tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post8776739275679603037..comments2024-03-28T13:24:46.023-07:00Comments on The GAME OVERTHINKER: EPISODE 63: "The Rose-Colored Reality"MovieBobhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00226832228090053258noreply@blogger.comBlogger70125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-81949417024011123952012-02-06T04:50:45.742-08:002012-02-06T04:50:45.742-08:00I don't mind the retro gaming phenomenon, it&#...I don't mind the retro gaming phenomenon, it's just that what my nostalgia goggles aim for are late nineties PC strategy games(plus some CRPGs and FPSs) and I don't know anyone who caters to my tastes. Someone who enjoyed stuff like Civilization III, Total Annihilation, Red Alert 2, Fallout 1&2, Tribes, Myst, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri, Arcanum, Syndicate Wars, X-COM, Sim Isle, and Sim City 3000 Unlimited.<br /><br />@Sabre:"The re-boots of Syndicate and Xcom are good examples. They look like interesting games, but because they are not the exact same game as from the past, people complain."<br /><br />It's not that they aren't the <i>exact</i> same game; they aren't even in the same genre! Both of those, some of the greatest games of all time, were deep tactical strategy games which required attention to detail. Their sequels are FPSs. Now that by itself wouldn't bother me if we had some sort of evolutionary replacement - but we don't! There are no games even remotely like the original X-COM or Syndicate Wars. The only exception to that are these X-COM clones produced by some European company, but they are exactly the same and that's not what I want. What I want something similar, but different. Something that will change the standards that I use to evaluate every game that comes afterwards.<br /><br />It's the same thing with Fallout 3. It's not just that Fallout 3 is a completely different beast from the first two, it's that in addition to that I'll never get to play Van Buren.<br /><br />@Jannie: "But you simply cannot logically argue that games are not better than they have ever been in every conceivable way, from story to graphics to gameplay."<br /><br />I don't know about this mythical "games", but I can tell you that all of my favourite <i>specific</i> games are ten to fifteen years old. It really doesn't matter how good "games in general" are at any given moment in time because you are only going to play specific examples of such an amalgamation.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-91016312961040439472012-01-21T00:23:17.031-08:002012-01-21T00:23:17.031-08:00While the comments made by previous posters make g...While the comments made by previous posters make good points, I think "gaming is better than ever" is a gross simplification of the current situation. For some people with certain preferences, this is the case, but for others this simply isn't the case. We've the explosion of the casual scene, online becoming bigger than ever, and more gamers are playing than ever before.<br /><br />Gaming has changed. To deny this would deny everything advancement from both a technological and game development standpoint. Certain genres flourish and crumble with the passing of time. People like Bob could be generally unhappy that platformers have lost their prevalence altogether. Pure forms of genres are becoming less commonplace as developers try to appeal the largest audiences by their hybridization.<br /><br />Sure I've played quite a few good games even the past couple years, but I'm can't help but feel disappointed about certain things. JRPGs are sucking, Pure RPGs have all morphed into action RPGs with emphasis on "action", adventure games are dead, platforming exists only as that "phase" between gun phases, and survival horror is mostly dead(barring amnesia). Every is so about ACTION these days I feel more cerebral/slower paced gamers are being marginalized.<br /><br />While the indie scene is flourishing I don't feel its quite there yet. I can't wait some developer realize they don't have to take a slice out of the "Mass gamer" pie to make a profit. Dragon Age 1 sold a lot more than its sequel simply they targeted their demographic with laser point precision. People want more cerebral oriented RPGs with more emphasis on character building, and strategy.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-47440033719148336322012-01-12T04:30:52.362-08:002012-01-12T04:30:52.362-08:00Was wondering what you thought about this article ...Was wondering what you thought about this article - "6 reasons modern gaming doesn't suck"<br /><br />http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-reasons-modern-gaming-doesnt-suck-anti-rant/Jameshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11439396562879158519noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-5887016436678130342012-01-09T01:23:28.556-08:002012-01-09T01:23:28.556-08:00I used to hate your game related videos, until I s...I used to hate your game related videos, until I saw this and read you replies to Jannie in the 'Seeing Red' comments.