A Novel Experience

ELIZA is the name of a natural language processing computer program designed in the 1960s.  It was pretty limited in what it could do, and by modern standards it would be considered little more than a "chatbot".  Even so, the program drew out a surprisingly strong emotional response in some people at the time such that they would confide personal thoughts and feelings to it.  That feature of the program is what partially inspired the indie visual novel Eliza.  

Despite sharing the same name, the fictional "Eliza" program in the game is a far more advanced AI-driven piece of software.  Set in Seattle, Eliza is being commercialized as a more affordable alternative to a professional therapist.  I'm sure some people will already be picking up on the dystopian themes here.  It's certainly true that the visual novel parallels Ursula K. LeGuin's "Lathe of Heaven" or even a William Gibson novel (particularly something out of his Blue Ant trilogy) in places.  The protagonist of Eliza is a thirty-something half Japanese, half British woman named Evelyn.  She was (before the start of the game) one of several coders who developed the Eliza program, but dropped out about three years ago due to the untimely death of a colleague.  For reasons not elaborated on until the end of the game, Evelyn has decided to return from her self-imposed exile and start working for an Eliza clinic as a "proxy".  What is a proxy?  Well, they're basically pseudo-therapists in that they simply parrot whatever Eliza prompts them to say in order to create the calming illusion of human interaction.  It's actually the game's fundamental premise (and is an interesting one), but also makes the early parts of the game painfully linear.  

From here, Eliza dives into its cast of characters.  Some are Evelyn's former co-workers while others are her patients.  Generally speaking, this is where the game really shines.  The characters are well written and have very relatable problems, fears and desires.  It's hard not to empathize with most of them on some level.  I was also very glad to see how the game portrays people with mental health problems.  Based on my own (somewhat limited) experience in the field, the origin of things like depression and anxiety can come from either social troubles or biological ones.  The thing is these two are like each side of the same coin.  Which one of them starts the problem isn't all that important because this cruel duo will work hand in hand to drive a person down into a cycle of misery with unsettling synergy.  Some people are able to climb back to some form of normalcy, but others find themselves trapped and unable to find a way out of their horrible circumstances.  Of course, this is where a good therapist can help...sadly, the Eliza program really isn't up to the task.  That's not to say it's useless...its just that over the course of the game its limitations really start to show.

Speaking of limitations, I often find that my enjoyment of visual novels depends heavily on whether or not my decisions matter.  In the case of Eliza, there aren't a whole lot to make until the very end.  The game really emphasizes the "novel" part of visual novel, though to be fair the visuals are quite good too.  Characters are extremely well drawn, and there's a consistency to it all that these kind of games sometimes lack.  Sound effects are almost non-existent, but the music does a decent job of setting the mood.  I picked up Eliza as part of the "Steam Visual Novel Fest" and as such am quite happy with it considering the amount I paid for it.  At it's suggested retail price though, I would have been underwhelmed.  Regardless, it's a thought-provoking game and definitely one that offers a wide range of perspectives on AI and mental health.  So, if that's the sort of thing you're interested in, by all means give Eliza a try.

Pricey Propositions

A little over a year ago I tried to gift a game through Steam to a family member for their birthday.  Unfortunately, Steam rejected the transaction because we weren't living in the same country.  I actually submitted a troubleshooting request hoping to navigate around the obstacle, but the customer support representative basically told me to give a gift card or forget it.  I didn't want to give a gift card because it's the thought that counts (getting someone something they didn't even know they wanted).  The expense wasn't an issue.  So, with a heavy heart, I had to give up on the present idea even though it wasn't this way before.  I had used the same system to give games on previous birthdays.  So, what changed?  Steam, in their infinite wisdom, decided to introduce regional pricing.

Basically, regional pricing is a way to sell games in countries that are generally too poor to purchase them at their suggested retail value.  To give an example, a hot new release might go for 60 dollars in the USA, but in Argentina it could be quarter of that price or less (when comparing currency conversion rates).  The reasoning here being that the average income in Argentina is much lower than in America.  So, on paper this is a method which can net some extra sales and a bit more profit than would otherwise be possible when using a universal pricing strategy.  It's by no means a new concept even in the video game industry.  The Final Fantasy series has notoriously always been slightly more expensive in Japan than other regions.  Of course that started off in a world where everything was physical media.  Now, in this age of digital distribution, there's a big 3-letter problem with this business strategy - VPN.

Provided you have a Virtual Private Network client, it's not especially hard to purchase games in cheaper territories without living in (or even visiting) them.  In other words, regional pricing is great in theory (publishers and Valve Corporation get to make more money while people in poorer countries get to play games that would normally be too expensive for them to afford).  However, in practice it's easily exploited and abused.  Recently, publishers on Steam have been drifting back to the old system which, in turn, has led to a lot of finger pointing on social media with statements that can be summed up as one of the following:

• It's those cheating digital boarder hoppers that ruined things!
• It's the fault of the governments of those poorer countries for not getting a handle on inflation!
• It's the greedy publishers who are to blame!

You get the idea.  In truth, all three groups are being terrible in their own ways, but I'd like to single out publishers for a moment because of what I see as a fundamental flaw in their reasoning.  Someone who jumps through a bunch of hoops to get a game for cheaper might not have bought the game at all if it were only available for purchase at a higher price.  It's very much an extension of corporate views on internet piracy.  Just in case anyone needs a reminder, an illegal download of a game doesn't necessarily equate to a lost sale.  There are plenty of games people pass on that they would have played had the price been a lot cheaper (or free).  When it comes to enthusiasts of this hobby of ours many have free time aplenty, but not a whole lot of cash to burn.  I can see how this regional pricing exploit was one way to stretch an otherwise limited gaming budget.  Alternatively, it's possible that most corporations are well aware of all this and simply don't care.  Maximizing profits is the ironclad mandate by which they chose to function...right down to exploiting cheaper labor markets to reduce development costs...funny how it's okay if they do it, but unacceptable if anyone else does.  Oh well, maybe I'll at least be able gift games digitally again some day.        

Prologue

If you haven't tried it already, go to the Steam store page and type "prologue" into the search engine.  You will get a long list of games that can be played for free.  Most of them are not very good, but a few might appeal to you if you have a particular interest in what might be an underserved niche.  Two examples that come to mind are Alder's Blood: Prologue (a horror themed strategy/tactics RPG) and Empty Shell: Prologue (a game that feels like GTFO, but plays like Teleglitch).  They are demo games at heart, but not every free game falls into the category of a sample that is trying to rope you into buying the real product.  In fact, there are a number of completely free-of-charge video games on Steam (as well as other online software distribution stores) that aren't covertly trying to get you to spend money. 

The oddly named Buriedbornes is one such example.  It's basically a dungeon crawling RPG with a somewhat Dark/Demon's Souls vibe to it.  The art is static, but well drawn and it has all the fundamental mechanics you'd expect from a game of this type.  The only complaint I have with it is a persistent online requirement despite being a single-player game.  Normally, that wouldn't be an issue for me except that if the servers are down then you can't play.  I guess that's the real price you pay for this free game.  

