u/Existing-Air-3622

"Arcade" is a term used very loosely, it's usually used to describe a game easy to pick up or not realistic (generally in the context of racing games).

The original meaning is obviously referring to actual arcade cabinets, and I'm perfectly okay with using the term "arcade" to classify games that where never actual arcade cabinets, but I feel like the usage should be more restrictive.

For example saying the last Need for Speed is an arcade racing game because the cars behave in a non-realistic way doesn't make any sense, it's a game that could not really be ported in arcade.

You spend a lot of times on menus or free roaming on the map, you have a story with lengthy cutscenes and a lot of dialogues, the loop of the game is centred around permanent upgrades and customisation... I'm aware "modern" arcade games have come up with ways to save progress (mostly in Japan as far as I'm aware), but the core experience is still centred around bite-sized sessions of play with fairly repetitive loop forcing the player to actually get better instead of relying on unlocking better gear.

Anyway, I'm not here to debate semantic, but to wonder if is there is still a place for the true arcade philosophy nowadays ?

The only relevant place where it's still surviving is the fighting genre. Basically the only things that were added since the arcade days are slightly more fledged story mode (which consists of a few completely disconnected cutscenes thrown between fights), training modes, online functionalities (but we could argue it's just a replacement for the split-screen mode that was present pretty much since the beginning) and a shit-ton of (I guess paid) cosmetic items.

To be frank, I'm not sure why this genre is such an outlier, it simply shouldn't work in this day and age. I guess the 1v1 format with all the action being visible on a single screen and the stakes being super easy to understand makes it perfect for esport. And maybe the strong presence of characters, that allow to glue lore on top, allows a more casual audience to still connect to the game ? A bit like what Overwatch did to shooter.

I don't know, but here's a thought experiment : with Sega trying to revive its arcade roots lately, imagine you are tasked to develop a new Sega Rally, how would you handle it ? I've picked Sega Rally because I think it's the most iconic from this era, but you can pick Ridge Racer, Daytona or whatever if you prefer I don't mind.

I mean, you could even pick something else than a racing franchise, but I think it's an interesting genre for this exercise, because it was an arcade pillar of course and it was still huge until the PS360 generation, but now it's mostly limited to a few juggernauts (well, mostly Mario Kart and Forza Horizon), so it's not completely dead either. There is clearly a BIG niche market of VERY hungry customers that are desperately waiting for something else than EA's next attempt at not bombing with NFS.

So you are in charge of the next Sega Rally, you can twist the formula a little, but it has to remain true to its arcade origins (no complex carrier mode, no open world shenanigan, no in-depth customisation, no gazillions cars... just a simple racing game), while being relevant in 2026. Of course it's never going to be GTA 6, it's not even going to be Gran Turismo, but it has to make a bit of a splash when it releases, and keep a dedicated community for a long time. Think Rocket League (which could be an actual arcade game now I'm thinking about it) or Rainbow Six Siege.

How would you tackle it ?

I might answer myself later (spoiler alert : I don't have the secret formula) but I'm curious to see if anyone has any unexpected hot take on this.

I have a high suspicion that in some way, MAME can keep some settings outside of its folder, here's why :

I have some VERY random results with Dirt Dash, more specifically concerning the acceleration and breaking input. Sometimes they are not registering at all, sometimes they are capped at half the normal maximum, it just doesn't make sense.

Everything is working perfectly at first, and then for some reason it suddenly stops working. After that I can try changing any setting I want inside or outside MAME, completely wiping MAME folder and creating a fresh one, even using older versions... It doesn't matter, it's a one way ride.

The only thing that seem to works is using another ROM set for Dirt Dash.

Then it works fine... until it eventually stops for some reason (usually I change a setting or something and then it's game over).

Now I've run out of versions of Dirt Dash, so I'm really thinking there is something surviving a complete wipe of the main folder, maybe some files hidden somewhere in the user folder or something (I'm using Windows), but I haven't find anything yet.

Am I onto something, or am I just losing my mind ?

EDIT : Wow, I fixed it...

Don't ask me how, it's basically voodoo magic at this point.

I THINK (really not sure at all) the right way to do it was to start with a fresh instal of MAME with the wheel unplugged.

Than run Dirt Dash once, configure everything just using keyboard input to see if it's working.

Than exit MAME, plug the wheel, run MAME again and then configure your wheel.

