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This only gave grief

3 (6.1%)

Grakelin is not stupid

6 (12.2%)

Are you happier now?

1 (2%)

------ Haiku, the encore -----

17 (34.7%)

Disagreeing, Fine

0 (0%)

Why you make a fuzz 'bout it?

3 (6.1%)

Lets just be happy

19 (38.8%)

Total Members Voted: 48

[Virex]

I don't get the love for valve games. Arn't they exactly the opposite of what a good game should be? Everything's linear and prescripted, the gameplay is mind-numbingly simple, everything's damn easy once you figure out the basics (Except for whit portal, that becomes easy once you've figured out some of the puzzles). There's no freedom to roam, there's no emergent gameplay and for the on-line games the community tends to suck. Only good thing they have is outdated graphics.

[Grakelin]

But they achieve the goal of being fun. And that's what counts.

[nenjin]

I take it you're a bit younger then? Valve has a long history, and used to be considered an independent, underdog developer. They originally won over hardcore fans with CS because it was a barebones, purist FPS that did tactical combat before major companies put the graphical shine and glitz on it. Valve was like that pair of skater shoes that was really awesome, but you couldn't find in any of the major shoes stores. Playing Valve games meant you had some sort of real nerd cred.

They got a lot of fans with HL2, which gave people a thoughtful sci-fi story with their shooter.

Portal showed that Valve was capable of thinking in non-traditional ways and producing a fun, non-traditional game with unique features.

They got a ton of fans when they bought TF, revamped the **** out of it, re-released it as TF2 and have provided ridiculous levels of support for the game since. Seriously, I don't think ANY game has had the level of support and the amount of updates as TF2. And it's all been free.

They created Steam, which, based on your experience, you either love or hate. I love it, simply because when I'm ready, I can get newer games for far cheaper.

L4D was where the company started to change though I think. Their budgets went through the roof, their target market became everyone and major publishers finally started taking them seriously. They had to. Steam by then was going full blast and Valve couldn't be disregarded anymore. They had become players in the industry.

I had never even looked at Valve until L4D. So I had none of the fanboi-ism going in. I would BE a Valve fanboi today if they had supported L4D like they promised. When we asked "Is L4D going to be like TF2, and get supported and updated regularly" the response was "It sure is!"

My ass. And even the stuff they've done with L4D2 has amounted to paying for cinematic campaigns. Lying *** mother-****ers.

I do respect Valve for one reason though, their design. Parts of L4D aside, almost every Valve game does something unique with standard FPS mechanics. In Portal, the Portal gun. In TF2, the classes and all the various ways they allow you to bend or break the rules. In L4D, it was mainly the hunter and the dynamics of wall jumping. Very few people do that well; most do some kind of special effect or vision mode or something that only slightly changes game play. Valve tends to go into the mechanics of the thing and make a lot of changes, so you end up with a lot of variation within the same game.

[Schilcote]

they'll make an entire game just to get a licensing deal with EA

Hmm? Which game was that? Licensing deal with EA? I've seriously never heard anything about that.

Also, I'm not a "fanboi". I mainly like the Source engine (which is only 25% Valve's anyway- underneath all that polish it's nothing but Quake) and Half-Life's story. I play their games because I like them, not because I have some irrational affinity to the producer. Believe me, if Valve ever does something truly stupid I'll be one of the first to complain. I don't play Left 4 Dead because it simply does not interest me. Actually, there's a Gmod map called Electric Onslaught which is essentially Left 4 Dead only slightly different and a hell of a lot more fun.

You can say a lot of things about me, but I've never made a thread devoted to seeing people agree with me.

Such a sweet way of distorting what I stated and being an ass again. Let me explicitly state that this thread is meant to let people rant about games whether they agree with me or not. They can rant about the same thing over and over, be it something I don't care about or something against my own rant, if that will make them feel better.

Look at Valve. Every employee of Valve Software knows what he's doing. They PLAY games, not just make them, and they know what the consumer wants.

