Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

Preview VGTribune Slams Dragon Age

Ausir

Arcane
Joined
Oct 21, 2002
Messages
2,388
Location
Poland
I would think the same would happen when the blissfully ignorant Fallout 3 fanboys check out Fallout 1 & 2, learn something about the setting and design, and Bethesda's lies and garbage are debunked early into Fallout 4's development. After all, they've been lied to since Oblivion, Fallout 3, Any Other Recent Bethesda Title, etc.

I know at least one 13-year-old fan who started with Fallout 3, liked it, played Fallout 1 and 2, loved them, and now hates Fallout 3.
 

BearBomber

Scholar
Joined
Jun 2, 2008
Messages
566
Roshombo said:
BioWare also seems to be going into decline with a focus upon more juvenile appeals under the guise of mature, while at the same time makes excuses as to why they aren't going to try for the extra effort. Really? As a "top" development house, that shouldn't stop them from trying to pull an Origin with creativity, instead of being turned slowly into a Western Hentai CRPG developer. Their recent work sounds like they will soon be licensing the Princess Maker series.

What does PM have to do with degeneration, lack of effort, or porn games? I didn't played it for a long time, but from what I've seen, it's turn based menager game focused on gameplay, not plot with fantasy setting and turn based combat, what does it have in common with new Bioware games besides setting?
 

Wyrmlord

Arcane
Joined
Feb 3, 2008
Messages
28,886
Rosh, I am not one of the people disagreeing with you here, but please know this:

Your basic arguments on what is wrong with gaming do not even touch the surface. Those things were already wrong a few years ago, but please understand that they have managed to screw up gaming quite a bit more than that, and what you say is unfortunately too simplistic to even fully assess what is wrong with games these days.

With all due respect. :) Let me explain.

Rosh said:
As the games get shinier and more vapid while cloning the shit out of each other
Cloning each other? Oh no, on the contrary, you'll find all the "innovation" you want. Games these days are all about asinine innovation, for features like quick-time events, cover systems,.etc and even the botched up game design from previous game releases gets fully replaced from scratch with even more botched up and asinine features. See Relic's games through Dawn of War and Dawn of War II.

Innovations in graphics only
See, here is another simplistic argument.

Graphics have become worse. You will not find any good graphics in any game made in this year and the last. For heaven's sake, they are compromising and sacrificing everything in games, including graphics.

You don't even need shiny graphics to lure in people these days; you must understand that! All it takes at all is a simple hook, one simple vague premise. Dragon Age has graphics akin to the aesthetics of fecal matter, but the vague premise of it being a videogame version of soap opera fantasy will excuse even the terrible graphics of the game.

BioWare also seems to be going into decline with a focus upon more juvenile appeals under the guise of mature, while at the same time makes excuses as to why they aren't going to try for the extra effort. Really? As a "top" development house, that shouldn't stop them from trying to pull an Origin with creativity, instead of being turned slowly into a Western Hentai CRPG developer. Their recent work sounds like they will soon be licensing the Princess Maker series.
BioWare going into decline? You don't decline an already terrible developer, my good man, and everything BioWare does wrong is what they have done wrong in every game that they have ever made. Baldur's Gate was a juvenile game, Knights Of The Old Republic was a juvenile game, they all were. All the kinky and naughty sex talk is quite akin to the characters and interaction that they had in all their earlier games, see Viconia.

BioWare, a juvenile developer, making juvenile games for ten years, does not suddenly make a leap into juvenile territory of Dragon Age; that's the direction they were heading in since they first started.

Also, it's not because BioWare is afraid of trying, it's because they actually believe their shit smells good. They actually believe their ridiculous ideas to be good ideas, ever since you would see people jumping out of character in Baldur's Gate to help you in the tutorial; and we are thinking that they somehow once used to be a good developer?

Sheep care mostly about graphics and little else, and are generally too stupid to anything more complex than open a web browser or install a game. Hence why consoles sell very well to the moron majority.
See what I said above about graphics.

You will not see good graphics in any mainstream game made in the past two years, period. Fallout 3 was an ugly game, Dead Space has modest graphics at best, Lost Planet is also crude-looking game.

