Zimzala

The fact that you actually think this is true is the fun part! The game is at best occasionally influenced by it's consumers. The fact DE has gotten people to think the userbase 'assists' in the way you imply is a PR win, that's for sure. The fact that you think I am a sock puppet for some other account is really funny, as it seems to be your 'go-to' accusation lately for anyone that decides to disagree, over calling them dumb or irrational. Anything you can post that you think will undermine the words of another poster seem to be fair game for you. It's transparent. For grins, what's you conspiracy theory here? In the words of Jackie Chan, "Who Am I?" 🤣 Good luck with those windmills, Dr. Video Game! Ideas at this point in human evolution are pretty much all recycled. Every new generation of humans thinks they invented everything, just part of the human condition. Video games, like all entertainment, just cannibalize and recycle the same formulas, this is not some big secret or revelation, it's just the state of the world. If you think trying to tell me that since I have not played all videos games that I am therefore not allowed to make this observation, I'll just be over here laughing some more. Take Soulframe for example. Just like it's predecessors, there are things like enemies to fight, stats to tweak and loot to acquire. There will be a story, attack mechanics, some form of advancement. The only question is, when the recycled ideas are mixed together, will it blend? Will is be a delicious milkshake, or will it be some abomination of anchovies and pineapple pizza? That's all that matters, is how the recycled ideas are put together. Since some people are lactose intolerant but love pineapple and anchovies, while I love milkshakes, no one will be 'right' or 'wrong' about their opinions on if the recycled elements blend well. Somewhere, someone will make it their life's work to tear the game apart, into tiny pieces they can then hold up as 'slaps in the face', because of some number being .0001% less than another. It's as inevitable as it hilarious and sad as it's already happening before the game has even arrived. I am hopeful DE has another successful hit with Soulframe. Perhaps they can even convince it's early players they helped improve it when it's 10 years old! 🤣

Take your own advice. You have no clue as to who I am or what I know, any more than I know you or what you know, yet at most every turn, you claim superiority in knowledge, it's hilariously hypocritical. You and your outlooks and experiences are not anything with which to use to measure others, either, with your assumptive talk about 'challenge', for example. It just shows your passive-aggressive attempts to claim what you prefer is more 'challenging', vindicate your outlook. It's hilariously transparent. The phrase I used was, specific - "armchair developer critics", not "armchair developers". You can try and wiggle out of that moniker all you like, but from my POV it's dead-accurate, or you would not have piped up about it. 🤣 Unless, of course, you get paid by someone for all the critiques you post here? You are, as you acknowledge, just another consumer of the product with no control over it's direction that has decided to act like a critic, thinking you can 'save' us with your wisdom. Unless you get paid to do that, you are just another armchair developer critic, professionals get paid. You even love to point out to others that this is not a place to be perfect with language and specifics, because it's not a Job or an Exam, yet you love to nit-pick. So easily triggered into hypocrisy. Let me know when you become a Doctor of Video Game Company Management so you can talk about it. 😉 As I have stated, many times, I know you won't shut up about it, and water makes things wet, you are who your are, I have used your posts here as a meme-level example on several occasions now. Please, carry on! On topic, I will continue to watch and see if Soulframe is a fun game for me to play, just as I pick up Warframe when I like. Not having played any of the 'souls' games and having a memory much longer then their existence, I will still judge Soulframe on it's own ability to entertain me an nothing more, just as I do all games., as all of them just recycle anyway. Happy Gaming.

I agree with this outlook. I think the entire idea of playing a game because it's the 'lesser evil' is irrational and negatively impacts mental fitness. If there are no games I want to play, then I do something else, I don't pick the game I dislike the least - it's not a Job, it's a way to spend leisure time. For example, I played Horizon Zero Dawn for about 45 minutes and uninstalled. Same with so many other other games the 'masses' seem to love, I find no entertainment in them, just chore-based gameplay and punishment for not doing the chores in the right way. That does not make me think, "oh I need to go tell HZD players they are doing it wrong", it just makes me realize I should find a different game. It does not make me think I need to take the developer of the game "to task" in some mis-guided attempt to parent a game company or it's players. Games are for Entertainment. It's true that some people like to be punished as entertainment. It's true that some people like learning "square dancing" routines to defeat bosses as entertainment. Both of those gaming aspects hold no entertainment for me, personally, nor do I need others to tell me what I 'should' and 'should not' accept in games as acceptable entertainment, I can do that on my own without nit-picking the tiny details of a game looking for something to 'ding' the developer about in some attempt to make myself seem smarter than the community. The armchair developer critics come and go, thinking they are saving teh world, when, in fact, they are simply wasting time they could be spending doing things other than acting like they are martyring themselves by playing 'bad' games to "save the gaming world" from itself. Much of this is just human nature based, the individuals to whom I refer can change their brain chemistry no more than I can - they are who they are, they do what they do - just I as I am who I am do what I do - the Internet is powered by Hate and Angst of gamers IME.

I resemble that remark! 🤣

Just doing my part! Another good visual for me as I read many of the arguments:

We are all human and therefor subject to confirmation bias...so the reality is somewhere between what I think and what you think most likely, from our divergent experiences and our personal lenses. On a side note, it helps me to read almost all forum posts in the voice of the classic "leave Brittainy alone" video...

Nailed it!

