Realm Deeps 2023 Round-up!

[Kinsie]

Slipgate/3DR/whatever have been juggling a frankly bizarre number of projects, each in their own unique and terrifying version of Development Hell. Their whole thing of "it's a AAA studio but split into indie-sized chunks instead of all being on one game!" hasn't exactly scaled up, or at least has scaled beyond the ability of their producers and management to keep shit on schedule/budget/the rails.

 

The Embracer chaos certainly isn't helping, and we'll almost certainly see at least a few of their projects taken behind the shed (remember that funny-animal RTS they ended last year's realms deep with and never spoke of again?), but it's not the catalyst here. This has been brewing for a long time.

[Rudolph]

4 hours ago, Kinsie said:

remember that funny-animal RTS they ended last year's realms deep with and never spoke of again?

No? What was it called?

[Kinsie]

25 minutes ago, Rudolph said:

No? What was it called?

I had to look up the VOD for last year's Realms Deep to even remember what it was, but it was WarPaws, which as far as I can tell hasn't had any SteamDB changes since last December. Seems like the co-developers have moved onto Tempest Rising, looking at social medias etc.?

[Gez]

On mardi 3 octobre 2023 at 1:48 PM, Mr Masker said:

I hope that if Mario goes into Public Domain, we'll get 5 HILARIOUS games about Mario doing the mushrooms and brutally killing the koopas with real life gun.

 

I should be a Video Game Parody Writer, Dorkly please hire me.

By the time Mario goes into the public domain, we'll have AI generating entire games as the new version of asset flips, and you will have thousands of terrible, never-tested games with that premise on the very second it becomes legal to release them.

[Daytime Waitress]

10 hours ago, Gez said:

By the time Mario goes into the public domain, we'll have AI generating entire games as the new version of asset flips, and you will have thousands of terrible, never-tested games with that premise on the very second it becomes legal to release them.

 

As distasteful as that may be, I'm genuinely more scared of a future full of procedurally-generated kaizo levels.

[Kinsie]

11 hours ago, Daytime Waitress said:

 

As distasteful as that may be, I'm genuinely more scared of a future full of procedurally-generated kaizo levels.

The robots can only regurgitate old ideas. True sadistic ingenuity can only come from a bored, undermedicated human mind.

[Daytime Waitress]

37 minutes ago, Kinsie said:

The robots can only regurgitate old ideas. True sadistic ingenuity can only come from a bored, undermedicated human mind.

 

I have played Reelism, yes.

[Kinsie]

Phantom Fury blogpost responding to the less-than-enthusiastic response to the demo. Long story short: Game delayed to next year, demo getting removed in 24 hours, updated demo coming in February.

[MS-06FZ Zaku II Kai]

44 minutes ago, Kinsie said:

Phantom Fury blogpost responding to the less-than-enthusiastic response to the demo. Long story short: Game delayed to next year, demo getting removed in 24 hours, updated demo coming in February.

Oh thank God, this game definetely needs more time in the oven.

 

I hope the devs will be able to deliver on their promise

[Rudolph]

59 minutes ago, Kinsie said:

Phantom Fury blogpost responding to the less-than-enthusiastic response to the demo. Long story short: Game delayed to next year, demo getting removed in 24 hours, updated demo coming in February.

Ha! Called it.

[MS-06FZ Zaku II Kai]

1 hour ago, Rudolph said:

Ha! Called it.

Rudolph...

 

forgive me

[BGreener]

They were certainly called out, that’s for sure! It’s also left a rough first impression of the game’s development.

[Rudolph]

Eh. I guess it depends if the game is just unpolished or fundamentally badly-designed. 

 

From what I have seen, I get the feeling that Phantom Fury is more of the former than the latter. Time will tell...

[BGreener]

“I guess it depends if the game is just unpolished or fundamentally badly-designed.”

 

They were called Interceptor Entertainment before being called Slipgate Ironworks. They sadly have a track record of being both ‘unpolished’ and ‘poorly-designed’ with this game, this game, and this game. Their games have been rough to enjoy and rougher to recommend - not unplayable messes, still some fun, but “eh” is very apt.

 

I’m empathetic to wide and large degrees but I have to be careful of “over-empathy”, and I’d be all the more sympathetic if they approached this differently: It felt like they came out with a demo to showcase a product they were confident in releasing later this year. If they announced from the get-go saying “hey, yeah… we’re well aware how rough it is but here’s some early access” - I’d be approaching this differently.

Edited October 9, 2023 by BGreener

[Rudolph]

Badly-designed is a game like Daikatana, where it is clear that no amount of tweaks and bug-fixing could make the game good.

 

I did not get such impression from the Phantom Fury demo, which looks like it could be alright if it were not for the bugs. Since the full game is not out yet and Slipgate seems committed to fixing it now, I am willing to reserve judgement for the time being.

 

And I must say, of all the three examples you mentioned, only Rise of the Triad 2013 comes across as a truly bad game (cool soundtrack, though), but that is mostly because it is a remake of a game that was never good in my opinion. Bombshell just looks bland and Rad Rodgers... honestly, I do not know much about that one, but based on the trailers alone, it looks kind of cool, actually; I do not know what are people's issues with it and for some reason, Steam will not let me see the more negative reviews.