I finally managed to make force feedback on top, so I'm not touching anything on MAME anymore, MAME is just a Dirt Dash simulator as far as I'm concerned.

---

I'm trying to play Dirt Dash with a wheel, including force feeback with a plugin.

The results I get are COMPLETELY random, it doesn't make any sense.

On the setting menu, the pedals are always working perfectly as intended, I can fill both bars for accelerator and brake.

Now in game, sometimes it works just fine, sometimes both pedals don't work AT ALL, sometimes they will work but pressing the pedal all the way will be like pressing it half way.

Same thing for the force feedback that seems to have a mind of it own, sometimes it works, sometimes not, the only constant is that I can't get the pedals and force feedback working at the same time.

And the worst part is that I can either do a full reinstall, change some random settings in MAME or with my racing wheel, try different versions of the rom or not touch anything, it will be a flip coin to determine what's working or not.

I'm on the last version (0.288) but I've tried with previous version and it was basically the same.

What am I missing ?

V-rally 1 is a game I'm currently completely obsessed with.

So in my dream, there would be a PC decomp adding the expected stuff (high resolution and widescreen support, an unlocked framerate or at the very least 60 FPS, rebindable keys...). Then I could dream higher, and ask for a 4 players online multiplayer with full championship.

But the truth is, there are probably at best 10 weirdos like me on the planet that would care about this, so I could already see myself constantly refreshing an empty server list.

For high value targets like Gran Turismo, Burnout or something, you can expect to have a real active community, but for most games it would simply not happen. (and even for Gran Turismo, if all the games are ported, how many people are going to play the first one ?)

So what would be a killer feature for a lot of less popular games would be to add an online leaderboard. If anything, having less people only makes this type of feature more exciting, because being 46271th over 153 211 on a specific circuit on the latest Forza Horizon is not super exciting, but being 16th over 27 on Burning Road (another great hidden gem BTW), now we're talking ! You can know each and every one of these 27 persons, and see how they progress compared to you.

And I'm talking about racing games, but this could be added to almost any game. Scoring system like Tony Hawk or Devil May Cry are another obvious pick, but frankly you can speed run any game, or even create any arbitrary rules to create some kind of competition on anything. Finish a Final Fantasy with the least amount of damage taken, or even with the least amount of damage dealt. Or you could create secondary modes like Mercenary with Resident Evil, built with bits and scrap from the main game, like a boss rush mode for Metal Gear Solid.

I mean, sure you can already do that without decomp just like speed runner are doing, but kick-starting this with an obscure game is almost impossible by yourself. Having a built-in feature is clearly not the same, that's the kind of tool that can help creating a small but strong community.

So yeah, someone do a V-rally 1 (and Burning Road) decomp please.

All in the title, I don't know how feasible this is.

To be clear I'm talking about games that had no online, or even no multi-console multiplayer in the first place.

V-rally made a bit of splash when it was released on PSX in 1997, but then mostly faded to obscurity, in favour of other racing games like Colin Mac Rae and its excellent sequel, and the juggernaut Gran Turismo that released the same year than V-rally (it's always weird to try to remember the timeline on old games, for me V-Rally was released way sooner).

But I think the few people who played this game would remember it as the one with cars made of soap, and would advice to just play the sequel, because it's the same thing but better.

And at first glance it sure does like it, V-rally 2 is really a good looking PS1 game with a convincing damage model, it's pleasant to play, you have a lot of content, including a cool level editor... But I think it's a game that not really interesting to play today, or frankly even back then, with again the vastly superior CMR2 released a few months later.

Whereas I think the first one has only become more interesting as time went by. If you just take a quick glance at it, it may look like your typical arcade racing game in the vein of Sega Rally, it doesn't even feature a real rally mode (one car at a time on point to point stages). Except time attack, every mode is played against 3 other rivals on looped circuits.

But V-rally was actually developed to be a somewhat realistic simulation, receiving advices from Ari Vatanen (yeah, I know, all racing games pretend some well known pilot was a technical advisors when I guess the guy was just invited to visit the studio for an afternoon). And I think this common critic of the cars being super twitchy and slippery comes from people expecting an easier to pick up experience, because again the package looks super arcady (and because they played with a non-analogue controller instead of a wheel or the amazing neGcon). Don't get me wrong, the game is far from being what you could seriously consider a simulation, but it does have a very specific spice you normally only taste in more "serious" games. Something I very rarely feel on a racing game, except on the most hardcore side (like Richard Burns Rally) is a sense of danger. Usually in most racing games, including in "simcades" that have a physic model 100 time more complex that V-rally, I just drive flat-out like a maniac, bumping into other cars and walls like I was at a funfair.

