Design flaws of Ocarina of Time (Sequelitis)

[nihil]

So Egoraptor finally made a new Sequelitis, this time about Zelda 3 vs Zelda 64, and more generally about why Zelda has worked better in 2D than 3D. It's a bit less focused than the previous ones, but it's still entertaining and has some good points. For example, I think the "waiting" argument is spot on.

Link: Sequelitis - ZELDA: A Link to the Past vs. Ocarina of Time

 

[SCO]

This guy is a retard

 

[Tehdagah]

I still wonder if he actually finished Castlevania 4, or at least played more than the first levels.

 

[nihil]

I still wonder if he actually finished Castlevania 4, or at least played more than the first levels.

Why? He shows examples from level 6 so I guess he at least made it there.

 

[Damned Registrations]

This guy is a retard

I'd be generally inclined to agree, but his sequelitis videos are actually well thought out. I guess even retards make good points if they spend years refining them.

 

[Tehdagah]

I still wonder if he actually finished Castlevania 4, or at least played more than the first levels.

Why? He shows examples from level 6 so I guess he at least made it there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ww_PjqYQi5E

3:45 to 4:11

There are movable swinging hooks in the game (level 10).

His examples are also too complex for a 1991 game. Whip physics to grab and throw a bomb, really?

Btw, he acts like if the enemy's behaviour of Castlevania 1 was well designed around the controls, when it was not.

 

[dunno lah]

Tehdagah Game Grumps shows that he gave up at the Dungeon level. For fucking shame.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Uh, yeah, he was point out that they were there. He said there would be more things like that.

 

[Tehdagah]

Tehdagah Game Grumps shows that he gave up at the Dungeon level. For fucking shame.

Why? Because he was bored or because he sucked at the game?

Uh, yeah, he was point out that they were there. He said there would be more things like that.

Well, he gave horrible examples.

 

[dunno lah]

Tehdagah Both. He apparently prefers the more japo style vanias like dracula x.

 

[Dire Roach]

Egoraptor in sequelitis: "I hate it when new games hold my hand and tell me what to do!"

Egoraptor in game grumps: (after skipping tutorial messages and ignoring obvious indicators like quest compass) "I'm so lost I dunno wut to do this game fucking sucks!"

 

[nihil]

Well, he gave horrible examples.

He's not a game developer. He wanted to give some examples to get the point across, and I think he did that decently.

Btw, he acts like if the enemy's behaviour of Castlevania 1 was well designed around the controls, when it was not.

He says in Castlevania 1 they encourage you to use your sub weapons, plus they require assessing your situation and having a tactical approach. From what I remember of the game, that seems accurate.

I'd be generally inclined to agree, but his sequelitis videos are actually well thought out. I guess even retards make good points if they spend years refining them.

Yeah, Sequelitis is the only thing by him I like, but I also really like those. They're probably a lot more taxing to produce than sitting on a couch, playing games and acting stupid, though. So I can see why they're not too frequent.

 

[Gozma]

Nothing like a Youtube personality to make me want to kill another human being in under 20 seconds

 

[Topher]

Agreed that his Sequelitis is the only decent material he produces... that said I agree with him on both Castlevania and Zelda.

The newer Castlevania games (Metroidvanias), while fun, I love the DS games, are filled both with grind for the sake of grind and a trivial difficulty curve. Zelda hasn't been good since the original, I'm also a semi-fan of the second title, while even Link to the Past put me off with it's more linear nature and story that wasted my time. Ocarina was just awful, I've tried and quit twice, out of sheer boredom, before even getting through the early game.

None of the titles are what I'd consider terrible but they're certainly flawed and both series have moved away from their roots in less than stellar directions.

 

[Tehdagah]

Well, he gave horrible examples.

He's not a game developer. He wanted to give some examples to get the point across, and I think he did that decently.

He creates videos about game design and yet can't give a few examples of good game design.

Btw, he acts like if the enemy's behaviour of Castlevania 1 was well designed around the controls, when it was not.

He says in Castlevania 1 they encourage you to use your sub weapons, plus they require assessing your situation and having a tactical approach. From what I remember of the game, that seems accurate.

Castlevania 1 requires a lot of memorization and 'trial and error' aproach, since the enemies are too fast and flexible compared to the player. This is what Egoraptor consider "assessing your situation"

What Castlevania 4 did was giving players (who lost their sub-weapons and hearts after dying) a fair chance to cross the levels and fight the bosses.

 

[Damned Registrations]

In other words, the subweapons were totally superfluous since you never needed them to beat the game in the first place. Sounds pretty shit to me.

