• chevron_right

      Mario Kart 8 update nerfs controversial “sandbagging” strategy

      news.movim.eu / ArsTechnica · Thursday, 9 November - 17:46 · 1 minute

    Baby Luigi represents the reaction of sandbagging racers in this artistic rendering.

    Baby Luigi represents the reaction of sandbagging racers in this artistic rendering. (credit: Nintendo)

    Since Mario Kart 8 's launch on the Wii U, one of the game's most successful and controversial strategies has involved intentionally hanging out at the back of the pack to amass and abuse the game's best items. Now, over nine years since the game's initial release , Nintendo has taken steps to eliminate the controversial "bagging" strategy in the latest update to the Switch's Mario Kart 8 Deluxe .

    Mario Kart 8 players who made use of "bagging" (short for "sandbagging" and sometimes also called "item smuggling") in online races would briefly retreat to last place to sit on a regenerating item box, waiting to acquire some of the game's most powerful items (which are much more likely to appear when you are far away from first place ). The bagging player could then use one of those items (say, a Golden Mushroom and/or Starman) to quickly catch up with the pack before using the other amassed item (say, a Bullet Bill) to build up a dominant lead. The strategy can be especially effective on tracks like "Cheese Land," where using a Bullet Bill in very specific locations can extend how long the powerful item lasts .

    Not “cheating,” but not exactly “racing”?

    Despite bagging's controversial reputation among many players, the strategy isn't really comparable to outright cheating—baggers play an unmodified version of the game as it was designed, after all. And for years , many Mario Kart 8 players have argued that it's a perfectly fair strategy that requires actual skill to use effectively. "Sandbagging is a risk vs reward kind of thing," GameFAQs user RydeonHD wrote in 2016 . "There have been many times where it can just plain out backfire (in those cases, it would've just been better to strive for first)."

    Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments

    • chevron_right

      Jagged Alliance 3 has smart tactics, goofy characters, stupid fun escapism

      news.movim.eu / ArsTechnica · Thursday, 20 July, 2023 - 17:50 · 1 minute

    Jagged Alliance 3 cover art

    Enlarge (credit: THQ Nordic)

    The first Jagged Alliance game was published nine months after X-COM: UFO Defense , despite being developed at nearly the same time, in the same genre, with neither knowing about the other. X-COM took the throne as the progenitor of turn-based tactics games . Jagged Alliance sold okay and became a minor cult classic but is not mentioned in even a fraction of as many histories or ranked lists.

    Jagged Alliance 2 was a richer, cruder, funnier, far better game. The sequel more fully meshed '80s action movie tropes and stereotypes with the peculiar fun of micromanaging a jungle gunfight, while also managing a cast of real characters. Like Soldier of Fortune magazine, or dozens of VHS box covers from the "Action" section, it's only realistic at a glance. As Darius Kazemi puts it in his wonderful book on the game : "No matter what a war-themed video game claims to do, it inevitably simulates the cultural fantasy of war and never war itself."

    Like its predecessor, Jagged Alliance 2 had exponentially more developer cred than sales. It racked up editors' awards and high review scores, but its most notable nod was a nomination for " Best Game Nobody Played " in 1999. Nobody expected a true sequel 24 years later. But here we are, with a Jagged Alliance 3 that feels very direct in its sequel-dom.

    Read 13 remaining paragraphs | Comments

    • chevron_right

      EU Voice is the official ActivityPub microblogging platform of the EU institutions, bodies and agencies (EUIs).

      Mathias Poujol-Rost ✅ · Sunday, 1 May, 2022 - 14:12 edit

    The official Mastodon instance! With EU Video (a #peertube instance), it is part of an alternative social media pilot program proposed, and provided by the European Data Protection Supervisor (#EDPS). The pilot program contributes to the European Union’s #strategy for data and digital #sovereignty that aims to foster Europe’s independence in the digital world.

    Press release (PDF) : https://edps.europa.eu/press-publications/press-news/press-releases/2022/edps-launches-pilot-phase-two-social-media_en