Whatever Happened to Sonic

[Yoshi]

But Rockstar North isn't a publisher, and who fucking cares what is important to Europe? The only thing that continent has accomplished in the last 100 years is starting two World Wars.

[bVork]

I didn't like the 16-bit versions of Exile. They lost a lot of the creepy atmosphere of the 8-bit versions. The AGA version is particularly bad because the physics are slightly broken and eliminate a couple of the more creative solutions to some puzzles. I also really don't like the AGA graphics - they feel both too colourful and too zoomed-in. It's hard to navigate the game when you see less of the caverns. The ECS version suffers from similar problems, but to a lesser degree.

And European gaming history is incredibly important. Another World was the direct inspiration for ICO and Shadow of the Colossus. DMA Design is pretty much singlehandedly responsible for the modern concept of open-world sandbox gaming (though Bethesda also made significant contributions). I think that, apart from the Mario games, European platformers are far more important and influential than most of the Japanese ones.

Batman: Arkham Asylum is fascinating when viewed from the context of European gaming philosophy. Look at how it lacks a jump button - a trait shared by many other European games such as Beyond Good & Evil, Black, and Heavenly Sword. Also look at the quasi-Metroid-but-not-really collectathon elements - that style of collecting is seen in games as far back as Jet Set Willy, and is also incredibly common in Rare's games.

[James]

Yoshi doesn't know much about video game history- check!

James

[Frogacuda]

DMA Design is pretty much singlehandedly responsible for the modern concept of open-world sandbox gaming (though Bethesda also made significant contributions).

Even Bethesda had a lot of help from a European in that regard. Though I think Elite, Mercenary, and later Hunter led up to that, too, even earlier. Hunter is really like GTA with a less graceful interface.

I think that, apart from the Mario games, European platformers are far more important and influential than most of the Japanese ones.

This sounds like a bit of a stretch, but I'd be interested to hear you elaborate. This is one genre where I saw Europe following more than going off in their own direction.

[NeoZeedeater]

Yeah, the sandbox thing is very much worth noting but bVork lost me on the platform game thing. I agree that Europe contributed a lot to what later would be called Metroid-style games (so did NA developers) but if there's any genre Japan contributed a lot to it's platformers. Space Panic was likely an influence on Donkey Kong, Pac-Land was likely an influence on SMB, Sonic had a ton of imitators from all over the world moreso than any Euro-platformer I can think of, the hybrid genre of arcade/Contra-ish run 'n guns was mostly a Japanese thing, etc.

Europe most likely did beat Japan to the blue hedgehog main character, though.

[Frogacuda]

Platformers really are one of gaming's truly international genres, where there was just a ton of influence between territories. I definitely appreciate how important stuff like Jet Set Willy and Out of This World were, but I couldn't put them over American stuff like Impossible Mission or Prince of Persia, nor Japanese stuff like Mario and Sonic.

[bVork]

I believe that Knight Lore was the direct inspiration for later block-pushing platformers, Landstalker being the most obvious non-European descendant. It was released in Japan on both MSX (1985) and Famicom Disk System (1986). Though I can't prove this, I would not be entirely surprised if later Zelda games, like LttP, took their cues for Z-axis puzzles in some fashion from Knight Lore or games inspired by it.

Prince of Persia pretty much invented the "step-platformer" (as I prefer to call them, due to their tendency to calculate distances in discrete steps rather than pixels) genre, but European developers definitely refined the formula with Another World and Flashback. The two 2D Oddworld games are based equally on Prince of Persia and Creatures 2, and the Exit games are most definitely patterned after Oddworld.

Donkey Kong Country 2 was the first game with persistent level collectables. I suspect this concept grew out of the long history of Spectrum platformers, since it's basically just an application of the collection aspects of the incredibly influential Jet Set Willy to a more linear environment. Miyamoto can't claim ignorance either.* He clearly played the series, since he whined about it after the release of Yoshi's Island - which was the prototype for Mario 64's collection design. Rayman also did this, but I think that it is more notable for being one of the first platformers to require you to return to previously beaten levels after you acquire new abilities in order to fully complete them. Doesn't that sound an awful lot like Super Mario 64's caps?

I must also point out that, while Metroid is the most obvious early example for the now common exploration-discovery-backtracking concept, there are earlier European games like Saboteur which involve similar semi-nonlinear exploration and item collection and use. The Dizzy games are another good example of this style of game, so though I used the more identifiable reference to Metroid when I commented on Batman: Arkham Asylum in a previous post, this sort of combination of platforming, exploration, and item use was most definitely not exclusively derived from Metroid. Exile, too, is not a Metroid-derivative but rather evolved from the far more simple Thrust. One of the earliest examples of emergent puzzle solving in a game, I think that Exile exerted a vast influence on European development and eventually the world as the 3D Grand Theft Auto games brought this sort of "living world" concept to a mass market.

As for 3D platformers, one mustn't forget that Tomb Raider is probably the most influential platformer out there other than Mario 64. Pretty much everything that wasn't inspired by [i]Mario 64 was inspired by Tomb Raider, ranging from modern hits like the 3D Prince of Persia series and Uncharted to forgettable crap like Heavy Metal FAKK2 and Space Bunnies Must Die!

Obviously Contra reigns supreme as the most influential action/platformer out there (though I must point out that Turrican was actually inspired by the considerably more obscure Psycho-Nics Oscar), but there was still a distinctly European style of shooting/platformer. Zamzara and Exolon are two big examples, but Cyberdyne Warrior also fits into the category. These games were often an order of magnitude more difficult than Contra, taking more inspiration from supremely difficult platformers than from arcade run-and-guns. Lots of developers of licensed games just loved this genre. Look at Robocop vs The Terminator and Alien 3 for two console examples. But where is this genre today? Look at the whining in the FarCry thread for one of the most recent iterations of this European predilection for thought before action.

* As an aside, I still think his claim to have not played Ratchet & Clank is utter bullshit. I played R&C2 after Super Mario Galaxy and I was just blown away by how many elements were directly cloned. They didn't just take the spherical worlds, but also the crazy gravity and magnet boot segment and the 2D sections.

[NeoZeedeater]

* As an aside, I still think his claim to have not played Ratchet & Clank is utter bullshit.

Miyamoto and Japanese game makers in general seem to avoid mentioning or deny influences from other companies' games. People often talk like he came up with every aspect of Zelda out of his head but odds are there were video game influences in it. I'm curious if he played Atari's Raiders of the Lost Ark which has similar elements (according to the book Game Over, Raiders is his favourite movie, and the game was available in Japan, so it's quite possible).

And FAKK2 wasn't crap. It doesn't deserve to be put alongside games like Space Bunnies Must Die.

[Melf]

I don't know how the game is, but with a name like "Space Bunnies Must Die," it just has to be awesome.

[Frogacuda]

I think all of bVork's points are legitimate, and I still think all that influence probably adds up to no more than Japan or America's influence on the genre.

Europe doesn't get the credit it deserves though, that much is true. If I can ever get enough time I want to do some articles on the subject.