Another game that got special mention on the "Three Moves Ahead" end-of-year-discussion podcast was Ardor.  It's a very small, tightly designed turn-based strategy game.  At first glance, it has a chess-like feel to it.  Upon further examination though major differences start to become apparent; hexes instead of squares, only one player-controlled playing piece, and a deck-builder card mechanic instead of a simple "I go, you go" approach.  The ability to unlock new cards and upgrade already acquired cards after each level is neat, and keeps Ardor from becoming an overly linear experience.  Even so, it does have a handy "revert back to the beginning of the turn" button - a very nice feature to have in the event that you miscalculated something important.

On the less analytical side of things, there are some nice free games out there as well.  Take the VR-supported game Dagon, for example.  It is an accurate retelling of the H.P. Lovecraft story of the same name.  Player input is minimal, but the narrator and environmental design do an excellent job of setting the mood for this horror tale.  

Speaking of horror, the Faith Demo is not actually a demo.  It's the first entry in a trilogy of games.  The graphics and sound are very retro (I mean we are talking Apple II retro here).  Despite the simple presentation, the game is actually pretty darn scary thanks to some well crafted tension building scenes.  The overall ambience is surprisingly good too.       

First released on Steam way back in 2014, NaissanceE is a walking sim, but not just any walking sim.  The environments in this game are positively intimidating in terms of size and scale.  It is almost as if the game is deliberately designed to make you megalophobic.  Thankfully, there isn't anything in the game that is out to cause you harm other than plain old gravity, so exploration and discovery are really what this game is all about. 

There are a number of other games I could cover such as the beautifully stylized Sailing Era with its anime inspired character and scenic 2.5D harbor towns, but I think I've provided enough examples for this blog post.  In general, I think games are too expensive these days.  Thankfully, there are a few good ones that are totally free. 

A Long Drive to Nowhere Special

Currently, I have over 40 games on my Steam Wishlist.  Most are labeled "TBA," "Coming Soon," and "To Be Announced," but one of those games is available for purchase and it's early access.  In additional to that game, I have half-a-dozen other early access titles sitting on my hard drive.  I've bought and played them a bit.  The list includes:

• Satisfactory
• Ultimate Admiral: Dreadnaughts
• ∆V: Rings of Saturn
• Songs of Conquest
• Stoneshard
• Vintage Story

I'm waiting for the full versions to launch because I figure they'll be more enjoyable in their "finished" state.  However, experience has taught me a harsh lesson: sometimes the difference between early access and the final product is disappointingly minimal.  To illustrate my point look no further than Hardspace: Shipbreaker.  It spent over two years in early access and the only real additions were two new classes of ship to dismantle (for a total of 4) and a filament of story delivered entirely through static images and audio clips.  In the case of other lackluster out-of-early-access launches like Kerbal Space Program and Darkest Dungeon, mod support can take up some of the slack, but not all that many games are mod-friendly.

As for games that have yet to be released in any form, I've noticed a troubling tendency for them to sit in development for ridiculously long amounts of time.  Sometimes they quietly disappear via delisting (such as in the case of Eitr and Routine), or eventually do come out in a state that doesn't reflect the amount of time they spent in development.  I get that in some cases the dev team are only working on the game in their spare time or had to abandon the project do to other commitments, but if that is the case why announce the game publicly?  It's clear that they don't have a clue as to when it will be done (if ever).  Just look at my aforementioned Steam Wishlist for a multitude of examples.  There's one title, in particular, I want to highlight and that is Ghost Song...nine years in development and all we got was a mediocre Metroid clone with dull layouts and clunky controls.  The most frustrating thing is there are flecks of greatness tucked into the design.  They're just mostly buried under a mound of blandness.

The last thing I want to touch on in this blog entry is release dates.  I swear the overwhelming majority of game developers couldn't adhere to them if their very lives depended on it.  Sure...they'll shove a buggy mess out the door on time, but actually delivering a fully functional running-as-intended game on the date they oftentimes set for themselves seems neigh impossible for them to do.  I can only theorize that programmers refuse to take planning seriously.  They must just start coding and hope that the fun will materialize out of some vague thoughts and half-considered ideas.  Its absurd and leads to crunch, burnout, hard to fix bugs, cut content and delays. Of course, developers love to give excuses like "making games is hard" or "no one sets out wanting to make a bad game."  All I can say in reply is if they really felt that way more of them would make greater efforts to execute on a thorough plan without overscoping.

No Signal

Do you love anime?  Are you chronically depressed?  Well, I have the video game for you!  It's called Signalis.

As a fan of that storytelling niche wherein sci-fi and horror meet, one would think Signalis is a perfect fit for me.  Yet, for reasons I will try to elaborate on, this indie title completely failed to garner my interest.  It's especially odd considering a similar game that came out less than a month prior, Scorn, was a very enjoyable experience for me.  What could be so different as to divide these two games into the wholly separate categories of "like" and "dislike" in my brain?

Certainly the visual differences are one thing.  Signalis is very anime inspired, so much so it's fairly easy to spot the influences - "Ghost in the Shell", "Blame!" and "Evangelion" being the most obvious examples.  While there are some first-person sections, the majority of the game is played from a fixed isometric perspective.  It's a rather baffling choice given that every entity and object is 3D rendered.  Why not use more dynamic camera placement and movement like the classic survival horror games Signalis seeks to emulate?

One comment I read recently online criticized Signalis for being too much like a Silent Hill cover band; not a homage, so much as a direct copy.  There is most definitely a lot of Silent Hill baked into the game, but some Resident Evil is sprinkled in too.  A strict six item inventory limit and pocket-dimension storage containers are the most obvious examples, but torching corpses to prevent revival (as well as some puzzles) harken directly back to the RE1 remake.  The thing is Silent Hill and Resident Evil are two great flavors that don't really go well together despite both being popular entries in the survival horror subgenre.

Compounding the problem is a strange decision on the part of the developers to make basic utility items like the flashlight and camera take up inventory slots, not to mention some weirdly restrictive limits on ammo stacking.  Other issues include difficult to trigger (or outright hidden) interaction prompts, and an overly obtuse plot.  Just to clarify, I'm not against unconventional forms of storytelling.  However, I do feel like a player should have a through line to latch onto provided they take notice of the broad strokes.  Signalis doesn't do this though, choosing instead to dump a bunch of misleading thematic elements into a chronological/POV blender.

Despite all those criticisms, the game seems to have been received well on Steam in addition to more official review outlets.  Honestly, it makes me wonder if I'm missing something fundamental.  Maybe it's just the overall vibe that people find appealing...and since my answer to the first two questions asked at the beginning of this blog post are "no", I can only conclude that I must not be tuned into the frequency this game is broadcasting on.  