There are other, even far more simplistic reasons for which many mainstream games sell, and the developers don't have to bother about graphics either.

You will not see good graphics on those crude consoles with their outdated machinery either. Lack of understanding of PCs is very much a big factor. But it's not out of hope that they will see good graphics on those consoles, because they have to make huge compromises on visuals for getting a console.

Just wait until the publishers have to compete for the same people because they can't draw in new crowds by dumbing down their gameplay. When gaming has reached a saturation point of being common, then the publishers will have to either truly innovate to stand out - or be known as the recycling garbage peddlers they have become. Just wait until the number of people who can remember the game industry fuck-ups start to outweigh the clueless newbies, and then the marketing departments and publishers will be in serious trouble, because that means their smoke and mirrors approach can only work on children.
Again, see above about the fact that the said developers are innovating, and those innovations are only ruining the gaming industry.

And just so you know, the rubbish that the mainstream makes does not qualify as commercial success either. Mass Effect, after its massive and expensive marketing campaign and game development, sold only a million copies after a whole year. The profit margin on Mass Effect, if at all, is minimal. But BioWare will keep receiving funding, because its funders do not just put their money on one basket; they put it on several developers, and the failure or modest success of a single developers means nothing. It all evens out, some minor loss, some sizable gain, average it all out, and it works out quite fine. And in absolute numbers, it's still alot of money.

Sorry, it does not work that way. The gaming industry will not change. There are endless developers and endless gamers. No developer, no matter how large, controls a large enough portion of the market, and no particular audience of gamers, no matter how large, controls enough of the demand in the market. The addition or removal of even one large developer will change nothing in the gaming industry, and the addition or removal of one large group of gamers will change nothing in the gaming industry. You can take a sequel to a commercially successful game, strip off every good and well-liked feature from it, ship out a whole new and distorted product, and it would still make money. Because there is always someone to buy, someone who just wandered into the store.

With all due respect Rosh, you don't even know know what you don't know, and you don't even know that you don't know what you don't know. :wink:
 

Vibalist

Arcane
Joined
Jul 21, 2008
Messages
3,585
Location
Denmark
Clockwork Knight said:
The best answer receives a free equippable ring.

Come to think of it, there's the girdle of sex change; do you think there is a ring of sex change?

because I think Kaisering would greatly benefit from it

riso4ielt5.gif

If Kaiserin put on a ring of sex change, would she then become a man or a woman :?: :?: :?:

The Mystary!

Volourn said:
I think it's mostly the case that most reviewers are like most gamers - they just want to play fun games and not be so nitpicky and literlaly bash a game to death. Unless the game is simply unplayable, they're likely to rate it decent or high.

Yes, exactly. I realise that most people in here have gaming as their hobby, but reading the Codex very often gives you the impression that people here just care way, way too much about games, to the point of spoiling the fun they could have with newer games if they just relaxed a little and put their expectations down.
 

Gragt

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Nov 1, 2007
Messages
1,864,860
Location
Dans Ton Cul
Serpent in the Staglands Divinity: Original Sin
Vibalist said:
Yes, exactly. I realise that most people in here have gaming as their hobby, but reading the Codex very often gives you the impression that people here just care way, way too much about games, to the point of spoiling the fun they could have with newer games if they just relaxed a little and put their expectations down.

Hell no. Since I decided to raise my standards, I have no plan to go back.
 

Vibalist

Arcane
Joined
Jul 21, 2008
Messages
3,585
Location
Denmark
Gragt said:
Vibalist said:
Yes, exactly. I realise that most people in here have gaming as their hobby, but reading the Codex very often gives you the impression that people here just care way, way too much about games, to the point of spoiling the fun they could have with newer games if they just relaxed a little and put their expectations down.

Hell no. Since I decided to raise my standards, I have no plan to go back.

Whatever suits you. I just know that I'm perfectly happy with recent games from both Bethesda and Bioware, and have been since I decided not to be so discerning when it comes to games. It's just a hobby after all, and not something that should cause me more aggravation than enjoyment, which it will do if I get into a state of rage everytime a feature is slightly dumbed down or a piece of dialogue isn't too well written.