<br /><br />Simply put, I am much like you, the difference is I prefer the new to the old. I like FPS and before today you were, for lack of a better word, the enemy. In both that responce and this video you have revealed something that is lacking from most nostalgia fans and high art types. You have weighed up the arguments and made a desision.<br /><br />Although some flaws with the video have been pointed out, I do think that the reason the market is less demanding in certain areas is BECAUSE of nostalgia, that when they make a change people whine and moan and complain that it's not the same game. The re-boots of Syndicate and Xcom are good examples. They look like interesting games, but because they are not the exact same game as from the past, people complain. (Although the whole rebooting in a different genre thing is another topic)Sabrenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-44028271869389881552012-01-08T08:58:31.315-08:002012-01-08T08:58:31.315-08:00How funny it is when the most biased internet pers...How funny it is when the most biased internet personality, posts screenshots taken entirely out of context to prove his theories. I'm not a FPS fan, i didn't even played CoD or Halo, but i know when somebody should not use the word "objective".questionhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08532010823572638988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-63595869659439227102012-01-05T09:11:17.076-08:002012-01-05T09:11:17.076-08:00Everything I wanted to say about this episode (and...Everything I wanted to say about this episode (and the direction your show is taking in general) has alread been said so much better by those who already poested before me.El Pibe Progrehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15776461523047559752noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-11332956385388456412012-01-04T21:37:54.524-08:002012-01-04T21:37:54.524-08:00Dear Bob,
While I often agree and see the points ...Dear Bob,<br /><br />While I often agree and see the points in the arguments you make. This was such a close-minded take on the current state of the industry. Since you aren't a PC gamer from what I've gathered I can assume you haven't spent time to invest into steam. The Independent movement is growing in leaps and bounds gaining a substantial share of the market compared to years prior. We are currently seeing the end of the 'Studio System' which happened to film. Smaller developers are innovating and using the medium in new ways. Yet you seem to not even acknowledge this in your normally reasonable speeches. <br /><br />Every time you go on these spiels I think back to episode 59 about how you said (paraphrasing) 'we wanted everyone to conform to our ideas of gaming instead of finding their own.' Well that's what you are doing. Not everyone wants a traditional platformer, they like most of America want 'MICHAEL BEY EXPLOSIONS!'. While I find that annoying it's what people like and now they found a type of game that does that. I feel like this has been pointed out to you but still, I felt the need to point it out. <br /><br />I love Historical strategy games; Hearts of Iron, Company of Heroes, Men of War, Victoria 2, Europa 3, CIV, Close Combat, Tropico (stretching it). I'm sure most of these games don't interest you and also don't showcase much innovation often using the same formula throughout. Does that mean that those who play them stagnate the industry? No, I simply have found the type of games that interest me, and those who enjoy these games get showered with tons of them. <br /><br />Interesting observation; The core problem with the gaming culture is the fractured communities and how there really isn't a core market anymore. People could love games and never play anything that I play. In the golden age there were 3 systems (basically). It's like what you said with your Simpsons retrospective, the culture is so broken that there isn't much in the way of shared experiences beyond a few ones. You see FPS's as the representative of the gaming zeitgeist, when that really isn't the case and I would think that there isn't even one anymore.<br /><br />Also like it or not COD 4 modern warfare was a mature and expertly crafted game and doesn't deserve the scorn you give it. Now the rest of the COD modern warfare sequels do, but COD 4 doesn't. Don't forget Valve, they created some of the best FPS's ever made. TF2 is a great example of everything done right in a game. It's Fun, Challenging, Easily Accessible, and Astatically Pleasing. TF2 has dominated online shooting, while never getting as high as CS or MW it has stayed more constant and active than any Online community of a current gen game.<br /><br /> P.S. these are games that showcase what games can do that are close to your comfort zone that are recent successes and showcase progress; Limbo, Braid, Minecraft, Terraria, Bastion, Trenched, Splosin' Man, and Rock of Ages. While these aren't all of them, these are the ones I've played and enjoyed.Glennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-35666682257849292302012-01-04T14:35:25.021-08:002012-01-04T14:35:25.021-08:00@Jannie