In V-rally, when there is a sharp corner, I clench my butt a little, because I know there is a serious chance my car might start barrel rolling uncontrollably at any moment. Same thing when I'm behind a competitor, I lift the throttle and wait for a very good opportunity to overtake and make sure to avoid ANY collision like I would... well in real life. What kind of lunatic would deliberately collide with another car at more than 100 km/h on a bumpy gravel road ? It's not really that the physic model is realistic, but more than the game is not afraid to punish with ANY mistake.

But at the same time, the penalty in itself is not THAT severe. There is no damage model and the circuits are enclosed by solid walls on both sides, so you can't roll down a cliff or get stuck on a tree. So even after spinning around or even rolling, you'll be back in the race in a few seconds. I quickly insert this here, but one of my biggest grip with the game is the co-pilot taken straight from Sega Rally, like all those old school rally games (basically easy/medium/hard - left/right and that’s it). It's usually more for flavour than anything else, because the circuits are easy to read and super smooth, but V-rally have some nasty turns that definitely begs for more elaborate pace-notes.

The AI have a nice balance, there is no rubber banding, but you always feel like you have a chance to catch up. They don't drive that fast, but they are fairly consistent (they do crash by themselves from time to time, so they don't feel like robots either), and that's the name of the game : avoiding mistakes more than driving aggressively. Oh, and the AI don't hesitate to ram you (to be frank I'm not even sure if they are programmed to avoid the player at all, but it works well) so you really feel the pressure when they are just behind you. Just like Halo 1 having enemies that put most modern shooters to shame, I think V-rally opponents are far more interesting in their simplicity than most other racing games.

So coming back to what make this game still unique today, it's this blending of a hardcore punishing driving model with a very straight-forward arcade framework. My biggest gripe with simulations is that they are often so focused on being realistic that they just ignore everything else that make a game interesting and fun to play. They often feel less than a game and more like... well a simulation, in the literal sense, a software just made to accurately simulate something. I don't give a crap about FIA rules, I don't want to spend 15 minutes tweaking my suspensions, hell, I don't even care about a carrier mode. Most of the time it's just some gimmicky macro-gameplay where you randomly chose a sponsor for some useless bonus or something similar.

And on the other end of the spectrum, simple arcade games often have a very shallow and unexciting driving model, where you don't feel the rush of being aboard a 1 ton cube of steel flying at 150 km/h on a twisty dirt road.

I feel like V-Rally is at a perfect middle point, and I frankly would struggle to find any other game like this.

Surprisingly, the closest example I could think of is V-rally 4, another overlooked game, but it's bogged-down by trying to be a Dirt 2 clone.

Yes, I know about the 50/60 hz thing, but PAL consoles and screens are totally capable of rendering at any framerate between 0 ans 50, so why stop at 25 and not match NTSF 30 ?

I guess it's to avoid screen tearing, but I'm not sure running a game at 30 FPS on a PAL screen would necessary give screen tearing.

Yeah, it's another disc related discussion, sorry.

But I think it's highlighting something that has been growing more and more : consoles are becoming closer and closer to PC, and losing discs means the number of advantages to console is getting paper thin.

Frankly what is left ?

Exclusivity ? AAA have become so long to develop you have like 5 exclusive blockbusters per generation at best.

Locked hardware, meaning game are tailored made for your machine was gone as soon as "pro" versions of consoles were added (try to play late generation games on base models).

Curated libraries are not a thing anymore, each console store is flooded with shovelware, even if manufacturers are periodically pretending to do something about it.

Ease of use is less and less true as time goes by (now you constantly need to do update and connect to accounts to do anything).

At the same time the PC side have become more console like, for better and worse, so the big hurdle of "PC game is hard" is becoming less and less true. And you can do other stuff on a PC, and a PC never get replaced by a new model making yours obsolete (I've been gaming on a constantly outdated PC for the last 15 years), you don't need to pay a subscription to play online, you have multiple store fronts (even if Valve is dominating which is a problem), and I can plug whatever peripheral I want on my PC...

