2023 Video Games Thread

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Passacaglia

I'm so confused, I feel like I'm from the past. So some players are not in the game, until you collect their card? It's not like the old days where all the players are just there from the start?

As dubb explained, the "card collecting" aspect is in its own mode. I'm not sure there's any game in the genre that makes touching it a requirement.

You'll often see acronyms like HUT or MUT tossed around, that's just (afaik) Hockey Ultimate Team or Madden Ultimate Team, MLB The Show calls theirs Diamond Dynasty.

Come to think of it, the DD description from Show might shed more light for you a chance to create a personal team of real Live Series players or Legends and Flashback players spanning over 100 years of baseball history

Those "personal teams" are then used against the CPU _or_ against other users head to head, in various modes that largely serve to generate the opportunity to earn more/better players to use. It's very .... well, I think of it as being very akin to the lather/rinse/repeat process common to app games, mobile games, etc. The whole "get better stuff, to do stuff better/quicker ... that let's you get more better stuff ... rinse, repeat" cycle.

[Mota]

Originally Posted by dubb93

There in lies the issue though. I don’t think the “majority” of people play MUT and not Franchise. First off there are no numbers I googled and they don’t exist. And just because the dev team is spending more time on it doesn’t mean it’s more popular it just means that the mode is monetized unlike franchise modes.

The MUT modes have largely replaced multiplayer IMO rather than replacing Franchise.

It's also a self fulfilling prophecy. They largely ignore franchise mode every year, and then notice that not that many people are playing in franchise mode several years later. Meanwhile they put tons of resources into the ultimate team modes, and surprise surprise, people spend their time there. We all know why they have invested in ultimate team, because you don't use your team's budget to sign a free agent, you use your real money to do it. But that's exactly why I play games, to get away from the class divide, not to be reminded about it when some guy that spent thousands of dollars trounces me in a sports game.

And my OOTP career league that I'm playing right now has financials off, and I'm up to my 8th season. Haven't won the league yet, I keep finishing around .550.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Finally got around to giving Cyberpunk a fair shot. They've made some incredible updates over the years and it's now a pretty fun game. It didn't live up to the hype and the city can feel empty at times, but I'm digging it.

I have just played through the game and DLC. I really loved it. Super fun. I accidently played through the ending before the DLC, so I had to circle back. I don't think I'll do the ending over again, but I'll definitely miss it. Fun game, great combat, some really good quests and side quests, etc.

Originally Posted by bhlloy

I put a lot of time into Wartales. It’s definitely got very limited replay value - the character classes and skills are somewhat limited and the map/quests are fixed as noted, but it does get combat right in a way that very few if any games of its genre does. It’s almost like each combat is a mini game of chess - putting a particular character in a different starting position or using a certain skill in a different order can win you a fight against far stronger opponents. I’d highly recommend it unless turn based just isn’t your thing.

Funnily enough I never finished it because I was just too underpowered to do one of the final arena fights needed for a quest and didn’t feel like grinding my party up a few more levels, but still a very good game that filled a lot of time for me.

Me and three friends started to play this co-cop. I've really been enjoying it.

[dubb93]

Maybe I’ve been living under a rock the last few years but I had no idea that in NBA 2K you can start Franchise all the way back in the 1983/1984 season and move forward with real life presentation changes, rule changes, real rookies each year, and expansion. It doesn’t stop at present day either. You can play as far into the future as you want from this start.

Why can’t we get this in football?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by dubb93

Maybe I’ve been living under a rock the last few years but I had no idea that in NBA 2K you can start Franchise all the way back in the 1983/1984 season and move forward with real life presentation changes, rule changes, real rookies each year, and expansion. It doesn’t stop at present day either. You can play as far into the future as you want from this start.

Why can’t we get this in football?

Roster size.

Even the NBA rosters are as few as half the players on a lot of teams

[SirFozzie]

Yeah, NBA teams have 16 tops. NFL has 25 starters (if you count punter/kicker/longsnapper) alone.

[Passacaglia]

That doesn't seem like a real reason.