Coelacanth

That was in my OP though, that most games can be thought of as puzzle games with extra steps.

I just don’t get where you’re getting “most games” from. If you would have phrased it like “many games can be viewed as puzzle games if you really think about it” you would have maybe had more people agree with you.

I understand your reductive approach - it’s just that there are so many games it doesn’t apply to that I can never agree with “most games”.

If you have 2 minutes to solve a puzzle, is it no longer a puzzle game?

Yes, clearly. It still behaves the way a puzzle - or puzzle game - would: knowledge of the solution trivialises the content. It’s just a puzzle game with a timer.

If moving certain colored pieces requires a button combo or sequence, instead of a simple action, is this no longer a puzzle game?

Depends on how the combo works. Is there an element of skill involved? If it’s like a rhythm game I would just call it a puzzle/rhythm game. Otherwise it’s just a puzzle game with extra steps.

For me, if the main challenge of the game is figuring out the puzzle, then it’s mainly a puzzle game. If a measure of skill is required in the actual execution of beating the game it is no longer a pure puzzle game - but it can still contain puzzle elements of course.

EDIT: I would agree that Tetris is not a puzzle game.

Knowing the optimal thing to do can be seen as but a higher order puzzle.

But knowing the right strategy and item build in DotA or LoL means fuck all if you can’t mechanically execute your hero properly, which - in my opinion - disqualifies them as “puzzle games”.

I think your definition of puzzle games is pretty flawed, to be honest. A puzzle does not provide additional difficulty once you’ve identified how the pieces go together, consequently a game should behave similarly to qualify as a puzzle game. The dichotomy is between conceptualisation versus execution.

Puzzle games can be solved or “won” by identifying the solution. Not-puzzle games require execution.

Guitar Hero and OSU! are not puzzle games. Games like RTSes and MOBAs can be argued to have puzzle elements in terms of strategy and meta, but knowing the optimal thing to do will still not give you victory which imo disqualifies them as outright puzzle games.

I know the car is getting the traditional Aston Martin mid-season downgrades, but Alonso has not been great lately either. Is he finally getting old, or is he still feeling the post-China hand injury? That was his last great race weekend wasn’t it?

What a lap from Lando holy

The even worse feeling is when there is a reply below with “<message deleted>” and a reply below that with “thank you so much, that fixed it!”

I suspect uncapping FPS would break physics and damage calculations. FromSoft are fond of tying those to FPS.

I’m not surprised about the rest either, though they really should start getting criticized for it in my opinion. No DLSS in 2024 is especially hard to excuse.

I don’t think the writing is particularly good, and it is particularly problematic in Act 3. The pacing falls apart, all urgency disappears and there is also a big problem with the villains. Gortash and Orin are pretty bad characters and the nebulous blob that is the Nether Brain is not a compelling antagonist. The Emperor is a pretty interesting character, but he sadly doesn’t really play out as an antagonist - which I find a massive waste in itself. It also felt like some parts of the plot only make sense if you’re playing as Dark Urge.

The companions all being extremely horny and protagonist-sexual gives off a weird vibe, and the progression and design of the relationship system is extremely bad. As an example, Shadowheart can say you’re her soulmate that changed her whole life on like the second day you spend together! There is also a severe lack of bonding moments that are purely adventure party/friendship and not avenues for everyone else to hit on you.

There being literally 0 consequences for dabbling in Mind Flayer powers felt weird and bad and generally undercut the impact of the entire main story. There is no reason not to fill out your whole tadpole tree (including becoming half illithid), and there is no reward for completely abstaining. No specific dialogue, no impact on the ending. Not even an achievement.

Lots of small attempts at fanservice for fans of BG 1&2 feel like surface level lipservice made by people who never played the originals. The Flail of Ages being a shitty rare regular flail sold in a random shop is just depressing.

I wish they left more BG 1&2 characters alone if they didn’t know exactly what to do with them. Jaheira is mostly fine, but even Minsc felt out of place and shoehorned in and the character assassinations of Viconia and Sarevok just felt terrible. Especially since the role of both of those characters in the plot could have easily been replaced with brand new NPCs.

On a similar note, it strikes me as extremely weird that they seemingly outright refused to have any voice actor reprise their role. Heidi Shannon has disappeared from the face of the earth so Jaheira needed to be recast, but Grey DeLisle (Viconia) and Kevin Michael Richardson (Sarevok) are still out there working for example and Jim Cummings (Minsc) was asking random fans at cons to remind Larian he exists.

Can we not go after one of the few good guys in gaming? Please? If you want to hound someone Nintendo is right over there.

This is why the game lost me to be completely honest. I felt like the type of storytelling changed into more of a Sunday morning cartoon type vibe where the gang always wins and nobody ever dies.

There was a point during the story (probably Post-ARR through the beginning of post-Stormblood patch quests?) where it felt like there were actual stakes and risks of consequences and the lives of beloved characters were actually in danger and I loved that.

But instead more people seemed to come back from the dead than actually die.

I’ve played only Origins but this trailer is not doing a whole lot for me. Even visually I don’t like it (which is bizarre because I think Origins looks like shit and still I somehow prefer it). Don’t really like this art direction, personally.

Yes, definitely! Using the [email protected] works well for communities, but linking to posts is a bit of a headache honestly.

Impressive that enough people still care for there to be a backlash.

Phenomenal race, absolute box office stuff. Something happening somewhere every lap, bold strategy calls, flat out driving for the win, chaos, uncertainty and some slick moves to boot. Albon’s double overtake, anyone?

These are the races that remind us of why we watch this goddamn thing. I wish Norris hadn’t gotten unlucky with the safety car but that’s just me being greedy for the sake of the championship table. And Max really deserved the win too, he absolutely had to push himself for this one.

Will be a tough ask to top this race for the rest of the season.

Georgepedo into Max DNF and McLaren 1-2 to really close up the top of the championship? Sign me up!

Tbf even Sargeant did. Perez has not been covering himself in glory as of late.

Well, maybe I believe it? Tomorrow will be an exciting one.

When qualy is this amazing I barely even care about the race to be honest. What a great show that was.

I will believe it when I see it. Wouldn’t be the first time they topped FP and were nowhere in qualy and race.

That really is one of the biggest flaws of Civ. It’s so hard to find a breakpoint where the gameplay “feels good” but still is challenging. If you’re at a difficulty level where the gameplay is mostly intact, the AI is just too dumb, and if you bump it up it becomes a meta game of playing around the AI bonuses.