Community MetaSteam | July 2021 - Corporate Propaganda

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ExistentialThought

Coffee Lover ♥☕
Feb 29, 2020
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Why are they raising prices? Stating the increase with no explanation seems poorly thought out.

Aren't most of these titles Steam only?

There really are only two possible reasons for this, too. Either NIS is in real bad financial straits, or they're just being greedy.

Neither of those is a good option!
This is exactly my thought, why send this out with no explanation only to leave folks to speculate, since as of right now I am speculating the worst.
 
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ExistentialThought

Coffee Lover ♥☕
Feb 29, 2020
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I had also just mentioned yesterday NISA reduced their Humble Choice discount as well.

This really does make me speculate financial concerns to shore up their bottom line inbetween projects.
 

toxicitizen

MetaMember
Oct 24, 2018
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Wouldn't be the first time that NIS is having financial problems. Didn't they come dangerously close to bankruptcy a few years ago?

If they manage to go under before they can deliver all those Trails games they just announced, I'm going to start believing that the series really is cursed... :disappointed-face:
 

Theswweet

Dirty Weeb
Mar 12, 2019
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You don't have to worry about that, the series is already cursed to begin with. :flare_lmao:
FC: Bombed on PSP, PC version took forever because XSEED assumed that the engine was the same as Ys VI/OiF/Origin. It wasn't.
SC: The above + Carpe Fulgur was a mistake.
The 3rd: Was announced alongside FC/SC 6+ years before it eventually got a localization on PC.
Zero: Is finally getting an official localization in 2022 - may only be happening because of Geofront translation
Ao: Ctrl+R 2022 -> 2023
Cold Steel 1+2: The only reasonable release timeframes on this list, but also released before Crossbell, so we played the series out of order
Cold Steel 3+4: Translations hopped companies from XSEED -> NISA, still no Crossbell TLs before these despite the games really needing that context
Hajimari/Reverie: Won't release until 3 years after the JP release in the west
Kuro: hahahahahahahahahahahahhaaaaaaaaaa
 

Cacher

Romantic Storm
Jun 3, 2020
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This also explains why some of their localized games skipped PC. Lapis x Labyrinth, Destiny Connect, Poison Control... I guess their sales on PC are not well.

Honestly, Labyrinth of Galleria couldn't sell well when it does not have a Switch version. It was destined to bomb hard :disappointed-face:
 
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PC-tan

Low Tier Weeb
Jan 19, 2019
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I like how I ordered Mustard from Amazon and it somehow got lost in the mail. It most likely got damaged in transit and now someone has to clean it up.... Sorry dude.


Speaking of NISA. It's been known that NIS In Japan is very niche and that D5 on N/S was their last "huge success story" (and YSVIII I think?)


Pretty much NISA is the only reason that NIS is still around, without them they would be gone.

I'm guessing that charging more on consoles is out of the question and has never been done before? And because of how cheap their games already are on PC I guess that they want to try something there and see what happens.


As mentioned in that Indie VS Sony thing on ERA I do remember hearing about someone from NIS being pissed at Sony and that's why they have been leaning on N/S.


I'm guessing that if you were a dev in Japan and you dissed off either Sony or Nintendo you would be very screwed. I guess those two have a lot of "clout"
 

Routa

Non-Stop MMO Searcher
Dec 22, 2018
861
3,797
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Beat Majin Tensei

What an utterly, miserable experience. Here is the game at 2x speed in the emulator.


Now imagine this for 59 levels :blobweary:. You can not turn combat animations off and the AI loves to move troops that are physically unable to reach the player just to waste time. Additionally, there is no way to increase the amount of tiles you can move - this is a huge detriment when some of these maps are absolutely massive. There are some tiles that slow your speed. There is one map covered in a desert where you can only move two tiles at a time. Every scenario is a slog to complete the goal - which is usually destroy all enemies.

The maps in general are just boring. Spawn hordes of enemies, throw them at the player. Rinse and repeat.