*insert 'first time?' meme* IME of being on gaming forums since around '99, this 'community' is no different than any other one based around 'shooty' games and min-maxing. There are people that like it, people that do not like but still play it, people that hate it and just post about it to get others to stop playing it, people that like it X months a year and hate it Y months a year at the same time, people that say they love the game but post nothing but negative diatribes about it, people like me that shoot rubber bands at the complainers because I think it's funny to make them angry over a video game, etc., because it's just another subset of humans, who come in many flavors. None of this has changed since game forums have existed, IME. The love, angst, and hate posted here is just people wailing in Times Square, it has no real meaning or bearing on ones life - it's just noise - just like any public forum on the Internet. While there are those that think they are 'saving the game' or 'saving the players of the game' and other such nonsense all the time, in the end, it's just humans ranting about things they are (un)happy they are powerless to change, be it the game or the other posters outlooks and opinions...just noise. Even though I frequent many game forums, this is why I solo in all games, unless I have a RL friend that plays the same game, because I would prefer to avoid so much noise when trying to actually play the game. Happy Gaming.

Many here don't play Horizon Zero Dawn or care about it at all, yet you won't shut up about it, but no one else is allowed to do the same? You seem to actually think everyone here has to agree with your opinions as objective fact and at the same time try to claim anyone talking about anything you don't agree with with is objectively wrong. You jump right to claims of emotional tirades over not liking what you say about WF, to having emotional tirades over your opinions not being accepted as objective facts. Are you even listening to yourself? It's transparent, sophomoric, and to use one of your favorite descriptors of the ideas and outlooks of others, 'dumb'. I know you won't stop, and that's awesome, because I still get a good laugh with my morning coffee. We get it. WF is inferior in your mind to our favorite game(s). So what? Happy Gaming.

I totally get that you are trying to make things better, in your own way. I totally agree that some option of allowing WF end users to create 'servers' of some kind as an option to clear up potential peer-to-peer issues _might_ work. However... This continued idea that approaching game companies using the same tactics as a social justice war as if the game is created by the community, like a society, is a totally illogical dead-end. If you like parts of the game, play them more, if you don't like other parts of the game, play them less - DE uses the statistics from our playtime to determine what works and what does not work - not the social justice war being fought on the forums, YouTube, Twitter, and Reddit. This continually perpetuated idea that the players shape the game, simply because the developers are smart enough to make it look like some of the player ideas have been added to the game, does not mean the community shapes the game, it just means that DE listens now and again to a good idea, or already had the idea and the community gets to pat itself on the back as if they 'changed things'. False hope of this kind is far, far more cruel to the player base than any change DE could make. If you want changes, great, ask for changes. But this idea that the community can change the game through mob rule with social justice tactics is just untenable, especially when, as you can already see here, the 'community' is _not_ a hivemind and has wildly different ideas on what is good or bad for the game. Why 'cry out' over things that you have no control over, in a video game, rather than accepting the game for what it is and getting the most out if it? Accepting reality is not laying down and dying, that is a seriously f-uped POV. This is not a country or society to be guilted into making big changes, it's just a video game, played by so many different types of people that the entire idea of a 'united front' is impossible and illogical.

I think it would 'best' if you would take the time to understand you don't get to dictate how others communicate or respond to, well, anything. If people agree with me, great, if not, great, I will continue to call out BS as I see it, regardless of which 'side' you choose. I am telling one specific poster that they are hypocritically tying to act like they are doing nothing more than giving valid feedback, when in fact said poster attacks and trolls all the time...you can agree or not, your choice, I made mine...which will not be based on the made-up 'honor' system of a video game character. I have seen this poster blatantly lie about attacking others and the devs, in some effort to act as if they are 'just stating facts', and I comment on it...said poster hates it when they get called out on their BS, as always. The funny part is that yet again, I am watching a poster trying to gaslight me into thinking I am 'upset' or 'bad' for calling out the blatant BS that I see... So, if you think my comments are 'offensive', report them. Otherwise, all you are doing is, as I stated, trying to gaslight me. I continue to enjoy that DE tries new things and I will continue to laugh at the armchair-wanna-be-developers who think they can do better, when they have nothing to show us to prove that. Happy Gaming.

No points missed. You are somehow so upset that you feel the need to go onto an online forum and berate the players that enjoy the game, with gaslighting and passive-aggressive attacks on their 'integrity as gamers for accepting reality', and yet also think that anyone that disagrees is somehow attacking your rights to feel and think what you like, so they should be attacked as if they are not allowed to post what they like. My choices are to cry or to laugh at the absurdity. I choose to laugh as much as I can, and you provide a lot of entertainment, even if these forums are more pleasant when you are not posting. Your entire schtick of 'karen-ing' DE is hilarious, if still a little sad. Your attempts to look and sound 'reasonable' since you have lately decided to post a positive note here and there as if it balances out all of the other negative things you spout are just as hilarious from my POV, as if a few kind words 'make it all ok'. So, no points missed - you think DE is not 'up to your exacting specifications' and you feel the constant need to remind others of that - it's freaking hilarious that you can do that and while still trying and convince everyone you are the 'cool kid' and get more validation from the other arm-chair critics. I give my POV, you attack me and call me a troll, and I laugh at you - this is our online relationship - it's very entertaining. You are welcome! HAHAHAHAHAHA!!

Defensive much? Seems like I struck a nerve. I have never said anyone does not a a 'right' to post anything they like, just that some of what I see posted is hilariously illogical. I am crying laughing at what some people post and sharing in that humor and reflection. If you enjoy posting breathless critiques of the work of others as if you could do better, when you can show us nothing you have accomplished, beyond criticizing the work of others...no one stops you. You can imply all day long my standards are somehow inferior to yours, and I will continue to laugh at your antics. You are so desperate for validation and attention it's kind of sad, really, but I will keep laughing. Happy Gaming.

It's impossible to reason with people that equate Critical Thinking with Criticism in my experience. A few posters here think 'to be critical of the game' is the equivalent of academic level Critical Thinking. The mere fact that they don't like things and can be critical of them makes them think they are big brained. It's sad and funny to me.