Dull Demos

As mentioned in the previous blogpost, Fabular was an enjoyable demo.  There were, however, a bunch of other demos I tried out along with that one.  Regrettably, they were not much fun to play.  Even so, I do want to share my thoughts on four of them here. 

SIGNALIS is a game that I wrote about awhile back.  At the time I was critical of the game for appearing very derivative.  Certainly, there are some attempts at stylistic flourish such as the stairs leading into an underground complex...but after playing the demo I still can't help feeling that I've seen most of this before.  The interior environments look very similar to the ones in the film "Alien" and the enemies are basically copied from Silent Hill.  Heck, there's even a radio that makes weird noises.  Granted, all this would be fine by me if the gameplay were good.  Unfortunately, foes are very bullet spongy and there really isn't any visual feedback (like in Dead Space or Mark of Kri) to indicate the effectiveness of your attacks.  Also, I'm not really sure what the point is of having first-person scenes in which the only thing the player can do is tap the button to move forward.

Conscript is another game that suffers from enemies that soak up bullets.  Set in World War I, players take the role of a French soldier stationed along the trenches of the western front.  It's an interesting setting, but the combat is more comical than intense.  German troops are tough and often attack using melee weapons such as entrenching tools.  Since the player quickly acquires a bold action rifle, the fights result in something that goes like this: 

1. Aim
2. Shoot
3. Run away 
4. Reload
5. Run away again
6. Back to step one

All that's missing is some Yakety Sax music. It's clunky despite some attempts to mix things up with exploding barrels.  At one point I brought ammo to a fellow machine gun crew, but they didn't actually help out.  Eventually, I ran out of rifle rounds and had to switch to my bayonet...which pretty much utilized the same five steps as listed above.  On the plus side, I did like that defeated enemies would sometimes writhe on the ground incapacitated rather than simply die outright.  It seemed like an appropriate fit for the horror aspects of the game.

Ghost Song is the game that has sat on my Steam whish list page the longest.  Having finally played the demo though, I can't say it was worth the wait.  It's basically a Metroid clone, but differentiates itself by having some light RPG elements.  My biggest gripe with the demo is a lack of mouse support, particularly when it comes to aiming.  I guess they wanted players to use a controller.  Hotkeys were another issue since they were not remappable, and in some cases not listed in the options menu (despite being mentioned in the tutorial).  At one point, I forgot which key it was to heal and was forced to simple press keyboard buttons at random until I chanced upon it.  Conversely, I did remember an option to switch between weapon types using the "F" and "G" keys...but didn't seem to work.  That may have been due to some kind of misunderstanding on my part.  Regardless, the interface is a bit rough.

Land Above Sea Below is, as far as I can gather, supposed to be one of those relaxing hexagonal puzzle games like Dorfromantik or Spring Falls.  The soft music and idyllic visuals definitely try to set a relaxing mood.  There's also no timer so the player can proceed at their leisure.  In direct contrast to that though is the game's central mechanic.  As the player places tiles, the surrounding water level rises.  The only way to prevent this aquatic doom is to place similarly themed tiles adjacent to each other.  This will raise their height.  However, new titles cannot be placed over submerged ones.  Worse still, if the player's starting tile gets flooded then it is game over.  Perhaps the developers were trying to create a meta-commentary about humanity's generally laissez fare attitude toward global warming and rising sea levels?  Regardless, the game seems to be actively working against itself, by having these two mutually exclusive elements active at the same time. 

Overall, I feel bad writing this.  I am well aware that these games are made by indie devs who have very little to work with in terms of resources, and as such should managed my expectations accordingly.  Still, I sincerely hope that they give their games a second pass in terms of design, before considering them ready for launch.  With some changes to systems any or all of these four demos could have been spectacular.  As is though they were hampered by some questionable mechanics. 

Update Pending...

A common complaint about buying early access games is you don't know ultimately what you're going to get.  This is certainly the case with Hardspace: Shipbreaker, a game that most people thought would eventually feature a wide variety of spacecraft to dismantle.  Counter to that expectation though, the full version of the game ended up focusing on the storytelling aspects of the game.  Don't get me wrong, it's a topical tale that is very relevant to the world we live in today.  Even so, I feel like it was (for me at least) one of the less interesting direction the developers could have gone in...well, it is a finished product for better or worse.  Some early access games have far less certain futures.  So much so, the real question isn't a matter of "what", but "when".

Developer roadmaps are nice because they let the players (current and potential) see what's coming.  The thing they don't show though is when, if ever, those updates are going to materialize.  In some cases it's understandable.  Stoneshard, for example, has some of it's dev team located in Ukraine - obviously not the easiest place to be making a game right now (with the war going on).  Satisfactory, on the other hand, seems to have lost some of it's momentum since the pandemic started in terms of frequency and substance when it comes to updates.  Still other games, such as Dwarf Fortress, have been steadily chipping away at their intended goals for what feels like more than a decade at this point.  Granted, that game will probably never truly be feature complete.  However, there has been a significant push in the last few years to get it in polished up state for it's release on Steam.  Thankfully, Dwarf Fortress is already extremely feature rich, so players have plenty to sink their teeth into while they wait.  For other games though, that's not the case.

Ultimate Admiral: Dreadnaughts is an odd game.  Ostensibly, it's all about modeling surface engagements between opposing warships.  The thing is, surface-only navel warfare ended about the same time HMS Dreadnaught came down the slipway.  Starting around the First World War, submarines and aircraft began to play increasingly important roles in naval combat.  Ultimate Admiral don't model any of that (at least not yet).  As a sandbox simulator for iron-clads and pre-dreadnaughts it works well enough, but it's really weird to have World War 2 era destroyers without any anti-aircraft guns or depth charge racks.  In other words the game has yet to update to the types of warfare it's supposed to simulate.

Lastly, I want to mention a real oddball, ΔV: Rings of Saturn.  As far as 2D space sims go it's alright.  The zero-G physics are accurate and the technology in the game feels appropriately near future in design.  Updates continue to be common and incremental in terms of improvements, but then (seemingly out of nowhere) the developer introduced paid DLC that adds anthropomorphic crew members into the game.  Now, I'm not categorically opposed to this sort of thing...but suffice to say I won't be buying this kind of content either.  It's a weird digression that I can only assume the dev made in order to make some extra money off a certain subset of his player base.  Let's hope we don't see this sort of thing in other games like Darkest Dungeon II.  That game has had enough ups and downs throughout its troubled history as is.

Satis-Factory-Oh

Factory construction sims are a pretty niche genre and yet there are two separate IPs currently in development that fit the definition perfectly.  The first is Factorio.  With a Steam early access release in 2016, this Czechoslovakian title has since become "complete" as of August 2020.  I put complete in quotes because even though the game has passed the version 1.0 mark it remains in active development.  Regardless, I imagine that any new official content will come in the form of paid DLC.  The other title is Satisfactory.  Made by the same developer as Goat Simulator, this game is newer (having launched in early access on the 19th of March, 2019) and is not yet feature complete despite just recently receiving its fourth major update.  Anyway...that little development overview aside, what's different about these two games?  Depending on who you ask, the answer can vary from "not much" to "quite a bit."

