Arkane Studios: Dishonored / Deus Ex / Thief - One of the gaming industry's most unfortunate victims.

[Sniperwoof]

It still blows my mind that for like ten years Anita could straight up waltz into any game studio's HQ, outright threaten to extort them unless they paid her off and gave her a consultant position and they would just do it, no questions asked.

I think the only one that actually told her to fuck off was CDPR.

 

[DeadwastePrime]

unpopular opinion: deathloop was not bad. my only wish is that the ways to take out the targets could be slightly different each new game, maybe taking some inspiration from the recent hitman games to set up kills and shit. otherwise, the gameplay was pretty good.

 

[The Pulverizer]

It still blows my mind that for like ten years Anita could straight up waltz into any game studio's HQ, outright threaten to extort them unless they paid her off and gave her a consultant position and they would just do it, no questions asked.

How did this feminist cunt gain so much pull within the company?

Arkane Studios’ Harvey Smith spoke to her [Anita] about the women in Dishonored, and made a deliberate effort from the DLC onward to put women in more interesting, nuanced roles.

So that explains why the DLC was trash. This brilliant set of decisions has of course allowed Harvey Smith create the masterpiece that goes by the name of Redfall!

Read these character backgrounds from Redfall to see what Harvey Smith meant by "interesting, nuanced roles":

"SHE IS A BADASS BIOMEDICALISTIC NIGGER PHD COMBAT SCIENTIST STEM ENGINEER THAT WAS RAPED BY A CHUDDY VAMPIRE BUT THE STUPID INCEL CHUD ACCIDENTALLY GAVE HER HIS POWERS WHILE RAPING HER AND NOW SHE IS USING THEM TO KILL ALL VAMPIRE INCEL CHUDS!!!"

Jesus Christ, Harvey! These read like a fucking tumblr fanfic. Don't worry, gamers! No original ideas will come out from this studio anymore.

 

[Scarthew]

You know, gamers like to talk shit about games releasing half baked, but the lists of best games ever made is full of games that needs to be modded by fans to be playable. We get what we deserve.

ss2 by some miracle works on modern computers, deus ex doesn't though, the lighting is borked. I know kentie's fixes that easily but not sure if there's a solution that preserves the original lighting better.

i don't see it happening but i'm also not sure what there is to finish. Death of the Outsider left things open for the franchise to continue, as many games typically do to give themselves an excuse to work on more.

Did it? Assuming the pacifist ending is canon like has been shown in every other instance the source of the magic is gone. There's no more outsider to hand out marks, do the existing ones still exist?

 

[The Pulverizer]

Did it? Assuming the pacifist ending is canon like has been shown in every other instance the source of the magic is gone. There's no more outsider to hand out marks, do the existing ones still exist?

Canonically, they draw their powers from the Void. The Outsider becoming mortal should not change that. Dishonored 2 and the DLC took out all the mystique out of the Void and tossed the existing rules out the window.
By the way, the old actor who voiced the Outsider was fired on quick notice despite voicing the original trailer for Dishonored 2. Arkane never gave an explanation, but the Reddit account he used for his Q&A was called TrannyDestroyer. The new one sounds like a brat and his voice is hiding behind 20 different effects.

 

[Scarthew]

Really? That's why? The replacement voice sucked.

 

[BlueSpark]

Dishonored has some of the most childish, shallow and retarded writing in the gaming industry.
The characters are cartoon characters.
The plot of the first game was just: evil aristocrats unleash plague literally for no other reason than hating poor people and wanting to exterminate them (because that makes sense, right? You kill all the lower classes that do all the work the upper classes don't want to do and that has no repercussions?).
And it made no sense that Daud and his band of assassins, with the incredible powers they have, were content just doing lowly murder-for-hire work and living in a derelict, flooded district. They could have taken over the entire nation if they wanted.
The Outsider is just Deus Ex Machina to get the plot moving and has no depth.
The voice acting was comically bad for most of the main characters, the choices you make don't matter, the level layouts were either annoyingly convoluted or too simple, the game was incredibly short yet they still reused levels, braindead AI, broken combat system that made everything too easy, most of the runes were useless etc.

I barely remember the second game except for things like the insane retcon where they made the evil scientist that experimented on human peasants in the first game into the kindly mentor character that everyone loved suddenly and the stupid female scientist that used a magic potion to turn into a werewolf.

