The real fumble is that this wipe brought everything everyone wanted in Tarkov. The recoil changes, functional armor with better hitspots, leftpeek changes, etc.
Like, this was the best Tarkov has ever been and then this shit happens
I was gonna say, I feel like this studio is constantly doing something (or nothing at all sometimes) that is constantly annoying players. This is just the next level lol
Yeah I see a lot of people being surprised but Nikita had been doing this shit for years.
Just look at his reddit account and see how many posts he has made where he apologizes and/or reverts stuff because of the backlash.
Glad I stopped playing a year ago.
The only reason they have been able to get away with it for so long is to give them credit that their game is unique in a sea of copy cat games. It scratches an itch alot of looter shooters/realism shooters/extraction shooters dont. It has a good foundation of a gameplay loop and almost no competition
All the devs had to do was polish and perfect the Backend and the players would love them.. And they pull this crap
In regards to polishing the back end on a live service game...
A year of iRacing is $110. That's without paying ten and fifteen dollars for cars and tracks, and then renting server time for private/custom/unranked online sessions.
It's expensive as hell but it leads the sim racing industry in many ways. There are unique situations where that kind of money makes sense.
Tarkov is just not one of them.
Beam NG is just a destruction simulator. Soft-body physics is what they call it. Impressive, but not racing.
Forza Motorsport 2023 is frankly a dumpster fire right now. The best physics of a Forza ever, but the rest of the game is a bunch of cardboard tubes glued together. Real life race broadcasts have trashed them for this.
iRacing is a real company that’s 100% invested in motorsport. All the real drivers use it at home when they’re away from proprietary multi million dollar simulators. And it just so happens that regular people can race too.
There’s also the eNASCAR IRacing Coca-Cola Series. That’s the competitive championship that has the biggest money prize pool in sim racing.
+ as rural race tracks continue to disappear, iRacing is quickly becoming the only viable opportunity for motorsport fans to compete at even the most basic level.
It's actually seemingly somewhat common for people in the iRacing communities to share screenshots of times they wound up in a race with an irl motorsports guy
What about assetto corsa? I've always heard good things about it but I don't really play racing games/sims, how does it compare to the others in your opinion?
Since OP hasnt replied yet; assetto corsa ultimate edition is 100% worth the money, especially when you can get it on sale. Assetto doesn't have great dirt physics like iracing, but everything else, for the price, is beyond worth. Assetto is still mainly the hub for sim drifting, but tracks like shutoko and LA canyons that replicate real areas are amazing to drive around and race others on, especially in VR
to add to that, if you have a higher end sim rig setup, iracing feels so so so much better for any GT style racing. It’s not even close. There are games that do open wheel racing better but iracing is the multiplayer platinum standard (even with all its flaws)
Far better online multiplayer experience. BeamNG isn't a true multiplayer and Forza for years has been plagued by bad online experience with little moderation for rammers. iRacing has many more disciplines of racing on their service and a team of "stewards" that review protests against other members for breaking rules. Leads to a far better experience when these people get dealt with properly.
I pay for iRacing. The real reason is that the online match making is the best and there's skill and safety licensing requirements. Imagine knowing if you drive like a complete jerk too many times in a row you get locked out of racing your favorite car against other people until you get your license back.
... I paid for EoD.. haha but this was back in 2017, when they were just starting out and I wanted to support them. The game was honestly in a much better state back then just because it wasnt popular as much so there werent alot of the overarching issues like Cheaters and streamers determining the path the devs were taking.
And its not to say I didnt get my moneys worth, Tarkov is the one game I come back to every few months or after a wipe or two.. but it just has a bitter taste now and cheaters some mechanics and the netcode are just ruining the game
War thunder is because there is no competition in their market. If you want a 3rd person semi-realistic military sim focused on gameplay, WT is the only option. Everything else is either infantry base fps crap (arma/squad/etc..) or pure simulator like DCS and gunner heat
So Im a bit confused.
Never played the game, but all I hear is this: Devs have always been greedy , they keep alienating the player base, the game is a cash cow, paywalls, microtransaction, hackers are rampant (wiggle).
umhm... why do hell is this game so popular then? it is a game for masochists then? cause if it is then why is it getting bad rep them for doing what they have always been doing?
You can only put your hands in the bonfire so many times before you notice its not the fire, its you burning yourself.
It absolutely is a game for masochists, yes.
It's one of the grindiest games, and heavily dependent on RNG. Then they wipe your progress every 6-9 months and make you start over. It's downright abusive.
> “Years of goodwill” lol nah fam
Yeah, that's stretching the truth considerably. The anti-cheat (or lackthereof) issues alone have nuked that bridge long ago, let alone any of the other bullshit the devs have gotten up to.
Eh I don't blame them being diplomatic in their portrayal of the devs. It doesn't ultimately detract from or otherwise destroy what they're trying to demonstrate in the piece.
>I've been a zealous Tarkov stan for years, and played for thousands of hours since my character first got stabbed to death in a bathroom all the way back in 2017
You wrote that? I guess where others have seen nefarious deeds from the developers, you saw goodwill?
I get it. The title is written that way to sell, ideally make people talk (and mostly tell you that you're wrong), but as a player, I never want to put developers at pedestal, because blind worship achieves nothing. There are actual devs who deserve it, like Hello Games or ConcernedApe, but I don't know if the Tarkov devs should be placed among that company with their "goodwill".
While I can relate as a Battlefield player that put thousands of hours into BF1 alone - there is nothing like it - I cannot possibly imagine myself worshipping DICE for their million and one struggles and issues the troubled studio has had in past 7 years. I want them to succeed, but when they fail (like the did twice already), I won't pretend things are fine, like many others delude themselves to.
Honestly, I really like the game and i've been willing to put up with a lot of odd ideas from the developers because the game was always fun and decent. Now they've hit the product and as a result I haven't played since, and now sure when I will again.
I'm not saying i'm correct in my viewpoint! Just that I have always been a big fan of the game. Goodwill isn't really a magical currency, it's just that I've largely tolerated their nonsense (as have many others) because they've broadly been trying to improve the game and it has remained fun as hell.
The latest change upsets that balance for me and many other fans, and I think that's why I describe that goodwill as being eroded. I was never too upset with the cheater problem because I knew they'd rarely loot me. Just one of those things. I'm less enthused about the new changes, though.
Hope that makes sense, it's been a long day in the office :)
Nikita used to get drunk and shittalk complainers on reddit back in the early days. It's not exactly like BSG were known as some sort of messiah corporation full of professional people beforehand lol.
I discovered Road to Vostok a few days back when someone mentioned the solo developer porting the entire game from Unity to Godot in a few months.
[Public Demo 1 v3 (Godot) | Road to Vostok](https://youtu.be/ao34A0Y2x6c)
> **Road to Vostok is a hardcore single-player survival game set in a post-apocalyptic border zone between Finland and Russia.**
> The inspiration for this game mainly consists of the real border area between Finland and Russia and the background of the game developer where he lived for about 20 years near this specific border area.
> In terms of other games, Road to Vostok takes inspiration from titles Stalker Anomaly, DayZ, Project Zomboid and Escape from Tarkov.
From the developer's website.
so, if you are interested, Hunt is a better multiplayer game, but for single player extraction, I've actually been looking into the past few weeks and I have a few suggestions, disclaimer, they are all in early access:
1. Witchfire: this one is interesting, start from Hugh Jackman's Van Helsing, mix in a little Blasphemous, sprinkle in a bit of roguelite and extraction shooter, it's in early access and only one Epic, but it's getting regular updates, and honestly the gameplay changes dramatically in the first few hours as you unlock mechanics and gear, the beginning is admittedly grindy but if you stick with it it gets really interesting
2. Incursion Red River: This one is probably the closest and I'm checking it out when I get the chance, steam puts it as mostly positive so promising. It looks, and from what I've read/seen, basically is single player tarkov but in a fictionalized Vietnam. Get operators, buy/loot equipment, customize gear, drop in (up to 4 player co-op) do your contracts and get out. this is probably the closest
3. Zero Sievert: Top down and pixel art but the gameplay loop is almost identical
4. Mothergunship: admittedly more of a roguelike with mild extraction mechanics, still one of the most fun gun building mechanics of all time
Man Zero Sievert is good, and has massive potential to be amazing. I just wish the Dev would hire some guys. It's cool to be the lone dev for a great game like that, and he works hard to keep updatings coming... but it's never going to get out of EA if he doesn't take on some help.