They do? Unless they use some hidden accounts or private setup, all TF2 developer stats are crap. It's like they don't even bother touching it. I also don't want any more HL or L4D games, I hope they know I want that and move to something better, like Portal 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, etc. And ultra-high quality boring games? Such a cute fanboy. =p




Spore.... Man, I regret pre-ordering it so much. Slightly more than I regret buying HL2 crap. I mean, I can see how Spore can be entertaining for little kids and how the creature editor was pretty much the only good bit of it, but so much disappointment due to that early demo.

There's no need for personal attacks.

It's not like Valve's games are the only ones that exist you know. During playtesting they probably use special dev. copies that don't call in to Steam (for good reason I bet, Steam is nice for getting good deals but the "No connection? NO GAEMS 4 U" is crap, made almost insulting with "offline mode" which does absolutely nothing except make it so that Steam doesn't even try...) and there's the separate accounts mentioned above. Listen to the commentary, it's very interesting. They have it all down to a precise science.

While you personally may prefer another Portal to Episode 3, just as many people have the reverse opinion. There's no need to be all offensive just because someone has different tastes. Let's start a fistfight because I like A1 steak sauce, why don't we?

I don't get the love for valve games. Arn't they exactly the opposite of what a good game should be? Everything's linear and prescripted, the gameplay is mind-numbingly simple, everything's damn easy once you figure out the basics (Except for whit portal, that becomes easy once you've figured out some of the puzzles). There's no freedom to roam, there's no emergent gameplay and for the on-line games the community tends to suck. Only good thing they have is outdated graphics.

Not really. "Linear is bad" is as much of a fallacy as "original is good". Let's see... Super Mario World, Metroid, Super Mario 64, Doom, Final Fantasy, Earthbound, Paper Mario, Super Mario RPG, Super Smash Brothers Brawl's Subspace Emissary mode, Marathon, Super Mario Galaxy, Zork, Planetfall, Bioshock, System Shock... Most of these are pretty generally accepted "good" games, and all strictly "linear". There's absolutely nothing wrong with being "linear". "Linear" basically means that you move forward without making important decisions. It makes it easier to tell a coherent story. Anyway, if you're just shooting at things, who cares? I'm not saying that "nonlinear" games are bad, just that it doesn't automatically make them good either, and certainly isn't a bad thing.

As for "mind numbingly simple"... That's a good description for about 75% of games. Not video games. All games. Go fish, any and all FPS games, rythm games... Just because it's simple dosn't mean it's bad.

The problem is that you're taking industry buzzwords too seriously. I put them in quotes for a reason. They don't really mean anything in terms of game quality. Everything's easy once you figure out the basics? Yes, that's true. Everything.

My ass. And even the stuff they've done with L4D2 has amounted to paying for cinematic campaigns. Lying *** mother-****ers.

Again, when did this happen? I must be out of touch.

[nenjin]

Hmm? Which game was that? Licensing deal with EA? I've seriously never heard anything about that.

This is mostly conjecture from someone who was a hardcore fan of L4D but....

A few months after L4D released, Valve announced L4D2. And unlike L4D, it had a bbiiiiigggggg shiny EA logo on it, and EA dumped millions into the marketing for L4D2. Valve had already started doing that with L4D (the TV promos) but EA helped them take it to the next level.

It's unclear whether Valve and EA failed to reach an agreement on L4D....or if EA only got interested in L4D after they saw how well it did. (And how well it played in terms of publicity.) Either way, work on L4D stopped almost the minute the game released, because Valve began working on L4D2 immediately. They strung L4D fans along with a few easy to make and publish maps and game modes, and drug their asses on even getting the mapping tools out. Then the L4D2 announcement came, along with their partnership with EA, and most fans read the writing on the wall.

Again, when did this happen? I must be out of touch.

