The 'games are alright sometimes I suppose' thread

Game music, I just love a good soundtrack. Especially when you associate a piece of music with a standout emotional or epic moment from a game, and you listen to the song and it brings all those feelings back.

For example the thing I remember the most about the first Halo game on the og Xbox is the incredible soundtrack that game had. More recently the Persona soundtracks have become my obsession, I listen to them constantly these days, really made me appreciate different styles of music that I never would've listened to before.

I always appreciate a good map, especially when they indicate where you have and haven't explored yet. Metroidvanias are usually good for this and survival horror games. Resi even tells you when you've found all the items, which doors are locked, etc

I was thinking about that the other day 👴🏽

Was watching a video about the Lunar series, and it talked about the Working Designs release, with the giant manual tome explaining the mechanics and lore, concept art, and a MAP.
Made me think of all the classic releases and how they’d contain novels worth of backstory. Blizzard was especially great at that. I remember Warcraft III and World of Warcraft in particular coming with multiple like 300 page booklets filling in the history.

Maps and manuals were good too. Been downhill since they've stopped doing those big cardboard boxes for PC games. Loved those.

Now add Hi-Fi Rush to the mix. 👀

On my wall... friends gave it to me for my 40th framed.

i.imgur.com/9Lw5fhC.jpeg

The feel of power in rpgs! When you finally become a badass!

Example

Planescape torment where at one point you have to fight or sneak past mid level group of thugs. Died few times trying to beat them. So had to sneak

Dozen of hours later, after travelling through planes, meeting and confronting demigods...
You can come back and fight them again.

A single spell made them run like scared kittens in chinese restaurant!

That ability to be able to escape from whatever and do something else. Hunt monsters, score worldies, explore space, participate in stories or ride the TT course without dying.

It keeps the shit at bay sometimes.

Yeah, this really. I'd do it all the fucking time if I could. But I can't. If I get an hour in I'm very happy though, so I try for that, even if it's a pre morning run 30 mins and a pre bed time 30 mins.

I dunno if it's age, or the world we live in, but I am.very easily distracted. So even if I have the opportunity for a decent session, I get sidetracked by phone/music/magazine etc.

I like a small level that I can repeatedly play, trying to see how I can do things differently and testing all sorts of ideas.

Growing up with demos really fostered that. To the point where I'd play a demo for dozens of hours sometimes, but if I eventually got the full game I'd quickly lose interest if the game then deviated too much from the content of the demo.

I think the gta games and botw latched onto a bit of that mentality, somehow.

Ever played Hitman? Sounds right up your street.

A book club for games.

Here's something very minor that still pleases me.

When cars in games have working suspension. I remember back in the PS1 era, seeing cars tilt when cornering in Driver or Destruction Derby was very pleasing. I remember for no reason playing GTA San Andreas and driving down a beach, with the camera angle side on so I could watch the jeeps suspension bounce up and down.

I think it's because I recall when details like that were basically impossible.

Same with shadows and reflections. There was a time when shadows were just vague blobs under characters. I think it's why I am partial to ray tracing, as I find it amazing seeing real time reflection.

Even when those are tricked I'm very pleased. In fact, in some ways seeing a good tricked reflection is even more impressive.