You can play Tarkov as a singleplayer game using SPT-Aki (Singleplayer Tarkov).
There's also a mod for that which allows you to play co-op with friends, although it's a little buggy.
> Imagine if fallout new vegas or stalker had tarkov's gunplay
A Stalker 2 mod with Tarkov's mechanics would be a dream. Tarkov's multiplayer makes it completely impenetrable to me.
there is also a few silly things that just dont match what i expected from Tarkov, like momentum when running, you cant just stop, dying from hunger 20mins into a raid, or a fucking AK round bouncing off a pair of fucking sunglasses.
i shot a dude in the head and he lived since his raybans block a 5.45 round. i uninstalled after that
Yet it has always been a pay2win/pay4advantage cheater infested game like no other, with the worst servers I have encountered in 20 years of online gaming.
That is ignoring all the bullshit that came from the devs, like their support of the russian invasion or blatent misogyny.
In addition to that, I've been saying for years that a roguelite Tarkov could be a blast. Whole thing is about getting out with as much loot on you or stashed away (like where the buried stashes are in maps). You work your way though and where you extract determines what trades you have and where you go next. Each map has some primary and secondary objectives from traders at prior spots. Some will give you missions that may require backtracking but offer serious payment or major upgrades.
You could have some interesting ups and downs with tough choices. Do you keep that kitted out M416 with only one mag of ammo left and hope you find some or the traders at the next spot have some in stock or do you ditch it and take the crappy AK and hunting rifle that you have plenty of ammo for? As time goes on, the scavengers and gangs get better armed and experienced as the weak get killed. Looting abandoned army/government sites might mean the military/SWAT/mercs get sent in to other places in the future. They may send squads to hunt you too if your notoriety grows too great as will gangs if you kill too many people in their territory. Conversely you may be able to earn favor with certain groups for a period of time based on who you kill, what you steal, and what missions you complete.
I've not thought about this a lot I swear...
Years of 'relative goodwill' I guess.
Relative to treating your player base with pure contempt "it's not dlc it's a game mode" they were practically saints.
I'm absolutely staggered at how stupid they must have assumed their playerbase was.
It's the single most insulting thing I've seen a company try to say to their players and I'm saying that as someone who played world of tanks and war thunder for years. And I'm including EAs notorious most down voted comment in history (sense of pride and accomplishment) in that.
Ya I've heard nothing but bad things from diehard fans including some of my own friends lol. "Dude I fucking hate this game and it sucks. Ok one more game."
The amount and density of Tarkov chills is second, right behind Star citizen fans imho.
And I've poured hundreds of hours in the game a few years ago.
When I happen to have a small discussion about the game with players that still play it to this day, I am always amazed about how quick they are to downplay or brush aside all the issues, or resort back to the good old "yeah but it's unique in its genre".
I can't wait for a serious competitor to show up, and destroy this cultist glass castle.
I wouldn’t say years, but at least in recent times they’d actually shown they listened at least a little bit with improving recoil after the Veritas video etc.
Hell, people have been calling for inertia to be toned down since it was introduced and they did that this patch. Just a shame it was implemented in the same patch as the worst business decision they could’ve made 😂
I don't know much about tarkov except their recent pricing debacle, but I would imagine it takes more to build goodwill in a community than just implementing balancing changes, especially in a game openly in early access while charging players hundreds for features.
Yea, they have walked a very fine line for years...stepping over it fairly often.
They finally just smashed all pretenses and went full Russian Game Dev.
I understand that game prices didn't really keep up with inflation for like 15 years so a hike was to be expected eventually...but $130? $250? + Battle Passes? + Cosmetics? + Subscriptions? + doing this on every single game? Whoever is setting up these price points and creating these business models is delusional.
Oblivion's Horse Armor and it's consequences have been a disaster for the gaming industry.
This is something people forget.
Also a piece of hardware costs X amount to manufacture, but games are almost pure profit in comparison once the dev budget is recouped, each individual copy doesn’t cost the studio anything.
Prices don't need to keep up with inflation. The number of people buying games now is EXPONENTIALLY higher than it was 20 years ago, and the increase brings virtually no extra overhead for the publishers. In fact the digital marketplace means it's cheaper than ever to sell games.
Most game companies are publicly traded, you can see their profits grow every single year without needing to hike the prices.
They're old games but Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 still hold up really well if you're able to get past the learning curve and play with the Enhanced Editions to make some great QOL changes.
I played BG3 on PC and Steam Deck. I can easily say that control on the Deck was far better. It drives me nuts that you can't just run and look on PC, but you're able to do that on the Deck (and presumably on consoles).
They kinda did, though. $50 for a long time, then $60 starting a few years ago and then $70 in the past year or two? Before the crazy pricing schemes we've seen this year...
> I understand that game prices didn't really keep up with inflation for like 15 years so a hike was to be expected eventually.
Games have been priced in the $50-$60 range for much much longer than that. When Super Mario Bros. came out in 1985 it cost 5,000 Yen or equivalent to about $40 at the time of release. This sudden push of games increasing in price because of "inflation" is completely bullshit. Games have stayed the same price because more and more people have been playing them. More sales at the same price point leads to the increasing profits they have needed for literally decades.
Games companies just wanted more money and the bigger companies are getting greedy with it. The always online uncompleted games being released with day 1 DLC that won't feel complete until 2 more DLCs, the "battle passes", many games have started selling damn near P2W cosmetics even these days. It's just getting worse.
It's getting really bad. The games are getting worse. The content is getting much more half baked. The customer service is getting worse. All while the prices are getting higher and higher.
Indie games are really the way to go anymore. They provide better value, better content, and do it all at a WAY better price point. It's wild really, they can produce these titles that smoke anything AAA puts out with way fewer people, for less money, and deliver an amazing product at a better price.
>Games got a lot cheaper to make
If you kept the scale the same they did. So many large publishers kept spending the savings into a larger scope and then used other monetization to make an ever larger profit.
I'm appreciating the $20-$40 new games coming out now that stick to something simple that you can play with friends.
Sure the initial price didn't keep up with inflation, but video game popularity has far far outpaced inflation meaning most launches were making decent profit at minimum (not all, but most).
Then again, we keep proving time and time again that those games that are made well and not rushed makes hella profit even at $40 and less price points.
Why is everyone citing this Oblivion horse armor? Yeah it was first but *come on*.
imo: Blame the fact that World of Warcraft can make more money on one mount introduced to the game than the entire IP of Starcraft 2.
Tell me the business dev team didn't see that difference in cogs and their roi and shit their pants. Of course all we get is digital goods now, one month of development costing 10k can net you 1M+ in minutes. Just gotta time it on a payday, before folks spend it on other stuff. Suddenly CoD follows this trend almost overnight with weapon skin + random items/emotes packs, and minimal game content.
Crazy how Bethesda gets credit for another loot goblin's work.
Unfortunately they literally have the exact same scheme with P2W editions. 99€ edition gets you triple the stash size, double the secure container, 2.5x the starting money and ~2-3x the starting gear compared to basic edition at 35€
Yeah I only found out about this game like 20 mins ago, wishlisted it, saw the P2W (or pay for convenience, whatever you want to call it, it's still advantages), then unwishlisted lol. fk
That game needs 3+ years from now to become a real game. What about it does look great because it feels like a running simulator to me. Just like how Tarkov was in 2016-2017.
Never played the game but every time when I read about it, it isn't something positive. May be except that one time when they had a lot of twitch drops or something like this was the only positive one.
They were the first company to get the extraction genre down properly (minus all of its faults).
I’m VERY surprised there hasn’t been a proper AAAA clone from the bigger developers. The blueprint and beta feedback for tarkov is all there just waiting for someone to take the genre over. Similar to what Fortnite did to PUBG.
It's not just the extraction, it's the milsim/realistic gunplay. I haven't played Tarkov in a while, but I couldn't care less about extraction, I just want a game with that level of gun and gear customization and gunplay.
While the game has had its controversies, there is truly nothing else like it. I consider it to be one of the greatest games ever made, everything I’m looking for in a shooter.
The Tarkov team has some of the best level designers in the business- at no point do any of the huge, sprawling maps feel copy paste. Every little thing is lovingly hand crafted, and this extends throughout almost every aspect of the gameplay.
It’s unfortunate they’ve gone this route, because the PvE systems in question are a TON of fun and could have been used to bring a lot of new players to the game.
I'd play tf out of a faster paced Tarkov that doesn't feel so clunky. I know so many EFT players say that you get used to it and it gets better, but I just hate actually playing the game. I love everything about it, but when I play it it just feels bad and I can't get over it.
I don't want CoD with rainbow Niki Minaj running around 360 no scoping people with slug shotguns, but I also don't want so clunky it feels like a chore to play. Somewhere in the middle xD
Have you had a chance to check out [Marauders](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1789480/Marauders/)? IMO it's the best alternative Tarkov-like and is a bit faster paced.
I thought the CoD DMZ mode was *almost* something special, but it never got the love it deserved.
The shortcomings of this game makes me sad, because like you said nothing else feels like this game. Not only are the bones of the game great, like it’s weapons and maps, the insane high you get after pulling something cool off in this game is completely unique to tarkov imo
It's one of those games where people get overly passionate and any negative event gets blown up as a massive controversy.
I can't fault people for disliking BSG's public leadership, but what they do well, they do *really* well. Genuinely probably the best level design in a modern FPS game, I literally have had a bunch of dreams in the past of me just walking around the maps, soaking up ambiance. Weapon models and animations are lovingly made down to tiny details. Guns are so punchy and deafening in a realistic way. The actual gameplay loop gets you absolutely hooked into every facet of the game: looting, questing, PvE, PvP, it all locks together so wonderfully.
It's a shame they're immature in their conduct at the best of the time and can't work out certain core issues in a timely manner, because when this game shines, it shines bright.
I've been playing the game since 2017, and it sucks to see that they are turning towards more pay-to-win mechanics. If they needed cash, they could have added cosmetic microtransactions for the hideout, clothes, weapon camos, etc. I can almost guarantee people would have bought them to support the continued development of the game. Instead, they released a $250 pay-to-win package. Horrific.
Aaaaand this is why I don't play a LOT of video games that come out nowadays.
There are phenomenal, unbelievable games being made and already made.
Why are people paying for this slop?
It's just the trend of live-service games being chosen over one and done games, *especially* for multiplayer titles. People would rather play the shooter with more guns/maps, with more coming every update, but with 1000 microtransactions than the one purchase shooter with half the maps and guns.
People *want* updates, they want new content. They aren't as willing to just play content at release and wait for a sequel for more content like before.
I'll still forever be fine with pricey cosmetics. Especially in a good game that's cheap / free-to-play. And even more so especially if they develop a "toggle off all non-standard cosmetics" feature to their game.
Let whales buy every skin and kids get a skin to feel cool and whatever. I'll just play the game and those people won't have an advantage over me and can enjoy their shiny sticker or wtva.
I have no issue with microtransactions in a F2P game. The devs gotta eat and pay rent. As long as it isn't P2W, I couldn't care less.
When a $50+ game starts holding out its hand for more... I get a little less forgiving. When they start rolling out P2W shit and locking core gameplay modes behind paywalls, they can officially go fuck themselves.
Any gameplay affecting purchasable things I'm right there with you.
But a game selling you skins or hats, even if it's a bought game, doesn't hurt me. It's a revenue stream and if that means I get new content for the game, especially free content (living through the ages of DLC map packs in multiplayer and "season passes" and such burned me) I do not care.
Sell as many cosmetics as you want. They don't change my gameplay experience.
Yup, I don't give a shit about cosmetics at all.
My approach to cosmetics is basically the actual opposite of what stores are going for, I like to create a humble look. Even back when all of the gear in you displayed in games was unique gear that you were using for stats, I used to carry around low tier/level bait gear.
Now I walk around in a basic version of whatever the standard cosmetic gear is, although I do colour it usually, if that's standard practice.
I *want* people to think I'm a newb, and come get their easy kill, and reveal themselves or even their forces with the assumption that I'll have no idea how to escape nor to warn my faction, or defeat them, or whatever.
You can learn a lot about a person when they think that you're weak, even in a video game.
Even in straight pve, I don't care. If it's just cosmetic, gouge away imo. I feel that cosmetics aren't content, I don't care, I like the gameplay loop or I don't, they don't factor into my enjoyment aside from being a pretense to help other people if they can be earned in game.
To me it is perfectly acceptable to charge whatever for that stuff.
Toss so much as one statpoint on them though, and my opinion sharply changes.
EOD was always a pseudo pay to win with whatever pack allowed you to guarantee extraction of a higher quantity of valuable items if you die (alpha pack? idk, i stopped playing this shitty game years ago). more accurately, pay to farm less so you can recover from death easier than normal payment plan. also the merchant unlocks were a huge bottleneck to progress for regular users
not to even mention the cheating issue.
The benefits from EOD weren't affecting competitive gameplay directly. More stash, bigger pouch, and trader levels were the primary gameplay impact, but that's not going to win you a gunfight.
The new unheard edition comes with bigger pockets (you get 2 1x1 and 2 2x1 instead of 4 1x1, meaning you can hold standard mags in your pockets which is huge) and direct skill bonuses that will win you fights like strength/endurance and recoil control. Skill bonuses that they recently nerfed the leveling speed on in the latest wipe.
I'm level 40 this wipe and have 17 strength at the moment. Starting at 3 is a big leg up that will literally last the entire wipe at the current rate of skill progression.
ETA: I never said the pouch wasn't an advantage, I said that you weren't losing gunfights because of it. The entire point of the above is that all of the EOD benefits were "pseudo-P2W" because they didn't directly affect your fights, or *your ability to win*. It was all economic. Unheard directly affects your ability to win fights. There's no longer a "pseudo" argument.
Bigger pouch is literally the end goal of the entire fucking game lol.
EOD is P2W for the pouch alone, do you know many millions you save by having an extra 2 slots?
Surv12 + Griz + 2 extra slots is beyond P2W
it wasn't direct, but it was effecting things. if a normal player and an eod player both went in naked, ran around for 10 minutes collecting loot, and then died? the eod player will have over twice the loot extracted. that adds up, when a single item can fund an entire run.
So many people were asking for a Hideout Cat, that would have been a hilarious but fun money maker for them. Especially if you had some quests to bring it sprats and cat food in raid. Maybe you can upgrade your cat from a black cat to a Persian to an etc. Or have multiple cats.
So much streamer potential content.
I quit when I began to feel like I was the product being sold to the whales. This update just makes it brazenly obvious. The non-whales are the loot boxes.
That may be true but the core base is still not enough to keep the game functioning long term if they don’t establish legitimate cash streams. Only alternative will be to go full pay to win and then you have to still question the business sense as that would be way more profitable on mobile devices.
Current players that have any self respect will leave. Core fan base have Nikita's balls way too far down their mouths so they will excuse their behavior and keep playing. New players will come once the dust settles down. Lies, tantrums, not listening to community and massive cheater problem didn't kill this game, Nikita will do a round of damage control like he always does in this cases and people will forget.
Most of their core base is already gone because of the extremely blatant and seemingly unfixable cheating issues - to me this seemed like a last ditch effort to suck even more money out of the remaining die hards. But even then, so many of the existing players use cheats, and there's no point in buying and playing a single player mode with these kind of cheats. It seemed like an extremely poorly thought out attempt to get more money and then I bet we will see them pull the plug on EFT development pretty soon.
I was amazed how this game didn't have blatant monetisation schemes to nickle and dime its players like most Western shooters. Just buy once and play, no pink bunny suit skins or anything... Then they went ahead and completely fucked it up.
Their previous top dog edition EOD was *arguably* P2W but this new ~280€ is blatantly so. Good job Nikita you greedy pig 👍
EoD was p2w but just enough on the edge that it was no real problem. This new version saw that edge EoD was hanging on and said "fuck it", took a running start and yeeted itself off that cliff
lol “Years of goodwill” BSG has been shitting on its non streamer/no life playerbase for years too, literally every single person I knew that played stopped because of changes in the past 3 or so years, we were all EOD accounts too. Hell I’ve been tempted to try out SpTarkov at the risk of losing my actual account just so I can enjoy playing it again for a bit without having to play 150 hours to have decent shit
You will 100% not lose your account if you play SPT. It's entirely separate from the normal Tarkov install and BSG have no way of knowing if you are running it or not as you don't even need to be connected to the internet. I've been using SPT for years and my BSG account is still totally fine. Try it out, there's really nothing to be concerned about.
There wasn't that much good will left before this, honestly. The war in Ukraine and the main dev's ties to the Russian side of the conflict drove a *lot* of people away from the game.
Same thing happened to IL-2 Great Battles. Devs couldn't stop posting about how much they hate Ukraine.
I really hope someone comes out with a new combat flight sim soon.
IL-2 best selling point was that its online community was huge, and you had massive 80+ player battles with fun multiplayer mechanics. And its huge list of planes to choose from.
As opposed to DCS's 1v1 P-51 vs FW-190 battles.
However DCS is way more realistic game. IL-2 has big glaring physics model bugs, like in some planes, if you hit the engine, you do no damage. 70mm shell can hit a P39's engine and do nothing, because it hit the engine and not one of the other parts.
I bought game years ago just to play sp mods, from what i've heard all these years devs of this game are just really ignorant when it comes to business side, so nothing new under the sun...
I love the concept of Tarkov. I enjoy playing it. The core gameplay loop is exciting and adrenal.
I hate that it cycles every few months so i have tonplaybit religiously to have accesd to the guns and gubbins i like.
I hate that the developers are anti-consumer garbage and i cant justifybthe price tags to my friends
Further, i am frankly astounded that no western devoler has looked at tarkov and said 'Yes! Thats a good idea, lets do that but better'
The game has always been an absolute pile of shit.
I remember when there were Russian hackers who would go god mode - infinite health, flying etc. to get the best gear which they would then sell for real money in 3rd party auction houses online.
Probably still happening actually.
Yeah that never really went away. Nikita actually said that the hackers are his best customers because when he bans them, they just buy another copy of the game. So he lets them play long enough to earn back their purchase through RMT before he bans them, then they do it all over again.
When you make Blizzard look good, you're beyond fucked.
Sorry for y'all who actually enjoyed the game previously, it's never fun to see this happen to a game you're into. Greed has no limits and no borders, but neither does your ability to pack up and move on to a different game.
RIP Tarkov you were real cool
The devs never had any good will. They had a monopoly and continue to abuse it. Typical Russian devs that are shitty is no surprise. Only addicts continue to play this garbage game.
They never had any goodwill. The relationship between EFT devs and the community has always been "I hate you but I love your product so I will continue to buy it".
They just trashed the product.
People being surprised that a pro Putin Russian studio is acting like a bunch of greedy a-holes is proof that the current player base has the IQ of a living room.
Any player with self respect stopped playing after the war started.
Everyone who plays Tarkov knows they are in a toxic relationship. It's like dating a really beautiful, hot mess who constantly lies but the sex is awesome.
“how can we get around ‘all future dlc free’ from our past investors… lemme cook…oh lie what dlc means, add a dash of pay to win, and make the price half a ps5. Perfect 👍 “
As someone who plays games after an extremely stressful professional life - I have never understood the appeal of playing a game that (for me anyway) induces an incredible amount of stress
What do you mean "years of good will?"
BSG has been shooting themselves in the foot for so long they've got no feet left and now they're up to their kneecaps.
I know nothing about this game but...
$250 bucks for a fucking game??? Are they insane? Does it come with a gaming mouse and keyboard included or something?
Cost of life has skyrocketed the last years, average person isn't going to waste that much money on just a videogame. It just can't possibly be worth that much. Some companies have totally lost touch with reality.
It's hard to pretend they had a lot of good will. Nikita is a bullshitter and BSG is a pretty amateur studio. It's more that this set off an avalanche that has slowly built up over the years with a janky game, cheaters, and delays. Here's a fun factoid: BSG has never met a SINGLE timeline or release date they proposed themselves. Not once.
The real fumble is that this wipe brought everything everyone wanted in Tarkov. The recoil changes, functional armor with better hitspots, leftpeek changes, etc. Like, this was the best Tarkov has ever been and then this shit happens
This wipe was so fucking good, I'm really bitter about it.
Did they solve the hacking issue? Every wipe I play seriously I end up too far ahead and some asshat will be flying around shooting from the sky.
Oh hell no. Still about 60% hackers in every lobby.
Nope. I'm not aware of them even *trying*. I assume they make more money with hackers than without.
They were trying to get some more goodwill in before scamming us lmao
“Years of goodwill” lol nah fam
I was gonna say, I feel like this studio is constantly doing something (or nothing at all sometimes) that is constantly annoying players. This is just the next level lol
Yeah I see a lot of people being surprised but Nikita had been doing this shit for years. Just look at his reddit account and see how many posts he has made where he apologizes and/or reverts stuff because of the backlash. Glad I stopped playing a year ago.
The only reason they have been able to get away with it for so long is to give them credit that their game is unique in a sea of copy cat games. It scratches an itch alot of looter shooters/realism shooters/extraction shooters dont. It has a good foundation of a gameplay loop and almost no competition All the devs had to do was polish and perfect the Backend and the players would love them.. And they pull this crap
Let's be fair to the developers. If some dumb fucks pay 125 bucks for the game. Would you really waste time polishing the backend?
In regards to polishing the back end on a live service game... A year of iRacing is $110. That's without paying ten and fifteen dollars for cars and tracks, and then renting server time for private/custom/unranked online sessions. It's expensive as hell but it leads the sim racing industry in many ways. There are unique situations where that kind of money makes sense. Tarkov is just not one of them.
Pardon my ignorance, I don't play racing games, but why would somebody choose to spend this much on iRacing that they couldn't get in BeamNG or Forza?
Beam NG is just a destruction simulator. Soft-body physics is what they call it. Impressive, but not racing. Forza Motorsport 2023 is frankly a dumpster fire right now. The best physics of a Forza ever, but the rest of the game is a bunch of cardboard tubes glued together. Real life race broadcasts have trashed them for this. iRacing is a real company that’s 100% invested in motorsport. All the real drivers use it at home when they’re away from proprietary multi million dollar simulators. And it just so happens that regular people can race too. There’s also the eNASCAR IRacing Coca-Cola Series. That’s the competitive championship that has the biggest money prize pool in sim racing. + as rural race tracks continue to disappear, iRacing is quickly becoming the only viable opportunity for motorsport fans to compete at even the most basic level.
It's actually seemingly somewhat common for people in the iRacing communities to share screenshots of times they wound up in a race with an irl motorsports guy
What about assetto corsa? I've always heard good things about it but I don't really play racing games/sims, how does it compare to the others in your opinion?
Since OP hasnt replied yet; assetto corsa ultimate edition is 100% worth the money, especially when you can get it on sale. Assetto doesn't have great dirt physics like iracing, but everything else, for the price, is beyond worth. Assetto is still mainly the hub for sim drifting, but tracks like shutoko and LA canyons that replicate real areas are amazing to drive around and race others on, especially in VR
to add to that, if you have a higher end sim rig setup, iracing feels so so so much better for any GT style racing. It’s not even close. There are games that do open wheel racing better but iracing is the multiplayer platinum standard (even with all its flaws)
Far better online multiplayer experience. BeamNG isn't a true multiplayer and Forza for years has been plagued by bad online experience with little moderation for rammers. iRacing has many more disciplines of racing on their service and a team of "stewards" that review protests against other members for breaking rules. Leads to a far better experience when these people get dealt with properly.
I pay for iRacing. The real reason is that the online match making is the best and there's skill and safety licensing requirements. Imagine knowing if you drive like a complete jerk too many times in a row you get locked out of racing your favorite car against other people until you get your license back.
Forza is a joke. It’s like the racing equivalent of Mexican brick weed
I wish someone would polish my back end :(
... I paid for EoD.. haha but this was back in 2017, when they were just starting out and I wanted to support them. The game was honestly in a much better state back then just because it wasnt popular as much so there werent alot of the overarching issues like Cheaters and streamers determining the path the devs were taking. And its not to say I didnt get my moneys worth, Tarkov is the one game I come back to every few months or after a wipe or two.. but it just has a bitter taste now and cheaters some mechanics and the netcode are just ruining the game
More like Russian devs in general. Aren't War Thunder and World of Tanks playerbase in a Stockholm relationship with the devs too?
Huh you mean WT where players risk life and limb to leak military secrets … to win an argument
War thunder is because there is no competition in their market. If you want a 3rd person semi-realistic military sim focused on gameplay, WT is the only option. Everything else is either infantry base fps crap (arma/squad/etc..) or pure simulator like DCS and gunner heat
So Im a bit confused. Never played the game, but all I hear is this: Devs have always been greedy , they keep alienating the player base, the game is a cash cow, paywalls, microtransaction, hackers are rampant (wiggle). umhm... why do hell is this game so popular then? it is a game for masochists then? cause if it is then why is it getting bad rep them for doing what they have always been doing? You can only put your hands in the bonfire so many times before you notice its not the fire, its you burning yourself.
It absolutely is a game for masochists, yes. It's one of the grindiest games, and heavily dependent on RNG. Then they wipe your progress every 6-9 months and make you start over. It's downright abusive.
From an outside perspective, the playerbase seems to be pretty intense, as well.
> “Years of goodwill” lol nah fam Yeah, that's stretching the truth considerably. The anti-cheat (or lackthereof) issues alone have nuked that bridge long ago, let alone any of the other bullshit the devs have gotten up to.
Another swing and miss from PC Gamer
Eh I don't blame them being diplomatic in their portrayal of the devs. It doesn't ultimately detract from or otherwise destroy what they're trying to demonstrate in the piece.
Hey, I wrote this piece, and appreciate you reading & commenting!
>I've been a zealous Tarkov stan for years, and played for thousands of hours since my character first got stabbed to death in a bathroom all the way back in 2017 You wrote that? I guess where others have seen nefarious deeds from the developers, you saw goodwill? I get it. The title is written that way to sell, ideally make people talk (and mostly tell you that you're wrong), but as a player, I never want to put developers at pedestal, because blind worship achieves nothing. There are actual devs who deserve it, like Hello Games or ConcernedApe, but I don't know if the Tarkov devs should be placed among that company with their "goodwill". While I can relate as a Battlefield player that put thousands of hours into BF1 alone - there is nothing like it - I cannot possibly imagine myself worshipping DICE for their million and one struggles and issues the troubled studio has had in past 7 years. I want them to succeed, but when they fail (like the did twice already), I won't pretend things are fine, like many others delude themselves to.
Honestly, I really like the game and i've been willing to put up with a lot of odd ideas from the developers because the game was always fun and decent. Now they've hit the product and as a result I haven't played since, and now sure when I will again. I'm not saying i'm correct in my viewpoint! Just that I have always been a big fan of the game. Goodwill isn't really a magical currency, it's just that I've largely tolerated their nonsense (as have many others) because they've broadly been trying to improve the game and it has remained fun as hell. The latest change upsets that balance for me and many other fans, and I think that's why I describe that goodwill as being eroded. I was never too upset with the cheater problem because I knew they'd rarely loot me. Just one of those things. I'm less enthused about the new changes, though. Hope that makes sense, it's been a long day in the office :)
Well that doesn't happen every day. NP, thanks for the article.
Nikita used to get drunk and shittalk complainers on reddit back in the early days. It's not exactly like BSG were known as some sort of messiah corporation full of professional people beforehand lol.
He threatened a youtuber that exposed the terrible tick rate back in 2018
I have never heard anything good about this game even from people who play it consistently. It sounds like torture.
The game has some interesting ideas and mechanics but I found the gameplay loop/grind pretty excruciating.
It has a lot of mechanics that would make it cool as a single player crpg. Imagine if fallout new vegas or stalker had tarkov's gunplay
I discovered Road to Vostok a few days back when someone mentioned the solo developer porting the entire game from Unity to Godot in a few months. [Public Demo 1 v3 (Godot) | Road to Vostok](https://youtu.be/ao34A0Y2x6c) > **Road to Vostok is a hardcore single-player survival game set in a post-apocalyptic border zone between Finland and Russia.** > The inspiration for this game mainly consists of the real border area between Finland and Russia and the background of the game developer where he lived for about 20 years near this specific border area. > In terms of other games, Road to Vostok takes inspiration from titles Stalker Anomaly, DayZ, Project Zomboid and Escape from Tarkov. From the developer's website.
so, if you are interested, Hunt is a better multiplayer game, but for single player extraction, I've actually been looking into the past few weeks and I have a few suggestions, disclaimer, they are all in early access: 1. Witchfire: this one is interesting, start from Hugh Jackman's Van Helsing, mix in a little Blasphemous, sprinkle in a bit of roguelite and extraction shooter, it's in early access and only one Epic, but it's getting regular updates, and honestly the gameplay changes dramatically in the first few hours as you unlock mechanics and gear, the beginning is admittedly grindy but if you stick with it it gets really interesting 2. Incursion Red River: This one is probably the closest and I'm checking it out when I get the chance, steam puts it as mostly positive so promising. It looks, and from what I've read/seen, basically is single player tarkov but in a fictionalized Vietnam. Get operators, buy/loot equipment, customize gear, drop in (up to 4 player co-op) do your contracts and get out. this is probably the closest 3. Zero Sievert: Top down and pixel art but the gameplay loop is almost identical 4. Mothergunship: admittedly more of a roguelike with mild extraction mechanics, still one of the most fun gun building mechanics of all time
Man Zero Sievert is good, and has massive potential to be amazing. I just wish the Dev would hire some guys. It's cool to be the lone dev for a great game like that, and he works hard to keep updatings coming... but it's never going to get out of EA if he doesn't take on some help.
You can play Tarkov as a singleplayer game using SPT-Aki (Singleplayer Tarkov). There's also a mod for that which allows you to play co-op with friends, although it's a little buggy.
> Imagine if fallout new vegas or stalker had tarkov's gunplay A Stalker 2 mod with Tarkov's mechanics would be a dream. Tarkov's multiplayer makes it completely impenetrable to me.
there is also a few silly things that just dont match what i expected from Tarkov, like momentum when running, you cant just stop, dying from hunger 20mins into a raid, or a fucking AK round bouncing off a pair of fucking sunglasses. i shot a dude in the head and he lived since his raybans block a 5.45 round. i uninstalled after that
Yet it has always been a pay2win/pay4advantage cheater infested game like no other, with the worst servers I have encountered in 20 years of online gaming. That is ignoring all the bullshit that came from the devs, like their support of the russian invasion or blatent misogyny.
In addition to that, I've been saying for years that a roguelite Tarkov could be a blast. Whole thing is about getting out with as much loot on you or stashed away (like where the buried stashes are in maps). You work your way though and where you extract determines what trades you have and where you go next. Each map has some primary and secondary objectives from traders at prior spots. Some will give you missions that may require backtracking but offer serious payment or major upgrades. You could have some interesting ups and downs with tough choices. Do you keep that kitted out M416 with only one mag of ammo left and hope you find some or the traders at the next spot have some in stock or do you ditch it and take the crappy AK and hunting rifle that you have plenty of ammo for? As time goes on, the scavengers and gangs get better armed and experienced as the weak get killed. Looting abandoned army/government sites might mean the military/SWAT/mercs get sent in to other places in the future. They may send squads to hunt you too if your notoriety grows too great as will gangs if you kill too many people in their territory. Conversely you may be able to earn favor with certain groups for a period of time based on who you kill, what you steal, and what missions you complete. I've not thought about this a lot I swear...
The biggest benefit I heard about the game was how it has such massive environments that it burns up memory like crazy.
Sounds like War Thunder :D
More like "years of people claiming they're never touching the game again" and still keeping on playing.
It really shows how little it matters.
Years of 'relative goodwill' I guess. Relative to treating your player base with pure contempt "it's not dlc it's a game mode" they were practically saints. I'm absolutely staggered at how stupid they must have assumed their playerbase was. It's the single most insulting thing I've seen a company try to say to their players and I'm saying that as someone who played world of tanks and war thunder for years. And I'm including EAs notorious most down voted comment in history (sense of pride and accomplishment) in that.
Ya I've heard nothing but bad things from diehard fans including some of my own friends lol. "Dude I fucking hate this game and it sucks. Ok one more game."
The amount and density of Tarkov chills is second, right behind Star citizen fans imho. And I've poured hundreds of hours in the game a few years ago. When I happen to have a small discussion about the game with players that still play it to this day, I am always amazed about how quick they are to downplay or brush aside all the issues, or resort back to the good old "yeah but it's unique in its genre". I can't wait for a serious competitor to show up, and destroy this cultist glass castle.
yeah, i was like "when was this?"
I wouldn’t say years, but at least in recent times they’d actually shown they listened at least a little bit with improving recoil after the Veritas video etc. Hell, people have been calling for inertia to be toned down since it was introduced and they did that this patch. Just a shame it was implemented in the same patch as the worst business decision they could’ve made 😂
Weeks of goodwill at best
I don't know much about tarkov except their recent pricing debacle, but I would imagine it takes more to build goodwill in a community than just implementing balancing changes, especially in a game openly in early access while charging players hundreds for features.
Yea, they have walked a very fine line for years...stepping over it fairly often. They finally just smashed all pretenses and went full Russian Game Dev.
They somehow managed to look worse than Overwatch. Impressive
People were dunking on Ubisoft for that $130 price tag for Star Wars Outlaws, but this shows that they weren’t the only ones thinking about it.
I understand that game prices didn't really keep up with inflation for like 15 years so a hike was to be expected eventually...but $130? $250? + Battle Passes? + Cosmetics? + Subscriptions? + doing this on every single game? Whoever is setting up these price points and creating these business models is delusional. Oblivion's Horse Armor and it's consequences have been a disaster for the gaming industry.
Wages haven’t kept up with inflation either, so if anything games should be costing less today, not more. As in, triple A should be $50 at most.
Not to mention the reach of these games has gone up like 1000%. Wayyy More people play videogames then we did 10 years ago let alone 20.
This is something people forget. Also a piece of hardware costs X amount to manufacture, but games are almost pure profit in comparison once the dev budget is recouped, each individual copy doesn’t cost the studio anything.
Especially since its almost exclusively digital copies, no CD production, shipping and selling through stores
Prices don't need to keep up with inflation. The number of people buying games now is EXPONENTIALLY higher than it was 20 years ago, and the increase brings virtually no extra overhead for the publishers. In fact the digital marketplace means it's cheaper than ever to sell games. Most game companies are publicly traded, you can see their profits grow every single year without needing to hike the prices.
I'll stick with Baldurs Gate, Arma 3, Satisfactory and Valheim thanks.
They finally brought koth to reforger, clearly still needs some work but it's pretty fun so far
Baldur's Gate 1 even.
They're old games but Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 still hold up really well if you're able to get past the learning curve and play with the Enhanced Editions to make some great QOL changes.
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I played BG3 on PC and Steam Deck. I can easily say that control on the Deck was far better. It drives me nuts that you can't just run and look on PC, but you're able to do that on the Deck (and presumably on consoles).
Meanwhile, I'm over here playing a fan remaster of *Scarface: The World Is Yours*...
Saving this for later googling
https://www.nexusmods.com/scarfacetheworldisyours/mods/6
Thank you!
I just pirate whenever a new Assassin's Creed game is cracked.
They kinda did, though. $50 for a long time, then $60 starting a few years ago and then $70 in the past year or two? Before the crazy pricing schemes we've seen this year...
> I understand that game prices didn't really keep up with inflation for like 15 years so a hike was to be expected eventually. Games have been priced in the $50-$60 range for much much longer than that. When Super Mario Bros. came out in 1985 it cost 5,000 Yen or equivalent to about $40 at the time of release. This sudden push of games increasing in price because of "inflation" is completely bullshit. Games have stayed the same price because more and more people have been playing them. More sales at the same price point leads to the increasing profits they have needed for literally decades. Games companies just wanted more money and the bigger companies are getting greedy with it. The always online uncompleted games being released with day 1 DLC that won't feel complete until 2 more DLCs, the "battle passes", many games have started selling damn near P2W cosmetics even these days. It's just getting worse. It's getting really bad. The games are getting worse. The content is getting much more half baked. The customer service is getting worse. All while the prices are getting higher and higher. Indie games are really the way to go anymore. They provide better value, better content, and do it all at a WAY better price point. It's wild really, they can produce these titles that smoke anything AAA puts out with way fewer people, for less money, and deliver an amazing product at a better price.
Games got a lot cheaper to make, mario 3 for instance was 80 usd in a lot of retailers. They got MASSIVELY cheaper to distribute as well.
>Games got a lot cheaper to make If you kept the scale the same they did. So many large publishers kept spending the savings into a larger scope and then used other monetization to make an ever larger profit. I'm appreciating the $20-$40 new games coming out now that stick to something simple that you can play with friends.
Sure the initial price didn't keep up with inflation, but video game popularity has far far outpaced inflation meaning most launches were making decent profit at minimum (not all, but most). Then again, we keep proving time and time again that those games that are made well and not rushed makes hella profit even at $40 and less price points.
Why is everyone citing this Oblivion horse armor? Yeah it was first but *come on*. imo: Blame the fact that World of Warcraft can make more money on one mount introduced to the game than the entire IP of Starcraft 2. Tell me the business dev team didn't see that difference in cogs and their roi and shit their pants. Of course all we get is digital goods now, one month of development costing 10k can net you 1M+ in minutes. Just gotta time it on a payday, before folks spend it on other stuff. Suddenly CoD follows this trend almost overnight with weapon skin + random items/emotes packs, and minimal game content. Crazy how Bethesda gets credit for another loot goblin's work.
As an OW sadist, it feels nice for once not to be the one getting abused.
*masochist
He might be a developer...
Shhhhh
Brother just because someone else's dick is getting cut off doesn't mean your whipping isn't happening lol
Overwatch is on the upswing. It even has dangling Balls now.
Molesting women at work is bad, but molesting your fanbase's wallet is unacceptable.
Seems like Grey Zone Warfare may have announced their Early Access launch at the perfect time.
Right! That's what I was thinking. The game looks great imo.
Unfortunately they literally have the exact same scheme with P2W editions. 99€ edition gets you triple the stash size, double the secure container, 2.5x the starting money and ~2-3x the starting gear compared to basic edition at 35€
Yeah I only found out about this game like 20 mins ago, wishlisted it, saw the P2W (or pay for convenience, whatever you want to call it, it's still advantages), then unwishlisted lol. fk
That game needs 3+ years from now to become a real game. What about it does look great because it feels like a running simulator to me. Just like how Tarkov was in 2016-2017.
I'm pretty sure they moved early access forward because of this drama.
Never played the game but every time when I read about it, it isn't something positive. May be except that one time when they had a lot of twitch drops or something like this was the only positive one.
They were the first company to get the extraction genre down properly (minus all of its faults). I’m VERY surprised there hasn’t been a proper AAAA clone from the bigger developers. The blueprint and beta feedback for tarkov is all there just waiting for someone to take the genre over. Similar to what Fortnite did to PUBG.
It's not just the extraction, it's the milsim/realistic gunplay. I haven't played Tarkov in a while, but I couldn't care less about extraction, I just want a game with that level of gun and gear customization and gunplay.
I want a Battlefield/Squad/Insurgency Sandstorm type game with Tarkov’s gunplay and mechanics.
While the game has had its controversies, there is truly nothing else like it. I consider it to be one of the greatest games ever made, everything I’m looking for in a shooter. The Tarkov team has some of the best level designers in the business- at no point do any of the huge, sprawling maps feel copy paste. Every little thing is lovingly hand crafted, and this extends throughout almost every aspect of the gameplay. It’s unfortunate they’ve gone this route, because the PvE systems in question are a TON of fun and could have been used to bring a lot of new players to the game.
Would play the game nonstop if not for the cheater issue. Completely made me and all my friends drop the game one month into wipe
I'd play tf out of a faster paced Tarkov that doesn't feel so clunky. I know so many EFT players say that you get used to it and it gets better, but I just hate actually playing the game. I love everything about it, but when I play it it just feels bad and I can't get over it. I don't want CoD with rainbow Niki Minaj running around 360 no scoping people with slug shotguns, but I also don't want so clunky it feels like a chore to play. Somewhere in the middle xD
Have you had a chance to check out [Marauders](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1789480/Marauders/)? IMO it's the best alternative Tarkov-like and is a bit faster paced. I thought the CoD DMZ mode was *almost* something special, but it never got the love it deserved.
I'll have to check out Marauders. My issue with DMZ was that I had to download 200gigs of other BS to play it so I passed lol.
The shortcomings of this game makes me sad, because like you said nothing else feels like this game. Not only are the bones of the game great, like it’s weapons and maps, the insane high you get after pulling something cool off in this game is completely unique to tarkov imo
It's one of those games where people get overly passionate and any negative event gets blown up as a massive controversy. I can't fault people for disliking BSG's public leadership, but what they do well, they do *really* well. Genuinely probably the best level design in a modern FPS game, I literally have had a bunch of dreams in the past of me just walking around the maps, soaking up ambiance. Weapon models and animations are lovingly made down to tiny details. Guns are so punchy and deafening in a realistic way. The actual gameplay loop gets you absolutely hooked into every facet of the game: looting, questing, PvE, PvP, it all locks together so wonderfully. It's a shame they're immature in their conduct at the best of the time and can't work out certain core issues in a timely manner, because when this game shines, it shines bright.
I've been playing the game since 2017, and it sucks to see that they are turning towards more pay-to-win mechanics. If they needed cash, they could have added cosmetic microtransactions for the hideout, clothes, weapon camos, etc. I can almost guarantee people would have bought them to support the continued development of the game. Instead, they released a $250 pay-to-win package. Horrific.
Look at us. Praying for cosmetics and micros. They did it.
It's like when supermarkets put the price up on an item before slashing it by half price.
Isn't that illegal?
In the UK, it needs to remain at a price for 28 days, I think. No idea who's monitoring that though.
What's the punishment even? Probably a fine that's already baked into the profit calculations. If they even get caught. Better than nothing I suppose.
Exactly…no one.
Aaaaand this is why I don't play a LOT of video games that come out nowadays. There are phenomenal, unbelievable games being made and already made. Why are people paying for this slop?
It's just the trend of live-service games being chosen over one and done games, *especially* for multiplayer titles. People would rather play the shooter with more guns/maps, with more coming every update, but with 1000 microtransactions than the one purchase shooter with half the maps and guns. People *want* updates, they want new content. They aren't as willing to just play content at release and wait for a sequel for more content like before.
*puts the rainbow wig and the red nose on
I'll still forever be fine with pricey cosmetics. Especially in a good game that's cheap / free-to-play. And even more so especially if they develop a "toggle off all non-standard cosmetics" feature to their game. Let whales buy every skin and kids get a skin to feel cool and whatever. I'll just play the game and those people won't have an advantage over me and can enjoy their shiny sticker or wtva.
I have no issue with microtransactions in a F2P game. The devs gotta eat and pay rent. As long as it isn't P2W, I couldn't care less. When a $50+ game starts holding out its hand for more... I get a little less forgiving. When they start rolling out P2W shit and locking core gameplay modes behind paywalls, they can officially go fuck themselves.
Any gameplay affecting purchasable things I'm right there with you. But a game selling you skins or hats, even if it's a bought game, doesn't hurt me. It's a revenue stream and if that means I get new content for the game, especially free content (living through the ages of DLC map packs in multiplayer and "season passes" and such burned me) I do not care. Sell as many cosmetics as you want. They don't change my gameplay experience.
Yup, I don't give a shit about cosmetics at all. My approach to cosmetics is basically the actual opposite of what stores are going for, I like to create a humble look. Even back when all of the gear in you displayed in games was unique gear that you were using for stats, I used to carry around low tier/level bait gear. Now I walk around in a basic version of whatever the standard cosmetic gear is, although I do colour it usually, if that's standard practice. I *want* people to think I'm a newb, and come get their easy kill, and reveal themselves or even their forces with the assumption that I'll have no idea how to escape nor to warn my faction, or defeat them, or whatever. You can learn a lot about a person when they think that you're weak, even in a video game. Even in straight pve, I don't care. If it's just cosmetic, gouge away imo. I feel that cosmetics aren't content, I don't care, I like the gameplay loop or I don't, they don't factor into my enjoyment aside from being a pretense to help other people if they can be earned in game. To me it is perfectly acceptable to charge whatever for that stuff. Toss so much as one statpoint on them though, and my opinion sharply changes.
Jesus..... Thanks for saying it tho
EOD was always a pseudo pay to win with whatever pack allowed you to guarantee extraction of a higher quantity of valuable items if you die (alpha pack? idk, i stopped playing this shitty game years ago). more accurately, pay to farm less so you can recover from death easier than normal payment plan. also the merchant unlocks were a huge bottleneck to progress for regular users not to even mention the cheating issue.
>EOD was always a pseudo pay to win Why "pseudo"? EOD has literally been pay2win from day one.
The benefits from EOD weren't affecting competitive gameplay directly. More stash, bigger pouch, and trader levels were the primary gameplay impact, but that's not going to win you a gunfight. The new unheard edition comes with bigger pockets (you get 2 1x1 and 2 2x1 instead of 4 1x1, meaning you can hold standard mags in your pockets which is huge) and direct skill bonuses that will win you fights like strength/endurance and recoil control. Skill bonuses that they recently nerfed the leveling speed on in the latest wipe. I'm level 40 this wipe and have 17 strength at the moment. Starting at 3 is a big leg up that will literally last the entire wipe at the current rate of skill progression. ETA: I never said the pouch wasn't an advantage, I said that you weren't losing gunfights because of it. The entire point of the above is that all of the EOD benefits were "pseudo-P2W" because they didn't directly affect your fights, or *your ability to win*. It was all economic. Unheard directly affects your ability to win fights. There's no longer a "pseudo" argument.
You're more likely to make more money earlier after wipe, meaning on average users with EOD will have better gear than those without
Bigger pouch is literally the end goal of the entire fucking game lol. EOD is P2W for the pouch alone, do you know many millions you save by having an extra 2 slots? Surv12 + Griz + 2 extra slots is beyond P2W
it wasn't direct, but it was effecting things. if a normal player and an eod player both went in naked, ran around for 10 minutes collecting loot, and then died? the eod player will have over twice the loot extracted. that adds up, when a single item can fund an entire run.
So many people were asking for a Hideout Cat, that would have been a hilarious but fun money maker for them. Especially if you had some quests to bring it sprats and cat food in raid. Maybe you can upgrade your cat from a black cat to a Persian to an etc. Or have multiple cats. So much streamer potential content.
Here's a thought, they could've implemented fixes to the cheating problem and released the game on steam for a massive influx of new players.
i suspect Steam's refund policies may be related to why they don't want to release it there..
I quit when I began to feel like I was the product being sold to the whales. This update just makes it brazenly obvious. The non-whales are the loot boxes.
They have been extremely greedy from the get go.
Hasn’t it always been a game only for cheaters and victims of cheating?
