While "AAA" has lost all meaning: even in that space we have some real bangers already
Yakuza/Like a Dragon 8 is already in the running as one of the all time great JRPGs (and probably a top 50 GOAT in terms of games period). FF7R2 is going to have to REALLY screw up for fans to not feel strongly about it. And Dragon's Dogma 2 is, somehow, showing all signs of actually being faithful to the incredibly weird original. We also might be seeing Elden Ring DLC sooner than later. Tekken 8 seems to be incredibly well received... accessibility aside. That gets us to the end of March (ER has a mysterious youtube entry but it has for weeks so who knows)? Even if nothing else happens this year, that already is a stacked as hell line-up.
Two months in and, gaming wise, 2024 is shaping up really well. Like most years, people see what they want to see. If you want to say things are a flop, there are flops. If you want to say things are awesome, there are some truly amazing games.
I'm so excited for 7 rebirth. And one I've finished that I'll be getting persona 3 reload to replay one of my favourite games. With those two alone and me catching up on some of last year's games, this year is going to be a good one for me.
Yea I've mainly been focusing on smaller games recently. Last AAA game I bought was Cyberpunk 77, which I enjoyed but was a whole thing. There's so many good indy games coming and going its definitely worth it to look into some of them
I'm cautiously hopeful about Nightingale. The game trailers and $30 tag caught my interest. I've played a LOT of survival games and only played a few extensively, like Valheim. But survival games are a huge time sink, so I can't give most of them the time they deserve. But the multiplayer and community aspect for Nightingale makes it seem worth the time.
Just gotta wait a bit after release for the reviews.
Yeah the flow of great indie games isn't going to dry up any time soon. So many developers willing to actually take risks with their games and not just churn out another copy of a copy of a copy. Art needs passion to be good.
I Always forget that Nintendo games are Triple A,
I always get that indie dev vibe in spite of being as far from indie as one can get. Not in community engagement, rather in the notable detail and unique art style each game has, like you can tell the developers care about what they're working on. You can definitely tell when Nintendo themselves develop a game vs. when they publish a game. (cough Game Freak cough)
You have to wonder if they ever played Cyberpunk 2077 (incl. Phantom Liberty) before they came up with that line. The only AAAA game. Maybe not the best game ever, but it definitely felt like the most expensive game ever.
I'm surprised that they even thought that they would come even close to outperforming the AAAA battery and even dared to put themselves on the same level as it.
I know a lot of people really enjoyed this game, but I couldn’t play more than a few hours despite loving Doom 2016. Restricted ammo quantity really killed the enjoyment for me. Adding Denuvo only after it was reviewed was a really shitty move and the soundtrack isn’t as good either now that I think of it.
“Might not be a good year for games.” Idk, we’ve already had the surprise with palworld, which, while it didn’t really grab me, was a breath of fresh air for people. Helldivers slaps. I think the key is not to buy into hype, and play actually good games. People like to say 23 was a bad year too, but, I’d argue that stinkers like gollum just got more coverage and were on top of people’s minds. Not to excuse it at all, but, I played a lot of really good games last year.
We'll see. Helldivers 2 is a gigantic success but it's a rare occurrence of a live service game being really good, priced correctly, and not abusively monetized.
This - I hate when gamers have too much attention on which games are bad, and none on the good games.
I have a page of Steam reviews where I give a thumbs up to a bunch of indie darlings, then a negative review to a live service game, and only the negative review has votes on it.
There’s a bunch of videos on YouTube now separately comparing Batman Arkham Knight to Gotham Knights/Suicide Squad, and AC4: Black Flag to Skull and Bones.
There is absolutely a trend of brain drain in game development that no amount of contractors can fill now.
Trails through daybreak, dragons dogma 2, avowed, Indiana Jones are all games I'm looking forward to off the top of my head. Trails through daybreak is actually the game I'm most excited about.
I have pretty high hopes for Obsidian on their next flagship game. Even the worst game of theirs is still pretty good! Alpha Protocol is a janky mess but it's very fun to play with.
tbh the game this seems to be about "Skull and Bones" isn't even that bad... The character models (especially faces) look pretty bad and I haven't tried intentional multiplayer, but that's all I've really noticed (played it for about 6-7 hours, including open beta)
I think that in a vacuum the game isn't that bad, but given the context of how much it costs, how long it's been in development, being hailed as the first "AAAA game", and the fact that they literally made a better version of this game 11 years ago and the game is only mediocre I totally understand why this game has gotten the reaction it has.
Palworld (i mean, it’s NOT polished, but it was fun), Enshrouded, and Persona 3 Reloaded have kicked off my year with a bang. And there’s a lot more good stuff coming on the horizon.
I don't know guys. It seems Unisoft have lost it. I don't buy games from them anymore. I don't know what happened to me, but after I made the decision, I found myself buying Far Cry 6 even though I hated Far Cry 5 with passion (I think it was Gustavo Fring). I am 2 hours in and I am not feeling it. The prologue was nice but then it turned into random missions. Go do this, do that. Should I just drop the game?
I'm have the exact opposite reaction right now. I stopped buying Ubi games years ago, but through give aways I got Assassins Creed Origins, Odyssey, and Valhalla for free. I never touched them until recently when a friend started playing through Odyssey and was talking about how much fun he was having. I installed Origins and played though it (because I can't skip games in a series) and I kinda enjoyed it. Then I played Odyssey and it blew me away with how much fun I had. I'm on to the second DLC of it, and when I'm done I'll start up Valhalla.
As far as Far Cry games go, though, I haven't enjoyed one since 3.
I've played Odyssey and it was fairly fun to play, but Valhalla to me seemed a bit, idk, empty? Not much parkouring around in large towns like an assassin when the buildings are pretty sparse and small.
FC6 was the first ubi game I really disliked. same as you a few hours in and I just couldn't get into the vibe of it. I really liked FC5 (possibly in my top 10 of all time) but 6 felt like such a miss