the diffx hall of fame thread

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Originally Posted by Shapermc

I am actually a bit... supprised at this list of yours. I figured you hated some of these (Tomba! 2 being one). Should I really ask if Castlevania:SotN will make at least an honerable mention?

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Absolutely not. SOTN is one of the most overrated games ever. I put it in my PS2 a couple years ago to play it again and realized that the graphics and gameplay are both crappy. The music is good, but Im not gonna play a game for the music (or because other people tell me its good, for that matter).

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I personal like the higher unit count in SC much more.

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If you know what youre doing, the unit limits in Warcraft III arent a negative, but a positive.

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Originally Posted by Regus

I feel as if I've read this list before, but Fur Fighters was on there the last time.

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I made a "Let's diffusionx: Fur Fighters" thread back when Recap was making waves on TNL.

I'd be up to seeing everyone elses list. It wouldn't really be diff's thread anymore, but we haven't had a "GameFAQs"ish thread or two in a while.

I'm down with what you said about JGR and Chrono Cross. People are blind to the latter one.

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Originally Posted by omfgninjas

Warcraft 3 is the most hardcore RTS ever made. No exaggeration, and I've played just about all the popular ones. It's easily accessible just like all Blizzard games, but has so much more depth and strategy than anything they've ever made, which is why it didn't do as well as their other, easier games.

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I disagree with this completely. Every single high-level Starcraft player gave up on War3 after a few months. Competitively, Starcraft (Brood War, specifically) has much more to offer than War3 does in the long run. The randomness of item drops and the limiting effects of upkeep prevent War3 from being the serious 1on1 game that Starcraft was (and still is).

If you ask me, Warcraft 2 is the most hardcore RTS ever made. It is nothing less than perfect for serious 1on1 competition. Of course, I prefer macromanagement (focus on resource gathering and producing units) to micromanagement (individually controlling units in battle). Warcraft 2 is definitely macromanagement-heavy, but War3's economy is just way too simplified for me. And the micromanagement is actually dumbed down from Starcraft, too.

Warcraft 3, though, is really fun for 2on2s, 3on3s and 4on4s. The early game is really short, so things get started very quickly. And I think the hero system works better in bigger games than in 1on1s.

Warcraft 3 is a great game, but Blizzard has done better.

I dont think War3's micro is dumbed down from Starcraft...

As for the economy being simplified... yea, it is, and thats a good thing. I wanna fight battles in my RTS games. Also, Im glad Blizzard took out the naval units with Warcraft 3. That made the game crappy. For what its worth, I think other developers are realizing this too - look at Rise of Nations and how they handled naval transports.

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Originally Posted by diffusionx

I dont think War3's micro is dumbed down from Starcraft...

As for the economy being simplified... yea, it is, and thats a good thing. I wanna fight battles in my RTS games. Also, Im glad Blizzard took out the naval units with Warcraft 3. That made the game crappy. For what its worth, I think other developers are realizing this too - look at Rise of Nations and how they handled naval transports.

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Damn, water maps were my favorite in War2. They suck in SC and War3, though, mainly because they're just land maps with water between the start locations (no water-specific units).

I stand by my statements about the micro in War3 too. They did a few things that newbified the micro: 1st) They put most of the important battle spells on your heroes, rather than having them spread out over a number of different heroes; 2nd) they raised the hit points of all units (this makes microing easier because you have more time to do it); and 3) they added auto-cast.

The odd thing is that I would also argue that these are some improvements over Starcraft and Warcraft 2. Auto-cast is a good thing for the most part. Slow was incredibly hard to use in War2 without autocast. The higher hit points and streamlining of the spell system are okay too. It's just that Blizzard didn't add anything to do in battle.

So now battles are kind of mindless. You watch to see if your unit is about to die, and you move him back. You have most of your spells on autocast, except for hero stuff, so you just cast those whenever you can. There's just not as much to do in battle and there's more time to do it in. And there's no reason to switch back to economy management during your fight, becuase there's nothing to do there either.

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Originally Posted by The_Meach

No Civ 2?

You lose.

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Originally Posted by diffusionx

Patience, young one.

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Tell me more.

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Originally Posted by The_Meach

Tell me more.

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Civilization II is and was an AMAZING game. It was so perfectly simple and pure. I dont know how much Id play it nowadays, since it lacks a lot of the things that we take for granted (as I remember, armies couldnt really stack, and the automanage AI was rudimentary to nonexistant). Still, it was such a good game because it let you build out your own storyline. Every Civilization was basically the same, and the maps were mostly auto-generated and had no basis in reality. So you could carve out the world as you please. Having an enemy go from defiant and proud to groveling at your feet as your army moved in on his capital was one of the best things in all of gaming.

Civ2 basically took Civ1 and perfected the formula. They did an amazing job. Unfortunately, though, the Civ2 legacy is mixed.

Civilization III added a lot of stuff, but I dunno it lost some of that magic in the translation. I bought the game the week it came out but gave up on it shortly after. Later attempts to get back into it proved fruitless as well.

Alpha Centauri was an amazing game, and it provided a real and tangible vision of the future that is far more interesting and concrete than so much of the sci-fi bullshit you see on TV and what not. It also added borders, actual personalities and more defined civs, but that took away from the chess-like, open-ended nature of Civilization 2. Sometimes advancement has its cost.

Call to Power and Call to Power 2 are both so bad as to not worth mentioning.

Rise of Nations, though, is an unbelievably good game and it showed just how talented Brian Reynolds is. Hopefully more games will extract the goodness from RoN and make other, worthy RTSes.

But now I honestly believe the heir to the Civ2 crown is not RON, but Rome Total War. The turn-based game in that is as full and meaty as Civ2 ever was, but yea, just like AC it lacks the open-endedness.

Strong Hold would be my favorite but im not really what you would call a big fan of the genre.

A bit odd of you to list 2 modifications for a game but not list the engine upon which they were built. But nonetheless good to see someone giving Team Fortress the respect it deserves. Was way better on Quake though. A little FYI; I met one of the HL2 and Team Fortress developers in December and he said TF2 was actually still being made. Can't wait :)