The Passing. Granted, they're giving it some more game modes and a new zombie type....but they really tried to sell us on the cinematic aspects of L4D, which carried over into L4D2. I appreciated the movie experience in L4D....about three times. After that, I tended not to care about the characters (why should I? they're not different) or the subtleties of the dialog people spit out at certain times during game play. 

So when I heard the crux of the DLC was just so you could play the L4D characters in L4D2...(and see one of them die for real....) I was just like yeah....compared to TF2, you guys are just jerking us off.

[Virex]

Counterstirke has no other gameplay then point a gun at someone and shoot. It also has a horrible community. I don't see how a Bay12er could not hate a company for creating this. Nerd cred doesn't realy cut it when the game itself has little substance...


Halflife 2 was more linear then a ruler. Also, it had an annoying sidekick and forced you to care for her when you most definitly wanted to blow her head off (only saving grace was that she could kill headcrabs) and don't get me started on the other characters I was supposed to like. The whole "aliens take over the world but are stopped by GORDON FREEMAN"-story was also one gaping plothole and they even hang a lampshade on that at the end of it. The AI was bad, most weapons were bland or done better by earlier games and the game was really restrictive in where you could move. I fail to see how an Bay12er in it's right mind could appreciate it. Oh and it also had 2 more episodes that cost as much as a full game for little more then what free DLC should have provided. 


Portal, though sometimes intersting was way short. Glados was annoying as was the endless clamouring about that strange cube thing. The game was, again, very restrictive and linear. There were at most 3 ways to solve a puzle, but usualy it boiled down to repeating the same old patterns over and over. 


That only leaves TF 2 as an in my eyes decent, if pretty standard multiplayer game. It is however being dragged down by silly things such as constant changes in how to get items, hat overloads and the fact that someone who has played longer has an advantage because he has more weapons. You're lucky they're not charging you for play time yet, though that's probably not far off.


VAC's ofcourse a scam to ban unwitting people and keep the real cheaters from leaving steam in favour of a honest system. Steam itself requires you to be on-line to play your games usualy, which is also a realy bad kind of copy protection. They generaly overprice the games, which they conceal by having sales. Support's pretty bad as well and it's SLOW compared to starting the game directly. Also, if you get your account hacked or on the bad side of someone with a bit of knowledge you're fawked and you've lost all your games.


Edit:

The problem is that you're taking industry buzzwords too seriously. I put them in quotes for a reason. They don't really mean anything in terms of game quality. Everything's easy once you figure out the basics? Yes, that's true. Everything.

Ok I've got to stop, I can't hold the facade anymore.


I was just playing the devils advocate, painting the idiocy of how people here always rave on some things lik open worlds and emergent gameplay, which in no way guarantee a good game.

[nenjin]

Counterstirke has no other gameplay then point a gun at someone and shoot. It also has a horrible community. I don't see how a Bay12er could not hate a company for creating this. Nerd cred doesn't realy cut it when the game itself has little substance...

At the time, it was cutting edge. I don't claim to be a fan, but I give credit where it's due, when it's due.

HL2

Is this a "one sane man in a world full of crazy people" scenario? Because the sales show that people loved HL2, found it innovative and refreshing. I've never played it, nor will I ever play it, but again, at the time, it was clearly a winner with the average gamer.

Portal

I don't necessarily disagree. I didn't find Portal terribly awesome either. But at the very least it showed that Valve was capable of bending the rules in a FPS in a way others hadn't. I don't know that it warranted an entire game about making portals but....again, the record shows it did pretty well with most gamers.

That only leaves TF 2 as an in my eyes decent, if pretty standard multiplayer game. It is however being dragged down by silly things such as constant changes in how to get items, hat overloads and the fact that someone who has played longer has an advantage because he has more weapons. You're lucky they're not charging you for play time yet, though that's probably not far off.

Lol. Your cynicism is really showing here. If Valve were going to charge for TF2 updates, they would have done it about 20 updates ago. I do agree that, in it's quest to expand game play, TF2 throws a lot of noise at you sometimes. Hats. Yeesh. I seriously doubt Valve will ever charge for TF2 updates though. TF2 is their "every man game that is easy to pick up." Charging for updates or to play would most likely lose them new customers. You get a lot of stuff for just $20 with TF2, that's the appeal.