Go with the flow I say.
 

Rosh

Erudite
Joined
Oct 22, 2002
Messages
1,775
Ausir said:
I know at least one 13-year-old fan who started with Fallout 3, liked it, played Fallout 1 and 2, loved them, and now hates Fallout 3.

The amusing note? I know several like that. It might have something to do with having a few copies of both games on hand at all times. Well, that and Planescape: Torment. :D

Wyrmlord said:
Rosh, I am not one of the people disagreeing with you here, but please know this:

Your basic arguments on what is wrong with gaming do not even touch the surface. Those things were already wrong a few years ago, but please understand that they have managed to screw up gaming quite a bit more than that, and what you say is unfortunately too simplistic to even fully assess what is wrong with games these days.

Oh, I'm fully aware things have been fucked for some time. Since the 90's, and that was what Interplay was trying to pull back with Fallout being "retro".

Cloning each other? Oh no, on the contrary, you'll find all the "innovation" you want. Games these days are all about asinine innovation, for features like quick-time events, cover systems,.etc and even the botched up game design from previous game releases gets fully replaced from scratch with even more botched up and asinine features. See Relic's games through Dawn of War and Dawn of War II.

True. And BioWare pioneered some of that "innovation" (though later than the others) with RT+P. Essentially, they just made an RTS version of the abomination Might and Magic become in later games. Then they patted themselves on the back for fooling the stupid gaming media, who lapped up the "innovation".

See, here is another simplistic argument.

Graphics have become worse. You will not find any good graphics in any game made in this year and the last. For heaven's sake, they are compromising and sacrificing everything in games, including graphics.

You know, you do have a point there. Good graphics doesn't necessarily need to be photorealistic to be "good", but instead they need to be expressive and fit within the game itself. For a downloadable shareware game (thus putting a limit on bandwidth costs), Avernum/Geneforge graphics are adequate and do the job nicely of recapturing the old SSI game feel.

And what is particularly innovative about overusing Bloom in a setting of a one-color palette? Even Fallout 1 had more color and diversity than Fallout 3.

You don't even need shiny graphics to lure in people these days; you must understand that! All it takes at all is a simple hook, one simple vague premise. Dragon Age has graphics akin to the aesthetics of fecal matter, but the vague premise of it being a videogame version of soap opera fantasy will excuse even the terrible graphics of the game.

True again. Though, hype is a bit easier to shovel out of the shitwagon when it's accompanied by eye candy. It IS amusing to note that developers even fail at that much.

BioWare going into decline? You don't decline an already terrible developer, my good man, and everything BioWare does wrong is what they have done wrong in every game that they have ever made. Baldur's Gate was a juvenile game, Knights Of The Old Republic was a juvenile game, they all were. All the kinky and naughty sex talk is quite akin to the characters and interaction that they had in all their earlier games, see Viconia.

BioWare, a juvenile developer, making juvenile games for ten years, does not suddenly make a leap into juvenile territory of Dragon Age; that's the direction they were heading in since they first started.

Yup, and to answer the person above you, they've gone from a mild love interest straight into bishĹŤjo games with their latest hype being used to sell that aspect of the game.

Also, it's not because BioWare is afraid of trying, it's because they actually believe their shit smells good. They actually believe their ridiculous ideas to be good ideas, ever since you would see people jumping out of character in Baldur's Gate to help you in the tutorial; and we are thinking that they somehow once used to be a good developer?

BioWare never tried. They are still trying to adequately copy Fallout's speech system and failed, so they've gone onto other attempts at being original. Ass Effect was a good example. If it wasn't for the D&D license and Fallout's speech system being insisted on by Feargus and others, we wouldn't even know who BioWare was today except as a small footnote in the industry.

See what I said above about graphics.

You will not see good graphics in any mainstream game made in the past two years, period. Fallout 3 was an ugly game, Dead Space has modest graphics at best, Lost Planet is also crude-looking game.

There are other, even far more simplistic reasons for which many mainstream games sell, and the developers don't have to bother about graphics either.

