Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[FearfulJesuit]

Here is my gaming list:

Mount and Blade Warband.
Civilizations II, III and (sometimes) IV. I bought 5 off Steam and didn't like it that much (though that's more a Steam thing).
Sim Cities 1, 2000, 3000 and 4.
DF
Eversion
Microsoft Pinball. Oh god, pinball. I've spent hours on pinball.

The interesting thing about all of these is that either they're pretty old, or they *act* like they're old. Eversion came out just last year, but it looks like '90's. DF is so bizarre, it doesn't apply to the old/new distinction, at least not in the normal way. Pinball is old; Sim City 4 came out in 2003, and Civ IV in 2005; and I'm not that fond of Civ IV. And M&B concentrates on fantastic gameplay; its graphics are crap.

I was 4 when the '90's ended, but in gaming, I'm more of a '90's child then a Noughtier or a Dickiteer. I bought Spore once, but I didn't like it that much; it's the sort of game that should be sold for five bucks, because you play it three times and get bored. I bought Civ V because I'd heard good things about it, but Steam just ruined it for me; it makes it impossible to play. I did like the game, but the real reason I shelled out fifty bucks to get it was that, well, Sid Meier is a god by now in the gaming world.

People keep sacrificing graphics for gameplay, and it pisses me off. Now I may be a jaded old-style gamer for whom five pixels a unit is enough for me to distinguish everything, who dreams in ASCII and gets creeped out by life-like imagery. But really, I know lots of people who play Civ III. They don't like it because it's pretty, because it really ain't. They don't like it because it's complex. It isn't that, either. They like it because it takes 2001 graphics, a game engine that works extremely well, puts them together, and makes a game you'll stay up until 3 am playing a decade later. How many 2011 games are going to keep people up in 2021?

It isn't just graphics, either. In modern gaming, games are either sandbox...and get boring...or they're strict...and they get boring that way, too, because there's no room to goof around. I mean, SimCity was open-ended, but it wasn't sandbox. You absolutely have to balance your budget, your services, your transportation, and then and only then can you craft your vision. Civ III wasn't open-ended, either, but in so many ways the world was your oyster. Culture? Domination? Conquest? You could settle how you wanted, you could fight the mightiest war in history, and lose...and then, five minutes later, it's 4000 BC again, planning to take a world you don't know. That was fun. That kept you up until 3 am...and it wasn't easy to get bored of it.

I'm optimistic. I'm hoping that we'll reach a plateau in graphics- maybe we're reaching it now- where any improvement in graphics isn't really noticeable, and we'll get back to gameplay itself. I'm also hoping that when we plateau, even casual gamers will take a look at what they've made and say "This is just another constrictive but pretty game. It's just as pretty as its predecessor, but it isn't any more fun." And the gaming companies will be forced to take a good, hard look at the Civ IIIs, the Sim Cities, the M&Bs and the DFs of the gaming world and say "These do what we need games to do, so how do what these do?" Gaming's a mass-market industry now, more so than even ten years ago, and the indie industry isn't going to save it. The indie games will provide models, inspiration, ideas, but only hipsters are playing indie games...well, and hardcore nerds like us... and it's only when EA and Activision and 2K decide "People don't like what we're making, but they don't know what they like," and revamp the old games- then and only then are we going to save gaming. But it won't be until then, and if EA and its ilk stick to their guns, the whole culture is going to go down the drain.

There's still time to fix this, of course, and I think it will be fixed. So here's to hoping that the era of pretty graphics and big-ass guns is coming to an end.



EDIT: Woops! Please move this to the gaming forum!

[Darvi]

Another one...?

Also, you can move threads yourself.

[ChairmanPoo]

The funny thing about these threads its not  how often they come up. Its that they do so with almost identical titles

[Ochita]

Oh wow, another one..

[Taricus]

Er, There's a typo within this.

graphics for gameplay

[Kusgnos]

I think what happens is that the same type of person comes along to these forums, feels the kinship, then is inspired to post about the decay of modern videogames.

I usually don't link to Cracked, but someone showed me a surprisingly succinct article from there about videogames that's fairly relevant to this topic.

http://www.cracked.com/blog/the-6-most-ominous-trends-in-video-games/

[Levi]

I agree with OP for the most part.  Too much time is spent on making things look good and not enough time is spent on making things fun.  I've been an avid gamer for my entire life and I tend to play from many genres, but lately I've finding that I'm having way more fun with cheap indie games than the big blockbuster titles.

I do appreciate nice graphics(I'm not a fan of ascii graphics myself), but I really do think a lot of games are sacrificing their budget on amazing 3d photo realistic graphics when they should be working harder on the actual gameplay.

That said, I think this is mostly the gaming communities fault.  If a game doesn't have amazing graphics reviewers give it lousy scores and people make fun of it and don't buy it.  Its a shame, but I do think this has been changing for the better lately.

[GlyphGryph]

What posters like this fail to realize is that Dwarf Fortress, Terraria, Cataclysm, Cave Story, etc and so on are all modern games. The problem isn't with modern games - its with corporate games. And thats always been the same! Games tend to be better when they are made by people interested in making a good game (instead of loads of money). It's no different from the 90s, when plenty of crap titles were churned out to turn a buck... except, of course, that back then "major game studios" were often composed primarily of enthusiasts!

[Enzo]

Oh look. This thread again.

There have always been bad games. There are still great games being made. Don't act like this is the end of the golden age of gaming.