The art and the way the games feel to play are excellent, but the story, characters and world consistency were terrible (which isn't surprising because Hazel Monforton is a literal communist retard with the writing skills of the average tumblr fanfic writer, incapable of nuance and with the worldview of a simpleton whose entire personality is whatever it's currently trendy to virtue-signal about).

That Prey game was fucking terrible, too: boring enemies that all look the same, cringey ultra-diverse characters to tick all the diversity boxes, tedious crafting, broken combat that was either too easy or too hard depending on how you specced and if I'm remembering correctly it had a cliche "you were the bad guy all along" ending.

If Arkane goes out of business the only thing I'll miss is the environment art from the Dishonored games.

Arkane never gave an explanation, but the Reddit account he used for his Q&A was called TrannyDestroyer. The new one sounds like a brat and his voice is hiding behind 20 different effects.

Holy shit BASED. I wondered why they recast him. The new voice sounds like a surfer bro and doesn't fit the character at all.
I fucking hate trannies, they ruin everything.

 

[Tor Lugosi]

Yeah, I always liked the art-style, atmosphere, and world building but the actual plots and characters are pretty shitty. The betrayal in the final act of the first game always stuck with me due to how retarded it is.

As you progress through the game the leaders of your group leave recordings wherein they become increasingly paranoid about Corvo, seethe about his connect & influence on Emily, and ruminate on how they'll have to deal with him. Yet you're still forced to drink their obvious poison.

 

[Judge Dredd]

The plot of the first game was just: evil aristocrats unleash plague literally for no other reason than hating poor people and wanting to exterminate them (because that makes sense, right? You kill all the lower classes that do all the work the upper classes don't want to do and that has no repercussions?).

I would say that's stupid, but then I see what the WEF is doing and it doesn't seem so stupid any more.

 

[Scarthew]

evil aristocrats unleash plague literally for no other reason than hating poor people

you're right about the story being childish morally but this statement is wrong. The plague is just the bubonic plague with supernatural elements maybe involved. Its then a cartoonish depiction of the rich taking advantage of the situation to maintain themselves and not caring for the sick. The game is fun though.

 

[Agent of Z.O.G.]

Dishonored making "you don't need to use powers to beat it" as a feature is one of the shittiest game design decisions in gaming; it just leads to making the game piss easy and removing the satisfaction from creatively using the powers because you could have smashed your head on the keyboard and got the same result.
Prey had a lot of the same problems though they didn't make you as OP (but I also kinda neglected the shotgun before getting bored and quitting).
Didn't play Deathloop or Redfall but I assume there's the same refusal to truly challenge the player. Well I guess they make others players challenge you in deathloop.

I wonder how many names from Dishonored 1 will be in the credits for Dishonored 3, on paper it could lead to improvements but after Redfall it's pretty likely they'll just fuck up again and get sold off.

 

[Asian tech support]

I also kinda neglected the shotgun

Once you realize that every combat encounter, including nightmares on the highest difficulty is solved by combat focus, psychoshock, and the shotgun for normal enemies/stun gun thingy for operators and technopaths, the challenge is over.

 

[The Pulverizer]

The betrayal in the final act of the first game always stuck with me due to how retarded it is.

I think the game solidifies the message of corruption when you are betrayed by your friends. Maybe they even intended to do good with their unlimited power, but having to break one moral principle after another to attain it ultimately turns them into the power-hungry dictators they are plotting against. The same goes for Corvo. What kind of impression will he leave on Emily and what kind of man will he become if he chooses to end the Lord Regent's reign by slaughtering everyone in his way?

And it made no sense that Daud and his band of assassins, with the incredible powers they have, were content just doing lowly murder-for-hire work and living in a derelict, flooded district. They could have taken over the entire nation if they wanted.

When you beat Daud he pleads for his life. In the speech he reveals that power had consumed him as well. Perhaps he too started with good intentions by killing the noblemen and noblewomen that deserved their fate and eventually became corrupted. He was taken down a road of bad decisions with the Outsider laughing at him along the way.
Also, how is he going to take over the nation when a failed attempt to raid his base almost led to his entire gang being wiped out?

The Outsider is just Deus Ex Machina to get the plot moving and has no depth.

