metaphysician

I really have a hard time getting past the sheer hypocrisy of "No one should want to fix your bad AI translation", coming from people who are already not working on a translation. Note: I do not consider "Has said at some point in the past that they will totally do a translation some day" to constitute "working on a translation". There has to be some sign of actual life and progress. While this might focus on the anti-AI side of things, honestly it feels more part and parcel with the broader toxic "Calling Dibs" aspect of the fan translation community.

The Sega CD was probably always at least a little doomed from pricing, but it wasn't conceptually bad like the 32X. It just needed more games and reasonable sales vs price expectations. Which is to say, it was mostly another victim of the SoJ/SoA split. While I usually place the majority of the blame on SoJ, in this case they actually had what was the correct idea for How To Make CD Games.

@AngelSpark

This. Bleem was in the clear legally, that just doesn't matter when a much larger company is willing to spend you into the grave.

@Martin_H

Except worse, because this game also adds third party licenses. Though I suppose its a mixed blessing, since the sales potential of those licenses might make for a compelling reason to clean up the issue.

I've been saying for a while that a "Castlevania strategy game" would be a great idea. Here's hoping it turns out good.

@sdelfin

Yeah, that's pretty much what I thought. Like, there are some legitimate gripes in there ( people bundling the emulator with ROMs does increase the risk of negative legal actions ). . . but it doesn't change that he's essentially throwing a temper tantrum. The GPL allows for commercial use, and doesn't allow for retroactive changes, and that's the license you chose to use, my dude. When you release software as open source, you are forgoing most ability to control what others choose to do with it.

I suspect he subscribes at least somewhat to the "FOSS as ideology" mindset.

@MegaJ

Its because, at heart, most of the anti-AI paranoia is based on an emotional aversion to art no longer being a special spiritual gift of humanity, as opposed to a skilled craft subject to the same threat of automation as many other crafts. That's why even the people who do talk about the ( very real ) threat of AI to employment, spend way too much effort on purity testing and witchhunts like this, as opposed to, say. . . advocating for Universal Basic Income. They don't want to ensure people don't get thrown out on the streets if automation comes for their job; they want to ensure that they can still tell themselves that being able to draw makes them special.

( And don't think for a second that the people who do want to abuse and exploit AI in all its worst forms aren't gleeful about this tendency. )

@cyxceven

Why would you think that? Translation and localization is hard, because language and culture is hard. You are trying to convert meaning across different languages ( which often have wildly different grammar and vocabularies, none of which is guaranteed to directly map ), and across different cultures too ( which the literal meaning of specific words and phrases can have radically different interpretation in context ). What about that sounds even slightly easy?

@sdelfin

Is there a publicly-known explanation for why he took the code out of the open source? i tend to be cynical, but I'm open to an alternative explanation.

@Tom_Gamer

The question is nonsensical, because there are no "preexisting buyers". Sin Remastered is an entirely new. . . well, remaster. Its not an update patch to an existing release.

@slider1983

I think the issue is less that those games are "trash", and more that stuff like Gain Ground and Sonic 1 have already been rereleased countless times. There isn't that much demand because there have been tons of ways to play them, for years or decades, many of which are recent or even still available. Those who are interested have already bought them, possibly multiple times; and those who aren't, won't magically decide to buy Gain Ground just because Virtua Fighter isn't available.

@slider1983

I mean, its possible that is what they are doing. The main obstacles in the face would be:

1. All the Dragon Slayer titles are 80s PC games at heart, and thus would need a lot of remastering to make them both reasonably playable on consoles and appetizing for modern players.

2. Their localization status is dicey, at best, meaning realistically they'd need new translations. They might not be giant doorstopper scripts, but they are still RPGs with a fair amount of text.

These aren't insurmountable obstacles, but they do mean that I think a rework of a game is more likely than a collection.

@MikeP

This. I suspect there are quite a few collections of classic Sega games that could command prices anywhere from $30 to $60 easily, depending on how big or previously-unrereleased they were.

Which I suspect is part of what they don't want to say out loud: part of the pushback and disinterest is likely execs who really wish they could sell every single rereleased title at those prices. "Why should we have to put together a collection of all the old Super Scaler games to charge $60, we should be able to get that for just Outrun!" Or thereabouts.

I think the underlying issue is the culture of "claiming" translation goals, with this somehow meaning no one else can or should work on one. Which is, to put it simply: complete *****. If you want to work on a fan translation, then work on it. If you want to be done first and get to claim credit for such, then finish it first. If you can't or won't, then someone else deserves to finish it first.