What if console stop being a PC and tried doing stuff I precisely can't do on my PC ? And I've talked about PC, but mobile is the elephant in the room.

I get why Nintendo got their fingers burnt with the WiiU, so they made the more boring Switch, and the even more boring Switch 2, but I think this is a dead end. And Nintendo is the far from the worst offender, I don't even get why people would buy a PS or Xbox.

Are console condemned to be boring black or white cubes where you plug the same controllers that barely have changed since the PS1 Dual Shock ? (to be fair, the biggest change is precisely you don't have to plug them anymore).

Is anyone still excited to learn about the new Playstation that will cost a month of salary for having marginally improved graphics ? And maybe it will also be somewhat portable, filling a niche that is already completely saturated by the Switch, the Steamdeck, the Microsoft one I don't even remember the name and the gazillions other similar android/windows based devices.

VR could be an interesting new path, but no one has seriously invested in (yeah, Meta has poured gazillions, but gaming always seemed to be more a hook than the main purpose), and I think in everybody's mind it has crystallised as this niche gizmo that will never catch on.

Frankly at this point I think Sega could come back, sell a cheap underpowered machine, some form of physical media and a weird controller looking like a fishing rod or something and everybody would lose their mind.

You see this all the time on online discussions, people trying to explain why a game "failed" (even the definition of failing can be discussed), often by giving the least convincing arguments.

I think you can put them in two categories :

• When the person in question likes the game too much, they finds external reasons to why the game failed (the marketing, other games...), because it obviously can't be the game's fault, since it's perfect.

• If there are things they don't like, they blame the whole failure on it. ("Concord failed because it's too woke"or some shit like that)

And I'm not immune to that, I think I'm smarter, but I'm probably just as full of shit. The truth is, a game success or failure can be multi-factorial and some of it can be completely random and even unrelated to video games (some economical circumstances or whatever). The only way to be sure would be to have a time machine and the power to change these factors.

So that's the idea of this thread, to discuss various games failure, and confront our opinion on why they failed.

I'm going to start with a textbook case : Titanfall

Whenever theses games (because people often seem to forget that before Titanfall 2, there was Titanfall 1, crazy) are talked about, I ALWAYS see the same few bullet points as why they failed :

Titanfall 1 :

• Xbox exclusivity on console

• No single player campaign

• No marketing

• Origin only on PC

Titanfall 2 :

• It was released between CoD something and BF1

• No marketing (again)

• Origin only on PC (again)

• The servers were hacked

Let's take these arguments one by one.

• Xbox exclusivity for consoles.

So I have to start by defining the failure of Titanfall, it wasn't so much the game didn't sold, it's more than players didn't stayed on the game for long. Of course more copy sold would mitigate that a bit, but not that much. Or it would have to reach Call of Duty level of sales, so they could justify making a sequel every year, so not only the player loss is irrelevant, it even become a strength. If people are bored of the annual CoD, it's a good thing, that means they will buy the next one as soon it's out.

Back in these days, cross-platform basically didn't existed, so this argument is completely irrelevant. Having people buying the game on Playstation wouldn't have changed anything for the population on Xbox or PC. And of course we can see that being on PS4 didn't changed anything for Tf2.

• No single player campaign

A lot of multiplayer only games sold very well over the years, starting with at least Starsiege: Tribes, Quake 3, Unreal Tournament, Battlefield 1942..., and with Arc Raider as a recent example. And again in hindsight we know that Tf2 very good solo campaign changed jackshit.

It's really not a good argument, people playing solo and PvP games are not necessary the same, and anyway the problem is again that people don't stay on the game, not necessary the poor sales. I mean, if you add a costly solo campaign, yeah, sure, now the number of sales become even more important, because you have raised the development cost and have to recoup it. Which is probably one of the reason we will never have a Tf3, because now it is expected to have both a solid solo campaign and an in-depth PvP part, making it even less likely to happen.

• No marketing

I hear that ALL THE TIME, for every failing game. It's sometimes true, but nowadays there are so many games realising all the time that except the biggest blockbusters, everybody is fighting for attention, yet despite this some game do succeed.

For the case of Titanfall it's pure bollocks, the game was overhyped before released, it was everywhere. Maybe it didn’t the reached height of the biggest of the biggest AAA, but it had more exposure than 90% of games. I feel like Tf2 did had a more modest exposure, but it was still a big thing, bigger than most games could ever dream of, and now having the brand recognition of the first game.

