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Thread: Talking 'Bout This Generation

  1. I like this generation. Score-based games are at a place today they haven't been since 1989, and we have the advent of online leaderboards and the retro movement to thank for that.

  2. #12
    Quote Originally Posted by Schlep
    Rock Band brought music gaming to the masses and still pushes out new songs weekly.
    I was talking purely about design there, not popularizing concepts. Rhythm games aren't that different than last gen from a design perspective. Most of Bioshock was done in 1994 with System Shock; Bioshock was unique thematically but I wouldn't call it that groundbreaking. Dragon Age seems like a continuation of last gen Bioware stuff from the few hours I played it. I do try to look at things objectively and not through rose coloured glasses. There have been games pushing certain types of design forward (you do have some good examples) but I just think overall there were larger steps forward in certain areas early last gen. And I'm not even complaining in most cases; I acknowledge that in any medium, the more time goes by, the harder it becomes to tread new ground.
    Last edited by NeoZeedeater; 03 Feb 2011 at 05:21 PM.

  3. Although obviously this goes back to Ultima Underworld and before, I do see the RPG genre broadening and blurring to an extent it never has before. I see my little brother not really understanding why Fallout 3 and Mass Effect are RPGs and STALKER isn't and I can understand. Same way we saw platform games broadening away from strict platform gameplay last gen. There are still strict genre games, but the lines are becoming a lot blurrier in general.

  4. Quote Originally Posted by MechDeus View Post
    I can't tell if you're trolling or not. I'll guess not for the sake of argument:

    The parents are asking for that game because their kids want GTA. So no, you're not going to get a sandbox game where all you do is shoot things and have it sterile and G rated, that's a game that would only be marketed at little kids and likely not do very well. Now, if you're talking about worthwhile sandbox games in general, there's also Dead Rising, Saints Row, Oblivion, Fallout 3, RDR, and Crackdown.

    As for quality FPS', there's also Bioshock, Condemned, the Darkness, Borderlands, and FEAR. You listed Gears so I'm guessing third-person is included here, so add Vanquish and the Club. I'm sure there's a bunch more good shootin' games I'm forgetting right now.

    Everything we listed is also at least double the amount of worthwhile games in the same genres from last gen, which considering the current generation has only been around for about a year or so longer than the previous is pretty damn good. The FPS lineup for last gen was, what, Halo and Killzone?
    I don't know if you're trolling or not, but I'll assume you're not.
    Playstation 2 had a shit ton of FPS. 4 MoH, 4 CoD, 4 Bond (and some 3PS Bonds too), Killzone, Black, 2 Red Factions, Deus Ex, No One Lives Forever, etc etc.

    As far as "kids want GTA", yes and no. You know what game I sold A SHIT TON of last gen? Mother fucking Simpson's Hit and Run. Know why? BECAUSE YOU COULD JUST RUN AROUND OR DRIVE AROUND AND DO RANDOM SHIT. I'm pretty sure EA made a few bucks on that game, so don't try to tell me there's no market for kid oriented sandbox games.

  5. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by NeoZeedeater View Post
    - Lots of high-quality games across pretty much every genre.
    At a macro level, I agree. But the essential death of two of my favorite genres, SRPGs and Survival Horror, on consoles this generation has been painful. This is highly correlated with Japan's implosion, but I can't decide which is the chicken and which is the egg.
    - Defective hardware, especially the 360.
    This is a huge one. I have never before adjusted my playing habits out of fear for the longevity of something I spent hundreds of dollars to own. But now, I won't play a 360 game unless it's installed on the HDD, and I won't leave any of the systems paused for any period of time, for examples.
    - Smaller, downloadable games have created a bit of a revival of old-fashioned 2d gameplay. Unfortunately, most of these have just been cheap imitations of classics.
    You nailed both ends of this. The revivals tend to have a Yay! to Oooh... cycle from announcement to actual gameplay. Part of this is 2.5D graphics. I think I might go as far as to say they are without exception ugly, especially relative to hand-drawn, parallax-filled wonderlands of yesteryear.
    - Control issues: forced waggle and touch-screen.
    Yes, though I will give credit for pointer controls finally going outside (but not beyond) the mouse.
    - The rise of multi-format development. Personally, I like having the PC tech race slow down a bit because of consoles. It's nice having a computer that doesn't feel totally outdated two years later.
    Blech. When I own seven current platforms, I want unique, hardware-optimized experiences. This common denominator bullshit seemed to really ramp up with the PS2, but now it's the norm. For the hundredth time, I want my 201X Neo Geo, and I don't care how much it costs.
    - DLC. I'm not paying extra for any of this shit unless it's a full-sized expansion pack.
    I won't go quite that far, but the price needs to match the content. And STFU, Opaque.
    - More gamers than ever before. I generally see this as a good thing for any medium although I don't understand why a lot of games aimed at traditional gamers are being made so easy. I played Assassin's Creed 2 for around 8 hours and hadn't been killed once. So, I stopped playing. I played Mass Effect 2 and Fallout NV on their hardest settings on my first playthroughs and they still weren't that difficult. This shit needs to stop. It doesn't seem to be a problem with the FPS genre (that has other issues lately) so why is it with action-adventure and ARPGs?
    The masses are asses. More popular is absolutely never better beyond the critical mass of survival of the industry.
    - I feel this has been a less progressive gen as far as game design goes. There have been some nice refinements of existing concepts (like Bayonetta) and some unique takes (Mirror's Edge) but gaming a decade ago seemed to be pushing boundaries more. Stuff like Grand Theft Auto III, Shenmue, Deus Ex, Jet Grind Radio, etc.. strike me as more ambitious than today's games. Although, given the slowdown of gaming technology, maybe it's a bit unfair to expect any major leaps.
    I think this is related to the increasing development cycle. The developers that matter, whether they are big (Valve, id, BioWare, Irrational, Bethesda) or small (Cave, Platinum), can only churn out quality games at a certain rate. Everyone else waits to see what they do, so the creativity cycle grinds to a halt.
    So, what do you think of the current video game generation?
    Too damn long. We should be getting new console this year, not new portables. The new portables should have been two-plus years ago.