I think its scarcely even a spoiler to go "Trevor and Sypha's kid". The trailer does everything but put up a neon flashing sign saying "This is their daughter". What might be up for debate is her name, I suspect. Someone might have assumed she'd be called Sonia, because of the prior character usage, when this wasn't actually a confirmed fact.

@sanmansan

I think the underlying issue was that, fundamentally? Sega was a hardware company, that happened to make software so as to better show off and sell their fancy hardware. As opposed to Nintendo who was ( and still is ) fundamentally a software company, where the hardware exists to serve the needs of the software.

@Zenszulu

In retrospect, as much as some developers might have complained about manufacturing costs? The SNES model of "enhancement chips" was absolutely the correct framework.

@Sketcz

That first issue is debatable ( assuming Embracer actually is setting up a museum themselves ), but the second? Yeah, that isn't just unprofessional, its criminal. Fake or not, those games are still someone else's property, until and unless you buy them. No purchase, then they still belong to the seller.

My own picks would be Dragon Quest, Mega Man, and Silent Hill

@h3s

I hadn't given it consideration, but. . . does Dracula X Chronicles run at least part of its stuff in emulation? If so, that would mean you'd be running an emulator inside another emulator. . .

I think there are two influences distorting the discussion. On one end, you had changes in the way games were coded that, starting in the mid 2000s, made games at least theoretically easier to port ( ie, you actually could "simply" port them, as opposed to rebuilding them ). Which created a largely-false impression that porting was a matter of pushing a button. On the other end, you have games like the FF7 "Remake", which apply the term 'remake' to games which essentially share nothing with the thing they are theoretically-remaking beyond the pitch bible and concept art.

Between the two, you thus get a disdain for ports as "lazy", and unrealistic expectations for remakes. Hence why developers largely like to name things "remaster", because its a vague term that doesn't trigger as many issues.

It feels a little weird to have a collection where the "FPS issues" are that it is too high. It makes sense in context, though, and begs the question: why? Like, would it really have been too hard to set a FPS cap in the emulator?

@smoreon

Sure. Its just, I get annoyed when the real issues with lazy use of machine upscaling get overwhelmed by a wave of ill-conceived "AI Bad!" Especially since I'm pretty sure developers were using machine learning tools for upscaling, both well and poorly, long before "generative AI" became a buzzword and a boogeyman.

@axelhander

While this is true, its also not entirely some sinister conspiracy. Given how expensive magnetic storage was, "cost engineering" was less a matter of eeking out more profits, and more a genuine way to reduce the cost of goods. The same changes that resulted in 'recent' magnetic disks having less of a lifespan, are also why the cost of a disk in 2000 was pocket change compared to what you'd pay in 1980.

Silly question: Aside from either "redrawing everything from scratch" or "haul out original high res art assets and use them without compression", exactly what would one expect to do to 'remaster' visuals that wouldn't involve some form of machine assistance?

Intellectual Property Law is, or at least is supposed to be, a two-way street. The public provides the creator with a legally-enforced monopoly for a limited time; the creator in turn provides the public with a creative work. Until such time as there is real meaningful reform in IP law ( ex: "use it or lose it" requirements on copyright, compulsory archiving towards public domain ), some degree of piracy is the least-bad solution to the problem. Because, to put it bluntly, IP being a one-way street, where creators benefit from the effort of the public in granting and enforcing rights, but do not actually provide their work to the public? Not acceptable.

( And this remains true, even though probably the majority of people loudly espousing "preservation!" are hypocrites using it as camouflage and rationalization. )

@sbeng135

The thing is, "simulation" is itself a video game genre term. . . and it refers to very different types of games than "immersive sim". Microsoft Flight Sim and Deus Ex are not anywhere near each other in genrespace, to put it mildly. Don't fall into the trap of trying to interpret genre labels by looking for the meaning of individual words composing said labels.

The real problem with "immersive sim" is that it overlaps with a lot of other genre labels, moreso than average. This doesn't make it useless as a label, but it does mean that you need to pay a lot more attention to the other genre descriptors. Thief and Deus Ex may both rightfully be part of the "immersive sim" region, but are otherwise very different games.

@Vyse_the_Legend

Also, its much more healthy to produce a diverse library than only a single thing. . . and to invest your budget into said diverse library rather than throwing it all onto a single stack on the misguided idea that adding 10% more budget to a game will produce 10% more sales.

Sure, you prioritize the more successful projects. . . but too many publishers believe that if ( ex ) Call of Duty is their most profitable series, the best way to gain a return on investment is to put your entire budget into Call of Duty. When in reality doubling the budget of an already "fully funded" game almost certainly won't double its sales, because spending money does not magically produce more interested customers. It likely has no real impact at all past a certain point.