[Cthulhu]

Modern games, modern music, modern everything only looks bleak when you forget how bleak it's always been.  90% of everything has always been terrible.  It's just that we don't remember all the shitty "old school" games, just the great ones.  Putting Medal of Duty Assault Recon: Modern Gears of Combat 4 up against the classics of the past is not a fair comparison and not grounds for declaring that the sky is falling.

[thatkid]

What posters like this fail to realize is that Dwarf Fortress, Terraria, Cataclysm, Cave Story, etc and so on are all modern games. The problem isn't with modern games - its with corporate games. And thats always been the same! Games tend to be better when they are made by people interested in making a good game (instead of loads of money). It's no different from the 90s, when plenty of crap titles were churned out to turn a buck... except, of course, that back then "major game studios" were often composed primarily of enthusiasts!

Why anyone would willingly go into a creative profession, or any profession but especially a creative one, without being enthusiastic is beyond me. Especially since most jobs aren't that lucrative unless you're at the very top, and at that point you're creative input only extends as far as making sure that nobody's doing anything that will end your massive cash flow.

[Catastrophic lolcats]

Maybe I've matured or I've become some pretentious jazz playing hipster with a black turtleneck but I really only buy indie games these days.
When you see E3 and don't want anything that the big developers are releasing it makes you wonder if the industry has changed and your just hanging on to the fossilised remains of nostalgia or if you've generally matured and can see past the hype.

I am sick of new trends in games however mostly because they're either over used or just terrible. My list.
FPS: The whole iron sight, can't move faster than a turtle thing is great ... in games like S.T.A.L.K.E.R. which are meant to be about survival and fighting stacked odds. It does not work in action games. This was my (almost only) complaint in metro 2033. Had to ram the gun up to your face to even attempt to shoot someone and even then the accuracy was so piss poor. Then to combat this they make the AI retarded, that doesn't feel like good comabt to me at all.

RPG: I honestly thought it was impossible to fuck up rpgs. A good rule set, some good voice actors and a massive world and bam! However along came the terrible grindy single player mmos, the jrpgs and mass effect to fuck over everything.
Hey developers, Mass Effect was a pretty decent game, doesn't eman you have to rip of every shitty thing it did. Dialogue  Wheels are just terrible. Stop it, just stop it.

RTS: Admittly these haven't changed much. Though I find the transition from 2D to 3D really destroyed a lot of franchises. Age of Empires could be an example here.

Adventure Games: They exist still? Never really a genre I got into but you can't deny that adventure went the way of the dodo. Like I said, I don't really care that mcuh but it still a bit depreassing to see a whole genre gone.

Rise of the Sandbox Game: I'd be blunt. I don't like sandbox games all that much. Theres only so many times I can run over some poorly rendered clone in a city and see the same animation.
I don't mind it when games have sandbox elements thats cool. Though when you amke a whole game about the sandbox or "bury" the story inside the sandbox so it's near impossible to find without detication then it's not fun to me.
I like my stories in games and I like my adventure too. But when a game can only offer me fart arsing around then it starts to bore me. The good lord of denmark invented lego for a reason.

Setting: By fucking god, setting. I'm sick to death of space marines and I'm sick to death of WW2 ... or WW2 with space marines. Games like Planescape can prove that a game can be forgiven for terrible (and I mean terrible) game play mechanics for quirky storylines and settings.
However no develop wants to come up with new ideas and would rather pull a nintendo and realease the same crappy game again and again.

This is a massive whine post. Though don't take it that I always hate mainstream gaming. I was playing overlord 2 which is pretty much everything wrong with newer games and I still managed to get a few smiles out of it (maybe because it was so gosh darn cheap, thanks steam).

[Darkmere]

Putting Medal of Duty Assault Recon: Modern Gears of Combat 4 ...

Thanks, you beat me to my own joke.

Seriously though, look at the Angry Video Game Nerd's library of games and say things were better back then. The difference is saturation. Someone shunts out a new product, everyone gets wind of it, and wants to cash in. Suddenly the original product isn't original anymore. So we used to have a whole bunch of varied crap with a few gems. Now we have a whole bunch of similar crap with a few gems. It's progress... after a fashion.

[Duke 2.0]

Modern games, modern music, modern everything only looks bleak when you forget how bleak it's always been.  90% of everything has always been terrible.  It's just that we don't remember all the shitty "old school" games, just the great ones.  Putting Medal of Duty Assault Recon: Modern Gears of Combat 4 up against the classics of the past is not a fair comparison and not grounds for declaring that the sky is falling.

 The point of this being nothing new and hardly a downfall is one that should bring an end to the idea that holding graphics over gameplay is somehow causing a market to degrade, but there needs to be a few more nails in this coffin before we can lay it to rest.

 Companies give a ton of thought to their product. Every feature and development is a deliberate calculated choice by these studios. Creativity is not ignored because it's difficult or any lack of talent, it's not a guaranteed sale. Making a remake of games that sell well is a wise investment decision because it's a known fact that people will buy it. Fun gameplay is irrelevant, it's all about what statistics these companies have gathered on what gameplay mechanics people spend time on.

 This isn't necessarily a bad thing. Companies are getting a good idea of what mechanics work and what mechanics we don't care for. If they try too hard to resell Call of Duty gamers will grow bored of those mechanics and the data collected will reflect that. The system should regulate itself to a healthy flow between what has worked and new stuff that could possibly work. If anything the downfall of gaming is how vague and unknown everything is. There are a ton of various gaming genres that have wildly different methods of marketing, selling models, ratings systems and distributions. Until there is an understandings on how different the many different types of games are and how to handle them we are left with the awkward teenage system we have now.