• Origin only on PC

It's a very common argument, if a PC game is not specifically on Steam, people get very angry for some reason. I do think it holds some water, but certainly not to the extend some are pretending. And if some publishers insist on having their own store (or insisted, because it seems most have dropped the ball) it was obviously because they didn't wanted to give whatever share to Valve, which is both totally fair, and a good thing for customers, because you obviously don't want a Valve monopoly. And again, plenty of counterexamples exist like the BF franchise (I think it's on Steam now, but when Titanfall released BF was an Origin exclusive).

And again, Tf2 eventually released on Steam, and guess what ? It gave the game a small impulse for maybe a few weeks and that's it. And anyway this only concerns PC versions, since again they didn't had crossplay.

• It was released between CoD something and BF1

The worst argument of all, a COD is realising every year, big games are releasing all the time, but for some reason it only affected Tf2. It could explain a slow start, but eventually the game would have grown, just like Rainbow Six Siege did. And Tf2 got a lot of second chances, it regularly was featured on gaming news sites for various reasons (like the Steam release) with every time the angle of the article or the comments below being the game was having the new birth it deserved (and every single time, the influx of players lasted for a couple weeks at best).

• The servers were hacked

Won't even bother elaborating on this one, the game was already dead in the water at that point, and the hacking happened precisely because of that (I think the hackers were salty because Respawn stopped updating the game or something like that).

So now why I think these games died.

Well simply put, there were games with very high skill ceiling that were made for a more casual audience (basically the CoD crowd).

Casual players were getting their ass whooped no matter what compromise was made (the smart pistol, bots and Attrition mode, Tf2 skill ceiling being significantly lowered...), whereas more competitive players didn't get what they needed to have a healthy competitive scene. No ranked mode, lacklustre private matches options (there wasn't even one at launch for the first game), no spectator mode, questionable balancing (especially the first game), netcode issues (especially the first game), lack of a flagship competitive mode to gather the community around....

Instead of committing to one specific audience they tried to please everybody, and in the end nobody liked it.

You can see that Apex Legend is way more focused, the skill ceiling was lowered (gone is the crazy jetpack parkour movement system of Titanfall) but at the same time the skill floor was raised (only one very competitive mode, carefully balanced heroes and weapon pickup instead of a free loadout system). It's made for a more narrow audience, and it paid off, the game has remained relevant for a long time.

Now it's your turn, do you have other examples of failures you want to analyse, or challenge commonly accepted reasons ? Or do you want to confront my 100% true and accurate explanation of Titanfall failure ?

I think the hammer is fairly representative of this game.

Why is it in the game ?

Well I guess they brainstormed and thought about every small things they like in other games, and someone said "I love the gravity hammer from Halo".

And everybody was like "You're right, it's so fun !" so they added one.

Now, after releasing the game to the public (clearly with zero testing), they realise it's obviously busted and super annoying to play against, because it was like a super weapon in Halo.

No problem, let's nerf it.

But if they nerf it, what's the point of this thing ? It's a game where you already have a quick melee button and where you die fairly quickly anyway, so what's the point of a melee weapon that can't one shot ? Being OP was the raison d'être of this weapon.

Now the only secondary weapon that everybody is stuck with will become useless.

So you're left wondering, why was this the only secondary weapon in the first place ?

It's a strong statement in a FPS to say "this is the only option you've got, deal with it", it's like the game was built around that thing, it's also fairly highlighted in trailers and promotions.

I'm not against not following norms and doing your own things, but again the question is why ?

It's just a basic hammer, it's not opening any gameplay opportunity or anything, especially in a game where, again you have a dedicated melee button. It's not even as fun as in Halo where it had this cool shockwave effect making nearby objects and players flying around.

It's good against mech, but not THAT much compared to just shooting, and it's not fun to use in that context (you just spam your attack button on a target that fill your whole screen at that distance) and it's even downright disorientating to try to fight so close something so big (that's precisely why Titans automatically crush pilots on the ground and why you're magnetised to a rodeo position in Titanfall). Mech vs hammer fights are just goofy looking.

It really gives the feeling this game is just a collage or random ideas from others games, just like adding portals in a Halo clone.

