twitter.com/valvesoftware/status/1196566870360387584

@Pavel Dammit Gaben. I don't want VR

But it's the first major release from Valve since, what, DOTA2?

about time he gets an update :)

@AdmBorkBork You could technically argue Artifact

yeah, they really pushed Artifact. At least in the Dota world :)

@Veskah lol, I'd already forgotten about it

Probably one of the greediest TCG models I ever did see

Pay2pay2pay2play

Buy a 60$ game so that you can pay for cards, so that you can pay to play in competitions so that you can pay valve to take a cut of all your trades

What about Underlords?

I was going to mention it but don't think I'd call it a "major release"

@DJMcMayhem eh, $20, but still.

It's a shame though, the game itself is really good.

Oh whoops

Underlords wasn't conceived by Valve. I did enjoy the mobile game though.

I really hope they'll try to resurrect it somehow.

A cut of the autochess pie

Wait, valve made a mobile game?

yeah, it was on mobile. It was pretty graphics-heavy, but the gameplay was still there

Inb4 half-life alyx charges you a dollar to reload your gun

"Alyx, run down to the local PRO-BASS SHOP(tm) and pick up some AMERICAN EAGLE(r) 9mm for your BERETTA 92FS(r)"

Random aside, Artifact being so entirely dead that its category on twitch was being used for movies, porn and anime slays me to this very day

I really liked the game concept

Having 3 different lanes you fight over was really clever

Yeah, mechanically it's another fantastic Richard Garfield design

I really wonder how hard it can be for the company to say "okay look, we fucked up, here's a more reasonable monetisation model". They're clearly not getting much revenue out of it as it is, so they might as well make it F2P and you only pay for boosters and tournaments.

Iunno, this is the same company who made the Meet Your Match update

And why yes, I'm still salty

I'm not convinced they aren't getting revenue

that's why I said "not getting much" :P

Had they not lost their goddamn minds, they probably could've gotten a solid core

They still have hard-core (likely high-paying) players.

I can't imagine they wouldn't make more money from the cut they take off market transactions if they actually had a very large player base.

Also, I think you could pick up the whole set for like a buck after the game massively flopped while everyone raced to the bottom

Hmmm...maybe. Dunno, I feel like making it F2P would alienate existing players, and I'm not convinced they would make more over the larger player base.

steamcharts.com/app/583950

@NathanMerrill all 100 of them? XD

Alright, most expensive card is $2.88

wow, that is surprisingly low. If I were to play at the same time every day, I'd likely be playing the same set of 80-200 people

Ok. So I've really been loving beat saber. There's just one problem: I can't really talk to anybody about it. Like, what are you supposed to discuss? Unless you are playing the same tracks, there's not much you can say besides "It was really fun/hard/fast"

Eh, same thing you talk about DDR, Osu! or Stepmania

yep. They have the exact same problem.

@NathanMerrill I beat "lvl insane" on expert.

Don't most games struggle with that phenomenon?

If that was true, there wouldn't be much point to this room :P

Well, but I mean it's tough to talk with someone else about Legend of Zelda unless you've done the same dungeons, etc.

Sure, to non-players, all games sound the same. But a game like Slay the Spire can still be actively discussed even if I didn't fight the same bosses, use the same abilities. Consider when the new character came out. I've discussed a bunch of the mechanics around the watcher, even though I haven't played most of her cards

And if I've never played a particular game, it's tough to talk to me about said game.

But beat saber is different: Unless we play the exact same track, it's really hard to discuss that track. And even if you do play the same track, there's more, but there still isn't much to discuss.

@NathanMerrill Speaking of watcher, there's a relatively new mechanic called "mark", and it's an incredibly strong scaling damage

Also, her art is mostly finished and it looks amazing

I imagine she'll be out of beta relatively soon

Wait, better than 2x/3x damage?

I still feel like watcher scales really strong, so that's surprising to me

So it isn't affected by divinity because it functions like poison

It's like poison that never goes down, but only does damage when it's applied. So if I apply 8 mark, you lose 8 HP. Next time I apply 8 mark, you lose 16 more

The weird thing about it is that only one card applies it

I had a really great watcher run where I used "Like water" to turtle up for several rounds while collecting mantra, and then I had several Brilliance cards, so crazy amounts of damage

huh. That's really cool

It's like the "claw" mechanic I see in various places

@NathanMerrill Oh yeah, forgot to mention. If I apply 8 mark to enemy A, then 8 mark to enemy B, the second time triggers A to lose 8 HP also

oh, odd.

The exact text of the card "Pressure Points" is Apply 8(11) Mark. ALL enemies lose HP equal to their Mark.

The watcher's cards probably have my favorite art in the game

You Are Already Dead

I found a StS mobile game, BTW. Called Rogue adventures. It's obviously influenced by StS, but not nearly as good. But if you're looking for that kick on the go, worth checking out.

That looks fun

Also, the maps aren't randomly generated, but there are just a couple of templates, which is lame.

@MartinEnder youtube.com/watch?v=OjfJpUZy4Dk

@NathanMerrill FWIW I've played it quite a lot back in beta, but haven't revisited it since

back then there were only so many tracks to talk about :D

I don't think that one was in the beta, so doesn't sound familiar.

It's a custom song

no, it's a custom track

ah

The one's I've played most are Escape and Angel Voices.

I spent all of yesterday going through my spotify playlists and searching for artists I like in beat saber

I've actually been meaning to check out some custom tracks, especially some more mathy music, but for some reason I haven't got round to it yet.

I'm curious what you mean by "mathy music"

like... weird time signatures and stuff.

math-rock, mathcore, prog rock/metal

OK, that's what I thought, just double checking. I like math-rock

Well, some. I don't listen to math-rock a whole lot, but I like Covet and Chon

And there are some bands I like that have some math-rocky elements like Tiny Moving Parts

haha, I've never heard of Covet and Chon (and only the name of Tiny Moving Parts), I'll have to check them out.

Covet is very relaxing. Yvette young is an insanely good guitar player. I saw them live a while ago, and it was fun.

Chon is either kinda jazzy/relaxing or sorta like instrumental metal if you listen to their older stuff.

TMP is muuuch more emo (and the only one of the three with vocals)

yeah, I could listen to any of those, but I'd never pick them for beat saber. Too slow and mellow.

ok fair :)

@DJMcMayhem Thanks, I'll check those out tomorrow.