On first impression, players will immediately notice Factorio is a 2D sprite-based game viewed from an isometric perspective.  It's highly optimized and runs smoothly even on fairly old hardware.  It's perfectly functional, but not especially pretty to look at.  Satisfactory, on the other hand, utilizes fully three dimensional environments viewed from a first-person perspective.  Everything is more impressive visually, but the GPU demands can lead to performance issues even on newer gaming machines.  This is especially true when the number of objects onscreen get large.  Visuals aside though, what's different when it comes to gameplay?

When beginning a new game, Factorio allows the player to specify what kind of world the procedural generator should create.  It's a nice feature to have, but only really makes changes to topography and resource distribution.  Regardless of the settings, the player will find themselves in a relatively flat, arid location with patches of trees, water and minerals.  Conversely, Satisfactory has four biomes to choose from at the beginning, each with their own distinct qualities.  While a more exciting way to start off, it's important to note that there is only one handcrafted world - the player simply chooses where they get dropped into.  Given it's 3D nature, Satisfactory is much more vertically oriented.  Exploration is also a more prominent feature.  To Factorio's credit though, it has one major feature that is absent in Satisfactory - base defense.

Both games feature hostile fauna on their respective alien worlds, but Factorio takes it to another level.  Specifically, there are hostile colonies of giant insects that will encroach on and attack the player's base(s).  Apparently, these bugs really hate pollution and will seek to destroy anything that does not conform to nature.  Of course, this gameplay feature can be tweaked or outright disabled during world creation.  Nevertheless, it remains a fundamental component of the intended experience.  Everything from laser turrets and artillery pieces to flamethrowers and tanks can be built to deal with external threats.  Conversely, Satisfactory has far fewer weapons and, in general, is a much less intense game.  

I've tried to clarify some of the differences, but when you get down to it both of these titles have resource extractors, smelters, power generators, automation and a whole lot of conveyer belts.  They both take place on exoplanets.  Either can be played multiplayer or alone.  Currently Factorio has a lot of mod support on the developer's website, but there are plans to introduce mods into Satisfactory via Steam Workshop.  If you're wondering which to buy, I would say get both.  Together they cost less than your average triple-AAA title, and you'll probably get more hours of enjoyment out of them as well. 

Recycling in Space

Hardspace: Shipbreaker is a game I purchased when it first became available via early access on Steam.  I played it for a total of about five minutes (just to make sure it ran properly) before setting it aside.  I fully intended to come back to it soon after, but a lot happened between then and now...the good news is I finally got around to clicking on that LYNX corporation icon that has been sitting patiently on my desktop between "Google Chrome" and "Microsoft Edge" for the better part of a year.

At first glance one might think that Hardspace got its inspiration from the blue-collared work experiences found aboard a deep sea oil derrick or logging in some remote northern woodland.  In truth though, nautical shipbreaking is a real thing done mostly in places like India and Pakistan.  It's dangerous mostly due to inadequate safety precautions and gear.  Without going into reports of child labor law violations, it is easy to see why the developers have such cynical take on their sci-fi version of the concept.

Players take the roll of an indentured servant in low-Earth orbit, tasked with the job of dismantling old spaceships for scrap.  Early on, the vessel look similar to corvettes found in Homeworld.  This should come as no surprise given that a number of the developers who work on that series are also making this game.  Visually, it's all very beautiful and the audio complements the environments perfectly.  In addition, the main voice actor has a folksy vibe that goes with the overall theme.  Generally speaking, Hardspace starts off strong, but runs into some trouble pretty quickly down the line.

When it comes to the mechanics of shipbreaking, the game opts for a fairly bog-standard narrated tutorial.  A, W, S, D, shift and spacebar allow movement left, forward, right, down and up respectively.  Because the game takes places in a microgravity environment the player can move in any direction via a reaction control system built into their spacesuit.  Additionally, it is possible to rotate or roll using mouse inputs and the Q/E keys.  "R" brings up a selection wheel consisting primarily of two tools, a grapple and a cutter.  The grapple is basically an energy lasso while the cutter is used to slice up or melt away pieces of metal.  All this is well and good, but there is quite a bit of pertinent information displayed in the HUD and aiming reticle (in particular) that goes unexplained.  I guess players are expected to figure things out as they play, but sometimes it can feel like pertinent information gets left by the wayside.

A good example is the "tethers" subsystem.  They are a secondary function of the grapple tool, but pull like heavy duty wenches.  In other words, they pull things apart just as well as hold them together.  At no point does the game make a distinction between this two very different functions.  Another example is the three kinds of scrap:

• Complex components that go in a barge (green)
• Nanofiber stuff that goes in the processor (blue)
• Alloys that go in the furnace (red)

Sounds straight forward enough...except some objects that look like they go in the barge are actually meant for the player to keep for themselves (such as repair kits and oxygen canisters).  Additionally, the player must be somewhat careful when chucking things into the barge.  If objects collide they can become unsalvageable.  The blue and red recycling systems are less fussy, but also more deadly in that they have a suction effect that will devour anything (including the player character).  The real annoyance though, comes in the form of mixed and matched materials.  While the indicator tied to the reticle might earmark a chunk of spaceship for the processor or incinerator it could be a combination of both which means regardless of which system the object is places in unwanted material will simply be lost.  It's not well explained and, in fact, I learned a lot more from watching Youtube videos than I did from the tutorial.  What more can be said other than this is definitely an early access game? 

On the plus side Hardspace does provide some useful advice on how to avoid accidents such as rapid decompression.  Wrangling reactor cores is a bit weird though in that the countdown warning implies that they need to be moved expeditiously to some kind of overload containment system, but in actuality all the player does is drop them into the barge like any other piece of green salvage.

I have no doubt that the game will eventually iron out most, if not all, of these issues.  As of now though (version 0.3.1), I feel like the roughneck feel of the game is perhaps a bit too authentic.  Still, I'm excited to see what the story is going to be like and how our blue-collared astronaut is going to play off his billion dollar debt.     

The GemCraft Pentalogy

While not as popular as other tower defense games, such as Kingdom Rush or Plants vs. Zombies, I've always had a soft spot for the GemCraft series because of its moody atmosphere. Journeying through a storm-wracked wilderness riddled with winding footpaths and abandoned medieval buildings has a strange appeal to me.  It's something that I can't articulate well, but I'll try to explain as best as I can.

