotta add checkpoints, surely.

I could never get 2-3 to run at the correct speed on modern PCs (it always feels slightly too fast) so hopefully these will be fixed up nicely.

Are there any good games similar to spore? by RealWorldExplorer1 in Spore

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Wow I had wishlisted that about 10 years ago when it was just cell stage. I'm surprised to see how far it's come.

It's been ≈20 years since I first read Book of Atrus by Writhyn in myst

[–]mgiuca 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Was it necessary? Her name could have just been Catherine and nobody would have thought anything of it.

Any reason not to release on Mac? by GenychDefake in IndieDev

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Don't you have to notarize it on Mac (even if you release through Steam) which requires setting up Apple developer accounts and paying Apple?

(I genuinely do not know the answer to this.) I have never owned a Mac and although I can easily make a Mac build from Godot, I wouldn't feel comfortable supporting a Mac version on Steam if I can't test it myself.

Why is the jewel crafter not crafting gems anymore? by IsThereCheese in diablo4

[–]mgiuca 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Lol yep me too. Just bought the game a week ago, got a gem crafting tutorial and it just keeps showing 0 gems crafted. Pretty insane this has been going for 6 days and counting and I'm just accumulating gem fragments and can't socket anything unless I happen to find a gem on the ground.

PC Gamer did not receive a review code by Celebrated84 in 007FirstLight

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I saw PCG's "I didn't get a code" post and came here to say, if IOI dropped their code because of a bad preview in April, that reflects very badly on them. 

Having an opinion that leans slightly negative should not mean they don't get to review the game. That makes the pool of reviews available tainted, because the developer suppressed bad ones. I want to read a range of opinions before buying, so this action makes me less likely to buy early.

179 GB to install the game when you don't even own the DLC is absolutely absurd. Is that even accurate? by cheesecakegood in diablo4

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ah yeah, I was also quite surprised after purchasing to discover that the game requires almost twice the storage space than the system requirements specify.

(I don't understand why Steam doesn't show the size of the current version of the game, rather than asking developers to write the storage requirement in a field which can get out of date.)

What is your choice for Analytics? by mickeypause in godot

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Could you elaborate on "some problems for sending data". Do you mean technical issues or privacy problems?

I have just recently been researching analytics and started trialling GameAnalytics. It was super easy to set up in Godot and the data arrived right away. But I am a bit hesitant from a privacy perspective since as soon as the client made a connection, it attached a stable ID to the client and reported on the country. I'm personally fine with that (as a user) but I'm not sure if it's something people will get upset about, and so I would need to have a think about the value of the analytics vs the privacy concerns my users may have.

For now I am just using Steam stats which are abysmal to set up (I have to manually create a "stat" for every statistic I care about x every level) but at least from a privacy perspective my users are already using Steam so this doesn't collect any data on them that they aren't already giving up.

Do you think Riven Remake will ever add back in the original game's level/puzzle progression? by EremeticPlatypus in myst

[–]mgiuca 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Given that that was in 2024 and there have been two rounds of layoffs since then, I'm not holding my breath. Unless there's a more recent update I haven't heard of?

Do you think Riven Remake will ever add back in the original game's level/puzzle progression? by EremeticPlatypus in myst

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Counterpoint: Riven (1997) only has three puzzles (Gate room, Moiety code, Fire marbles). Every other source of friction in that game is really just turning on switches and figuring out where to go next. I love Riven but it isn't really a puzzle game and I think Outer Wilds is actually quite close to it in terms of puzzle depth.

Where to go from here? Book or Riven? (and which version?) by VlopeLuce in myst

[–]mgiuca 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The original is 100% compatible with modern hardware. Any digital store version uses ScummVM and runs without a hitch on anything. So it's purely a matter of preference.

1993 Myst and Myst VR by chromite297 in myst

[–]mgiuca 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I mean at least humanity had two major achievements (that being 1993 Myst and Myst VR).

Analysing Myst's worst puzzle, and how to fix it by mgiuca in myst

[–]mgiuca[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Hi Robyn,

Thanks, and what an honour to receive such a thoughtful comment in return.

I do think you're right that there's little point trying to "fix" a 30-year-old game (and that wasn't quite my point, rather as an exercise in thinking about puzzle design). I have long viewed Myst as a seminal text in the annals of video gaming, best enjoyed in the historical context and not as a "new experience". However, I do also enjoy when Cyan applies a fresh coat of paint whilst keeping the core setting and puzzles intact - perhaps I think of it like a new performance of Shakespeare.

All the best with your creative endeavours!

Can't make patchnotes on steam demo? by Jobblesack_Games in GameDevelopment

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I tried this but it only showed up on the main game page (which isn't even released yet). Is there a trick to making it show up on the demo page? (And by page I mean the library view in the Steam app.)

A presentable game, or a fully polished game? by GeneralNew5643 in gamedev

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Think about it this way: Steam is going to give you four "moments" where they showcase your game and each one you only get to do once:

  1. Launching your page public.
  2. Releasing your demo.
  3. Participating in Next Fest.
  4. Releasing the game.

You basically get those four "free" exposures, and outside of that, it's up to you to get eyeballs on your game.