Let's get this out of the way, I'm completely stealing the base idea from this post, but I'm going to expand on it because I think it's great : https://www.reddit.com/r/Empulse/comments/1uan446/some_suggestionschanges_based_on_the_beta/

As it is now, the paint system is really a gimmick. What would be the difference between the boost grenade, and having a button that just provides you a boost ? 95% of the time you throw the grenade at your feet, you get your boost and go away, not thinking about the paint any more.

Sure, sometimes you use the paint from someone else, but it never feels like a strategic element, more like some random thing that just happens.

The base idea is that enemy paint should have opposite effects (boost make you slower, heal hurts you...), so you can use you any grenade as a boost for you, or as an offensive tool.

On top of that the paint should not go away, so at the end of the match, the whole map would be painted. People would finally stop saying it's just a Titanfall ripoff and say it's also a Splatoon ripoff !

Just make paint the main focus on the game, everything should have a paint effect. Instead of choosing just a paint grenade, you just choose a paint effect that would be applied to multiple things.

Mechs should leave a paint trail behind them. Killing someone or destroying a mech would make a paint explosion. Completing an objective would paint like a third of the map. Mech missiles would apply paint...

You know these restaurants where you have sushi, pizza, burger, kebab... on the menu, and everything is bland at best ?

That what you are doing with this game, trying to please a crowd as big as possible. Pick the game mode you want, build your loadout as you wish, use a mech, don't use a mech, whatever you want. I guess you are going to add an extraction mode next.

You know how many games like this have succeeded in the last ~15 years ?

You have CoD with the biggest budget you could imagine and a 20+ years of brand recognition, and they have to make a new game every year to keep players interested. Fortnite, but they started branching in every direction after being REALLY successful, now there are trying to become more a social platform/game engine like Roblox, and despite that the simple BR mode is still the most popular part. Battlefield maybe, but again they have a core experience with Conquest on large maps and vehicles (and again a huge budget and long lasting brand).

Even Halo Infinite with it's massive budget, legendary IP and BEING A FREAKING F2P is at 771 players on Steam at the moment I'm writing this (it's 2 places below Red Dead Redemption... the first one, the PC version with no multiplayer...).

The only games that work and stay relevant for a long time are based around a very focused type of experience.

CS, Valorant, PUBG, Overwatch, TF2, R6 Siege, Arc Raiders, Tarkov...

Just look at Respawn, they did Titanfall like this, it flopped, they did Titanfall 2 like this, it flopped again.

And then they developed a cheap asset flip, but focused on something specific, a BR mode with only one map at launch. It was an instant-hit, and the game is still super popular today 7 years later (it's the 9th most played game on Steam right now).

Don't try to please everybody, or you're going to end up like the billions game that tried before you. Just pick something as focused as possible, and do it the best you can do and you may have a chance.

edit : It's so funny, devs proved me right literately a few hours later by adding a "mech free" mode.

So after a few hours playing, I've unlocked the healing grenade and started playing Capture the mech only in defence with the sniper rifle, and it was super fun, but also lacking in some way. But I could see how this could be used a foundation for how this game should actually be.

First there should be only one mode : escort the mech

Why only one mode ?

Because the whole game can build a real identity and be balanced around it.

Why this mode ?

By making the mech an objective, it gives more freedom on how to balance it. If you treat the mech as a power-up super weapon, it has to be super good in some way so players want to pick it, but not too overpowered so it's not unfair. But if it's an objective, it doesn't matter how good or bad it is, players HAVE to use it to win anyway.

It also means at any time in the match, you have mechs, so again you can balance the whole game around that.

But I do think the mechs should be reworked, it's really clunky to move around, and it needs more dashes charges. To compensate, the maps (which again would be made exclusively for this mode) could be made a little bigger (otherwise it would be too fast to go from one base to the other with a mech).

Entering the mech should need some work too, not only we need a proper animation (remember Titanfall 1 cool first person animations ?), but I think you should not be able to immediately get inside the mech. There need to be some kind of hacking process where the player have to stand still for a second or two, because right now it's too easy to just rush to the mech without taking care of defenders.

Next change... add classes/heroes.

Yes, I know, some people prefer the COD style of free loadout. And you know what these people will do ? Not buy/play this game anyway, or play it for a month and then move back to CoD or something else.

To be clear, I'm ok with some level of customisation within this system, a bit like R6 Siege or Tribes.

So why I want classes ? Because it's an easy way to get people to play as a team. As I've said I'm playing defensively (because usually no else does), but when playing with randoms, it's hard to coordinate, people usually all have the same idea at the same time (I must capture the enemy mech/ I must defend my mech...) and so they all clump together in the same spot.

With a class/hero system, everything is simple and obvious. You have the guy defending the base, you have the guy that will go capture the mech, the one that will try to destroy the enemy mech... Without using a single word, players will tend to have a balanced team.

A class/hero system also gives more flexibility to balance things. A powerful weapon can be balanced by making the rest of the kit weaker in some way. Or a fun but not super effective weapon can be made viable if the rest of the kit is strong.

And lastly it will allow players who are not that super good at zipping around the map and headshoting people to still feel useful to do the team if they have a class/hero that allows them to fill a specific niche.

With all that, you will get 2 things Titanfall didn't had : a real competitive framework, instead of being a CoD clone (with wallrun and mechs) that will inevitably fail. But also a broader appeal, instead of having the more casual players getting their ass kicked over and over (before eventually leaving) because the only way to git gud is to move around at 200km/h and have a built-in aimbot.

Thank you for listening to my Ted-talk.

This game is really weird, it seems they have copied the worst parts of Titanfall and decided to go their own way where Titanfall shines.

The biggest issue is the absence of a defining game mode. Don't threat this as a Call of Duty clone, it's not, the skill ceiling is way too high and you don't have the marketing budget that come with.

Instead just take a look at EVERY successful competitive game, they ALL have one main mode. The ones in the demo (except TDM) are fine, just pick one and stick to it, and build the whole game around it.

The other problem is that it's too chaotic, there are players everywhere, there's no frontline, no teamplay, no rythm, no structure to the matches. Instead of spawing randomly in the map, you should spawn in a safe space inside your base, so you immediately know where you are and where you have to go.

The maps are very generic, both in term of looks and in the layout, it's all small 3 lanes symmetrical maps that looks like a grey skyscraper rooftops or some random harbour area. Maybe it's because it's early in development, but the whole game is lacking any kind of identity, and the maps are the worst offender.

The mechs feel like they are here just because Titanfall had mechs too.

First they feel bad to pilot, it's so sluggish, you have one dash per century, and the jump is completely useless, you just go up.

The other problem is how they spawn, having both teams having their mech always at the same time (if you don't get yours stolen) is not very exciting for the match rhythm, and waiting 10 seconds like a moron for the mech to spawn is not the most fun thing. And if a team controls both mechs, it's a pain in the ass. If you want to keep things simple, here's an idea : each team has a mech timer that goes down faster when one teammate get killed. When the timer is over, the next player who dies respawn in the mech (with an option to opt-out if you don't want to pilot the mech). And you can only have the mech once per match, so it's turning between players.

Pilot vs mech is so bad, it really feels like it was made different from Titanfall just to be different. Here you have absolutely no tools to fight mechs , so you are just supposed to shoot them with your regular gun, like when you fight a guy on foot, the only difference is the mech has 10 times the amount of armour. And pilot vs mech fights at close range is just complete random garbage.

Just get the rodeo back (both for enemies and friendly), just accept being a Titanfall clone, no one give a fuck.

I'm a bit harsh, but I feel like this might have its chance if they don't fell for the same traps than Titanfall.

I think this game is either unknown, or unjustifiably maligned, but it's pretty good.

First thing, yes it's a Wii game, but it's super easy to emulate on PC and you can play with a regular controller just fine.

I think the art direction is super cool, including the deformed cars.

The driving model is obviously super arcade, drifts are a bit on-rails like the last Ridge Racers. But it's way deeper, you have to actually put some efforts to do a good drift, and drifting is not always the best solution, you need to be gentle to be fast, and you'll need to be fast to beat some of the challenges, the game can be surprisingly brutal.

The campaign is fairly basic, and can probably feel receptive for some people, but I enjoyed its very old school/arcade nature (I've 100% it BTW). As I have said, you actually have to git gud to beat the game, unlocking cars definitely helps, but it's not a challenge bypass either. And the star system allow you to do races in the order you want, or even just skip some if you want.

Also this is probably amazing for a specific audience, but the full campaign can be played in coop (splitscreen only) on top of the expected arcades modes.

It's not perfect, it has a lot of undercooked elements (the rivals, the Mario-Kart-like items, the whole tagging thing...), but if you just want to play a fairly straightforward but challenging arcade game with a strong personality, I definitely recommand this one.

C'est pas possible le pouvoir de nuisance d'un joint, CA PUE LA MORT A DES KILOMÈTRES MÊME EN EXTÉRIEUR !

Je fais un trajet le long de la Seine, sur les parties piétonnisées c'est blindé de gens qui profitent du retour des beaux jours, et tous les 50 mètres y'a une bulle où ça pue le shit, même en passant 2 secondes en vélo t'as l'impression de te prendre une claque, c'est l'enfer.

Et je parle pas de mon voisin qui fait profiter tout l'immeuble dès qu'il s’allume une de ses saloperies.

Bref, l'idée est simple, on autorise le cannabis sans limite de taux de THC ou je sais pas quoi, mais que sous forme comestible. Ou en piqure même, je m'en fout, tant que j'ai pas à respirer cette merde constamment.

You can draw a parallel between the evolution video game graphics, and the transition from drawing to photography.

In short, before being an art form, drawing was a way to represent reality, and photography made that purpose way more effective.

You can see the same trajectory with video game graphics, that were primary made to imitate reality, and as technology evolved, that has never been easier. Pretty much anyone can run Unreal or Unity, pick some photo-real assets on the store, put some lights and create a somewhat realistic scene (and yes, that's big shortcut, because someone actually had to create these assets, but you get the idea).

So I was thinking about what made "retro" graphics so appealing for some people, and nostalgia probably plays a big part, but I don't think it's the main factor.

If I reuse my drawing/photography analogy, if I have to capture a random scene, I could either painstakingly pain it, or photograph it.

Obviously photography can be an art form, you can spend a lot of time choosing a specific lens, framing the picture, arranging the scene, placing some additional lights, and even modifying the picture afterwards.

But you also can just pick your smartphone, vaguely aim at the object, press a button and voilà, and it would be good enough in a lot of case.

Whereas you can't "cheat" with a painting, to get an accurate result you have to put efforts in. But more importantly, you have to put intent in every-line, every splash of colour. Not a single drop of paint would be placed randomly, it's there because the creator wanted it to be there.

If given the choice between a dull photo of a random street, and the same scene painted by a not very talented painter, I guess most people would still find the painting more interesting, because at least the personality of the painter is shining trough.

It's the same thing with "retro" graphics, when you didn't had real time dynamic lighting, real time physics and so on, you had to fake everything by hand. And so the way every single object was lit was made with specific intent. Maybe it was made to look more real, but maybe what the dev thought was realistic was not, or maybe the dev just thought it was cool, whatever the reason, they have to put actual thought into it.

Of course this can still be present in modern games, even with a realistic graphic engine you can fake some effects to get more dramatic results, it's what separate an interesting looking game from a store asset flip shovelware that may be photo-real, but also completely flat and lifeless.

But again with "retro" graphics you can't cheat it, you have to actually think for every small detail, so by default it gives more life and personality to every single details.

I get why devs add rubber banding, it fixes the issues of races becoming boring when the player get too far away from the pack, especially in high octane racing games where the core experience is less about perfect racing line, and more about jousting with other cars.

But my main issue with this system, is that the player skill become meaningless, you can play with one hand while doing your taxes, it doesn't matter, just focus for the last kilometre and you'll win.

I think Burnout (at least Takedown, not sure how the rest of the franchise works) has a good middle-ground. AI cars rubber-band like crazy, but ONLY when they are behind you, You simply can't shake them, no matter how good you drive, you will always see them in you rear view windows. But when they get ahead, the rubber banding stops, so they can easily get a 20+ seconds lead if you drive poorly, they won't wait for you.

That means as long as the race is not over, you will never feel safe, but at the same time, you have to play well to win.

Some may find this unfair or frustrating, but let's not pretend playing a single player game is supposed to be a fair competition. In Burnout AI can't use boost, your car seem to weight twice as much as your competitors when you collide, and let's not even talk about the most unfair cheat the player is constantly using without thinking about it : restarting a race. Just imagine for a second if the bots could restart a race the moment they knew they couldn't win.

And as for Burnout, having opponents staying close is also an opportunity for the player, it means you have cars you can crash to farm boost.

So of course it means you can end up in situations where a race can't be won any more. But again, that just means it's time to use your most busted ultimate joker : restarting the race.