There are five games currently in the GemCraft franchise.  All five were made by an Hungarian development studio by the name of "Game in a Bottle."  The first three titles were flash games available to play for free on websites such as Kongregate, Newgrounds, and Armor Games.  The most recent two are for sale on Steam.  All the games in the series play similar to each other with only subtle changes marking any real difference from one to the next.  At the core are the gemstones which (depending on their color) have distinct properties.  They can be placed in towers or traps to harm enemies.  The potency of their attacks can be increased by combining two gems of the same color.  Alternatively, combining two differently colored gems creates a new gem with the power of both the originals (albeit slightly diluted).  It's even possible to combine three, four, five, six, seven or all eight colors (nine in the Steam games) to create a single rainbow gem.  Generally speaking though, there are certain color combinations that are more useful than others.

At the strategic level there are skill which are upgraded by applying points from leveling up.  To gain levels the player must clear maps (each with its own layout and limitations).  It possible to reallocate skill points between maps.  In this way, the player can increase the viability of whatever battle plan they have devised.  In addition to all this, there are pieces of a talisman that the player collects over the course of the game that grant addition bonuses.  In the maps themselves, the player has a variety of tactical options ranging from walls and traps to tower placement and gem bombing (sacrificing a gem in order to inflict a large amount of damage in certain area-of-effect).  

The opposition in the game comes in the form of insect-like monsters that infest buildings and swarm the player in in waves.  Some enemies are fast and weak, others are slow and tough.  There are even ones that have armor or health regeneration.  Each wave of attackers has a color association.  If the hue is similar to a gem they are being hit by then they take less damage, whereas if it is of a different color they take more.  Regardless of all these factors, the monsters are always single-minded in that they seek to destroy the player's base on the map for each combat encounter.

While I own (and have played) every single GemCraft game, I've only ever actually finished the original IP starter.  I think it is in no small part due to me not really grasping how all the subsystems work in tandem with each other.  I suppose I could do more grinding to make up for my inability to fully grasp the big picture, but replaying maps for extra points get repetitive very quickly.  That said, the starting menu screen with it's howling wind and blowing leaves (in GemCraft: Forgotten) or the sound of distant thunder in a cloud covered sky (in GemCraft: Chasing Shadows) still holds an irresistible allure to me.  One day, I will have to finish what I have started...

Verdant to Brown

Once upon a time consoles had radically different hardware.  This meant games found on one platform were rarely seen on another.  Porting was a labor intensive process that didn't happen much because it might entail rebuilding a game from the ground-up; re-recording sound and music, re-drawing sprites, etc.  Few as they were, ports tended to be pretty similar.  Mortal Kombat and Earthworm Jim for the Genesis/SNES were almost completely identical.  On the other hand, Alien 3 tie-in games for those two 16-bit platforms are radically different despite having the same titles and cover artwork.

It was also common in those days to see games made with the express purpose of challenging a rival system-seller (i.e. a popular game exclusive to one platform).  Franchises like Phantasy Star and Sonic were created by Sega in order to complete against Final Fantasy and Mario Brothers respectively.  Killzone was often thought of as a game made to directly oppose Halo.  To a degree this sort of think became blown out of proportion by overzealous fanboys, but the fact remains that exclusives helped sell consoles; Golden Eye on the N64, Gears of War on Xbox 360, and...well...to this day Sony maintains a number of studios that develop games only for PlayStation hardware.  Naughty Dog is probably the most famous, but there are others such as Team Ico, Gorilla Games, and of course the newly formed Kojima Productions.  Exclusives are what has allowed Nintendo Switch and PS4 to overshadow the Xbone in terms of Market Share.  When you get down to it though, there aren't many differences between current-gen consoles.  All of them are basically using similar off-the-shelf-parts found in gaming PCs.  As such it seemed like exclusivity was going to become a thing of the past, and the only difference between ports would be some minor variations in graphics fidelity or operating system feature sets...that is until Epic decided to take a bite out of Steam's market share.

Just for the record I use Steam, but I'm not a fan of Steam or their borderline monopoly on digital game distribution.  I also appreciate attempts by smaller competitors to weaken their dominance thorough cheaper prices and less restrictive terms-of-service agreements.  Unfortunately, a recent tactic is the timed exclusive.  I first encountered one of these with the indie game Bad North and felt that it was a terrible business practice because it basically comes down to strong-arming customers into using a particular service provider.  True, it doesn't cost anything to download and install Epic's client Software, or GoG's, or Origin's...or Uplay's.  Having said that, none of them are particularly useful either; beyond having an alternative digital storefront from which to buy games.  There's no reason why, from a consumer's perspective, a game should only be available through one service.  Of course from the publisher/distributor viewpoint there can be many reasons; almost all of which have to do with stuffing more money in already fat pockets.  Basically, it's a case of pachyderms butting heads...and we all know what happens to the grass when elephants fight, right?

Valve Wide Open

Steam has gone full libertarian with regards to policing their distribution platform.  Any software that isn't illegal or simply trolling is A-okay; according to a blogpost by Valve executive Erik Johnson.  From a purely business standpoint, I can see where they're coming from.  As is Steam makes money hand over fist and the cost of enforcing some kind of quality assurance in their store is almost certainly greater than lost sales from bad PR.  They have a total monopoly over the distribution of a lot of games (complete list here), and a market revenue share vastly greater than GoG, itch.io, Uplay and Origin (their four biggest competitors) combined.  Because so many players are heavily invested in their service via Steam gaming libraries, the prospect of users backing out now en mass for any reason is dicey...and Vales knows it.  Aside from the really vile junk that gets published on Steam with the sole intent of offending/pandering to one social group or another, I think there's a universal problem that continues to plague Valve.  It's a problem that will probably continue to fester for the foreseeable future...in a word - shovelware.

Asset flips are the worst of this, and as far as I can tell remains a big universal concern of the Steam community.  There is so much trash being dumped on the Steam store everyday it has become practically impossible to find something worth playing unless you already know exactly what you're looking for.  So much bug-riddled garbage.  So many scammers trying pass their products off like they're worth paying actual money for.  It might help if the search filter has a more robust set of options, but even then it would only be a partial solution.  Whatever algorithms Valve has been using certainly don't work.  Curation has largely been forgotten, and the reviewing system remains vulnerable to metabombing (or boosting).  Also, what is up with that trading card stuff?  It's like a shady marketplace for people who want to launder money or something...

I don't have any elegant solutions to Valves issues.  In fact, I'll fully admit that the situation they're in is a tricky one.  At the same time I don't like the idea of customers being systemically stripped of their agency by obscenely wealthy corporations.  On the other hand though, I guess fans of dystopian cyberpunk futures can get excited because the world continues to head full speed in that direction.   

Dollars per Hour

There's an old saying that goes "don't judge a book by its cover."  Perhaps a good follow up to this would be "don't judge a book by its thickness either."  Nevertheless, there are avid readers out there who won't touch a novel unless it's a brick of paper by the likes of Stephen King or Michael Crichton.  For some this desire might steam from a place of insecurity (i.e. the need to look smart), but I think most of the time it's simply because these sorts of readers want something they can sink their teeth into.  At this point you might be wondering what any of this has to do with video games...well...more than you might think as of late.

