Video Games Randomness - Prioritize specific game threads!

Rumpy · Post by **Rumpy** » Sun Feb 09, 2020 3:28 pm

Ever since Steam overhauled their Discovery Queue to give smaller devs more exposure, I've been getting some really off-the-wall recommendations for things that either would never interest me such as a lot of hentai games or games that I wouldn't be able to play anyway. I just got a recommendation in my Queue for a game where the English language isn't even supported. WTF Steam, that's just awful.

Skinypupy · Post by **Skinypupy** » Sun Feb 09, 2020 4:12 pm

Rumpy wrote: Sun Feb 09, 2020 3:28 pm Ever since Steam overhauled their Discovery Queue to give smaller devs more exposure, I've been getting some really off-the-wall recommendations for things that either would never interest me such as a lot of hentai games or games that I wouldn't be able to play anyway. I just got a recommendation in my Queue for a game where the English language isn't even supported. WTF Steam, that's just awful.

I clicked the store filter to block anything with "Nudity or sexual content", as simply opening Steam had started to become risky if my kids were ever around. Some weeks, the "new and trending" would be filled with hentai(ish) games, and when hovering over them shows screenshots, well...

Problem is that filter also keeps out actual games that I actually would be interested in. It filters out games like Assassins Creed Odyssey, Witcher 3, Conan Exiles, Path of Exile, Pathfinder, etc. I've gone back in and unclicked the filter, and have instead told it to block any games with the "hentai" tag. That does seem to filter out most of the most egregious offenders, but I'm finding that lots of the shovelware titles don't bother to include that tag in their description, and end up sneaking through. It's kinda frustrating.

JetFred · Post by **JetFred** » Sun Feb 09, 2020 4:28 pm

If you don't care about visual novels, block that one too.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Sun Feb 09, 2020 4:53 pm

And whatever you do, don't explore the workshop for Wallpaper Engine with the kids around if they aren't ready for hardcore porn!

Rumpy · Post by **Rumpy** » Sun Feb 09, 2020 7:28 pm

Skinypupy wrote: Sun Feb 09, 2020 4:12 pm
Rumpy wrote: Sun Feb 09, 2020 3:28 pm Ever since Steam overhauled their Discovery Queue to give smaller devs more exposure, I've been getting some really off-the-wall recommendations for things that either would never interest me such as a lot of hentai games or games that I wouldn't be able to play anyway. I just got a recommendation in my Queue for a game where the English language isn't even supported. WTF Steam, that's just awful.
I clicked the store filter to block anything with "Nudity or sexual content", as simply opening Steam had started to become risky if my kids were ever around. Some weeks, the "new and trending" would be filled with hentai(ish) games, and when hovering over them shows screenshots, well...

Problem is that filter also keeps out actual games that I actually would be interested in. It filters out games like Assassins Creed Odyssey, Witcher 3, Conan Exiles, Path of Exile, Pathfinder, etc. I've gone back in and unclicked the filter, and have instead told it to block any games with the "hentai" tag. That does seem to filter out most of the most egregious offenders, but I'm finding that lots of the shovelware titles don't bother to include that tag in their description, and end up sneaking through. It's kinda frustrating.

I guess I'll have to start being more vigilant. I mean, at its core, I think Steam had a good idea. The problem with the execution is that it leans too far in one direction and floods the queue with too many games I would never look at in the first place, and by flooding it, I think it creates the inverse of the previous problem where now any interesting games I would have looked at are being flooded out by these and it's been rare as of late for me to find anything to actually put on my wishlist. I don't know what it is, but the problem seems to have gotten even worse as of late.

Skinypupy · Post by **Skinypupy** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 3:57 pm

Skinypupy wrote: Thu Jan 23, 2020 3:57 pm Semi-long story of how Gamestop has basically stolen $125 from me
Spoiler:
Skinypupy wrote: Sun Jan 19, 2020 7:26 pm
Daehawk wrote: Wed Jan 15, 2020 6:03 pm https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/356 ... _sales.php

GameStop stock tumbles by 16 percent following poor holiday sales

I dont think Gamestop is long for this world. Between their bad prices, lame practices, and simply being a physical store in a digital world I think they will be gone sooner than later. It makes me sad to see them reduced so badly. Ive never liked them though since they took over all of Software Etc and Electronics Boutique. Ive shopped there. My wife got me a bunch of pre order stuff too like the Fallout 3 lunchbox and such Ill treaure forever. But as a store I dont go there. I guess in 12-15 years or whatever Ive been maybe 20 - 25 times.
GameStop may have taken $125 from me, and I’m pissed.

