The Outer Worlds: Spacer's Choice Edition - Obsidian's first-person sci-fi RPG set in a corporate space colony

[Prime Junta]

Did you parse that as me advocating for body positivity?

You read a lot of womens magazines to by the sound of it.

Gotta know the tune to which the devil is dancing, bruh.

Spoiler

More seriously: I am naturally curious and find myself quite often trying to get inside the heads of people. This means I spend a lot of time and effort trying to understand how they think. I'm also pretty good at this and I pick up the jargon quickly. I understand capitalist economics quite well (classical, neoliberal, Keynesian), I understand how the woke-net thinks and works, I've even been able to overcome some of my disgust to figure out what makes so-called 'race realists' tick, and yes I do keep an eye on women's magazines too. Half of humanity are women, it would be pretty remiss of me not to even try to understand the popular culture and entertainment that's directed at them.

Spoiler

I could probably larp a fairly convincing SJW, Sailor Woedica, or libertarian. For a while anyway, it's really tiring and I prefer to be at least a little bit sincere.

 

[Daidre]

Grundbreaker captain is quite clearly ethnic Chinese. There's also an Asian vendor there.

Oh. I checked it out - wow, so Parvati is Indian with asexual crash on Chinese lady. It is so... inclusive.

 

[DeepOcean]

boyarsky was at blizzard for 10 years. that had to leave a mark on his soul

Maybe it was in there where he learned how to create vapid, souless, consumer ready pop culture for man children.

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

Did you parse that as me advocating for body positivity?

You read a lot of womens magazines to by the sound of it.

Gotta know the tune to which the devil is dancing, bruh.

Spoiler

More seriously: I am naturally curious and find myself quite often trying to get inside the heads of people. This means I spend a lot of time and effort trying to understand how they think. I'm also pretty good at this and I pick up the jargon quickly. I understand capitalist economics quite well (classical, neoliberal, Keynesian), I understand how the woke-net thinks and works, I've even been able to overcome some of my disgust to figure out what makes so-called 'race realists' tick, and yes I do keep an eye on women's magazines too. Half of humanity are women, it would be pretty remiss of me not to even try to understand the popular culture and entertainment that's directed at them.

Spoiler

I could probably larp a fairly convincing SJW, Sailor Woedica, or libertarian. For a while anyway, it's really tiring and I prefer to be at least a little bit sincere.

I strongly recommend you to RP/larp as an actual psychopath for a medium to long period of time if you haven't already. The experience is fascinating, although maybe a bit too emotionally taxing.

 

[Haplo]

How does the combat compare to FNV? Even in FNV the combat was so easy that I could not travel with a companion. I found the combat challenging enough on the hardest setting when solo though especially against deathclaws and cazadores in the early game. Having a companion in FNV was like a IWIN button. They should really balance the difficulty on HARD so that going solo is really hard, but fighting with a companion is still challenging.

Its much faster-paced, more dynamic then FNV. A LOT more fun too.

But gets easy really fast. Guess you'd have to not optimize your character and gear choices, maybe then would have some challenge. Or go to Scylla right after Edgewater. But then I guess once you get some upgraded kit and some levels, you'd struggle to find challenges throughout the rest of the game.

I guess melee could be more challenging. Abusing the ranged sniping makes the combat much easier.

 

[cvv]

I wonder what there reasoning is here. "Let's save money by hiring brainlets for our most important department, that is the only reason we still are in business"?

I don't think it has anything to do with money. If you look at the press this game got, people are very happy with it

1. Most vidyas have always had absolutely trash tier writing. Developers have always considered writing unimportant because gamers don't give shit about writing and reviewers don't either so why should they? Plus even most gamers who do care can't tell good writing from their own fat ass anyway. They'd happily munch on a Larian game or a nuObsidian game proclaiming something about well written story and dialogues. And it's usually not due to stupidity but due to a lack of perspective. Nobody reads great literature anymore so nobody has proper reference points. If you only ate at McDonald's all your life you wouldn't have a clue about high-tier cuisine either.

2. Developers are under pressure to hire more women and since finding a quality female coder is on par with finding a Big Foot all those new female hires pile up in their art or writing departments. So while in the golden days games were written by neckbeard engineers today they're written by college age dangerhairs. I.e still trash but a different kind.

 

[just]

boyarsky was at blizzard for 10 years. that had to leave a mark on his soul

Maybe it was in there where he learned how to create vapid, souless, consumer ready pop culture for man children.

maybe he came up with the title reaper of souls as a cry for help
but you didnt listen

 

[Riddler]

I wonder what there reasoning is here. "Let's save money by hiring brainlets for our most important department, that is the only reason we still are in business"?