Green Man Gaming, a software distribution website, somewhat similar to Steam or GOG, recently introduced a new analytic feature.  It takes the price of a game and divides it by the number of hours typically needed to complete said game in order to give consumers an idea of how much they're paying for each hour of entertainment.  A lot of people (including Jim Sterling) are decrying this as a meritless piece of statistical data while others are embracing it wholeheartedly and claiming that the magic ratio to live by is one dollar per hour (or one pound if you're in the UK...for some reason).  Personally I'm not buying into either side of the argument.

As much as I like Jim Sterling's work, I think he's exemplifying a problem that I see with a lot of current and former video game reviewers' attitudes toward this metric.  Namely they claim that "average cost per hour" is a worthlessly arbitrary metric and yet somehow review scores are okay.  A buy-wait-skip system of evaluation is fine, I think, as is a simple thumbs up or thumbs down.  The problem with 1 to 10 scales is that the numbers don't equate to anything and inevitably lead to score comparisons, apples vs oranges arguments, and petty bickering.  Sterling rightly pointed out the contradiction between accepting review scores as valid but rejecting "average cost per hour," and yet failed to take it to the next logical step.

On the flip side, I'm not a fan of the idea of reducing games down to their efficiency as pure time killers either.  Not only does this rob games of any artistic merits they might have, it wrongly assumes that each and every hour of playtime equates to an hour of fun.  I can't speak for anyone else here, but I've played more than a few games that would have been much tighter, streamlined, and overall better products if they had stripped out tedious filler like fetch quests, random encounters and the dreaded grind.  Then again, I'm one of those people who has money for games, but not much free time to play them.  For a lot of people who enjoy this hobby (particularly younger enthusiasts) it might be the other way around.

Regardless of money and free time, there are some other factors worth considering.  I'm not just talking about graphics and sound or any of the usual bullet points advertisers put on the back of game boxes.  As Sterling put it, The Order 1886 was a ripoff when it came out because it was a full priced (60 dollar) game at launch that could be finished in under six hours.  Since then the price has gone down to around 20 bucks, but it still isn't worth it because of an incomplete storyline and bland third-person cover-based shooting mechanics.  Sure it looks and sounds nice, but there are plenty of other games that have that and excel in less vainglorious ways.  FAR: Lone Sails is another example people have been bringing up because it has a fifteen dollar price tag, but only lasts about two hours.  I can see where their coming from, but as least that game has a novel concept and, in it's own simple way, a proper beginning, middle and end.

Of course, not all folks want to read door-stopper novels or play sixty hour RPGs.  On the other hand that might be exactly what some people are looking for...something that they can sink their teeth into.  Thankfully, there's a website dedicated to breaking down the length of pretty much every game in which this sort of information could be applicable (stuff like MMOs and freemium online games have no ending by design so no point in listing those).  It's called howlongtobeat.com and is a great resource for that sort of information because it also breaks down a lot of games into more precise data points for players who just want to mainline the story or completionists who want to do everything.  "Average cost per hour" though...that just a bunch of misleading nonsense.  Then again, so are numerical review scores.

Meta Games

In the indie space it's fairly common to see developers experimenting with the limits of what video games can achieve.  One direction I've seen being pushed increasingly the last couple years is in a meta direction.  "What is game?" is a question that was first brought to my attention with the Stanley Parabola about four years ago and is one which I'd like to address here by pointing out three specific examples.

What starts out as a VR adaptation of Duck Hunt on a pseudo-NES, turns more sinister the longer you play.  I won't get into the story details, but I would like to mention that the game uses the virtual reality headset to allow the player to see through the eyes of a child (complete with a 1980s home built around playing one of those third generation video game consoles).  It's all rather immersive in that the player can swap out cartridges to try out different games, stick in a VHS tape and watch live-action video on an old CRT, or even interact with various objects in the house.  Although you're limited movement-wise the weather outside the house seems to imply a hot sunny afternoon.  Perhaps the environment was crafted based on one or more of the developers' childhood memories from a leisurely summer school break.  Funnily enough when you pop in the Duck Season game cartridge the player is quite literally drawn into the TV set and a version of the game that feels much more consistent with a modern adaptation of Duck Hunt rather than the 8-bit version it's supposed to be based on.  Oh and that hound has a Donnie Darko thing going on...just replace Frank the Rabbit with the Dog from Duck Hunt.

Advertised as a text-based adventure game it actually has more in common with an old television series like Outer Limits or The Twilight Zone.  The story is broken into three seemingly unrelated episodes and a fourth info-dump that ties everything up into a big metatextual ball.  This is one of those games that sets up players with a series of extraordinary events and then hits them with an ending twist that's actually very mundane.  If you've played The Vanishing of Ethan Carter, Firewatch or Gone Home you probably know exactly what I'm talking about.  If not, then let's just say it's not my cup of tea.  Performing medical/scientific procedures on an unknown specimen is intriguing.  Relaying weapon deployment codes from a remote base somewhere in the frozen wastes of Greenland?  Riveting!  Even the first episode which features the double layer of the player using his or her computer to manipulate an in-game character to play a text-based game on their computer (which in turn seems to affect that reality) is trippy and bizzare in interesting ways...alas, learning that it's actually just a daydream fantasy made up by an ordinary loser who made some questionable life choices is kind of a let down.

Billed as an educational game, the demo version of PC Building Simulator has been freely available for download off the internet for the better part of a year now.  However, a more fully realized version of the game is set for a January 2018 release.  From the perspective of trying to teach people how to build PC desktops without make costly time consuming mistakes, I can see why this piece of software might have a degree of widespread appeal.  That said, the whole notion of using your computer to build another computer in a simulated environment is more than a little weird when you take a step back and look at it objectively.  When we're done building a simulation of a PC are we going to use that PC to run a simulated version of PC Building Simulator and build another PC in that one?  If so, things are starting to look a lot like one of the endless series of reflections you get by placing two mirrors face to face.  I suppose this sort of game coming out was inevitable considering that there are over 200 unique pieces of software for sale on Steam (not counting DLC) that have the world "Simulator" in the title.  Maybe a better name for PC Building Simulator would be Simulation Simulator...or is that too meta?

Black Tiger, Hidden Agenda

Steam has a serious problem with shovelware.  To Valve's credit though they don't really promote any of the garbage that is steadily overcrowding their library of games.  PSN, on the other hand, has gone out of its way to advertise the abomination that is Life of Black Tiger.  Right off the bat, would-be-players might notice the banner art for the game is actually just a slightly reworked version of a freely available background wallpaper image.  That in itself isn't a big deal, but it gets worse.  Watch the trailer and you might notice some music playing in the background.  It's actually a cover by "JackonTC" of the OST song "Next to You," for none other than the anime "Parasyte" ("Kiseiju," in the original Japanese).  So what?...you might think.  Original art and sound assets aren't necessary to make a good game, right?  Technically...yes, but Black Tiger isn't a good game by any stretch.  It has graphics comparable to a PS2 title, despite being released on the PS4.  It also has audio issues, non-existent collision detection, clunky controls, and English localization text that reads as follows:

It's full of smell with blood of wolves today and the smell is stronger than a few days ago.  I can't bear with it. Let's kill every wolves found.

