Randomly Mine #11

Texts

I’ve typed many responses to people in comments but few ever actually get posted; one of the primary factors is that text doesn’t have the strength to properly convey certain speech.

Sarcasm can easily come across as serious without body language, tone of voice, or familiarity with the people in question.

However, there is a power to this.

And it’s one that text-based games have; ambiguity.

No voice acting is often taken as a lack of resources or budget and that is often the case, but there’s an opportunity in this environment to create characters or scenarios that you can’t do in a fully voiced game.

Villains can be more obscure without hearing their inflections or tone, foreshadowing can pass by without overt speech or camera angles. Music and sound-effects can underscore a tone rather than speech.

There’s a question I heard years ago from Keegan Michael-Key; do you look at the challenges as opportunities, or do you look at them as problems?

It’s always best to see them as the former.

Hellblade for the Hotseat

One of the best things to come out of Hellblade’s development and success is its face-scanning technology that achieves an incredibly believable performance for a fraction of the cost in traditional face capture.

This opens an opportunity, and chance for a middle-market title to iterate upon LA Noire rather than a big-budget gamble. Because LA Noire is a great idea with a surprising amount of promise that hasn’t been continued since. 

The Triple-A sector of the industry is meant to be where the best ideas are refined to their fullest potential, and the middle-market is the place where those ideas are created and crafted prior to being ready for prime time.

But due to LA Noire starting in the Triple A space, the middle-market couldn’t continue its concept.

Now it can.

I Understand Why But…

I can’t help but feel cynical upon seeing Rainbow Six Siege being 30% during sales while everything else is the price of a Subway Sandwich. Mostly because Siege was one of those dirt cheap games during sales for years and only recently has had the success to get away with charging consumers more than it previously did.

Moving Away From Fidelity

I’ve got a surprisingly optimistic view when it comes to VR, and it’s not even for the reasons that have to specifically deal with the technology itself. Granted, there’s lots to be excited over. I know the prospect of something beyond Superhot peaks my interest. However, there’s something else…

Since gaming began, we’ve always been pushing fidelity, and with each console generation, we seem to put more emphasis on it with less in return.

Game’s from 2008 hold up in 2018 without a desperate plea for an upgrade, meanwhile no one in 2008 could imagine still playing something from 1998, at least not seriously.

We’ve hit a technological cap in terms of what we’re able to stomach. We don’t view older titles as being outdated the same way we used to.

What’s VR got to do with this?

Well, VR’s inherit demands don’t allow people to push for fidelity, at least not without limiting their already smaller consumer base.

How you interact with the world in question is far more important in VR than what that world looks like.

That is what excites me.

Because for years we’ve been focusing on changing the materials of the model, rather than rebuilding the model itself.

Shhhh

That’s what Eldewrito AKA Halo Online should’ve been codenamed. Shhhh. Because with it being completely playable with thousands of people online, but unable to stream or link it, the mod’s become the gaming communities dirty little secret.

The opportunity for Microsoft isn’t simply to just make an experience for PC Halo fans, but to allow this discussion to be open rather than spoken in code.