I traded a bunch of stuff in early December and got $200 on a gift card. Spent $60 to buy Zelda for Xmas, and haven’t used the card since. Went to use it yesterday to pick up Ring Fit Adventures, and the balance on the card was $0. The cashier at the store couldn’t tell me anything about why the balance was gone, but gave me the customer service number.

Called them yesterday and explained the situation. The rep told me that there was an “OCID transaction” on January 14th for the balance. She couldn’t tell me anything about what the transaction was for, just that the amount. It would have been impossible for be to have used the card in the 14th, as I was at training in Phoenix and didn’t even have it with me.

They said they needed to research it and would get back to me via email within 24 hours. Predictably, I haven’t received any communications from them, and I’m sure I’ll have to continue to chase it down this week.

While I do still like having physical games, this is likely the last straw with GameStop for me. Their service has gone steadily downhill every time I go in there, and I’m just done with them.
Quick update on this. Predictably, I didn’t back hear from anyone at Gamestop. Called them again today, and got some additional details from a much more helpful customer service rep.

- The $125 balance on my gift card was transferred last week to a different card by a Gamestop employee.
- This was apparently done via the Gamestop website, which isn’t supposed to be possible.
- Whoever got the new card has apparently been trading back additional items for credit and putting them on the card, as it now has $145 credit. LOL

So either some employee really screwed up a transaction, or they’ve got some employee fraud going on. They’ve frozen the other card so whoever has it can’t spend my credit. The rep has “opened an investigation” and they’re supposed to get back to me by tomorrow with next steps. I’m not holding my breath that they will (she even recommended that I proactively call them back), but at least I have the details.

Gamestop has burned it’s final bridge with me here, but I at least want to get my $125 credit back.

OK, last update. Alternately titled "The Perils of Poor Customer Service"

I've tried the Customer Support line two more times now, with the same results. They see that my credit was moved, no one can tell me why, and they will "look into it" and get back to me...which never happens. The last time, they told me I had to physically go into a Gamestop location and have the store manager call them (supposedly to verify my identity). I did this and, unsurprisingly, they told the Gamestop manager the exact same thing: They would get back to me...which they never did. One of their reps even told me that "It's not Gamestop's fault if your card gets stolen". It wasn't stolen, you nitwit. Your dumbass company gave my credit to someone else!

I'm basically resigned to the fact that I'm not ever getting my $125 back. Their Customer Support is clueless. The funnest part is that apparently not a single person there keeps any sort of records (despite them telling me they do), so I essentially have to start this conversation over from scratch every time I call. I've tried going through my local stores, who are no help and just refer me back to their Customer Support line. I've been trying get a contact number for someone higher up, but they've been loath to give any of that information up so far.

It's amazing to me the dollars they're going to leave on the table here in order to save a few pennies. I've been a fairly loyal Gamestop customer for YEARS, and would guess my spending there is in the thousands, if not approaching 5 figures at this point. They have not only completely lost my business forever, but I'm also very actively telling other people to stay away from them. A non-gamer friend at work wanted to buy a Switch for his kid and came to me asking where he should go, what games to get, and what to look for. Said has around $500 to spend and wants to make sure he does it right. Guess where I told him not to go, under any circumstances?

And all because not a single person at their company can be bothered to figure out how or why $125 disappeared from my gift card. Hell, at this point, just tell me the credit was stolen by Russian hackers or something...at least it'd be an answer. But to keep telling me that they'll look into it and never bother? That's just shit customer service, and I'm out.

TheMix · Post by **TheMix** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:13 pm

You could purchase a few things online, then tell your CC that you didn't make the purchases, or they never arrived, or they were broken...

Obviously not a good solution, but, frankly, they did steal from you.

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:23 pm

Either call customer care and escalate to management, or take to the social media space.

Skinypupy · Post by **Skinypupy** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:29 pm

Isgrimnur wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:23 pm Either call customer care and escalate to management, or take to the social media space.

The last two calls to customer care have supposedly been escalated, but that doesn't seem to matter much. When they made me drive to the store and have the store manager call, the manager was pleading with the customer care guy to "please make sure that someone calls Mr. Skinypupy back". He was assured that they would absolutely, 100% contact me within a couple days, and...nothing.