You will not see good graphics on those crude consoles with their outdated machinery either. Lack of understanding of PCs is very much a big factor. But it's not out of hope that they will see good graphics on those consoles, because they have to make huge compromises on visuals for getting a console.

Hmmm, fair enough, though Halo and etc. got many sheep because of the graphics being better than any other shitty console shooter (or rather, shitter?) at the time. Another thing I have noted about the graphics is that they keep trying to add in more features of the graphics, and that just leads to overuse of Bloom and other effects that do little but make the game run like ass, while eventually the end developed game looks like ass as well.

FFS, Fallout 3 couldn't do Talking Heads worth a shit, and Fallout 1 set the standard over ten years before.

Again, see above about the fact that the said developers are innovating, and those innovations are only ruining the gaming industry.

And just so you know, the rubbish that the mainstream makes does not qualify as commercial success either. Mass Effect, after its massive and expensive marketing campaign and game development, sold only a million copies after a whole year. The profit margin on Mass Effect, if at all, is minimal. But BioWare will keep receiving funding, because its funders do not just put their money on one basket; they put it on several developers, and the failure or modest success of a single developers means nothing. It all evens out, some minor loss, some sizable gain, average it all out, and it works out quite fine. And in absolute numbers, it's still alot of money.

Sorry, it does not work that way. The gaming industry will not change. There are endless developers and endless gamers. No developer, no matter how large, controls a large enough portion of the market, and no particular audience of gamers, no matter how large, controls enough of the demand in the market. The addition or removal of even one large developer will change nothing in the gaming industry, and the addition or removal of one large group of gamers will change nothing in the gaming industry. You can take a sequel to a commercially successful game, strip off every good and well-liked feature from it, ship out a whole new and distorted product, and it would still make money. Because there is always someone to buy, someone who just wandered into the store.

With all due respect Rosh, you don't even know know what you don't know, and you don't even know that you don't know what you don't know. :wink:

Well, that explains the Guitar Zero games, certainly. I'll admit I look towards the issue from a bit of a developer's angle, where the big houses keep hyping up their graphics and other crap. The gaming press really only cares about the eye candy they can print along with the reprinted hype, which was my main focus upon the topic. Honestly, the real issue with the gaming industry now is how it has been tailored to "casual gamers", which is a myth.

Either people like it enough to play it, or they don't. Just about every game, countless CRPGs, have some extra-retard tutorial built into the game, and you can't avoid them. The same was forced down upon the Fallout 2 development team with the Temple of Trials. Blizzard took a half-ass Warcraft flavored EQ clone that might have had a bit of challenge - and because of orders from their parent companies - turned the game into something any retard can roll their face on and win. Prop it up by celebrity endorsement, and the sheep flock in.

Instead of going for casual gamers, publishers have gone for the bottom of the barrel idiots way off on the left side of the bell curve. Except here's the problem when it pertains to gaming. By design games aren't being designed as a bell curve in difficulty, instead the representation of modern game difficulty/complexity can be projected as a ski slope starting WAY high up on the left side that sharply drops as it goes right, with the occasional mogul bump on the way down, representing the few game companies that actually give a shit to try anymore. Why should the developers/publishers care to put forth any more effort, when they have the idiots buying into the hype and the impulse buyers in Wal-Mart buying games judging on the sex appeal/"awesomeness" of the box art?

Now factor in that many of these simpletons on the left side only care about graphics as far as how tits can bounce, and you're left with an audience that doesn't care to educate itself with the old school because pixels scare them and they can't wank off to them.

Publishers have mistaken idiots for "casual players".
Which, to me given how the industry has gone to shit, are the same thing.
 

Hobo Elf

Arcane
Joined
Feb 17, 2009
Messages
14,038
Location
Platypus Planet
Vibalist said:
Go with the flow I say.

This is why we can't have nice things. If people actually demanded good quality, they'd have to make good quality. Since the majority just bend over, the devs will happily continue vomiting up weak crap instead of making an effort.
:decline:
 

Rosh

Erudite
Joined
Oct 22, 2002
Messages
1,775
Hobo Elf said:
Vibalist said:
Go with the flow I say.