The test the Outsider gives to Corvo is for him to prove that he can rise above all the other men before him. He even says that in the low chaos ending and , "You watched and listened when other men would have shouted in rage. You held back instead of striking." He also says this when the Outsider first appears in the game.
The Outsider is an omnipotent being that's interested in the future of mankind, much like Q (obligatory Star Trek reference). They did a great job in making the player understand the Outsider's motivations in the conflict without ruining the mystery surround his character, whereas Dishonored 2 failed miserably by doing the latter.

 

[Snekposter]

That Prey game was fucking terrible, too: boring enemies that all look the same, cringey ultra-diverse characters to tick all the diversity boxes, tedious crafting, broken combat that was either too easy or too hard depending on how you specced and if I'm remembering correctly it had a cliche "you were the bad guy all along" ending.

Oh, the ending is absolutely horrid.
Turns out it was all literally just a dream simulation ran by your asshole brother on an Earth that's been overrun by the same aliens you've just battled across a space station. And you are one of said aliens, and the whole thing was a desperate attempt by him to try and create a horrid alien being with empathy. Somehow the good ending is the one where you shake his hand and ignore his sins and the bad one is where you look at what the man has unleashed on his species in the name of petty greed and decides he needs to die violently.

 

[God of Nothing]

Oh, the ending is absolutely horrid.
Turns out it was all literally just a dream simulation ran by your asshole brother on an Earth that's been overrun by the same aliens you've just battled across a space station. And you are one of said aliens, and the whole thing was a desperate attempt by him to try and create a horrid alien being with empathy. Somehow the good ending is the one where you shake his hand and ignore his sins and the bad one is where you look at what the man has unleashed on his species in the name of petty greed and decides he needs to die violently.

to be fair, he is trying to rectify a horrible mistake
and it isn't even his fault earth got fucked either

My only real complaint about Prey was the lack of difficulty even on the hardest one. I remember very hard on Dishonored and Dishonored 2 giving you about the same durability as everyone else, so two fuck ups was all it took to kill you, super magic powers or not. Prey? I only ever died at the beginning because I didn't know how melee combat worked or that the shotgun was available right when you reached the main hub. Unlocking powers and exploring the station was fun but ultimately pointless. While it gave a lot of powers, it took more than half the game to unlock all of them through scans and didn't give any reason to use them over the shotgun. Wokeness was there but it had the decency to not show up every time you interacted with someone like it does most games these days.

 

[Asian tech support]

I only ever died at the beginning because I didn't know how melee combat worked or that the shotgun was available right when you reached the main hub. Unlocking powers and exploring the station was fun but ultimately pointless. While it gave a lot of powers, it took more than half the game to unlock all of them through scans and didn't give any reason to use them over the shotgun.

I feel like the game only catches you off guard twice when it comes to challenging enemies: the first time you encounter an elemental phantom, probably the fire one in the medical wing, and the first time you encounter a nightmare. The only typhon powers worth taking are psychoshock and some of the elemental resistance ones.

 

[Tor Lugosi]

I think the game solidifies the message of corruption when you are betrayed by your friends. Maybe they even intended to do good with their unlimited power, but having to break one moral principle after another to attain it ultimately turns them into the power-hungry dictators they are plotting against. The same goes for Corvo. What kind of impression will he leave on Emily and what kind of man will he become if he chooses to end the Lord Regent's reign by slaughtering everyone in his way?

That's all well and good but the characters are still written as retards who don't try to hide how corrupt they are or that they totally plan to betray Corvo.

 

[The Pulverizer]

That's all well and good but the characters are still written as retards who don't try to hide how corrupt they are or that they totally plan to betray Corvo.

I do agree that the audio logs are a bit too much. Especially since you can already get that information about the characters by using the heart. It's probably nothing but a Bioshock influence. Listening to the audio logs at the Hound Pits Pub is also completely optional.

 

[God of Nothing]

I feel like the game only catches you off guard twice when it comes to challenging enemies: the first time you encounter an elemental phantom, probably the fire one in the medical wing, and the first time you encounter a nightmare. The only typhon powers worth taking are psychoshock and some of the elemental resistance ones.

Pretty much. Psychoshock fucks the shielded ones that are otherwise impossible to kill, disables even the Nightmare, and works on the technothings if I recall correctly. Taking out the thermophantom in the early game with a pistol and nearby pipes was probably the most difficult yet most fun fight for me. And I guess playing hide and go seek with the Nightmare because I didn't want to see if my shotgun was up to snuff.

 

[Epoch]

Oh, the ending is absolutely horrid.

I thought Avellone was supposed to be a good writer?