I get it, this is a weird situation that is being handled by customer service drones who aren't paid enough to give a shit. I'd like to think that it would eventually get to someone who actually does and can do something about it, but it hasn't happened yet. I shot them an e-mail this afternoon, maybe having something in writing will get it routed to someone who cares.

Social media rant incoming.

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:32 pm

GameStop HQ
625 Westport Pkwy.
Grapevine, TX

If you want to fly in, I'll drive you by there to pitch something through their front windows.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:33 pm

TheMix wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:13 pm You could purchase a few things online, then tell your CC that you didn't make the purchases, or they never arrived, or they were broken...

Obviously not a good solution, but, frankly, they did steal from you.

Please do not commit fraud.

Someone stole from him, not necessarily Gamestop. Committing another crime doesn't actually make anything better.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:34 pm

Isgrimnur wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:32 pm GameStop HQ
625 Westport Pkwy.
Grapevine, TX

If you want to fly in, I'll drive you by there to pitch something through their front windows.

Again with the crimes.

TheMix · Post by **TheMix** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:34 pm

When we had our customer service issues with solar company, it ended up being a Yelp review that got notice. Emails, phone calls, twitter.... nothing seemed to help. But them losing a sale when someone walked away after reading our review got noticed. Unfortunately, Yelp probably wouldn't help in a situation like this one.

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:36 pm

One of those was hyperbole. I'll leave it up to the reader to determine which was which.

Skinypupy · Post by **Skinypupy** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:36 pm

Isgrimnur wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:32 pm GameStop HQ
625 Westport Pkwy.
Grapevine, TX

If you want to fly in, I'll drive you by there to pitch something through their front windows.

Think this would work with a used PS4?

Skinypupy · Post by **Skinypupy** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:46 pm

TheMix wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:34 pm When we had our customer service issues with solar company, it ended up being a Yelp review that got notice. Emails, phone calls, twitter.... nothing seemed to help. But them losing a sale when someone walked away after reading our review got noticed. Unfortunately, Yelp probably wouldn't help in a situation like this one.

Yeah, I don’t want to leave any sort of bad review for my local store, as they’ve actually been pretty helpful. As much as they can as an individual store in a chain of 5,000+ stores, anyways.

If there’s a Yelp for GameStop Customer Support, I’d gladly shred them.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 5:21 pm

Someone stole over $100 from you. File a police report.

Skinypupy · Post by **Skinypupy** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 5:28 pm

Daehawk wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 5:21 pm Someone stole over $100 from you. File a police report.

Yeah, I’m sure they’d get right on that.

It’s not that big of a deal the grand scheme. I’m more chasing this out of sheer principle, at this point.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 5:31 pm

I have $138 credit on my Target account and I am nervous about having that out there, but I refuse to spend it on groceries. Even "worse" I will likely add $500 to it next week (awards from work are best redeemed as Target gift cards) and then I have no idea how I will manage to spend that. The PS5 is pretty far away.

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 5:50 pm

Target sells Steam cards.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 5:52 pm

Skinypupy wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 5:28 pm
Daehawk wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 5:21 pm Someone stole over $100 from you. File a police report.
Yeah, I’m sure they’d get right on that.

It’s not that big of a deal the grand scheme. I’m more chasing this out of sheer principle, at this point.

Could at least threaten them with it.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 6:18 pm

Isgrimnur wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 5:50 pm Target sells Steam cards.

It's an idea, but you can't buy gift cards with gift cards at Target. That is pretty standard these days. I just tested it to verify. If I add a game it prompts me to use the balance, if I add a steam gift card, it does not.

Kasey Chang · Post by **Kasey Chang** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 10:46 pm

So, nothing around the house you need? No kitchen appliance like an air fryer? An instant pot? No bedding and stuff?

-----

Decided to reload a bunch of older games I've tried and abandoned, and some of them are just as bad as I remembered.

Replayed Guns N' Zombies. It's just as lame as I remembered. It's a twin-stick shooter that lets you shoot in all directions. It makes you do stupid achievements without explaining how to do them. Some are rpetty obvious, like kill 7 goons (the big guys with smash attack), but what the heck is "use goon attack to kill 30 enemies"? WTF? It tried to add some variety by letting you buy some turrets in certain locations, but it's still lame.

Replayed Heavy Fire Afghanistan, one of those "topical" budget games rushed out for the news. It's a rail shooter where you can hide behind cover (sometimes) and shoot enemies before they drop out of view. Except you have to play with a joypad or mouse/keyboard, not a lightgun. Meh. It's still lame that I never finished it.