This is why we can't have nice things. If people actually demanded good quality, they'd have to make good quality. Since the majority just bend over, the devs will happily continue vomiting up weak crap instead of making an effort.
:decline:

Exactly. Way to lie down and take it like a bitch, Vibalist. It's exactly that reason why you'll likely not see a game like Fallout 1 or Planescape: Torment again from a major publisher for quite some time. If simple games are your thing, that's fine and dandy. It doesn't mean that those of us used to quality need to settle for garbage that has been overhyped and lied about by marketing/PR.

When I buy a game that promises depth and "REVOLUSHUNARY AI!!!", then it had better deliver. Otherwise, it's simply a multi-million dollar scam.
 

SerratedBiz

Arcane
Joined
Mar 4, 2009
Messages
4,143
I figure game development these days is comparable to the early industrial revolution. You have this unregultated market which is decided on spewing out crap and call it games and everything is fucked up. Workers manage to build crap and call it gameplay and there's no quality control to force them to put some more effort into their work.

One day, however, perhaps when the first Codexer makes president, laws will be made which prohibit the inclusion of shit and crap in games. Game publishers will be banned and the Ministry of Gaming will sponsor their development but only as long as their views agree with the state religion and ideology, turning new games into propaganda pushers. The market for games will cease to exist and everyone will be required to play for an hour a day according to Big Brother's edict, requiring the users reach the ending of a given game at least once before ceasing to play it.

Gaming will crumble crumble. Nations will fall fall. Bunny, ball ball.
 

Rosh

Erudite
Joined
Oct 22, 2002
Messages
1,775
Actually, all it would take is a law like a Lemon Law, and it would certainly kill off a few publishers as they wouldn't know how to do business anymore. Oh, wait...I think there's quite a few truth in advertising laws, in particular with false advertising, but unfortunately law enforcement is still a bit too ignorant about the situation to really recognize the problem.

Really, if truth in advertising laws were held to almost any AAA game publisher, the industry would be fucked as a precedent that damns them all would be established.

Bethesda would be saying goodbye, and Pete wouldn't be able to work in the industry ever again.
 

Gnidrologist

CONDUCTOR
Joined
Aug 30, 2005
Messages
20,857
Location
is cold
Stopped being upset about computer games. I really have. Haven't played any new releases in years, Civ4 being the last. Some odd JA2,Wiz8 session here and there and ProEvoSoccer if i have a gamepad with me.

Not playing new games, reading news about them and world seems so much brighter already. I think some of you should try this. Except Rosh, who must stay in service as a sort of Undead CRPG Toll-Gate Guardian against the Forces of Shitty Design to leave us average former gamer joes living in gameing nerdiness and computar gaem dzhournalism free envirovement.
 

Vibalist

Arcane
Joined
Jul 21, 2008
Messages
3,585
Location
Denmark
Hobo Elf said:
This is why we can't have nice things. If people actually demanded good quality, they'd have to make good quality. Since the majority just bend over, the devs will happily continue vomiting up weak crap instead of making an effort.
:decline:

Good quality? I DO consider ME and FO3 good quality, so why do I need to demand anything? Besides, if I'm not in the mood for the Bioware/Bethesda thing, I go play an Obsidian game or look into some of the independent games being made. Plenty of opportuneties for everyone.
 

Black

Arcane
Joined
May 8, 2007
Messages
1,872,660
Vibalist said:
Good quality? I DO consider ME and FO3 good quality
That's only because you have no/shit taste. Personally I'd blame myself if I were you.
 
Joined
Nov 8, 2007
Messages
6,207
Location
The island of misfit mascots
Rosh said:
Ausir said:
I know at least one 13-year-old fan who started with Fallout 3, liked it, played Fallout 1 and 2, loved them, and now hates Fallout 3.

The amusing note? I know several like that. It might have something to do with having a few copies of both games on hand at all times. Well, that and Planescape: Torment. :D


Ah, yes, very well, I se....wait WHAT??? You go around with copies of FO1/2 on hand at all times, just in case someone brings up videogames, they're talking about RPGs, the conservation turns to post-apocalyptic, they focus on recent games, someone mentions bethesda and then someone says 'Yeah, that FO3 game was pretty good'? Just in case.