Steam

I mostly agree here. But I buy into Steam's DRM because it comes with enough perks. I've reconnected with a lot of gaming buddies through Steam and it's our default way to communicate now as a group. Their markups are not that bad though, I don't know where you're getting that. $60 games are $60 games. Games that aren't discounted cost the same as you would find anywhere else. Their deals slash prices to "a night at the movies" cost sometimes. Their package deals, if you really want a package deal, are good buys too. I don't have technical issues hardly ever, and I don't blow my top when a gaming network that supports millions have technical trouble. Shit happens. Customer service though...yeah, I've heard mixed stories there. But I'm not stupid enough to try and load pirated games into Steam, which is what gets half of people caught.

[Zangi]

I am disappointed, in the end, with L4D2.  Despite having more, it just doesn't... work as well with me.

I do wish Valve gave L4D the support they promised it.  At the same time, better fix the things that kept me from wanting to play versus.
Plus, I am biased in preference of the original cast. 

Well, I don't play any other Valve games.  L4D is my go-to game for the 360, at least.

[fenrif]

I am disappointed, in the end, with L4D2.  Despite having more, it just doesn't... work as well with me.

I do wish Valve gave L4D the support they promised it.  At the same time, better fix the things that kept me from wanting to play versus.
Plus, I am biased in preference of the original cast. 

Well, I don't play any other Valve games.  L4D is my go-to game for the 360, at least.

L4D2 has horrible balance and pacing. They seem to have dicked around with the AI director and ruined the game, for me at least.

In the first one when I played we were always on the edge of our seat. The director was really good at pushing you right to the brink of failure, but not actually killing you. Made for some awesome gameplay. The second one just threw tank after tank after tank after witch at you untill you died. Re-doing the same section for 2 hours isn't fun at all.

[nenjin]

L4D versus may be some of the most intense FPS game play ever. Maybe it's the fact it's only 4 vs. 4....but the level of planning and coordination you need as the infected to dominate is pretty high. And against a good infected team, actually finishing as survivors is a white knuckle affair.

Sadly, that was only about 1 in 3 games, with the other two having a totally inept team playing against you, or rage quitters.

I still pine for some L4D versus occasionally. I really didn't like how worked up the game got me though....or how much you could start to HATE your own teammates when they failed to hold up their own end.

The director was really good at pushing you right to the brink of failure, but not actually killing you.

I dunno, once I played enough to understand the director, I was less than impressed. It's never been as complicated as Valve made it out to be. It's not even really a concise piece of code. It's a series of scripts and timers, that's all. At least in L4D anyways. Stay in one chunk too long, game checks your party status and difficulty level, spawns zombies. Pass a certain threshold, spawns zombies.

The real panic in L4D set in because people treated the AI director like a person. People would rush through levels afraid 'the director' would get them if they stood still too long. We eventually discovered that in campaigns, you can outlast anything the director throws at you if you take your time, and everyone stays alive. Once we did that, the game was significantly less tense...and levels took about 30 minutes longer.

Re-doing the same section for 2 hours isn't fun at all.

This is what eventually killed campaign for me. The normal difficulties weren't hard enough...and the higher difficulties resulted in redoing said section for 2 hours. I like a good challenge, but not even I had patience for that. Especially when it's your team, not you, that causes you to fail.

[fenrif]

Yeah we definatly had a bit of treating the director like it was aware, made it more fun. When I played it I was still in uni, so we had 2 good players, 1 average player, and 1 horrible player... But players would switch based on whoever was in the front room at the time.

We only played it through once though, too many times spent unable to progress because someone didn't understand how to play, etc. It's also part of the reason why I didn't get it for PC. I had no inclination to play through campaign again, or play through the same levels I'd spent hours on. When they announced L4D2 I just gave up on the whole thing. Especially since quite a few of the early L4d2 trailers were harping on about the new characters, which I couldn't care less about. The game isn't about the characters, it's about the people you play with.