Played Drift 86 for a few minutes. It's actually kinda interesting, as you get to drift cars and they made it easy to keep the car drifting, but you need to know your throttles and brakes to go around corners without hitting anything. Hitting something resets your score to zero.

I'm not sure if I want to go back to play Murdered Soul Suspect as it feels very much like a walking simulator where you just end up scouring for clues that may be hidden all over the place.

JCC · Post by **JCC** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 10:59 pm

Why would you refuse to use the gift card on groceries? Or is it just that you don't want to buy groceries at Target?

Rumpy · Post by **Rumpy** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 11:29 pm

TheMix wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:34 pm When we had our customer service issues with solar company, it ended up being a Yelp review that got notice. Emails, phone calls, twitter.... nothing seemed to help. But them losing a sale when someone walked away after reading our review got noticed. Unfortunately, Yelp probably wouldn't help in a situation like this one.

I would have probably said, send the story in to the Consumerist, but... I just looked them up and they're now owned by Consumer Reports and they're no longer publishing any new content.

Kasey Chang · Post by **Kasey Chang** » Tue Feb 11, 2020 3:52 am

Twitter shame them... Except they admitting over the phone doesn't make for good Twitter drama.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Tue Feb 11, 2020 10:49 am

JCC wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 10:59 pm Why would you refuse to use the gift card on groceries? Or is it just that you don't want to buy groceries at Target?

It feels wrong to spend the proceeds of an award on feeding my teenager. I try to make it "me money" but it turns out "me" already has all the stuff he needs, so it may just end up being groceries after all.

They used to let us take these awards in the form of Amazon gift cards, which would have been better, but really just because those get spent without me even noticing.

Anyway, this has basically nothing to do with Video Games at this point, other than I wish there were some video game things I could buy from Target so I could use up this credit.

Skinypupy · Post by **Skinypupy** » Tue Feb 11, 2020 11:17 am

Kasey Chang wrote: Tue Feb 11, 2020 3:52 am Twitter shame them... Except they admitting over the phone doesn't make for good Twitter drama.

I'm not a Twitter user (signed up years ago, but have never posted anything), but I did make a rather lengthy FB post about it this morning.

One of my friends who is a longtime retail/customer service worker apparently shot that post over to GameStop (not being a Twatter, I'm not exactly sure what that entails, tbh), which I thought was amusing.

JCC · Post by **JCC** » Tue Feb 11, 2020 11:51 am

coopasonic wrote: Tue Feb 11, 2020 10:49 am It feels wrong to spend the proceeds of an award on feeding my teenager. I try to make it "me money" but it turns out "me" already has all the stuff he needs, so it may just end up being groceries after all.

Buy groceries you would have bought anyway with the gift card, then spend money on the video game(s) at whatever store you want. You end up with the same result/cost.

dbt1949 · Post by **dbt1949** » Wed Feb 12, 2020 1:25 am

I haven't bought any new games in weeks!
The shakes are really bad nowwww.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Wed Feb 12, 2020 11:53 am

It looks like Nioh 2 coming next month will be my first new game purchase in quite a while (ignoring the monster hunter world expansion because it is just a {massive} expansion).

Skinypupy · Post by **Skinypupy** » Wed Feb 12, 2020 1:04 pm

I tried Tyranny twice when it first came out. Got bogged down 4-5 hours in because there is SO much dialog and the performance on my old system was really awful. Been itching for a CRPG, and gave it another shot.

Third time is apparently the charm, as it has really clicked this time around, for some reason. About at the halfway point now (12 hours in). I'm completely fascinated by the world, the story is very unique and well-told, and the graphics are fantastic...now that they're running at more than 5 FPS. It avoids my main issue with most CRPG's by not filling my journal with 253 quests, and keeps me focused on one or two objectives. I really appreciate that structure, and it's definitely kept me playing.

My only gripe is that I really don't like the PoE combat system very much. I find it to be far too fiddly, and much prefer the D:OS system when it comes to current CRPGs. Thankfully, I can dial it down to "Story" difficulty and enjoy the game without having to worry too much about encounters. They're still fun, but don't require a ton of thought or strategy. And I don't die as much.

naednek · Post by **naednek** » Thu Feb 13, 2020 1:10 pm

Skinypupy wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:29 pm
Isgrimnur wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:23 pm Either call customer care and escalate to management, or take to the social media space.
The last two calls to customer care have supposedly been escalated, but that doesn't seem to matter much. When they made me drive to the store and have the store manager call, the manager was pleading with the customer care guy to "please make sure that someone calls Mr. Skinypupy back". He was assured that they would absolutely, 100% contact me within a couple days, and...nothing.