@Count_of_Monte_Fisto

Related to this, in my experience virtually all "friendly local game stores" don't just have retail shelves to sell RPGs and cards and miniatures- they have table space and event boards, with which they encourage events and a sense of community. This has allowed establishments to survive and prosper when other small stores didn't, because their community supported them even through tough times.

I suspect that video game stores, even corporate ones like Gamestop, could have leveraged a similar philosophy. Have some table space, maybe a rotating selection of hardware and games to try out ( verging on a mini arcade ), encourage holding small events like local tournaments and contests. Make Gamestop a place people wanted to be, not just a store to pass through. It would have even helped if they had to transition towards more merch and less used games. Its just. . . this would require actually sacrificing quarterly profits in the name of long term health, and most corporate execs have zero interest in the long term.

( Which is why I think the best reforms would be ones which tied top executives more thoroughly to their company, so as to force them to consider the long term, because if the company goes down, they go down with the ship. Fewer golden parachutes, more golden anchors. )

@Sketcz

I've long felt there is a demographic within the hobby that is resentful of games being a form of storytelling, in the first place. Its like their ideal is an abstract plotless boardgame, chess with less plot. Or at least that they suffer from media illiteracy and don't realize all the ways storytelling can manifest in a video game ( and and that some of those ways they actively like, they just don't call them storytelling ).

@Peteykins

I suspect its a mix of two things:

1. Avoiding a list of deadly mistakes, in particular "not having enough funds to allow for ramp up time". Less things you do, and more things you need to not do.

2. Luck. Even a business that makes no mistakes still needs to catch an audience, gain attention, and inspire repeat business. And that is heavily influenced by factors out of your control.

@Martin_H

I would say the key issue isn't achievements, per se, its public-facing achievement systems. Lots of games have lists of tasks and goals, of varying quality and varying contribution to the experience of the game itself. When consoles make mandatory public systems, however? It immediately pushes the experience towards being what is effectively a competitive high score chase, only with scores even more disconnected from the actual game experience than normal. This encourages all kinds of bad habits in both designers and players.

Basically, Nintendo has it right: "You can put whatever goals you want in a game, but we aren't going to mandate it and we aren't going to broadcast it. People should play games, to play games. Not to make a public number go up."

@Blast16

Yeah. There is value to photorealism, but probably 90% of the time, game developers/publishers simply use photorealism as an easy and reliable substitute for "actual good art design".

( Note that I said "easy and reliable", not cheap. Photorealism is very expensive, but you can be fairly certain that if you plug in X million dollars worth of man-hours of labor, you will get Y amount of photorealistic visuals. They might be boring or ugly, but they will be photorealistic! Whereas stylized graphics and actual art direction may be far cheaper, but are dependent on the actual quality of your art team and their creative vision. Execs hate "we don't know whether the result will be good, or whether people will want it even if it is good". )

@Sketcz

While Falcom did ultimately buy a couple Geofront translations ( with NISA kind of hiring their key workers ), that's a really rare move. And for a reason: most fan translation projects, even big professional grade ones, don't have clean and simple IP ownership. Their isn't some singular person a company could go to and say "We want to buy your work", because its not the work of one person.

@Scollurio

More importantly, at least on a ruthless pragmatism level: generative AI may be able to create "something", but it can't create the things those execs actually need to make in order to offer their product for sale. At least for the executives of studios which aren't already shovelware houses, that already deal in "doesn't need to be good". If you aren't aspiring to be a business that views Kemco and Compile Heart as high end competitors? AI is at best an overhyped tool with marginal uses, not a magic "free instant content" button.

@gingerbeardman

Probably because Valve, amongst others, have realized that policies for handling AI can't operate on protest placard-board logic. They need actual rigorous definition about what activity they are trying to examine and regulate. And if they want these policies to matter, they need to be reasonable, and not "if honestly applied everyone will be violating them".

@smoreon @Sketcz

Yeah. In most cases I'd attribute this kind of "shutter a profitable operation" as a misunderstanding of opportunity cost. An exec imagines that budget funneled into a different project would bring in much greater profit, thus they should kill one project to reshuffle the funds. Which can be valid, but depends on an honest and accurate evaluation of whether that would actually happen. Too many publishers think that if ( say ) Call of Duty makes the highest percent profit, than dumping All The Money into COD will produce the highest return. . . . when in actuality, adding more money to an operation does not necessarily increase revenue linearly, or at all. Doubly the budget of Call of Duty doesn't double the number of people interested in buying it, etc.

In this case, though? Sure, the magazine was currently turning a profit, but I bet they predicted that this would change, likely within a single month. That 22nd issue was probably already approved largely as a generousity.

@heligo

They aren't really even remakes. They are ground up new games, that just happen to share part of a story bible/premise sheet. Just like how Super Castlevania 4 isn't a "remake" of Castlevania 1.

Note, this is not intrinsically a bad thing. You can do some really worthwhile and interesting things by going back to the pitch sheet and starting over from scratch ( see: various Falcom games like Oath in Felghana or Trails in the Sky 1st ). However, I kind of hate the way the FF7 "Remake" especially has distorted the conversation about remakes, where any game which isn't trying to be completely different than the original is somehow lesser.

I would actually agree that the PSP was a failure. However, it wasn't a failure by any intrinsic quality on its own part, including its sales. Its a failure because Sony decided it was a failure, due to some combination of "We aren't interested in anything other than Immediate Final Victory over Nintendo" and "We don't actually want to succeed in the handheld space if it means having to actually make and support handheld gaming".

If the PSP were made by a more pragmatic company, it would have been a huge success. "For the first time ever, someone actually challenged Nintendo's handheld monopoly! And with a distinct sales premise that leverages your own established catalog!" But even the best product concept can't succeed in the face of indifference and hostility by the very company trying to sell it.

. . . sequels should be cheaper than the original, all else being equal. Because you've already done a huge amount of the work, building a codebase and set of creative assets. The entire "we should throw everything out and start from scratch every time" mindset is a big part of what is generally screwing over the medium.

@h3s

My own theory is that its not actually about "middle vs working" for the most part. After all, lots of high paying jobs that absolutely put you in the middle class, like all the skilled trades, also have not traditionally gotten much respect. I think it has more to do with certain jobs being viewed as "sacrosanct": working in artistic fields viewed as elevated and praised and important, even when the pay is utter crap. Consider the glorified icon of the Starving Artist. Generative AI is thus "bad", not because its taking away jobs, or even taking away higher paying jobs that are "supposed to be" safe. Its "bad", because it cracks the mystique that participating in "art" automatically makes you a superior person, a secular priest participating in a holy calling.

@Bakamoichigei

I put a lot of the blame on the fact that the tech market largely exists in an ecosystem that is entirely artificial and created. That's allowed a whole lot of theoretically-smart people to think they had way more understanding and control of the world than they do. . . because they had been operating the entire time in a system that was the equivalent of "a spherical cow on a frictionless plane". Hence why "techbros" tend to run into all kinds of problems when they try to move beyond that entirely artificial environment, and solve problems that exist in the larger world that isn't designed by humans, and isn't obliged to be simple or intuitive for humans to understand.

@gojiguy

Hey now, they also occasionally allow arcade titles to escape. Its just their non-Genesis console titles that they seem to actively hate and want to vanish into the memory hole.

@Razieluigi

My suspicion? its less the "taking jobs" part that angers them, so much as the "immigrants" part. Jobs being lost is fine by them, as long as its not leading to money and social status going to the "wrong" ( read: non-white ) people.

single person in the back row tries and fails to clap enthusiastically

I mean, I love FF9. Its debatably my favorite FF game. Doesn't change that a music album is pretty close to the lowest effort "Hey we are doing something!" action S-E could take. Better than a gacha collab, but only just.

@Bakamoichigei

I think I'd expand upon that: the big problem is people trying to apply AI to challenges that are poorly suited for being solved by AI, because the things that AI actually can do well and efficiently aren't profitable or "sexy" enough to entice the gigantic capital investment. Art AI could certainly generate near infinite amounts of placeholder/alpha quality visual assets, for instance. However, since no one is going to make a fortune with a quicker, better source for placeholder art? They instead promote it as being totally able to produce AAA final release grade art "any day now". And thus that gets the investor dollars, even though it is at best only true with so many asterisks attached as to be moot. Presumably the salespeople are hoping to disappear with the cash before everyone finally admits that they spent billions on a tech that only slightly reduces the total man-hour-dollars needed to produce something.

@mouthwash

The issue is less that it closed, or even that it closed unexpectedly. Its that it closed, without any official notice or statement.

While this almost certainly was nothing more than water cooler spitballing at absolute most. . . I kind of could see it working. After all, Capcom made puzzle games out of their fighters, and IIRC so did SNK. The precedent is there. The big issue, I suspect, is whether the western fanbase ( or developers ) would be willing to accept the intrinsic parody this would involve; versus being outraged at their definitely-serious games being mocked.

Silly question: does anyone know why Dungeon Master is not currently available for sale, even on GOG?

My theory: the inevitable copyright takedowns are not a tragic outcome, they are part of the plan. Its an intended part of the theater, whether for the personal ego-boost of being "oppressed by the man" or else as a cynical marketing move that earns them far more headlines and eyeballs.