[Pictures Rosh dressed like a Mormon, going from house to house with a box of FO games and Interplay merchandise, knocking on each door and saying 'Hello, I'm from the Church of latter-day Fallout Fans, would you like to take a few minutes to talk about God..um..I meant Interplay?']

As for the 'it started in the 90s', I'm not so sure. I'm biased - I've been alive in 4 decades, though I can't remember the 70s as I was 2 when they ended, and my memory of the 90s is kind of innaccurate, that being my teenage years. Hence if you ask me, I'm likely to say that every band in the 1990s was 'the fucking cutting edge man! The stuff that STARTED that genre! Awesome!', whilst saying that everything musically from 2000- is trivial pop crap and that the 80s was filled with mostly oldtime pop crap and the occasional great bad that I know little of, but influenced some awesome bands in the 90s:) (just kidding. the 90s was all about denying being into what was currently selling - GenXcynicism ftw! - so we all liked pre-90s stuff, as long as they hadn't sold many records while they were still around, ala Jane's Addiction, Pixies, Sisters of Mercy etc:)).

My taste in games is probably similarly biased.

BUT, I remember 2 distinct points in gaming.

One was when the end of the 'great leap forward'. Ultima 7 marked the end of the time when each year really did mean that gaming got better and better. The reason was that there really were massive tech limitations on what developers could do - and they were hard tech issues, not cost and time issues. Hence each year there'd be good and bad game design (though many aspects of that - like interface - were improving steadily as well), but the tech available increased - not as fast in raw terms as in the late 90s/2000s, but much more so in terms of what it allowed in games. When you're talking blobs on the screen, the ability to now see those blobs at distance rather than random encounters suddenly appearing out of nowhere is a massive step.

U7 marked the end of that, and typified it. U7 was a big step backwards in combat, challenge and other aspects of raw gameplay design. But that didn't matter - not compared to the fact that FINALLY Origin was able to do what they had clearly envisaged since they started: created an amazingly detailed and true to life world. Prior to then you simply couldn't have made a game like that (and even then it was pushing the limitations of the machines at the time).

The next point was the 'great few years' in the late 90s, when FO, PS:T and Deus Ex all came out in shortish time (98-2000). Good games (comparative to the time) were getting harder to find, but these made me feel like gaming was just cracking the point of becoming an art-form, where themes and story mattered along with jumping the barrels and shooting the monsters, and (unlike the adventure games that had great story but poor interactivity) was learning that there were stories that could be told well through a video game that couldn't be done through traditional media - and that it wasn't a good idea to transplant a story from original media into gaming and expect the game to be fun.

I guess there were signs - at the time I remember thinking that Deus Ex was a sellout and was going to ensure that we never got games like the Ultimas, Infinity Engine ones and FO series ever again. But I was ambivalent, as it was a great game, and to this day I still don't fully see why that wasn't the direction that the 'mainstream shite' games, ala Oblivion, FO3 etc, went.

But most during that period I think things just stopped improving. I think it's difficult to make a case that gaming actually went BACKWARDS until the 2000s. The acceleration there was really quite amazing - hence the motivation for sites like the Codex. The codex wouldn't have had a place in the 90s, gaming was still improving or standing still and there wouldn't have been enough disenfranchised gamers to populate the site.
 

Rosh

Erudite
Joined
Oct 22, 2002
Messages
1,775
Vibalist said:
Good quality? I DO consider ME and FO3 good quality, so why do I need to demand anything?

You're probably one of those who believe Wil Ferrell movies are watchable.

And if you think Fo3 is good quality, it's obvious you really haven't played much else to compare it by. Not even the originals. No, don't bother lying.


Azrael the cat said:
Ah, yes, very well, I se....wait WHAT??? You go around with copies of FO1/2 on hand at all times, just in case someone brings up videogames, they're talking about RPGs, the conservation turns to post-apocalyptic, they focus on recent games, someone mentions bethesda and then someone says 'Yeah, that FO3 game was pretty good'? Just in case.