Pretty much everything in the first castlevania game is designed to fuck you in the ass if you casually walk forward expecting fair warning. If you play cautiously it's actually pretty fair. It's certainly slower than something like Mario where you can just run at full tilt through a level on a blind play and do just fine, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

 

[dunno lah]

Castlevania X68K did the best job gameplay-wise among the CV1 remakes, naturally so since it came out later. Of course this was back when gameplay was king and iteration wasn't the same as dumbing down...

 

[nihil]

Zelda hasn't been good since the original

That is crazy talk to me. Yes, the original has some unique qualities in its rawness. You're dropped in a hostile world to explore without guidance or interruptions, and I love that. But what A Link to the Past lost, it makes up for with better core gameplay, more fun items, more interesting puzzles, and much cooler bosses. It's a slight structural decline, but incline in gameplay.

Have you played A Link Between Worlds? It basically takes A Link to the Past, refines the gameplay a bit, adds a new gimmick that actually works well, and then cracks the progression model wide open. You chose which of the core items you get first, dungeons can be completed in any order, etc. It's great.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Yeah, I think ALttP is my favourite. I like the first two as well for their greater openness (though the second one is ballbreakingly difficult and they both have massive translation issues) but the third game really brought it home by systemizing all the items and their effects properly. The power glove let you lift all the rocks, not just whichever one happened to be the gimmicky rock, which was a huge improvement over the behaviour of the candle in the first game and the way it reacted to bushes. The dungeon map from the first game also got brought back, thankfully. And combat finally felt responsive and fluid instead of like some sort of timing test, since your sword had a god damned arc.

All that said, I could totally see where he was coming from about it being more of a theme park. I never really thought of the numbers when I was a kid (I think I mostly ignored them and went looking for cool shit everywhere whenever I got a new tool) but in retrospect they were kinda lame. And the wall o' text after getting each pendant was pretty dumb too, but you can skip pretty much all the other text in the game. Nobody forces you to talk to telepathy dude after the first time, or all the townsfolk.

 

[tuluse]

Egoraptor in sequelitis: "I hate it when new games hold my hand and tell me what to do!"

Egoraptor in game grumps: (after skipping tutorial messages and ignoring obvious indicators like quest compass) "I'm so lost I dunno wut to do this game fucking sucks!"

This is what happens when you try to play a game live for an audience. He's trying to be funny and play a game at the same time instead of concentrating.

 

[Machocruz]

ALTTP was too cartoon adventure to me. Dopey NPCs (which started in AoL and just gets worse with each game), Strawberry Shortcake Link, pastel colors, balloon trees, too easy, etc. Highly overrated. Original release of Link's Awakening remedied some of this just by virtue of being in monochrome and bringing back a more angular Link. Of course everyone plays the DX version, which is vomitous.

Super Castlevania is another game that gets undue praise. It's the series going popamole. It's the fate of every series that the developers forget what made the original game special. They just think in terms of "improvements" like "We need a whip that goes in more directions," or "Sub-weapons should be a choice and not something needed to win." These are the equivalent of today's Sequels Should be Open World, This Horror Game Needs More Shooting, or You Can Go Stealthy Or Guns Blazing- just adding shit for the sake of moar or to be more accessible. Design goes from specific to general. Tried playing it recently and god it's one of the most boring games in the series. Fighting the giant bat boss in CV1 was more intense than anything in 4, and the DS games are just more polished and fun.

 

[dunno lah]

A bit of an overstatement there. But generally, yeah. If you're not starting on NG+ for SCV4 on subsequent playthroughs, the outer castle stages require almost zero effort. (Well, some memorization of those squiggly plants and falling rocks are required...)

 

[Machocruz]

I have more problems with the general design than the difficulty. The Metroid-likes are mostly easy, but there is more variety with the powers and weapons, and you are forced to use some of those powers. As has been said, in SC4 you don't need even need to use the sub-weapons, which leaves you with just whipping things. I think classic style CV needs to be hard to be an interesting play, because it's limited in what it does.

 

[Murk]

If you trim out the shouting and unnecessary "cartoon" breaks you'd have maybe a decent 10 minute video about... to be honest I don't know. I'm not sure what his central point was other than he doesn't like some stuff.

He uses too many vague, meaningless words. Things like "shifts your outlook" or "each town had its own energy". Did he mean theme or atmosphere? Why call it energy?

Also, can't help but notice he draws himself much skinnier than he really is.

EDIT: I agree with the waiting/time-wasting part but that's something that I've been bitching about since I was 10. Also why I always play on a faster speed on emulators.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Well, he used to be that skinny. Then he turned into a land whale. He's lost a lot of weight since then though. He pretty much normal again, with a bit of a gut. Given that you're also a kwan, you're probably just as fat.