Diecast #378: Email Madness

Diecast – Twenty Sided

Once again, I was sure the show was running long. And yet again, the resulting podcast is just under an hour. I guess I underestimate just how much ends up on the cutting room floor. Between segments Paul and I frequently stop and talk about what topic we want to jump to next. Or we pause while one of us looks up something on Google.

In my mind, these take only a few seconds. But apparently we spend five to ten minutes on this sort of stuff. Weird.

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Hosts: Paul, Shamus. Episode edited by Issac.
Diecast378

Link (YouTube)

00:00 Leah’s Mojang Migration
It can be done!

02:17 Shamus Fixed his email
I’m still working my way through the backlog.

04:46 Sending request to Facebook.com
According to Linkedin, Facebook currently employs approximately 8850 software developers. And yet… when was the last time you saw a new feature? Those coders must spend at least some of the day coding. Where is the output of those 8k+ people going? What does their code DO? And how much of it needs to exist at all?

07:11 Oli Oli World
They added characters. And a story. And lore. And I have no idea why.

12:18 The Captain

Link (YouTube)

21:23 Coding is very hard now
Alas. Hopefully things turn around soon.

27:42 Mailbag: Which Minecraft is Best

Dear Diecast,

I hope you’re doing well! Recently, I exposed the joys of PC gaming to my 5 y/o sister. Up until that point she’d only played mobile games, and while there are some good ones out there, most of them are… well… mobile games.
On the PC we mostly play story games, but I know that she also likes watching Minecraft Let’s Plays. Which is why I want to show her how to play Minecraft.
But I’ve never played it myself, so I was wondering – which version of Minecraft should I get – the Java version or the Microsoft store version? E.g. I know that the Java version is free, and has all the mods. What’s the Microsoft version got going for it?

Anyways, take care, and keep being awesome,
Lino

32:29 Mailbag: Waiting for Windows (NICK)

Dear Diecast,

I admit I have no comprehension of program or operating system design. Despite this, I find it hard to comprehend why – in the year 2022 – I still find myself in the same dumb situation I found myself in during the 1990’s, where I would double click on an executable, and then must wait some arbitrary period from 5 to 30 seconds, waiting for any kind of response.

During those fleeting seconds my mind can play cruel games with my heart:

“are you sure you double clicked correctly? The computer might not have registered your input, and now you could be wasting time waiting for a program that will never start”.

But then, of course, if you were to double click again, you might risk opening the same program twice, simultaneously.

Even if modern technology did still require such extensive start-up times, couldn’t there at least be some basic signal from Windows to tell you that your computer is in fact doing something… anything?!

As I have no experience with Linux or Mac, do those platforms handle this problem any better?

Yours inconsistently,

Nick

42:55 Mailbag: Weird West

Dear Diecast,

Firstly, hope you guys are doing well. Have you seen Weird West by Devolver? I was tempted to get it, but it’s so outside of my usual wheelhouse when it comes to games that I didn’t know what to think.

Jennifer Snow

45:17 Mailbag: Quicker Quitting (NICK)

Dear Diecast,

TL:DR “Many gamers have busy lives where they may be required to drop what they are doing at a moment’s notice, to do something else unexpected (e.g. parents of young children). Yet many games still seem to lack a reliable way to quickly save and exit a gameplay session. Not being able to pause or re-watch a critical cutscene can also be frustrating. Could this be considered as a “quality of life” oversight?”

I’m sure you don’t remember when you answered my Diecast question in Episode 301 regarding my wife and I considering parenthood. Either way, your advice must have been good, because our son is due to be born later this month!

Whilst I am sure I have no idea what I have gotten myself in for, at the very least I am sure that if I still find the time to play videogames, then they ought to be the sort of games that can be paused or exited at a moments notice, when real life requires my attention. Which is why I am surprised that so many games these days do not seem to have a reliable way to quickly save and quit a gameplay session. I get that this would not be feasible for all games (online multiplayer being an obvious example), but even many single player games seem to dictate special circumstances for when and where you are allowed to save and quit.

If the rationale is that being able to save anywhere may result in an unfair advantage for the player (e.g. temptation to use “save-scumming” tactics), then my rebuttal would be that I have played games with an “ironman mode” like X-Com Enemy Unknown, where the game is perpetually saving your progress, but only allows you to load the most recent save.

As a side note, as much as we hate it when cutscenes are unskippable, I find it even more ridiculous when they cannot be paused or watched again later. Don’t game designers realise that some people may need to step away from their game quickly and at a moment’s notice?

Yours prenatally,

Nick

48:17 Mailbag: Cover Systems in Shooters

Dear Diecast,

Do you think cover systems ruined shooters? (Not trying to be dramatic, so feel free to interpret however severely you feel is appropriate.) Or elsewise detracted from the storytelling or experience of a narrative-driven game?

Kind regards,
Andrew