Hosts Dandr0id and Jack McBastard deconstruct the anatomy of a scary game, and discuss why certain particular games can scare us right off the sofa.
Resident Evil 7 has massively flopped by making fewer than 2000 purchases on iOS, with other console mobile ports also performing poorly.
Well at least there are games like angry birds or clash of clans for mobile gamers :-)
Good it flopped.. they must have realized that the target audience is totally different
This is a win for gaming even if it’s not an ideal experience on iPhone yet:
1. It’s a huge step forward for mobile gaming showing in the next 2 - 4 years this will be a solid 720p@30fps experience for AA / AAA PS4-PS5 quality games on a device we carry with us everywhere.
2. It’s a huge step forward for Apple gaming in general which has been underwhelming for years running NATIVELY and flawlessly on any M2 / M3 / M4 iPad and MacBook. At worst 900p@60fps Medium-High Settings + Metal on the M2 iPad, 1440p@60 - 80fps Max settings on the M3 Pro Max which is equivalent to a RTX 4060 / RX 6700XT, so slightly above console settings…..but in a $3000 - $4000 laptop (Apple and they’re ridiculous prices).
3. But most important for all of us, it shows what the future of mobile platforms like the Switch 2 will be capable of and ports like RE7, RE Village, and RE4 Remake should be lined up for the Switch 2, optimized even more for mobile PC like SteamDeck / ROG, and eventually Android based platforms.
The iPhone version won’t be good for another 2 years (iPhone 18) or so when they have their next fabrication node (2nm), so they can hopefully improve the CPU cores (AA/AAA games will need 3 or 4 performance cores instead of 2), add 2 more GPU cores, and improve memory bandwidth with LPDDR6.
Then it should be a stable 720p - 900p resolution, @ locked 30fps, Medium-High Settings, with better Type-C out for larger displays.
Apple users ain't gamers. I don't know whether this push with "metal" was just to say they did it and it's possible to run modern games, or if Capcom just said hey more units is better, but either way this shouldn't be all that surprising.
You say that but everyime I’m waiting for one of my kids’ events to start, I see an audience full of kids playing games on phones. No Nintendos. Just phones. Lots of Minecraft. Lots of Clash of Clans style games.
Roblox as well. Gigantic mega platform. Kids can’t get enough of it. Sony/Nintendo would be wise to integrate more with their platform as kids get older.
Playing clash of clans doesn't make you a *gamer.* Most mobile games are designed to literally be time wasters and money pits. They're for casuals who don't actually have a gaming platform. Kids on phones today is just a symptom of the modern era. Doesn't mean gaming is what they're really into, as proven by those sales numbers.
Mobile gamers only want simple games and gachas. Nobody wants to pay up front for a mobile game, you have to hide it behind micro transactions lol.
From GameWatcher: "Embracer has shut down Pieces Interactive, the studio that recently developed the Alone in the Dark Reboot for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S.
Pieces Interactive, acquired by THQ Nordic in 2017, worked on the Titan Quest franchise. Its most recent game, Alone in the Dark, received mixed critical reception at launch but was improved with subsequent patches."
Like we did not see this coming. Pieces and Alone in the Dark, had a kick me sign on their back the entire dev cycle to release. Perfect example of not reading current market trends, bad forecasting, marketing and release.
Why is it the perfect example?? It was actually one of the few games that did all those things well. In fact considering the current environment in the industry it actually did all those things very well.
The problem was the game itself was just rough around the edges and that’s the problem we currently have in the industry it’s hard to release something like that when everybody wants perfection and the developer and publisher doesn’t have enough to pay off all the reviewers.. it has a large cult following and had potential to be exactly what survival horror fans have been crying out for while they were waiting for silent hill 2. Don’t see what market trends and forecasting has anything to do with it at all. I don’t remember it fighting in its release window either.
Alone in the Dark would've gained more praise if it released in 2022, well before Alan Wake II and other horror projects
The demo they released a while back didn't leave a good impression, and it seems like they were riding far too much on Jodie Comer and David Hayter to be the driving force to buy the game. They're both great actors, but their performance on this game from what I've seen felt very stiff/forced - like they were out of their comfort zones. It's a shame to see another studio closure, though, and I hope the people effected (affected? I always get it wrong) can find more work soon.
Embracer's takeaway from this will probably be that they should focus on live service games.
Until Dawn is receiving a remake and is being ported to PC and PS5, and this is a move that has massive potential for the game.
At least it's mostly cinematic. I worry about performance currently of anything running on Unreal 5 that has any kind of "action" in it.
Time codes for Digital Fiasco Episode 32: The Anatomy of a Scary Game
(0:23) There's always time for joke intros and Mother's Day
(2:14) Dandr0id plays Metro Last Light
(4:47) Jack McBastard plays Shock Tactics
(8:28) Jack McBastard plays Prey
(15:33) Doing Stuff is Fun! - debrief on Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime
(20:13) Discs, Downloads and DLC
(26:38) Anti-releases
(31:37) E3 Rumor Roundup
(33:05) Rumor #1: Assassin's Creed Origins
(38:04) Rumor #2: Batman: Arkham Insurgency
(41:33) Rumor #3: Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle
(44:51) Rumor #4: Star Wars Battlefront II PlayStation VR support
(47:24) Rumor #5: Halo 6 will not be at E3
(47:48) Rumor #6: Halo 5 DLC? Halo spin-off? Scorpio strategy for Halo
(50:50) Rumor #7: Why is everyone thinking about Far Cry 5 instead of Ubisoft's other Wild West franchise
(1:03:30) Phil Spencer steals Home (IT'S A PUN!)
(1:08:48) Beam as a streaming service on the Xbox Live platform
(1:12:19) Alan Wake leaving Steam and other services May 15th, 2017 (potentially forever)
(1:14:17) Google actually hires Job Simulator developers
(1:15:48) Square-Enix wants to sell IO Interactive and Hitman may come with them
(1:19:51) The Options Menu - Checkpoint: The Anatomy of a Scary Game