That's just one of the less jiberish-laden examples, but believe me if it hadn't originally came out for the Android three years ago I would have given it this blog's "Engrish Award" for 2017.  Another point worth noting is the Android version of this game is absolutely free, while the PSN version costs 10 USD.  Horrible, I know, but even worse is the fact it's not the only game on PSN that has done this.  Horse Racing 2016  (which actually came out for the PS4 in 2017) is a dollar on google play...but...well, let's just say it goes for a bit more on PSN.

Generally speaking, Black Tiger is considered to be one of the worst, if not the worst game currently available on the Playstation Store.  A number of people strongly believe Sony is pulling some kind of elaborate joke by curating this game.  I've also seen accusations of nepotism (the developer must actually be the son of a Sony CEO or something along those lines...).  The publisher is a company called "1GAMES" which, as far as I can tell, has pushed out a fair amount of trash over the years.  However, I haven't been able to find any specific names attached to this particular title (perhaps for somewhat obvious reasons).

The last thing I want to mention about Black Tiger is the reviews...particularly on Metacritic.  Of course there are plenty of 0/10 scores that are fairly honest about their impressions of the game, but the real enjoyment comes from reading those 10 out of ten perfect ratings.  They are, in the vast majority of cases, being deliberately sarcastic about the quality of the game to the point that it can be pretty entertaining to browse through some them and see what people wrote...at least more so than actually playing the game.

Detectives of Tomorrow

Like most folks, I enjoy the process of solving a good mystery.  In literature and television I'm talking about characters like Sam Spade, Miss Marple, Sherlock Holmes, Philip Marlowe and (my personal favorite) Lieutenant Columbo.  In video games there's also some noteworthies such as Professor Layton, Phoenix Wright, Laura Bow, Gillian Seed and Cole Phelps.  For me though, the backdrop in which these police procedurals (and what have you) unfold is just as important to good storytelling as the unraveling of the mystery itself.

As fun as shows like Dexter and CSI are to watch, having everything take place in modern day USA has always felt like a missed opportunity to me.  I'm sure it saves them a small fortune on their production budget, but there's something to be said for taking the classic detective formula and changing it simply by transporting the setting to an unusual time and place.  One great example is the long running Sano Ichiro series set in Edo-period Japan.  Eighteen books in total, I must confess that I've only read the first fourteen.  Another example is "In the Name of the Rose."  Set in a 14th-century european abbey, the novel/film were adapted into an unofficial 8-bit computer game entitled La abadía del crimen.  There's also a whole slew of authors who have written crime fiction set during classical antiquity, but I have yet to hear of any such stories that take place during the Viking Age.

That might sound like a strange era to consider, but believe it or not norse culture has more than a few law-speakers.  In fact one of the longest and, consequently, most famous sagas prominently features a character called Njáll the Beardless.  Essentially a 10th century Icelandic lawyer, I think it would be fun to play a Phoenix Wright-style video game with him as the protagonist.  Of course going the opposite direction could also be quite interesting.  Instead of looking to the past for inspiration how about the future?

Subsurface Circular is neat little indie game that was released on Steam August 18th, 2017 (with deliberate lack of preceding hype or fanfare).  It has players take on the role of a detective robot assigned the subway system beneath a major city.  From this rather confined place the player has to solve a mysterious disappearance by interviewing other robots that happen to be riding the train at various times over the course of the game.  Part of what makes it a compelling experience is learning about the world above and what it's like having AI controlled machines doing all of humanity's dirty work.  It's all very minimalist by necessity, but I kind of wish a larger developer would try tackling a similarly themed game concept.

While I like LA Noire, I can't help thinking it would have been so much more awesome had the game been set in the Blade Runner universe.  Rather than using the clumsy "good cop," "bad cop," and "accuse" options during interviews, I think it would have been a lot more well suited to the medium of video games to perform Voight-Kampff tests on suspects.  Something that the 1997 video game adaptation of Blade Runner did rather well was at the start of a new game a random algorithm would secretly decide which characters are replicants and which weren't.  That, combined with multiple endings gave the game replayability as well as a degree of personal investment in the story.  A recreation of 1950s Los Angeles is cool and all...just not as cool as it would have been in the far flung future of 2019...errr...maybe the sequel's 2049 would be a better timeframe...

Monetization of the Dead

This topic has been converted pretty thoroughly by Jim Sterling and Totalbiscuit, but I feel compelled to dedicate a post about it on my blog simply because it bothers me that much.  Just to make sure everyone is up to speed, one of the heads over at Monolith Studios passed away about about a year ago from brain cancer.  By all account he was a well liked guy whose death was considered a great loss by many of the studio's employees.  Monolith collectively decided to make a tribute in the form of a character modeled after him that will appear in their upcoming release Middle-earth: Shadow of War.  Supposedly the character will come to the rescue when the player is in dire peril.  It's a nice touch, but there's a problem with all this, Monolith Studio's producer is Warner Bros.

In case you don't know, WB has a fairly tarnished reputation - loot crate driven microtransactions in a full-priced games, attempts to manipulate media coverage, and the abandonment of the bug-riddled PC version of Batman: Arkham Knight.  There's more, but for the sake of brevity their poor industry practices have brought the publisher down to level Ubisoft and Konami.  In other words, WB is some of the worst the industry has to offer.  Not helping matters is their handling of Monolith.  In a backhanded attempt to improve PR, the aforementioned tribute character is being offered as paid DLC through Steam.  After Valve takes their cut the remaining proceeds go to the family of the deceased.  It's not a great arrangement, but I could get behind it if it weren't for the fine print.  Specifically, purchases made in six states in the USA along with anywhere else in the world don't actually go to any charitable cause whatsoever.

In essence, WB is trying to make a little extra money off the death of a cancer victim.  It is, in my opinion, disgusting.  It also underlines how cluelessly greedy WB really is.  They could have simply said for every sale of this particular DLC they will donate the full amount to the family or, barring that, a reputable cancer charity.  Alternatively, the DLC could have been free; honoring the dead man in the same way a statue in a park or a bust in a university does.  Of course if that's too much work then a simple "In loving memory of..." at the end of the closing credits would have sufficed.  However you slice it though the current setup at WB is a mix of avarice and ineptitude of the lowest order.  One wonders if anybody calling the shots over at WB has even read any of J.R.R. Tolkien's works.  If they had they probably would have noticed the similarities between themselves and certain villainous characters that appear in the stories.