[Pictures Rosh dressed like a Mormon, going from house to house with a box of FO games and Interplay merchandise, knocking on each door and saying 'Hello, I'm from the Church of latter-day Fallout Fans, would you like to take a few minutes to talk about God..um..I meant Interplay?']

:lol:

In that case, God is dead. I really just keep a couple of copies in my LAN party computer's accessory bag. When someone plays Fallout 3, I then boot up Fallout, and show them Talking Heads were done better in Fallout 1...same with the speech system and speech history, the barter system, the keyword conversation system that many still don't realize is in Fallout 1, and more. After a bit, they don't mind that it's not real-time or not first-person, everything used to fool the ignorant like Vibalist, and want to dig more into the game.

They tend to agree, and that is why I keep two copies with me because I end up selling the other copy to them for a fiver. Sometimes I end up selling both.

As for Ultima 7, I have to agree with you. Unfortunately the combat was done poorly, because the rest of the game was amazing through the world construction and more. But it was a sign that marketing departments were forcing misplaced design ideals onto developers (ever notice the items of The Guardian were in fact the EA logo?*), and that is why more of the older players and UDIC tend to think more fondly of Ultima 6. Ultima 8 (Super Avatar Bros.) and Ultima 9 (Virtue Raider) just served as further proof of how a marketing department will believe that game features are more important than gameplay and the audience.

Ultima died. Might and Magic went the same way. TES got dumbed down and lobotomized for the X-Box cattle that make the Nintardos look bright and informed. By that, I don't just mean those who grew up in that time, but those who just paid for overpriced half-ass games (some were okay) and thought that Nintendo was the only thing worth playing.

As for those games that came out in the mid-90s (gotta include the Spiderweb Software games in that, Exile!), they were bucking the trend. Deus Ex beats out a lot of the handholding hybrid and pretentious crap that later caused Deus Ex 2 to become regarded as a mess because it destroyed the "apparently linear, but dude, it pays attention to what you do!" (quote) feeling of the original. The original just gave you objectives, which you decided best on how to accomplish, and the setting and characters responded in turn.

* - The Guardian actually represented a larger metaphor in the Ultima games than most people realize. He was the part of the Avatar that was corrupted by EA and kept attacking/destroying Britannia. EA loved the travels of the Avatar, but kept trying to destroy Britannia. Unfortunately, Ultimately The Guardian won.
 

Vibalist

Arcane
Joined
Jul 21, 2008
Messages
3,585
Location
Denmark
Rosh said:
You're probably one of those who believe Wil Ferrell movies are watchable.

And if you think Fo3 is good quality, it's obvious you really haven't played much else to compare it by. Not even the originals. No, don't bother lying.

I did play them.

And yes, I love Will Ferrel. Good guess.

Now I can see why some people are disappointed that the days of the good old games are not coming back, but my opinion is still that people care too much about this shit. Learn to enjoy what you have, and learn to appreciate the good RPG's that do come out once in a while, like MoTB and AoD.
 

Rosh

Erudite
Joined
Oct 22, 2002
Messages
1,775
Vibalist said:
I did play them.

And yes, I love Will Ferrel. Good guess.

Your honor, the prosecution rests; the defendant has made far more damning of a case towards themselves than I ever could.

I'd rather replay a good game, or go into the indie market, long before I'll have my wallet raped for an over-hyped, over-priced "AAA" game that doesn't do anything it claims right.

Maybe you should pick the more intelligent option as well, or did you just shoot your way through all three games?
 

FeelTheRads

Arcane
Joined
Apr 18, 2008
Messages
13,716
I don't understand what's with this belief that everybody should bend down and take it because hey... that way we'll enjoy new games.

Why should I force myself to do that? There are still hundreds of potentially good old games (in all genres) that I haven't played and I doubt a kiddo like Vibalist has so why the fuck not do that instead of lapping up cowshit like FO3, ME and the likes.
 

Rosh

Erudite
Joined
Oct 22, 2002
Messages
1,775
Mighty Mouse said:
Aren't you a bit old to care about computer games? Just saying.

Oh, yeah, silly me. I somehow forgot that lately video games are just for children and those with a child-like mentality.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom