This is definitely one of the weirder missteps by From.

I’d like to know what the decision looked like internally, because I somewhat refuse to believe they just overlooked it.

This is going to become the new AAA normal, isn’t it.

Oh lmao nice

How many wishlists is that?

You can report the video.

But to be blunt, I wouldn’t really worry about it. Most people don’t pirate, and trying to chase pirates down isn’t exactly going to convert them to paying customers as they’re not the type to buy it anyways.

Do frequent smallish updates to add QoL options, bugfixes, etc. (As you should be anyways) This will make the store version superior and making pirated copies obsolete and require new versions to keep up. Obviously additional Steam features are valuable here too as you don’t quite get those in alternate versions.

I’ve demoed my games at conventions and had people tell me to my face that they’re going to pirate my game. I’d offer them a free key instead and one guy said he’d prefer to pirate it, so idk some people are just extra.

Its hard lol. I rarely take pride on positives and mostly dwell on the negatives. Not good or healthy but what are you going to do.

Flaws are hard. I’ve gotten some pretty brutal review smackdowns for things that were largely out of my control, or things I was aware of but couldn’t fix in a satisfying way, and that just feels awful.

But on the flip side I got reviews that pointed out issues I had never seen or even noticed, or worded it in a way that clarified the issue, and those are helpful.

All you can really do is remember the dev is human at the end of the day. Full of flaws and likely jumped on a project too ambitious for their own good.

Hardware being changed up makes sense. Feels funky that MS would pull a bait and switch for a game project, but its hard to say if that was MS or Molyneux being funky since they both have a history.

Not in game dev lmao :'-(

There’s actually somewhat of a resurgence for retro-ish games even among new gamers.

General consumers are mostly keeping up with the latest releases or updates because that’s what their friends or streamers are talking about. High fidelity adds to that but I don’t know if that’s the big draw. Especially since things like Roblox, Minecraft, and Fortnite seem to be the juggernauts right now.

Its just harder to create new conversations around something like Ps2 games because all the talk around them has passed.

True, though people tend to replace laptops when they fall out of support or start having hardware issues, much less often to do an upgrade looking for more frames.

I still feel Microsoft has to bring something hot to really sway anyone over since they have a long history of competing in the mobile hardware space and fumbling it hard.

Well a Windows license is just that: Here is a code for the OS, have fun. They don’t care because most support will be from hardware vendors.

Microsoft hardware is a different beast. You need to have parts for replacement, its got to be compatible (and stay compatible) with whatever accessories are coming out, and its got to be better than its competitors on new game launches. That last part takes coordination and support with dev teams.

Don’t care isn’t a great option, unless Microsoft wants another Windows Phone or Zune or one of the many other failed hardware launches they’ve had.

So it’ll be the ROG Ally but ‘better’ because its less Windows than normal. Hmm.

The last part concerns me. Why am I buying into a platform that Microsoft couldn’t care less if it sells at all because they make their money from subscriptions?

People don’t want hardware that just gets abandoned when its not profitable enough, which Microsoft absolutely has a history of doing.

Seems like everyone was all over Avowed the week it was out, then I hardly heard it mentioned at all until now.

That being said, these seem like some nice QoL features but I don’t really see this persuading many people to hop in and buy it.

This feels weirdly too late. I can’t imagine that many people in 2027 who passed on a Switch 1/2, SteamDeck, supposed other upcoming handhelds, or the ROG Ally and are looking for a gaming handheld with money to burn.

Xbox has to really bring something hot to the table, and its certainly not whatever they’ve been doing with their hardware/games/IPs for the past 5 years.

For some reason it didn’t click to me until I saw the Steam page that this game is set in the same universe as Control.

They only have 7 days to fix the licensing or their licenses are revoked? Is Unity that hard up for cash?

• Fields of Mistria
• Roots of Pacha

Easy recommends if you liked Stardew Valley.

Weird recommends would be My time at Portia/Sandrock. They absolutely have combat, but have romance systems and a cuter aesthetic. Even the enemies are derpy/cute.

• A Hat in Time
• Trine
• Spiritfarer
• The lego games
• Knights and bikes
• Human fall flat
• Cassette beasts
• Chariot
• Octodad
• Monaco

I don’t remember these being particularly violent but maybe are worth a look:

• Pit people
• BattleBlock Theater

I also liked Moon Hunters and Children of Morta but those are harder.

Divinity Original Sin 1 is also good but definitely falls into the violent category. Its kind of goofy too so it could be worth considering. The second game + BG3 are significantly more violent and serious so are harder to recommend with that criteria.

Edit: hmm it seems the formatting is funky in Voyager, should be fixed now