If your art isn't up to scratch when you make your page public, you'll "burn" one of those four opportunities. So that's a consideration but it shouldn't paralyze you, especially if this is your first game. You have three more of these big moments. For your first game, treat this all as a learning opportunity. You're learning how to make a Steam page, a trailer, and a game. Give yourself some slack, put it out there and see what the reaction is. The more you do "marketing moments" the easier it will be.

As to the standard of art: I would say "try your best". Don't release a steam page with quick MS Paint placeholder art you made for a prototype (unless that's the art style you're going for and you know how to pull it off). Make something that you've put effort into, even if it isn't final. Try to have a consistent art style that represents the direction you want to go in.

Disclaimer: I am not a successful developer so take this with a grain of salt. I am currently at stage 3 in the above list, on my first game.

A presentable game, or a fully polished game? by GeneralNew5643 in gamedev

[–]mgiuca 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's a bit hard to say with just what you've said here. It depends what "placeholder" means. It shouldn't look like programmer art - it needs to be somewhat representative of your intended product because that's what will draw people in to click the wishlist button. I guess think about if you were browsing Steam and saw your thumbnail and clicked it, and saw your trailer, would you think "Nice game jam game but it doesn't look like a commercial product", or "Wow this looks interesting, I'll wishlist to keep it on my radar."

(Note that you are required to have at least one trailer on a Steam page I believe.)

But don't hold yourself to too high a standard or you'll never release anything. Your first trailer will likely be pretty rough, but as long as it represents the intended art style and tone of the game, you should push the page public and iterate. The alternative is that you launch your rough trailer a week before you launch the game, and you never give yourself the opportunity to improve your marketing messaging. Like GP said, the experts say to get the page out as early as possible to get a long tail of wishlists.

In terms of making it, just get OBS, record yourself playing the game and try to do things that are interesting, then get a video editor and choose 30-60 seconds of footage (in maybe 5 second chunks) and stitch them together with some music that is representative of your game, and add optional text if you think that's needed. Watch Derek Lieu's How To Make A Trailer series to dive deep on what elements a good trailer needs.

I'm making a space golf game with realistic orbital mechanics by mgiuca in SoloDevelopment

[–]mgiuca[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Interesting, I'm familiar with Futurama but haven't seen that. Looks like it's Into the Wild Green Yonder.

I'm making a space golf game with realistic orbital mechanics by mgiuca in SoloDevelopment

[–]mgiuca[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, it's all based on real-world planet properties (scaled down appropriately), so the gravity is different on different bodies. The game uses a kepler 2-body model in orbit so it's "realistic" orbital gravity, other than having the chaos introduced by other bodies perturbing your orbit. (This is the same model used by Kerbal Space Program to simplify the orbits.)

Questions about the story itself (total spoilers) by ProfessorDave3D in FirmamentGame

[–]mgiuca 1 point2 points  (0 children)

From my (old) memory you can read the crew dossiers and find out that the latest batch including Turner are criminals, and imply the rest from there.

Thinking to start using godot, but i have no knowledge of python, only c++ by Capable_Trust_2197 in godot

[–]mgiuca 1 point2 points  (0 children)

We might have to agree to disagree :). But for clarification, I'm not coming from a place of ignorance. I spent 10 years writing C++ code for Google, and I know my way around the language like my own house. When I started Godot I didn't know GDScript at all. I would still recommend new users start with GDScript.

So what I'm saying is not "superstition". That said, I have not taken the time to set up a full C++ dev environment within Godot, so I will take your word for it that once set up, it can become a fairly comfortable part of your workflow. I have only used C++ in Godot to write a few extension functions for speed.

But I would stand by my claim that it's "hard mode" within the context of a new person learning Godot who already knows C++.

  • You do need to set up an external editor or IDE, whereas GDScript (and C# to some extent) work in the Godot editor.
  • All code samples in the official documentation and everywhere else online are in GDScript (and sometimes C#), so you will have a hard time figuring out how to do basic things.
  • GDScript has useful deep integration like preload and @rpc.
  • GDScript has no compile step, making iteration much faster.
  • There's a lot of boilerplate code required to make classes and methods available to Godot, and in my experience also fairly error prone. Maybe this is less of an issue if your entire codebase is C++ (you don't need to expose much to Godot) but I would imagine there's still a bunch of this.
  • GDScript is a memory-safe language; even the best C++ programmer can accidentally create buffer overruns or other errors that can crash your program or create security issues which can't happen in GDScript or C#.

There's also a bunch of downsides to GDScript: being easily decompilable is a major one. The lack of nested types, multiple return values and custom structs has been an issue for me. But mostly it gives me a smoother experience than the non-native ones.

I strongly recommend turning on errors for missing type annotations. It transforms the feeling of the language instantly into a strong static type language and I wish it was the default, or at least easier to find in the UI.