Personal Computer Game News

[king3pj]

I actually just ended up refunding TWD Michonne and buying it from GOG instead. They are having a TellTale games sale so it was the same price and I'm going to try to start buying more of my games there instead of Steam when it is an option.

So this happened...

[GALLERY=media, 467]2016-06-25 by king3pj posted Jun 25, 2016 at 10:32 AM[/GALLERY]

I only asked for a refund on TWD Michonne but according to this email all the games that were purchased during that transaction were refunded and I am getting the full $42 back. Even Stardew Valley which shouldn't be eligible for refund since I have played it for over 2 hours is showing up there.

I did confirm that only TWD Michonne was removed from my Steam library. The other games are still there. I'm still skeptical that I will be refunded the full $42 but that is what the email says. I guess I'll see when it hit's my next credit card statement.

 

[yourbeliefs]

You know, between this, getting the PS4 with that Taco Bell contest, and your dual 970 snafu, I can't help but think...

 

[king3pj]

You know, between this, getting the PS4 with that Taco Bell contest, and your dual 970 snafu, I can't help but think...

Yeah, I have been having some crazy luck with video game related things. My only regret is that I didn't include XCOM 2 in that purchase. I had it in my cart but ended up removing it at the last second because I decided I could wait for a better price than $36 since I have so many other games to play.

 

[yourbeliefs]

So there's a bit of a controversy brewing on Steam right about now, or rather with one of their games.

Recently Orion, a game that's basically been called "Halo with Dinosaurs" was taken off of Steam due to a DMCA complaint by Activision. They claim that Orion stole some of their gun assets from Black Ops 3 and Advanced Warfare.

At first, it looked like a typical case of the big guy bullying the little guy. Orion is far from a "AAA" title. It regularly retails for 99 cents and was on sale for 49 cents during the summer sale. It's also had a number of free weekends on Steam. So the devs cried foul online, asking people to spread the word and yell at Activision for being such jerks and taking their game away. They even posted comparison photos of their guns versus the CoD guns to show how different theirs were.

Unfortunately, it appears that Orion forgot that if you're going to ask for help on the internet, said internet is going to scour your past and proof to see if you're correct. In this case, people discovered that yes, Orion's devs DID steal the assets and Activision's claim was legit. It also came out that the developer has a shady past to say the least. They've stolen assets in the past, treated employees like crap, and have done complete re-releases of their games with new names in order to trick consumers and metacritic (Your game is crap, so you re-release it under a brand new name so people don't google it and see a bunch of negative reviews.) A full breakdown is here thanks to /r/pcmasterrace.

More info here from Total Biscuit about the game's original controversy of rebranding itself.



You REALLY have to screw up royally to have people side with ACTIVISION in a lawsuit against a small developer.

 

[yourbeliefs]

So there's a bit of a controversy brewing on Steam right about now, or rather with one of their games.

Recently Orion, a game that's basically been called "Halo with Dinosaurs" was taken off of Steam due to a DMCA complaint by Activision. They claim that Orion stole some of their gun assets from Black Ops 3 and Advanced Warfare.

At first, it looked like a typical case of the big guy bullying the little guy. Orion is far from a "AAA" title. It regularly retails for 99 cents and was on sale for 49 cents during the summer sale. It's also had a number of free weekends on Steam. So the devs cried foul online, asking people to spread the word and yell at Activision for being such jerks and taking their game away. They even posted comparison photos of their guns versus the CoD guns to show how different theirs were.

Unfortunately, it appears that Orion forgot that if you're going to ask for help on the internet, said internet is going to scour your past and proof to see if you're correct. In this case, people discovered that yes, Orion's devs DID steal the assets and Activision's claim was legit. It also came out that the developer has a shady past to say the least. They've stolen assets in the past, treated employees like crap, and have done complete re-releases of their games with new names in order to trick consumers and metacritic (Your game is crap, so you re-release it under a brand new name so people don't google it and see a bunch of negative reviews.) A full breakdown is here thanks to /r/pcmasterrace.

More info here from Total Biscuit about the game's original controversy of rebranding itself.



You REALLY have to screw up royally to have people side with ACTIVISION in a lawsuit against a small developer.

The Drama Train is Steaming (no pun intended) right ahead..

First David James (the game's creator/leader) has threatened to legal action against anyone who commits "Slander and libel" against him in regards to this story. He also claimed he was going to sue Activision in retaliation, but "after a night's rest" has decided against suing the multi-billion dollar corporation that's in the right. But of course he's still saying they're jerks, and is now trying to do a crowd funding effort that would pay for A: Money's lost from the game not being on sale, and B: Legal costs in fighting Activision. So WE get to pay for their screw up! More information here, again from our friends at the /r/PCMASTERRACE

 

[king3pj]

http://www.pcgamer.com/radeon-rx-480-review/

AMD's RX 480 launched today. The 8GB reference version is currently going for $240 on Newegg. There is supposedly a 4GB version available for $200 but I don't see that in stock anywhere. They aren't pulling the Founders Edition early adopters tax stuff that Nvidia did. The custom cooled, factory overclocked cards should be available in a couple weeks for about the same price.