    Quote Originally Posted by Diff-chan View Post
    1. Remake trend - I'm already over this. Playing old games is trivial at this stage. Yet every time I see a "top 10 games that should get remade" article it gets tons of attention so that's what people want.
    I think it's fair to say that I am over it until some certain game gets announced. I've been pretty vocal about what I think of 3D's ability to age gracefully, so remakes from the 32-bit generation's few great 3D games continue to be welcome, but we've already hit a lot of them. Panzer Dragoon comes to mind as a welcome possibility, and I don't mean some bullshit spiritual abomination using Kinect.
    2. in-game preorder bonuses - get the fuck out of here with this junk. Burn in hell forever if the bonuses are store-specific.
    A-fuckin-men.
    3. Peripherals - this gen was the first one where peripherals were not an automatic dead end. Obviously music games have run their course but millions of people spent a ton of money on them. And stuff like steering wheels, joysticks, etc., were as popular as ever.
    Here is the trick for me given this statement (which I agree with): Make this generation's peripherals work with the next generation hardware. I don't need to build another arcade stick. The one I have now is perfect.
    4. "art games" - it seems like this gen is where morons really started looking for "art" in games, which led to overpraising of crap like Flower. Still it gave boring non-gamers like N'Gai Croal a career and they need to put food on the table too.
    Yes, "art games" are frankly insulting to those of us who vehemently believe that games have been art for 30+ years.

    Quote Originally Posted by Schlep View Post
    Disagree on this point. Little Big Planet (and ModNation Racers to a lesser extent) have pushed user content creation.
    You need a PC or to upgrade that Mac with Windows.
    I do wish there were more representation of Japanese games on consoles, but that's about it.
    There are tons of Japanese games on consoles. It's just that 99+% of them are awful. There is exactly one developer in Japan working on current console hardware that is worth a shit: Platinum. Capcom's studios all suck. Sega's studios all suck. Konami's studios all suck. Nintendo still sucks. Hell, even Sony makes all its decent games outside Japan. Note: Cave doesn't work on current console hardware; they only port to it... and too slowly.

  6. #16
    I...

    I didn't play a single FPS on my PS2. Not a one.
    HA! HA! I AM USING THE INTERNET!!1
    My Backloggery

  7. Oh, and neo-retro is an interesting development as well. While there's always been something of a retro-game movement since at least the 16-bit days, this is the first time where there's a conscious effort to actually dial the graphics and sound back a couple generations as well. Retro remakes and updates used to always try to modernize the visuals; that was the point, in fact. Now we have games like Fantasy Zone II DX and Mega Man 9/10 that could legitimately pass for 1980s games, and it's a selling point.

    Which, even if it bothers Yoshi-types, shows a broadening (not a lowering) of consumer expectation that I see as a good thing, because it shows gamers judging graphics on how effectively they communicate a feeling rather than how heavily they exploit the hardware.
    Last edited by Frogacuda; 03 Feb 2011 at 05:14 PM.

  8. #18
    Quote Originally Posted by Frogacuda View Post
    Oh, and neo-retro is an interesting development as well. While there's always been something of a retro-game movement since at least the 16-bit days, this is the first time where there's a conscious effort to actually dial the graphics and sound back a couple generations as well. Retro remakes and updates used to always try to modernize the visuals; that was the point, in fact. Now we have games like Fantasy Zone II DX and Mega Man 9/10 that could legitimately pass for 1980s games, and it's a selling point.

    Which, even if it bothers Yoshi-types, shows a broadening (not a lowering) of consumer expectation that I see as a good thing.
    Yeah, I remember you calling this a milestone for gaming before, and I agree. It's nice to have more people see that visual and audio styles of the past can have value today, and that video games aren't about labeling everything old-fashioned obsolete.

  9. The games this gen are worse than any I can remember. They are buggy, too easy, too much brown/black, too obsessed with being photo-realistic, etc.

    But all the cool features (online play, leaderboards, downloadable replays) have masked how bad this gen's games actually are.

    Madden 10 is a good example: it's a horrible, buggy game that somehow manages to be worse than the PS2's Madden 05. But the 32-man online franchise mode kept me playing Madden 10 and having fun with it, in spite of how much the core game sucked.

  10. Also: Fuck these companies for forgetting about local multiplayer. What kind of world do we live in where you can't even count on a racing game to have two player. It's bullshit.
    There are entire markets being left untouched.
    I get people in here all the time that say "Hey, we like that Mario game on the Wii where all four of us can play, what else do you got that's like that?" I then get to stare at them blankly. Sure, there's 1001 party games, but nothing really where they can go through levels.
    I have to ask, "Do you like Marvel super heroes?"
    Last edited by Some Stupid Japanese Name; 03 Feb 2011 at 05:33 PM.

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