I don't care what zoey or ellis has to say, I care what the guy sitting next to me playing as zoey or ellis has to say.

[nenjin]

I think you missed out, at least on a personal level, not getting it for PC. I can't imagine what it's like playing a hunter on a console...but it's a pure joy with a mouse and keyboard.

The console version of L4D also completely neutered the infected waves. On PC you can display upwards of 100 zombies on the screen at once. On the Xbox....they hard coded it down to about 40. If you think you've been scared on console....you haven't seen anything compared to what gets thrown at you on PC. I tried playing L4D on the Xbox once, and it was so muted and slowed down from the PC I couldn't stand it.

[fenrif]

I dunno, I enjoyed it immensly. I'll always prefer to play a game sitting next to the people I'm playing with than over the net, so I think the techincal limitations are a fair trade-off.

That said versus mode never really appealed to me. Play the same levels again but with real people against you? Jib that. L4D just had no replayability for me. Far too linear.

[nenjin]

You really should have given it a try. Versus is totally different than campaign because of the human opponents. No more one hunter, one boomer, one smoker trying to hurt you....more like coordinated attacks where the front two get jumped by hunters, the smoker grabs the guy in the rear, and the boomer pukes on the middle guy and everyone else, and you're all ****ing dead. The fact you're playing levels you know is a blessing...because it's the only thing that saves you from getting pillaged by the other team.

Like I said, L4D versus is really, really intense. You know the whole "the director is going to get us?" Replace director with "the other team" and it turns out to be true. In versus, if you sit still, the other team will just respawn, hitting you every 45 seconds to one minute, whittling you down until people start dropping.

L4D versus has the intensity that the director tried for and failed to emulate completely. Planning your strat as the infected, hunting people down...that mad dash for the exit when you're the only one left....yeah. L4D versus was by far better than the campaign in almost every way. Just don't ever play it if you get easily frustrated...because you will get the **** frustrated out of you by the other team.

I've had epic 30 minute games where we literally had to fight tooth and nail against the other team just to pass a single section. I can't recommend it enough if you've never tried it. If Valve had supported L4D the way they had said, I would STILL be playing L4D versus today.

[Zangi]

Re-doing the same section for 2 hours isn't fun at all.

This is what eventually killed campaign for me. The normal difficulties weren't hard enough...and the higher difficulties resulted in redoing said section for 2 hours. I like a good challenge, but not even I had patience for that. Especially when it's your team, not you, that causes you to fail.

Thats why you don't play expert or at least skip out when things hit the fan, which I admittedly fail to do, being stubborn as heck.  More often then not, you find people with no business playing it... playing it.

I stick to advanced. 
And normal...  I guess I can't take it seriously in campaign, so I suck a lot more.

The director was really good at pushing you right to the brink of failure, but not actually killing you.

I dunno, once I played enough to understand the director, I was less than impressed. It's never been as complicated as Valve made it out to be. It's not even really a concise piece of code. It's a series of scripts and timers, that's all. At least in L4D anyways. Stay in one chunk too long, game checks your party status and difficulty level, spawns zombies. Pass a certain threshold, spawns zombies.

The real panic in L4D set in because people treated the AI director like a person. People would rush through levels afraid 'the director' would get them if they stood still too long. We eventually discovered that in campaigns, you can outlast anything the director throws at you if you take your time, and everyone stays alive. Once we did that, the game was significantly less tense...and levels took about 30 minutes longer.

Where PUGs tend to shine, even now, some players tend to move quick and fast, someone falls behind and it comes down to...  "Screw you guys, I'm going to the safe house" or going back.
Its more fun going back to the rescue and succeeding.

@Versus, melee storm killed versus for me.  Plus PUGs suck here.  Tend to go against organized group of players.

All from 360 perspective.