The demons you can summon are worthless. The two human characters are massively stronger than anything you'll encounter in the game, especially when the heroine learns Remidola. This is your best friend in the later encounters when there are hordes of enemies all over the maps, this is also where melee damage starts to become pitiful. Max out her magic or you will hate yourself at the end of the game. She virtually killed everything on her own once she learned said spell.

Who made the inventory in this game? You only have about fifteen-twenty slots, and Rag's shop is in this game - but guess what - the gems do NOT stack. This is especially stupid because of the costs. Trading for any decent demon costs up to 5x of a gem, the armor he sells (which seems to be best in the game) costs 3 gems, 1 of different types. I spent most of the game with 80% of inventory being gems and just discarding everything else. The maps have so many damn chests I just started ignoring them.

The summoning circles are the worst thing in this game. They serve to summon reinforcements, and you're supposed to block them with your demons. The problem is, a lot of these are in places you'll never reach in time, so they just keep summoning shit to throw at you which slows you down form reaching them, which means the next summoned enemies are already coming at you. You see where I'm going with this. It's a test of patience,

I spent most of this playthrough watching shows on Netflix and alt-tabbing. Retroarch says 29hours at 2x speed, about 4-5 of those hours were actually probably me inputting commands and paying attention. Very mindless. I wasn't able to figure out how to uncap the the max speed, which I think is possible. The game would be much more tolerable at 10-20x speeds. I can not imagine playing this on the original hardware.

Getting the best ending requires you to visit one NPC three times. They are at the bottom of a dungeon, problem is, enemies do not stay dead! Congratulations, you have trudge down through annoying encounters again :blobclosecry:

Don't play this. I don't know why I did. I guess I couldn't resist being able to say "I beat Majin Tensei" :surrenderblob:

Edit: Oh, this isn't the rate thread, oops.
 
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MaskedCircle

"Let's Positive Thinking"
May 28, 2021
153
316
63
Beat Majin Tensei

What an utterly, miserable experience. Here is the game at 2x speed in the emulator.


Now imagine this for 59 levels :blobweary:. You can not turn combat animations off and the AI loves to move troops that are physically unable to reach the player just to waste time. Additionally, there is no way to increase the amount of tiles you can move - this is a huge detriment when some of these maps are absolutely massive. There are some tiles that slow your speed. There is one map covered in a desert where you can only move two tiles at a time. Every scenario is a slog to complete the goal - which is usually destroy all enemies.

The maps in general are just boring. Spawn hordes of enemies, throw them at the player. Rinse and repeat.

The demons you can summon are worthless. The two human characters are massively stronger than anything you'll encounter in the game, especially when the heroine learns Remidola. This is your best friend in the later encounters when there are hordes of enemies all over the maps, this is also where melee damage starts to become pitiful. Max out her magic or you will hate yourself at the end of the game. She virtually killed everything on her own once she learned said spell.

Who made the inventory in this game? You only have about fifteen-twenty slots, and Rag's shop is in this game - but guess what - the gems do NOT stack. This is especially stupid because of the costs. Trading for any decent demon costs up to 5x of a gem, the armor he sells (which seems to be best in the game) costs 3 gems, 1 of different types. I spent most of the game with 80% of inventory being gems and just discarding everything else. The maps have so many damn chests I just started ignoring them.

The summoning circles are the worst thing in this game. They serve to summon reinforcements, and you're supposed to block them with your demons. The problem is, a lot of these are in places you'll never reach in time, so they just keep summoning shit to throw at you which slows you down form reaching them, which means the next summoned enemies are already coming at you. You see where I'm going with this. It's a test of patience,

I spent most of this playthrough watching shows on Netflix and alt-tabbing. Retroarch says 29hours at 2x speed, about 4-5 of those hours were actually probably me inputting commands and paying attention. Very mindless. I wasn't able to uncap the the max speed, which I think is possible. The game is would be much more tolerable at 10-20x speeds. I can not imagine playing this on the original hardware.