The benchmarks are a little disappointing but that's only because of AMD's claims that this was a GTX 980/R9 Fury level card at their announcement. In reality the RX 480 is closer the the GTX 970. Considering that the 4GB version of this card goes for $200 and the 8GB version is $240 that's still pretty impressive.

Because Nvidia doesn't have their lower priced cars out yet (1050 and 1060) and there is nothing with similar performance to the RX 480 that doesn't cost significantly more I see this card selling very well. The GTX 1070 averages nearly 40 FPS more at 1080p but it also costs $160 more (cheapest 1070 i have seen is $400).

For people playing at 1080p I think the RX 480 is the clear choice, at least until the GTX 1060 comes out. The GTX 1070 averaging 111 FPS at that resolution is great but it's really overkill unless you have a 144Hz monitor. The 1070 is a better choice for people who play at 1440p and the 1080 makes sense for 4K.

 

[yourbeliefs]

Too bad I couldn't have waited it out another year, but I'm still mostly satisfied with my 960.

Total Biscuit has weighed in on the controversy:

 

[king3pj]

Too bad I couldn't have waited it out another year, but I'm still mostly satisfied with my 960.

Total Biscuit has weighed in on the controversy:

Unfortunately AMD based that claim off one game, Ashes of the Singularity. The problem is that Ashes is an AMD sponsored game that has always run much better on AMD cards. It is designed around things like AMD's async compute feature that doesn't run on Nvidia cards so they don't run the game as well.

Don't get me wrong, Nvidia does very similar stuff with their sponsored games by including Nvidia Gameworks features like Physx, special lighting, hair, and shadows that run terribly on AMD cards. Professional reviewers simply turn those off to show a fair benchmark between the two cards while async compute cant be turned off.

If you look at the benchmark for that one specific game the RX 480 does actually beat a 980 and tie a Fury. I think it was dumb and misleading for AMD to claim the RX 480 was on the same level as those cards based off one game though. Instead of everyone talking about what a great bang for the buck you are getting with the RX 480 today they are talking about how it doesn't live up to AMD's claims instead.

 

[yourbeliefs]

The Drama Train is Steaming (no pun intended) right ahead..

First David James (the game's creator/leader) has threatened to legal action against anyone who commits "Slander and libel" against him in regards to this story. He also claimed he was going to sue Activision in retaliation, but "after a night's rest" has decided against suing the multi-billion dollar corporation that's in the right. But of course he's still saying they're jerks, and is now trying to do a crowd funding effort that would pay for A: Money's lost from the game not being on sale, and B: Legal costs in fighting Activision. So WE get to pay for their screw up! More information here, again from our friends at the /r/PCMASTERRACE

More drama! So they set up their crowdfunding campaign for $500, and the goal was met, presumably by the guy that set up the crowdfunding! He's also claimed that he finally learned specifics from Activision as to where the asset stealing was, and the director allegedly identified and fired the worker responsible.

http://steamed.kotaku.com/developer-claims-activision-nuked-their-game-from-steam-1782784952

 

[yourbeliefs]

Was Left 4 Dead 3 accidentally revealed by a Valve Employee?

http://www.craveonline.com/entertai...revealed-valve-employee-accidental-screenshot

 

[yourbeliefs]

Evolve is going Free To Play on PC

https://talk.turtlerockstudios.com/t/a-message-to-our-community/87816

Update: Announcement trailer

 

[yourbeliefs]

Speaking of games that could benefit from F2P, here's the latest Battleborn user numbers...

http://steamcharts.com/app/394230

 

[king3pj]

Evolve is going Free To Play on PC

https://talk.turtlerockstudios.com/t/a-message-to-our-community/87816

Update: Announcement trailer

The thing that sticks out to me is that if you read their FAQ it says that there is currently nothing that costs real money in their new free to play model.

Q: What can I purchase with real money?

A: Currently, nothing. There is no monetization in the game. The only thing we care about right now is making the best game we can make so we can grow the healthiest playerbase possible.

This has to be temporary right? Why else would they bother switching to F2P if they can't monetize it? More players are great for an online game but that also requires more money in server and bandwidth expenses. Anyways, now that it's free I might give it a shot some time. I still don't see it taking much time away from my current go to multiplayer games, Overwatch and Rocket League.

Speaking of games that could benefit from F2P, here's the latest Battleborn user numbers...

http://steamcharts.com/app/394230

Ouch! I just took a look and there are currently 437 people playing on Steam. That all time peak of 12,070 players has to mean this game cost Gearbox and 2K quite a bit of money.

This game really should have been F2P from the start. I can't think of a single MOBA that isn't. Trying to break into an already pretty saturated market with games that have huge player bases like League of Legends, Dota 2, and Heroes of the Storm while charging $60 when all the competition is free was incredibly arrogant and stupid.