I get it, this is a weird situation that is being handled by customer service drones who aren't paid enough to give a shit. I'd like to think that it would eventually get to someone who actually does and can do something about it, but it hasn't happened yet. I shot them an e-mail this afternoon, maybe having something in writing will get it routed to someone who cares.

Social media rant incoming.

I saw your social media rant, but I believe you just ranted on your wall and not tagging or posting on Gamestop's page... They gotta see it

Skinypupy · Post by **Skinypupy** » Thu Feb 13, 2020 1:35 pm

naednek wrote: Thu Feb 13, 2020 1:10 pm
Skinypupy wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:29 pm
Isgrimnur wrote: Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:23 pm Either call customer care and escalate to management, or take to the social media space.
The last two calls to customer care have supposedly been escalated, but that doesn't seem to matter much. When they made me drive to the store and have the store manager call, the manager was pleading with the customer care guy to "please make sure that someone calls Mr. Skinypupy back". He was assured that they would absolutely, 100% contact me within a couple days, and...nothing.

I get it, this is a weird situation that is being handled by customer service drones who aren't paid enough to give a shit. I'd like to think that it would eventually get to someone who actually does and can do something about it, but it hasn't happened yet. I shot them an e-mail this afternoon, maybe having something in writing will get it routed to someone who cares.

Social media rant incoming.
I saw your social media rant, but I believe you just ranted on your wall and not tagging or posting on Gamestop's page... They gotta see it

Yeah, I couldn’t get FB to tag them for some reason. It tagged them just fine in one of my replies, but wouldn’t do it in the main post. Weird.

Will try posting it on their wall and see what happens.

Skinypupy · Post by **Skinypupy** » Thu Feb 13, 2020 9:59 pm

SUCCESS!!! It look another 90 minutes, 6 different transfers, 2 different supervisors, and a call directly to the corporate office, but I have my $126 back.

Time to go spend that (before it disappears again), then never enter another GameStop store in my life.

JetFred · Post by **JetFred** » Thu Feb 13, 2020 11:11 pm

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Thu Feb 13, 2020 11:23 pm

Skinypupy wrote: Thu Feb 13, 2020 9:59 pm SUCCESS!!! It look another 90 minutes, 6 different transfers, 2 different supervisors, and a call directly to the corporate office, but I have my $126 back.

Time to go spend that (before it disappears again), then never enter another GameStop store in my life.

Just to rub it in try not to spend it on any used stuff.

Rumpy · Post by **Rumpy** » Sat Feb 15, 2020 12:04 am

Well, crap. Metro Last Light again. After the train sequence when the Dark One saves you, and you end up carrying it, I can hear myself choking, and I have my mask on, and plenty of filters. Yet for some reason I keep suffocating right after I lay it down next to the tree. I have no idea what I'm supposed to do at this point. No idea if this is a bug? Seriously, I feel this game due to the way it's designed puts you into some unwinnable situations sometimes.

Edit: Ok, I made it through and found a new mask. But they really don't give you much time.

Kasey Chang · Post by **Kasey Chang** » Sat Feb 15, 2020 2:06 am

Decided to go retro a bit and try an old game I thought I never really tried: Conflict: Pacific Carriers, where you play as a pilot in the carrier air war between USN and IJN. The gimmick they have is you actually can switch planes. If you get killed use a different plane. If you run out of ammo, use another plane, and so on. The problem is also, no matter which squadron you play (fighter, dive bomber, torpedo bomber) you have to switch and do something else and you up playing as all three anyway. And the bombing accuracy is atrocious. I think it took me like 20-30 bombs (each plane has 4, dropping 2 per attempt, so I went through the full roster a couple times) to kill one tank farm. That's AFTER I killed all the fighters on the ground, in the air, AND the hangars. Then I had to torpedo the two cargo ships, except they have a destroyer escort shooting at us. And it's a pain getting the right altitude AND speed. I think I ended up putting one bomber in the water.

I guess that's why I never really played it. *sigh* It's tedious bombing and torpedoing.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Sat Feb 15, 2020 11:53 am

Lara Croft would be 52 years old in real life.

https://www.wikiraider.com/index.php/Lara_Croft

February 14th 1968