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[Blademasterbobo]

I edited the post to have a small list of stories with similar endings. They're not all exactly the same or anything, but they're close enough to make stuff like this predictable if you've seen a few of them.  

[Blambo]

fyi bioshock infinite is $45 on greenmangaming, and you get a steam key etc.

Just curious, how does GMG make a profit if it's a secondary distributor?

[deathtotheweird]

I remember reading on reddit that their marketing budget is essentially selling discounted games and banking on word of mouth advertising. Discounts bring traffic and traffic = revenue. Kind of like what Bobo did, by posting about the discount. That word of mouth advertising goes far, especially on social networking sites and large public forums such as reddit/4chan/sa/etc.

It's definitely a good place to get some cheap games, and probably one of the best places to pre-order games.

[Fallsburg]

@Fallsburg the game actually explains some of those things. The Luteces get magical powers because Comstock kills them with one of the tear machine thingies, to make it look like an accident. Sorta like what happens with Doctor Manhattan in Watchmen, I guess. Comstock is older for the same reason that he can't have kids and is dying from cancer: too much time spent in close proximity to all the technojunk the Luteces made.

No, I'm aware that the game explains why the Lutece's gained powers, but it still felt like a copout.  The game just seems to randomly pass out powers as it wants, without any sort of internal logic. 
I guess I missed that bit about why Comstock was older.  I got the sterile and cancer bits, but missed them saying it had made him older too.

[Tuba]

I edited the post to have a small list of stories with similar endings. They're not all exactly the same or anything, but they're close enough to make stuff like this predictable if you've seen a few of them.  

Don't worry, I saw most of those, I thought you were talking about more obscure stuff. And yet I couldn't predict the ending. Playing again you can see a lot of signs of it, like the Lucete's talking in the boat and playing heads or tails. But, I think I was distracted expecting something more akin to Bioshock to think about that. Probably because of the whole working class revolution and racism debacle that is going on. The game also makes a good job making you think that Elizabeth is the key to everything, while actually Lutece (which is actually the same person from 2 different realities btw) is. Once that starts to become more clear (when the ghost shows up), the game gets more fast paced and linear so you don't have time to think about what's going on.

[Blademasterbobo]

The first quote they show you before the game even starts made me expect a stupid ending. At first I thought it was gonna be more of a Final Fantasy 10 type thing, though. When I got to the part where you jump to different realities, and heard more of the Luteces tapes, it was pretty easy to guess what sort of ending it'd be. Especially after I spent a little time thinking about previous Luteces encounters (eg the coin flip thing.) And then you get nosebleeds when you kill Comstock, etc, etc. I'm a bit cynical now when it comes to these types of stories, so I always expect this type of ending. So part of it was probably just that I was actively looking for things that'd confirm that the ending was gonna be dumb.  

[crowe]

Frankly these days it'd be more of a twist for that not to happen.

[s0]

so how is the 1999 mode?

[deathtotheweird]

There's one boss that I'm convinced is broken on 1999 mode, but other than that it was good. A few enemies can get kinda spongey though.

Dying is very costly, but even if you lose a lot of money the game never really becomes an insurmountable challenge like I was expecting it to be. Though perhaps that's why I had trouble on that certain boss.

If you're decent at shooters and don't want the game to hold your hands, there's no other way to play it but 1999 mode.

[s0]

hahahaha i just read you have to play through the game to unlock 1999 mode how dum is that.

but i also read that you can cheat to unlock it early so thats good.

[gimymblert]

konami code to unlock

[deathtotheweird]

yeah it's a shame they hid it under a cheat code, most people probably won't know it exists until they beat the game.

and the game is nearly unplayable on anything but 1999 mode, it's just so easy and boring.

[ink.inc]

and the game is nearly unplayable on anything but 1999 mode, it's just so easy and boring.

t b h i was bored 20 min into the lets play

[ink.inc]

namragog and jmickle made an rpg and i used it to spell 'anime' in urine

r pee g

get it

game of the fucking year

[Faust06]

Nice tip, I'll try the 1999 mode on my first playthrough if it's that easy. Is there also a "hard" mode available from the beginning?

[crowe]

my favorite silent hill of all

[Uykered]

Been enjoying Cosmic Encounter, its great. Also been good to play Telestrations with many of the family members, lots of amusements with that game.

[Blambo]

I remember reading on reddit that their marketing budget is essentially selling discounted games and banking on word of mouth advertising. Discounts bring traffic and traffic = revenue. Kind of like what Bobo did, by posting about the discount. That word of mouth advertising goes far, especially on social networking sites and large public forums such as reddit/4chan/sa/etc.

It's definitely a good place to get some cheap games, and probably one of the best places to pre-order games.

Wait...is ad and promotion revenue really enough to balance the loss in sales profit? I imagine that the only way that they get steam keys is by buying them off steam, unless they're a primary distributor and get them from the developers. If that's the case, Valve must value increasing the size of their platform more than their digital monopoly, which makes them saints compared to EA.

[deathtotheweird]

I'm not exactly sure how it works, but I'm pretty sure publishers can ask for an infinite amount of keys from Steam. I doubt Steam would sell keys to other distributors directly.

And to answer your first question, obviously that would be a yes or they wouldn't be in business. I'm not quite certain if they're rolling in the dough or anything, but I'm positive it's part of a long term business strategy.

[Blambo]

That makes sense. Steam's pretty much an industry standard for distribution, so they're not really competing with GMG at all. Still, Valve does "lose sales" when publishers are also distributing through GMG as a primary along with Steam.