{"id":48226,"date":"2019-09-30T06:00:02","date_gmt":"2019-09-30T10:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/?p=48226"},"modified":"2019-10-01T10:54:26","modified_gmt":"2019-10-01T14:54:26","slug":"diecast-274-borderlands-3-mailbag-raytracing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/?p=48226","title":{"rendered":"Diecast #274: Borderlands 3, Mailbag, Raytracing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>No, the show wasn&#8217;t canceled. We just took a couple of weeks off. Now we&#8217;re back and <del>feeling better than ever<\/del> feeling exactly the same as before except now we&#8217;ve forgotten how to run the show. Enjoy!<\/p>\n<p><br clear='all'><audio controls><source src='\/diecast\/diecast274.ogg' type='audio\/ogg'><source src='\/diecast\/diecast274.mp3' type='audio\/mpeg'>Your browser does not support the audio element.<\/audio><div><small><a href='\/diecast\/diecast274.mp3' download='diecast274.mp3'>Direct download<\/a> (MP3)<\/small><br\/><small><a href='\/diecast\/diecast274.ogg' download='diecast274.ogg'>Direct download<\/a> (ogg Vorbis)<\/small><br\/><small><a href='?cat=287&feed=rss2'>Podcast RSS feed.<\/a><\/small><\/div><br \/>\nHosts: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.peripheralarbor.com\/\">Paul<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/\">Shamus<\/a>. Episode edited by <a href=\"http:\/\/steamcommunity.com\/profiles\/76561198087035658\/\">Issac<\/a>.<br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/diecast\/diecast274.mp3\">Diecast274<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Show notes:<!--more--><\/p>\n<p><strong>01:32 Paul can\u2019t watch JB Play Satisfactory<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Also, I ragequit the game over the lack of a bugfix.<\/p>\n<p><strong>07:50 Done with Borderlands 3<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>My opinion on the game started out as &#8220;mostly positive&#8221;, but the longer I go the more things bug me. If the moment-to-moment gameplay feels bullet-spongy and the long-term loot grind feels empty, then what does the game have left? The story? Because the story isn&#8217;t really top-shelf either.<\/p>\n<p><strong>15:05 Oculus Connect 6 Keynote<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s dry, technical, incredibly long, barely anyone knows what he&#8217;s talking about, and it&#8217;s completely enthralling anyway. It feels like the Quakecon keynotes that Carmack used to do.<\/p>\n<p><table class='nomargin' cellspacing='0' width='100%' cellpadding='0' align='center' border='0'><tr><td><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/PMIDaomx0GA\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen class=\"embed\"><\/iframe><br\/><small><a href='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=PMIDaomx0GA'>Link (YouTube)<\/a><\/small><\/td><\/tr><\/table><\/p>\n<p><strong>28:23 Mailbag: Game Bundles<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Dear die that has been cast,<br \/>\n&#8230; sorry Paul, you&#8217;ll probably have to sit this one out.<\/p>\n<p>I was wondering about cheap videogame bundles recently, and having seen Good Robot show up on a couple of them (indeed, I think that&#8217;s how I ended up owning it), I thought I may ask Shamus if he has insider knowledge about how these things work and if he is allowed to talk about it.<br \/>\nIf not&#8230; I mean, come on, we&#8217;re all friends here, it&#8217;s ok, right?<br \/>\nAre you approached by these companies putting out bundles, or do you approach them?<br \/>\nHow can 10 indie games for 2.50 euro be profitable for anybody? What kind of volume do these generate?<br \/>\nI&#8217;ve been taking advantage of these for some years now, but the business model still seems puzzling to me.<br \/>\nI wouldn&#8217;t mind if the whole process was documented in a detailed article either *hint hint*<\/p>\n<p>Sorry if this topic is contractually disallowed or if such things are considered social taboos to openly discuss, I am just curious about the industry I love.<br \/>\nRegards from the depths of Steam backlogs.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>32:21 Mailbag: Games that require a guide.<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Dear Diecast.<\/p>\n<p>The modern Persona games are lauded for their fusion of turn-based combat and social sim gameplay, but I&#8217;ve always been bothered by the social sim aspect. It&#8217;s less about roleplaying and more about puzzling out the spreadsheet nightmare the designers have conceived so you don&#8217;t miss out on story content and have to replay it in new game plus to see it. As such, I always play them with my head in a guide to negate the issue so I can instead focus on enjoying the combat and story. <\/p>\n<p>What&#8217;s your thoughts on games that are hard to play properly without using a guide and have you ever found them enjoyable in spite of needing to look things up constantly?<\/p>\n<p>-Victor<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>42:34 Mailbag: Too Much Power?<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Dear Diecast<\/p>\n<p>The last decade has seen huge leaps in the performance of gaming hardware.  As a result of this increase in power developers have had few limitations placed on their ambitions.  <\/p>\n<p>In the past developers often had to make choices, compromises or find unique solutions to hardware limitation such as Silent Hill&#8217;s fog to hide the terrible draw distance or Final Fantasy using turn-based combat to increase the visual quality.  <\/p>\n<p>Now most games can have as many elements and ideas as the developer can squeeze in regardless of whether it needs to be there or not.<\/p>\n<p>My question is; Do you think that having access to so much processing power has hurt or hindered game development?<\/p>\n<p>Regards <\/p>\n<p>Eric<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>48:50 Mailbag: Raytracing and Game Size<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Dear Diecast,<\/p>\n<p>Back in the early 2000s I remember baking the lights as being one of the most expensive parts of making a map for a shooter, both in terms of CPU time and filesize. I assume that baked lighting is still a major contributor to modern day game install size, especially as environments have become more detailed and have greater surface area. In your opinions, does this mean that a game that fully commits to raytracing could actually see install size drop? Are there other side effects of a studio embracing raytracing you&#8217;re anticipating?<\/p>\n<p>Thanks,<br \/>\n-tsholden<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>59:56 Mailbag: Shadows and Raytracing<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Dear Diecast,<\/p>\n<p>In the comments to Shamus&#8217;s article about Raytracing, Paul expressed frustration about something Shamus got wrong in his description of shadows. Could Paul please describe in excruciating detail what exactly it was? Enquiring minds want to know.<\/p>\n<p>Yours,<br \/>\nChris<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>No, the show wasn&#8217;t canceled. We just took a couple of weeks off. Now we&#8217;re back and feeling better than ever feeling exactly the same as before except now we&#8217;ve forgotten how to run the show. Enjoy! Hosts: Paul, Shamus. Episode edited by Issac. Diecast274 Show notes:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[287],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-48226","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-diecast-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48226","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=48226"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48226\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48237,"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48226\/revisions\/48237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=48226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=48226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=48226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}