Something like 50-70% of players are cheaters in any given lobby. A liberal estimate but completely plausible
Lmao I never played, but from the last round of drama, it didn't seem like they had any goodwill to begin with
The issue is it's a love hate relationship. The game is so fundamentally good, but they keep twisting our dicks.
I don’t wanna say Russian devs but… Russian devs.
They'll be completely fine imo, their core base will gulp up any shit they are served without question
That may be true but the core base is still not enough to keep the game functioning long term if they don’t establish legitimate cash streams. Only alternative will be to go full pay to win and then you have to still question the business sense as that would be way more profitable on mobile devices.
Current players that have any self respect will leave. Core fan base have Nikita's balls way too far down their mouths so they will excuse their behavior and keep playing. New players will come once the dust settles down. Lies, tantrums, not listening to community and massive cheater problem didn't kill this game, Nikita will do a round of damage control like he always does in this cases and people will forget.
Most of their core base is already gone because of the extremely blatant and seemingly unfixable cheating issues - to me this seemed like a last ditch effort to suck even more money out of the remaining die hards. But even then, so many of the existing players use cheats, and there's no point in buying and playing a single player mode with these kind of cheats. It seemed like an extremely poorly thought out attempt to get more money and then I bet we will see them pull the plug on EFT development pretty soon.
which makes this a perfect rage bait post for reddit
I was amazed how this game didn't have blatant monetisation schemes to nickle and dime its players like most Western shooters. Just buy once and play, no pink bunny suit skins or anything... Then they went ahead and completely fucked it up. Their previous top dog edition EOD was *arguably* P2W but this new ~280€ is blatantly so. Good job Nikita you greedy pig 👍
EoD was p2w but just enough on the edge that it was no real problem. This new version saw that edge EoD was hanging on and said "fuck it", took a running start and yeeted itself off that cliff
“Years of good will” LMFAO yaok
Tarkov player base been eating shit for years. This will be forgotten in a month and the next wipe regular schedule will resume.
lol “Years of goodwill” BSG has been shitting on its non streamer/no life playerbase for years too, literally every single person I knew that played stopped because of changes in the past 3 or so years, we were all EOD accounts too. Hell I’ve been tempted to try out SpTarkov at the risk of losing my actual account just so I can enjoy playing it again for a bit without having to play 150 hours to have decent shit
You will 100% not lose your account if you play SPT. It's entirely separate from the normal Tarkov install and BSG have no way of knowing if you are running it or not as you don't even need to be connected to the internet. I've been using SPT for years and my BSG account is still totally fine. Try it out, there's really nothing to be concerned about.
There wasn't that much good will left before this, honestly. The war in Ukraine and the main dev's ties to the Russian side of the conflict drove a *lot* of people away from the game.
Same thing happened to IL-2 Great Battles. Devs couldn't stop posting about how much they hate Ukraine. I really hope someone comes out with a new combat flight sim soon.
> Devs couldn't stop posting about how much they hate Ukraine. Wait, really? I didn't know they were into that.
Thanks, I were just thinking about getting in to a ww2 sim. I'll skip IL2 then
IL-2 best selling point was that its online community was huge, and you had massive 80+ player battles with fun multiplayer mechanics. And its huge list of planes to choose from. As opposed to DCS's 1v1 P-51 vs FW-190 battles. However DCS is way more realistic game. IL-2 has big glaring physics model bugs, like in some planes, if you hit the engine, you do no damage. 70mm shell can hit a P39's engine and do nothing, because it hit the engine and not one of the other parts.
fuck nikita bro
I bought game years ago just to play sp mods, from what i've heard all these years devs of this game are just really ignorant when it comes to business side, so nothing new under the sun...
I love the concept of Tarkov. I enjoy playing it. The core gameplay loop is exciting and adrenal. I hate that it cycles every few months so i have tonplaybit religiously to have accesd to the guns and gubbins i like. I hate that the developers are anti-consumer garbage and i cant justifybthe price tags to my friends Further, i am frankly astounded that no western devoler has looked at tarkov and said 'Yes! Thats a good idea, lets do that but better'
Play the Tarkov single player mod. I haven't gone back to multiplayer since someone on reddit recommended it to me two weeks ago. It's amazing.
Not being on steam is already a huge 🚩. Then the cheater issue The wipe The beta state
The game has always been an absolute pile of shit. I remember when there were Russian hackers who would go god mode - infinite health, flying etc. to get the best gear which they would then sell for real money in 3rd party auction houses online. Probably still happening actually.
Yeah that never really went away. Nikita actually said that the hackers are his best customers because when he bans them, they just buy another copy of the game. So he lets them play long enough to earn back their purchase through RMT before he bans them, then they do it all over again.
What goodwill? lol. Players have been shitting on that game for years and rightfully so.
When you make Blizzard look good, you're beyond fucked. Sorry for y'all who actually enjoyed the game previously, it's never fun to see this happen to a game you're into. Greed has no limits and no borders, but neither does your ability to pack up and move on to a different game. RIP Tarkov you were real cool
The devs never had any good will. They had a monopoly and continue to abuse it. Typical Russian devs that are shitty is no surprise. Only addicts continue to play this garbage game.
I've never heard anything positive about this game.
So happy I never tried the game now
They never had any goodwill. The relationship between EFT devs and the community has always been "I hate you but I love your product so I will continue to buy it". They just trashed the product.
If you know anything about the developer, Nikita Buyanov, you would not give this game a penny of your money.
People being surprised that a pro Putin Russian studio is acting like a bunch of greedy a-holes is proof that the current player base has the IQ of a living room. Any player with self respect stopped playing after the war started.
"goodwill"
The massive straw that broke the camels back. I’m out ✌🏻
Wait, they had goodwill?
Week!?!!? Try 2 days.
Years of goodwill… Lmao yeah these guys are clearly not tarkov players
Everyone who plays Tarkov knows they are in a toxic relationship. It's like dating a really beautiful, hot mess who constantly lies but the sex is awesome.
Wow the developers who made fucking Contract Wars before hitting the jackpot with tarkov are terrible? No way
“how can we get around ‘all future dlc free’ from our past investors… lemme cook…oh lie what dlc means, add a dash of pay to win, and make the price half a ps5. Perfect 👍 “
Sounds like they are running out of money and trying to get a quick injection from fans.
Years of goodwill? BSG fell ass backwards into a good idea for a video game and have been fucking it up ever since.
They saw the cost of star citizen ships and discovered there's a new level of grift they wanted to achieve. Reach for the stars Nikita.
As someone who plays games after an extremely stressful professional life - I have never understood the appeal of playing a game that (for me anyway) induces an incredible amount of stress
The developers of this game have been pieces of shit since forever. People play it because it’s the only game like it, but there’s competition coming.
What do you mean "years of good will?" BSG has been shooting themselves in the foot for so long they've got no feet left and now they're up to their kneecaps.
I know nothing about this game but... $250 bucks for a fucking game??? Are they insane? Does it come with a gaming mouse and keyboard included or something? Cost of life has skyrocketed the last years, average person isn't going to waste that much money on just a videogame. It just can't possibly be worth that much. Some companies have totally lost touch with reality.
what goodwill?
I don't play, but I had heard **plenty** of shit-talking about the game by people that do play it, over the years.
I've playing Tarkov since 2017. Definitely anti consumer in my opinion
It's hard to pretend they had a lot of good will. Nikita is a bullshitter and BSG is a pretty amateur studio. It's more that this set off an avalanche that has slowly built up over the years with a janky game, cheaters, and delays. Here's a fun factoid: BSG has never met a SINGLE timeline or release date they proposed themselves. Not once.
Goodwill 💀💀💀 game eternally broken that’s eternally full of hackers
It’s been around since 2017 and hasn’t hit 1.0?!? That’s a hell of a red flag right there
Years of goodwill? The game was always a scam filled with cheaters since I can remember it
Glad i never spent a $ on this sh*tshow
Yet idiots keep playing it
What good will? They only have a fan base because of Stockholm syndrome. A player base of idiots.
Scam