Getting the best ending requires you to visit one NPC three times. They are the bottom of a dungeon, problem is, enemies do not stay dead! Congratulations, you have trudge down through annoying encounters again :blobclosecry:

Don't play this. I don't know why I did. I guess I couldn't resist being able to say "I beat Majin Tensei" :surrenderblob:

Edit: Oh, this isn't the rate thread, oops.
oof, I still haven't finished it.
way to go bruh.
 
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Deku

Just nothing
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Ouch, on the NISA increasing prices :suicide-blob:

The Caligula Effect is the only game I'm interested out of those they are increasing the price for. How is the game? Is it fun?
 

PC-tan

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Jan 19, 2019
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It just dawned on me .... Crazy conspiracy theory (that may or may not have already been mentioned by others in the last 4 years

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Mor

Me llamo Willy y no hice la mili, pero vendo Chili
Sep 7, 2018
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There really are only two possible reasons for this, too. Either NIS is in real bad financial straits, or they're just being greedy.

Neither of those is a good option!
unfortunately I think it's the first one, most of the latest releases have bombed hard and well, this could explain why all the sudden they expanded to all potential services and why they took a deal for Disgaea 6 in the west, for example.
 
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Alexandros

Every game should be turn based
Nov 4, 2018
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I have been following the discussion on Sony's indie support issues and I hope it will be eye opening for developers who believe that Steam isn't doing a good job promoting indies. So many of Steam's features and Valve's policies are taken for granted but they make such a big difference. I think that some developers do not fully grasp what a huge deal it is that indie games sit side by side with AAA on the front page, or that almost every developer in the world has easy access to tens of millions of customers.
 

thekeats1999

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Dec 10, 2018
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I have been following the discussion on Sony's indie support issues and I hope it will be eye opening for developers who believe that Steam isn't doing a good job promoting indies. So many of Steam's features and Valve's policies are taken for granted but they make such a big difference. I think that some developers do not fully grasp what a huge deal it is that indie games sit side by side with AAA on the front page, or that almost every developer in the world has easy access to tens of millions of customers.
Yeah, been reading the thread on ERA, it amazes me to this day that people still don't realise how vital steam reviews are to helping success.

It's also the most telling indication that EGS was only ever developed for the dev side and not the consumer. It is the one area that EGS hasn't backed away from I believe. The only reviews they are planning on integrating are Metacritc I believe.

Oh and the amount of people that come out to defend Sony (well console of their choice) blindly still surprises me to this day. And I grew up with the platform warring of Commodore vs Spectrum and at least there where actual differences that set these machines apart.
 

thekeats1999

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Dec 10, 2018
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not even entirely for the devside , for all we know dev backend on EGS is almost nonexistend and for a long time everything was done by hand by the epic rep
Aye, true. A better way to phrase it would probably be that more thought was given to what dev's want than customers.

- Someone on the internet [Probably]

Yes it's a strawman, but reading some places on the internet you'd thing that's real.
No probably about it. Spend 5 minutes on any Sony announces PC game on twitter and there are far too many comments that are thinly veiled versions of that comment.

I really shouldn't spend too much time (or any time) on Social Media. Only upsets me.
 

tetel

MetaMember
Jan 7, 2020
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I'm hearing reports that NISA's regional pricing got fucked over, huge surprise!
Well, they already dropped at least some of the decent regional prices when Ys 8 got a price cut (60$ Ys 8 followed Valve's pricing, 40$ didn't) so can't wait for it to be even worse.
 
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Ascheroth

Chilling in the Megastructure
Nov 12, 2018
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Yeah the Sony stories are kinda wild.
If anyone isn't aware what this is about, this seems like a good article that also has the tweet chains that started the thing.

My main take away to this is that Sony's backend is kinda shite and has a really high bureaucracy overhead that is made worse by long communication times and no clear contact persons if you're not "big enough".