I don't think it has anything to do with money. If you look at the press this game got, people are very happy with it

1. Most vidyas have always had absolutely trash tier writing. Developers have always considered writing unimportant because gamers don't give shit about writing and reviewers don't either so why should they? Plus even most gamers who do care can't tell good writing from their own fat ass anyway. They'd happily munch on a Larian game or a nuObsidian game proclaiming something about well written story and dialogues. And it's usually not due to stupidity but due to a lack of perspective. Nobody reads great literature anymore so nobody has proper reference points. If you only ate at McDonald's all your life you wouldn't have a clue about high-tier cuisine either.

2. Developers are under pressure to hire more women and since finding a quality female coder is on par with finding a Big Foot all those new female hires pile up in their art or writing departments. So while in the golden days games were written by neckbeard engineers today they're written by college age dangerhairs. I.e still trash but a different kind.

I'm not looking for high art here, just passable writing and that has been accomplished many times in games. Consider Mass Effect for example, its simplistic popamole produced by Bioware, yet somehow they manage to create three different ideological factions (The council races) and give them a relatively fair shake, with examples of both successes and failure modes of all three. This is not fucking rockets science, this is the level of knock off B-list star wars books.

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

I'm not looking for high art here, just passable writing and that has been accomplished many times in games. Consider Mass Effect for example, its simplistic popamole produced by Bioware, yet somehow they manage to conceptualize three different ideological factions (The council races) and give them a relatively fair shake, with examples of both successes and failure modes of all three. This is not fucking rockets science.

Agreed. The consistency at which the gaming industry fails to achieve even a basic level of competence is the real absurdity here.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

This. You become a writer by living, not by reading. You live a lot, and then, if you had it in you, you will be a writer. But the problem of graphomania has been around forever.

By his own admission, Chris Avellone was a fat meganerd when he wrote Torment.

And he's just a part of tradition that goes back to the antiquity, because throughout history most writers were independently wealthy sheltered aristocrats, or at the very least, middle-class well educated upstarts. People with " rough life experience" didn't write fancy novels because they had fields to plow.

But anyway, let's go back to discussing how real writer needs to fight in a war and wrestle bears.

 

[Daidre]

Developers are under pressure to hire more women and since finding a quality female coder is on par with finding a Big Foot all those new female hires pile up in their art or writing departments. So while in the golden days games were written by neckbeard engineers today they're written by college age dangerhairs. I.e still trash but a different kind.

I kinda think that game with a team of female coders will end up in a much better place than a game with a female writing team.

Code just works. You can't force your opinion or personality in it. And ladies, as my experience shows, less creative but much more throughout about it. So end result is always less buggy, if delivered a bit slower. Not mentioning that 80% of QA in Russia is girls.

 

[Theldaran]

Looks legit to me. In the past, the games were by nerds for nerds. Now, the games are by hipsters for hipsters. That's what causes the repulsion for most of us.

"The future is our world, Morpheus. The future is our time."

The exception to females being shit at game design is Rieko Kodama, of Phantasy Star fame. Though she's from a conservative society like Japan, with a pretty different approach. I have no doubt than in the eyes of Californian hipsters, the Japanese are a bunch of sexist scum and enslaved women. I don't mean to say that Japan is free of problems, far from it, but they are different problems. Though they also have their cuckold games, that doesn't bode well for them :D

 

[Van-d-all]

Code just works. You can't force your opinion or personality in it. And ladies, as my experience shows, less creative but much more throughout about it. So end result is always less buggy, if delivered a bit slower. Not mentioning that 80% of QA in Russia is girls.

Just no. Time-effectivenes might be a common factor in modern corporate development thus resulting in severe decline in coding standards, but there are dozens of ways to implement the same functionalities. Things like readability, maintainability or adherence to design patterns or coding standards are a thing. I've only worked in my life with two female coders, both presented rather bad approach. First was a typical mess of pasta code, fixed ad hoc and lacking overall planning. The other was just minimalist, case specific code without a speck of flexibility. Spend enough time with programmers and you'll be able to tell the author by their code.

 

[Theldaran]

But why do we need mandatory women making the games. Is there any quota by law in Murica? Or some government financial support for integrating the poor destitute girls into society?

In my eyes the feminists just want to hold the jobs that are primarily occupied by women, while worming their way into jobs primarily occupied by men. And still many of them just choose not to work.

But in the end, these games are bad because they're made with the wrong idea or by people with next to no talent, there are also some mediocre games made by men with next to no talent.

 

[Prime Junta]

Code just works. You can't force your opinion or personality in it. And ladies, as my experience shows, less creative but much more throughout about it. So end result is always less buggy, if delivered a bit slower. Not mentioning that 80% of QA in Russia is girls.

Eh, generalisations.

Two best coders in my team are women, as is the lead QA, who is the third-best QA I've worked with (the other two were also women). So can confirm that part.

The other part not so much. Helen Hindpere wrote a lot of Disco Elysium and her work is top.

 

[Infinitron]

2. Developers are under pressure to hire more women and since finding a quality female coder is on par with finding a Big Foot all those new female hires pile up in their art or writing departments. So while in the golden days games were written by neckbeard engineers today they're written by college age dangerhairs. I.e still trash but a different kind.