So the question is (metaphorically speaking), will WB perish by their own folly like Ungoliant, at the hands of a hero like Smaug, or will they redeem themselves after a fashion like Thorin Oakenshield?  Sadly, I don't have access to Galadriel's Mirror so we'll just have to wait and see what comes to pass.  Personally, I'd be happy with any of the above...

Lord of the Wasteland

When it comes to certain games I'm a bit behind the times.  Case in point, I've only just got around to finishing the Mad Max game by Avalanche Studios.  Overall I enjoyed my time spent wandering the wreckage-strewn Australian outback, but I can't help think there might have been a better way to approach the franchise.  It seems like when it comes to adaptations of this setting, they tend to come in two varieties; micro or macro.  The former is the more common with examples like the Fallout series, Rage, Wasteland, and The Last of Us.  They're games focused on a single individual or small group of people trying to endure in the aftermath of a global catastrophe.  The latter is the rarer of the two and is a bit harder to find examples for.  There's a Crusader Kings II mod entitled After the End which features a post-apocalyptic North America divided among a number of tribes.  Another game is Atomic Society, an early access title soon to be available through Steam.  In both cases they put the player in charge of a community (or tribe) and give them a bird's-eye view of what's going on.  I guess you could call them part of the RTS genre.  The problem I have is neither of these video game subgenres quite have what I want.  One category has lost it's luster, while the other feels too detached to capture what makes the setting interesting.  I think though, there might be an untapped sweet spot somewhere in-between.

Imagine taking the role of Immortan Joe, Lord Humongous or Aunty Entity.  How did they get started?  Were they once wanderers like Max?  How did they recruit followers, secure resources and deal with potential rivals?  In a post-apocalyptic future basic necessities are almost always in short supply, which means raiding is one course of action, another is trade.  As the leader of a faction how do you go about getting things like drinkable water, eatable food, adequate shelter, life-saving medicine, and a fuel supply for your vehicles?  That final point is especially important since if you have access to it, you can maraud for the rest.  There's always the risk though that you might run up against someone bigger and meaner than you, which places a certain value on alliances (for mutual protection or simple strength of numbers) Aside from the usual itinerary of burn, pillage and enslave, there could be groups within your own collective that have other motives or desires.  Perhaps a cult springs up from within your ranks or some of your members begin to take up cannibalistic practices.  Do you suppress it and risk rebellion or embrace it and become all the more dogmatic?

From a gameplay standpoint, I like the idea of having some kind of "nemesis system" akin to the one we've seen in on display in the upcoming Middle-earth: Shadow of War.  Instead of branding individuals though, I think it would be cool to focus on salvaged vehicles.  To begin with the players would only have access to motorcycles and dune buggies, but after obtaining the services of a talented black thumb (black finger?) the repertoire could steadily expand into sedans, trucks and the penultimate vehicle in every aspiring post-apocalyptic conqueror's arsenal, the war rig.  Of course the absolute pinnacle is a flying machine, but let's not get ahead of ourselves here.  I like the idea of keeping the gameplay in the over-the-shoulder-third-person perspective because it gives players a chance to not only see their customized rides up close in action, but their warlord and followers too.  As the game progresses he (or she) could go from an unremarkable wastelander to a grizzly-looking cross between a samurai general and punk rocker.  The player's underlings could also have distinct looks with some variation between individuals.  Even the base of operations could have it's own set of "modules" such as gates, walls, garages, cisterns, depots, and armories that make it unique.

Weapons are always important and guns are what everyone wants most.  However, they might not be so easy to come by, the same goes for ammo, so they tend to be reserved for elite units while the rest make due with improvised weapons; pneumatic dart launchers, crossbows, spiked clubs, knives, machetes, and fire axes are just some examples along with armor jury rigged from sports equipment, or my personal favorite - a shield that's actually just an old road sign.  That said, improvised explosive devices such as the thunder sticks seen in Fury Road or molotov cocktails aren't hard to fashion out of scrap.  Grappling hooks and spring loaded harpoons are useful tools for when one vehicle attempts to commandeer another.

Looking back on what I've written thus far, it occurs to me this hypothetical video game I've brainstormed here doesn't have to be an exercise in power hungry conquest.  I've always liked the idea of a post-apocalyptic King Arthur and his knights errant.  Through good deeds it might be possible to form a just and sane government from which society could rebuild.  Good or evil though I think the important thing is to let the player decide how they want to rule the wasteland.

Thieves Guild

Internet piracy may not exactly be legal,
but it is paradoxically non-profit

In theory Steam keys are a useful way for developers and publishers to promote games.  By sending out these strings of letters and numbers they can offer prominent Youtubers, Twitch streamers and assorted review outlets free copies of a game they're looking to raise awareness for.  Just punch in the code, download the game, and you're good to go.  The thing is there's a dark underbelly to Steam keys when it comes to resale.

"What's the big deal?" you might be wondering.  People sell used games all the time through E-bay or upscale pawnshops (usually referred to as "Gamestop").  True, but I'd argue that the majority of the games you see for sale at those stores were trade-ins or simply the result of people getting rid of stuff they're never going to play again.  Steam codes being sold on websites such as G2A though are more often than not an online fence for scammers and thieves.

Steam trading cards?  CS:GO cosmetics?
DoTA hats?
It's all bitcoins to me...

In case you don't know how this grey market works, let me give you a pair of typical scenarios.  Developers, particularly from smaller studios, will sometimes receive E-mails from high-traffic video game websites (such as Giant Bomb) claiming they want to hold some kind of event based around a game made by said developer.  "Please send us promo codes."  Of course, it turns out that the message is a complete fake and just an attempt to swindle a few downloadable copies of the game for resale on G2A.  Because these stolen keys go for cheap, they get remedied before the developer even figures out what really happened.  It's not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but the second example is far more egregious.

Online credit card theft is a serious problem, but the thing is once the thieves get the info they need they have to find a way to turn it into a quick profit (before the owner figures out what's up).  One way to go about it is to hit up an online retailer and purchase digital copies of video games in the form of download keys.  Then quickly put them up on G2A for cheap.  By the time the credit card owner blocks the charges the thieves have already laundered their ill-gotten gains...hang on though, it gets worse.

Whenever a credit card is frozen, or has its charges blocked, the retail outlet in which it was used has to pay a fine.  This has led some developers such as the makers of Factorio (who allow customers to purchase digital copies of their game directly from them) to come out and publically ask people to pirate their game rather than purchase it with stolen credit card information.  Their reasoning being at least piracy doesn't cost them anything directly out-of-pocket.  Now, I'm sure there's a minority of gamers who end up with duplicate copies of a game for legitimate reasons.  Here's the thing, you should give those extra codes away to your friends not try to sell them for a quick buck (actually less after G2A takes their cut).  Shady websites like this should not be allowed to thrive because none of that money ever finds its way to the people who actually deserve it.  At least with used game sales the developer got their money from the initial purchase, but here it's all hot goods and greedy parasites.