Edited October 9, 2023 by Rudolph

[BGreener]

7 minutes ago, Rudolph said:

Badly-designed is a game like Daikatana, where it is clear that no amount of tweaks and bug-fixing could make the game good.

That’s been the opinion some people have held here of the Phantom Fury demo, which is more to the concern that they initially felt confident in a 2023 release date. The best case scenario is gives the impression that they weren’t aware of how poorly received it was going to be. (The worst case scenario is they knew how poorly it was to be received and hoped they “could get away with it”.)

 

I also did not say those three games were “truly bad”, just truly “meh”. Phantom Fury’s geared to be just as “meh” so far. That’s not something I’m too excited for or will want to spend a full $20 on, let alone pre-order.

[Rudolph]

21 minutes ago, BGreener said:

I also did not say those three games were “truly bad”, just truly “meh”. Phantom Fury’s geared to be just as “meh” so far. That’s not something I’m too excited for or will want to spend a full $20 on, let alone pre-order.

That is also how I feel about Ion Fury, although I read that the people who are more into Build games than I am seem happy with it.

 

No, scratch that: that is how I generally feel with 3DRealms' catalogue in general. Maybe that is another reason I do not feel all that passionate about their newest releases. And yes, I know 3DRealms is more of a publisher now than a developer, but they still get to pick the games that get resources allocated to them and as such they have a say on the finished product.

Edited October 9, 2023 by Rudolph

[BGreener]

20 minutes ago, Rudolph said:

That is also how I feel about Ion Fury, 

Then you should understand: I don’t want to feel “meh” about this upcoming game, and I’d like to think I speak for others here in wanting to feel “wee!” about this upcoming game. That’s what some demos do: I tried out Endless Dungeon a few weeks back, had lots of fun, and now it’s coming out soon - wee!

 

There’s still a chance it can get there, but this will also be the third similarly-styled shooter in their catalog so one would think that they should have it fully figured out, right..? :(

[Lila Feuer]

Yeah considering ROTT '13 is a decade old now I would hope they'd come a long ways since their early days. They're clearly a passionate studio, they have access to good tech, so unless their skill set just never evolved during all that time then idk wtf is the deal then.

[Rudolph]

40 minutes ago, BGreener said:

Then you should understand: I don’t want to feel “meh” about this upcoming game, and I’d like to think I speak for others here in wanting to feel “wee!” about this upcoming game. That’s what some demos do: I tried out Endless Dungeon a few weeks back, had lots of fun, and now it’s coming out soon - wee!

I understand and I never meant to imply that people were wrong to express their disappointment over that bad demo. I just think it is way too early to rule out the entire project as a failure and especially call it a repeat of Duke Nuke Forever. That is where I object.

 

Again, best case scenario, Slipgate successfully irons out all the bugs, releases a more convincing demo and Phantom Fury turns out okay; worst case scenario, Phantom Fury does not get much better, it bombs on release and 3DRealms realizes that Voidpoint is best-suited to handle the Bombshell IP from now on. Either way, things do not look as hopeless for Bombshell fans as they are for Duke Nukem fans.

Edited October 9, 2023 by Rudolph

[BGreener]

9 minutes ago, Rudolph said:

As I said earlier, I just think it is way too early to rule out the entire project as a failure and call it a repeat of Duke Nuke Forever.

Has anyone else here been concerned with that comparison? Kind of like what I was talking about with @TheMagicMushroomMan, I’m just concerned with the demo being quite unfun and how it doesn’t make me excited about the final product. If they pull around and make a great game then sweet! That’s the least I’d want from any game, and it would mean a brighter future for Slipgate with them getting on the right track.

 

(…I might pull a Ron Burgundy if it was ”DNF” levels of bad, though; like honestly, if they screwed up that bad I’d be impressed.)

[Rudolph]

See, I would not even call Duke Nukem Forever bad, just too little too late. It is not Daikatana, that is for sure.

 

Anyway, have you played Ion Fury: Aftershock? How do you feel about it?

 

[mrthejoshmon]

Delayed is good.

 

Them delaying it is nothing but a positive given the state the teaser demo was in, a bad game at launch is all too common nowadays and I'm getting sick and tired of the "fix it later" approach.

 

I will not retract my statements/mockery of the game because they would've been (and still currently are) valid statements, but I am not without hope, if they take the criticisms onboard and make something great out of it then I think we're gonna get something good in the end, then we all win.

Edited October 9, 2023 by mrthejoshmon

[BGreener]

14 minutes ago, Rudolph said:

Anyway, have you played Ion Fury: Aftershock? How do you feel about it? 

 

 

Huge thumbs up so far and that's before I've even gotten to the new levels. Just the improvements through the 'Arrange' mode have been great; that includes the new enemies, items, and weapon mechanics. I also either completely missed or forgot that they also mirrored the original levels through the 'Arrange' mode for an even fresher revisit.