What baffles me most though is how the sales are apparently handled. Like, devs and publishers have no control and only Sony decides who they "invite" for a sale and at what discount? Like, what? No wonder the smaller/mid-tier indies can't move copies there at all. There are apparently indie games that haven't gone on sale since they launched, months or even over a year ago. Just cause Sony don't care.
Wow.
 

dex3108

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Dec 20, 2018
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My main issue are double standards. When outlets and devs started sh*tting on Steam 2 years ago Sony and Xbox Stores were in same state as today more-less and nobody complained. To publish game on Steam you need 100$, to publish game on PlayStation you need sh*t ton of money, time and patience. That was known for years, and nobody said nothing. If Valve doesn't deserve 30% cut than Sony should be paying devs to publish games on their store.
 

Mivey

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Sep 20, 2018
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Another possible idea I have is maybe that NISA is just aiming to go for "fake" deep sales in the future. Keep games at a high price forever, and then just go for a "75%" sale every time which makes it look super generous when they are essentially still asking you to pay 15€ for an old game.
 
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lashman

lashman

Dead & Forgotten
Sep 5, 2018
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Another possible idea I have is maybe that NISA is just aiming to go for "fake" deep sales in the future. Keep games at a high price forever, and then just go for a "75%" sale every time which makes it look super generous when they are essentially still asking you to pay 15€ for an old game.
it also kills any sales outside of the big discounts

and basically murders any last bit of good will they might have still had
 

Alexandros

Every game should be turn based
Nov 4, 2018
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I am not surprised by self interest, even if it is for dumb reasons like console wars. What surprises me or more accurately what utterly baffles me is when some developers seemingly argue against their own interests. I see developers of small games arguing in favor of 'curation' and for some weird reason it never dawns on them that console or EGS-style 'curation' would completely obliterate the business of 99% of them.

I honestly don't know how to explain it. Is it delusion about the true status of their game? Is it the 'american dream' that yeah, I will be in the shit but if I get into the walled garden I'll be a millionaire? Are they being gaslighted by bigger publishers and developers even though their interests do not align at all? I wish I had an explanation.
 

Le Pertti

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Oct 10, 2018
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There is something that devs aren't telling us regarding Mac versions of games. There are way too many games now that are on Steam that only offer the windows version but they still made a Mac version for the App Store. Not sure why they would keep that off Steam.

I can understand M1 optimised versions of games, like Disco Elysium, they offer a Mac version on Steam but not the M1 optimised one, which is only on the App Store. Someone mentioned that Steam itself not being up to date is preventing people offering M1 versions.

Why make the effort to port a game to Mac but not put in the effort to make it available on Steam.
 

thekeats1999

MetaMember
Dec 10, 2018
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I am not surprised by self interest, even if it is for dumb reasons like console wars. What surprises me or more accurately what utterly baffles me is when some developers seemingly argue against their own interests. I see developers of small games arguing in favor of 'curation' and for some weird reason it never dawns on them that console or EGS-style 'curation' would completely obliterate the business of 99% of them.

I honestly don't know how to explain it. Is it delusion about the true status of their game? Is it the 'american dream' that yeah, I will be in the shit but if I get into the walled garden I'll be a millionaire? Are they being gaslighted by bigger publishers and developers even though their interests do not align at all? I wish I had an explanation.
It has to be some form of Delusion. When you go back to curation you go back to manual reviews. You go back to being reviewed by people who have bias'.

Unfortunately a lot of people aren't critical enough of their own works.

I know I am preaching to the converted here, but you only have to look at the whole Zachtronic/GOG issue. Or Valve admitting they would never have let Minecraft on Steam under their old review system. These are why curation is bad.

Hell, if I was in charge of curation I would probably never allow another sports game to make it to a store, because I am biased (sarcasm, but you know people will have it in for something like Visual Novels or Walking Simulators).

I hope to never see Steam go back to being the ones who chose the winners and losers again.
 

kafiend

MetaMember
Dec 6, 2018
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Something worth considering, tbh.
Having played and finished the story with also a little post game done, Disgaea 6 bombed because its the worst Disgaea game by far. Tedious story, dull characters, some ??? gameplay changes with some improvements also.
Added together it just about made it into meh territory. I just wanted the story to just end...PLEASE I'm begging of you just end... about 3 hours before it did.
 
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