No pressure is necessary. Writing in general is becoming a pink-collar profession in the West, and there are aspects of professional video game writing that probably make it particularly suitable for women (lots of "secretarial" fill-in-the-blank tasks as opposed to stream of consciousness writing, lots of collaboration and teamwork, etc).

 

[cvv]

I'm not looking for high art here, just passable writing

Gimme quality on the level of Betrayal at Krondor, Torment, Dragonfall, Witcher 3 or Kingdom Come and I'm a happy clam. I don't need Umberto Eco either, just solid, well-executed craft.

 

[Van-d-all]

Code just works. You can't force your opinion or personality in it. And ladies, as my experience shows, less creative but much more throughout about it. So end result is always less buggy, if delivered a bit slower. Not mentioning that 80% of QA in Russia is girls.

Eh, generalisations.

Two best coders in my team are women, as is the lead QA, who is the third-best QA I've worked with (the other two were also women). So can confirm that part.

The other part not so much. Helen Hindpere wrote a lot of Disco Elysium and her work is top.

Sure, female coders are a rare breed still, so it's just statistically obvious, they're likely to represent the wide average. And said average nowadays, in an over saturated market full of wannabe script kiddies, is just like that. The two examples I gave are my personal experience, but by far they're not the worst people I had to work with.

 

[Atchodas]

I don't need Umberto Eco either

Inb4 Sawyer releases Disco Elysium iike game inspired by The name of the rose and its actually good

 

[Theldaran]

By the way, you do know that there are women untainted by the SJW plague, right? The problem may lie then in recruiting questionable artists such as Amber Scott or this Megan Starks, whom haven't produced anything of worth before this job, nor will produce it later.

 

[jf8350143]

One could make an observation that vapid and uninteresting Parvati must be doing something right it she causes 50 pages of furious discussion and encourages people to emotionally debate politics of China, differences between man and woman, nuances of Californian lifestyle and meaning of life itself.

It almost seems that some of our esteemed posters have developed an obsession with a cute girl from a vidya game. And when nobody is looking, they stare dreamy-eyed at the sky, imaging a perfect TOW sequel where they get to finally play house with their asexual lesbian waifu.

Meh, if there is a sequel I would prefer Pravati to be married with Junlei and in charge of the groundbreaker together.

It would cause much more butthurt comparing to being a love interest.

 

[Daidre]

Just no. Time-effectivenes might be a common factor in modern corporate development thus resulting in severe decline in coding standards, but there are dozens of ways to implement the same functionalities. Things like readability, maintainability or adherence to design patterns or coding standards are a thing. I've only worked in my life with two female coders, both presented rather bad approach. First was a typical mess of pasta code, fixed ad hoc and lacking overall planning. The other was just minimalist exact case code without a speck of flexibility. Spend enough time with programmers and you'll be able to tell the author by their code.

I work with dozen of girls in ~50 people Dev team and main thing about them that they worry about business logic, usability and on-time delivery much more than about patterns. Or coding styles. Or new shiny technologies. It is nice in bloody enterprise but lot less attractive in start-ups.
Another strange observation - female coders tend to be more proficient with SQL, when guys are better with java and frontend.

The other part not so much. Helen Hindpere wrote a lot of Disco Elysium and her work is top.

I have meant totally female writing teams in exaggerated lesser of two evils comparison. As far as I know one of the better written companions in P:K - Jubilost was also written by girl.

 

[Van-d-all]

I work with dozen girls in ~50 people Dev team and main thing about them that they worry about business logic, usability and on-time delivery much more than about patterns. Or coding styles. Or new shiny technologies. It is nice in bloody enterprise but lot less attractive in start-ups.

Case in point. That's the exact problem. It's not about "attractiveness" it's about craftsmanship. "It just works" is a lousy standard

 

[cvv]

I don't need Umberto Eco either

Inb4 Sawyer releases Disco Elysium iike game inspired by The name of the rose and its actually good

A Name of the Rose game would be extremely cool. All 53 people who'd buy and play it would enjoy it tremendously.

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

These "life experience" comments read like pseud bullshit.
The people who made your favorite games were fukken' NERDS who sat on their ass all day watching and reading TV/books, if they lived interesting lives they wouldn't have made video games.

And eating pizza, drinking cokes, spending multiples days without sleep or showering, jerking off to relax, etc. You can’t expect Tumblr women studies dykes to provide the same gameplay experiences because they are completely different creatures with different formative experiences and priorities. The nerds didn’t see themselves as artists, didn’t take themselves seriously and wanted to have fun and immerse themselves in their work. The dykes see themselves as top-notch artists, take themselves too seriously, want to express their profound feelings and will control and restrict their work according to the dictates of the latest political correct post-modern diarrhea. And yet if you point these obvious differences, some people here will say you are crazy or paranoid. Guess what. The only people who don’t care about this topic are either sympathetic towards these cultural tendencies or are too dumb to tell the difference between the genuine article and this inferior FO4 clone.