The only good news in this is that Borderlands 3 suddenly became a much bigger priority for Gearbox. If Battleborn would have been F2P and took off the way other MOBAs have there might not have even been a need to go back to the Borderlands well. Now they are going to need a big hit after this failure and Borderlands is clearly their best chance to make that happen. Since I really liked BL1 and BL2 this is alright by me. The recent Homeworld games had a pretty solid reception on PC but besides that everything they have put out since 2009 outside of the Borderlands franchise has been pretty weak.

 

[yourbeliefs]

The recent Homeworld games had a pretty solid reception on PC but besides that everything they have put out since 2009 outside of the Borderlands franchise has been pretty weak.

What? Surely you've forgotten about those classic games Duke Nukem Forever and Aliens: Colonial Marines!
To put the Battleborn player numbers in perspective, I regularly see well over 1000+ people who play the daily challenges on Rayman Legends (as I am one of them), and those are just randomly generated levels from a game that came out 3 years ago. To be fair, I don't know if that's platform specific or not or if it applies to EVERYONE who has played the levels, but at least on the Xbox One there's still enough people to keep the level generator going. Also I don't think it's completely fair to compare BB directly to LoL, DOTA, and HotS because those are top down MOBAs while BB is a MOBA from a FPS perspective. Not saying it justifies a $60 release AND a season pass AND microtransactions, but it's hardly apples to apples. I bet if the Evolve "experiment" goes well that BB will soon follow with F2P. Both are owned by 2K so they'd be the ones to make that decision.

 

[king3pj]

Also I don't think it's completely fair to compare BB directly to LoL, DOTA, and HotS because those are top down MOBAs while BB is a MOBA from a FPS perspective. Not saying it justifies a $60 release AND a season pass AND microtransactions, but it's hardly apples to apples. I bet if the Evolve "experiment" goes well that BB will soon follow with F2P. Both are owned by 2K so they'd be the ones to make that decision.

That's a fair point. All of the biggest MOBA's have more of a top down, isometric view. There are some pretty big 3rd person F2P MOBA's like Smite, Paragon, and Gigantic though. This obviously isn't the same as Battleborn's first person view but those games are a much closer comparison than the major MOBA's I mentioned earlier.

Still, my main point is that every MOBA that has had any level of success has been F2P. Battleborn is a little different in that there is at least an attempt at a campaign and it is a FPS but asking $60 in a genre that is built around F2P clearly wasn't the right choice.

 

[yourbeliefs]

but asking $60 in a genre that is built around F2P clearly wasn't the right choice.

Yeah, I mean who did they think they were? Blizzard?

 

[king3pj]

Yeah, I mean who did they think they were? Blizzard?

Point taken. I think just about anyone besides Blizzard would have had a hard time getting people to pay $60 for Overwatch. I am totally satisfied with my purchase but you would expect most games like it to either be F2P or significantly cheaper.

On top of that many people did think Overwatch would end up being F2P during it's very long beta period. Blizzard had already shown that they can make a ton of money in the F2P market with Hearthstone and Heroes of the Storm.

It would have been really easy for them to copy their exact same monitization model from Heroes of the Storm. Make the game free with a small rotation of maybe 5 free characters that changes every week. They could charge $10 per character with weekly sales and cheaper bundle pricing for people who want their favorite characters permanently unlocked just like they do in Heroes of the Storm. They could also sell the skins for about $5 each just like in HotS. You can also purchase heroes and skins with currency you earn by playing the game and completing the daily challenges.

I'm glad they didn't go this route though. I paid $36 for Overwatch: Origin's Edition and have access to every character and lots of skins. It would have cost a lot more than that to buy each character individually. In reality I would have probably only bought 1 or 2 and used the free rotation for my variety.

 

[yourbeliefs]

Evolve going F2P yielded 1 million new players. Question is how many will stick around.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/167932-Evolve-Has-One-Million-Players-Now

 

[king3pj]

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/nvidia-geforce-gtx-1060-pascal,4679.html
http://www.pcgamer.com/geforce-gtx-1060-preview/
https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/MSI/GTX_1060_Gaming_X/

The GTX 1060 launched today and like the other Nvidia 1000 series GPUs, it lives up to the hype. It's slightly above or slightly below (depending on which review you look at) the $550 GTX 980 for $250. At 1080p it averages 82.7 FPS in PC Gamer's 16 game benchmark suite. That's about 10 FPS more than AMD's competing RX 480 for $10 more.

Right now I'd say that Nvidia's massive market share lead over AMD is only going to continue to grow with these current generation GPUs. That's probably not a great thing for GPU pricing in the future. The GTX 1060 is a better choice than the RX 480 for 1080p gaming. The GTX 1070 is the only choice for 1440p and the same holds true for the GTX 1080 at 4K since AMD's higher end cards are rumored to be pushed back to 2017. With the 1060's 6GB of VRAM it's also an option for 1440p on a budget for people who are willing to turn a couple settings down in some games.

 

[yourbeliefs]

*SIGH* if I had only waited a year on that graphics card...