Jannie, Skyrim grew out of JRPGs? …Okay...@Jannie<br /><br /><br />Jannie, Skyrim grew out of JRPGs? …Okay history lesson time the first attempte to bring D&D to computers happened in around 1975 with games like Dungeon, dnd and Pedit5. Due to the limits of the tech at the time they were only really able to bring over the “waking in maze, kill monsters, level up” part of the game play, and even then they had to be run on mainframes that covered multiple universities, like the PLATO terminal. It was also here that online multiplayer’s got their start, but that’s a whole different story.<br /><br />Role playing finally hit the home computers around 1980, with a verity of games, notably many were in the first person perspective, meaning RPGS used that view point before shooters did. Anyway in 1980 perhaps the most influential RPG series ever came out, Ultima, and in 1981 the second most influential also came out Wizardy. <br /><br />These games would eventually also make it over to Japan were a man by the name of Yuji Hori would decide to make his own take on the RPG with these games rather then D&D. The game? Dragon Quest, released in 1986 The rest is history.<br /><br />But it’s not like CRPG just stopped in the west. They kept growing and evolving along a different path then their JRPG offspring. By and large getting more open and sandboxy as the tech needed to make such games was made.<br /><br />In 1993 the first Elder Scroll came out, tracing it’s roots through the world of WRPGs and NOT JRPGs. So it IS a call back to the golden age, just the PCs golden Age not the consoles golden age. And for a lot of the old school WRPG fans it actually doesn't come across as a new height. The simplification of the skill and abilities you can customize along with each mission having A solution leaves many viewing it as a very watered down WRPG experience.<br /><br />Oh and Transformers NEVER went under it cam close during the disaster of G2 in the early nineties, but then in 1995 Beast Wars came out and revived the franchise well rising the bar on the expected quality of writing for the shows. Since then it’s been going strong, it just that since I doubt you were into buying kid toys or watching kid TV shows (especially since the ones put out n the early 2000’s failed to meet the bar set by the Beast Era) you would have no way of knowing that.NathanShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16318655557022495392noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-33764991064233246862012-01-04T10:18:48.969-08:002012-01-04T10:18:48.969-08:00For the first time in a while I actually enjoyed w...For the first time in a while I actually enjoyed watching the plot in this series. Why do you continue with the argument that video games aren't as good today as they were back in the day. The same argument can be said about music, literature, and film!<br /><br /> Please Bob go back to the episodes where you spoke of Carl Gustav Jong, and Dostoyevsky and compared the ideas and teachings to this wonderful medium. This series should be about enlightening others, gamers specifically, not about dreading what the industry has become!Fever Dream Dog Partyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18141426905921195801noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-56145466056659124202012-01-04T07:49:47.913-08:002012-01-04T07:49:47.913-08:00@Sylocat
No kidding, the genre needs an intellect...@Sylocat<br /><br />No kidding, the genre needs an intellectual/creative jolt that it's sorely been lacking in . Too many seem to be just wasting their time recycling stuff. The Modern Weapons series has been far too comfortable resting on the laurels of the (vastly overrated) title that drove it into blockbuster status. It pains to admit that if THIS is the kind of bland gruel people demand while shunning other entries in the genre that do something different I don't have much hope for the genre at this point. Its simultaneously in its equivalent of crappy 90s comic books and 70s glam rock excess.ScrewAttackSamushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00062574888317631429noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-4076763931760526612012-01-04T03:40:15.223-08:002012-01-04T03:40:15.223-08:00Correction:
The "game" is called Socket...Correction:<br /><br />The "game" is called Socket. Pressed the P by mistake somehow...<br /><br />http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socket_%28video_game%29Janniehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07704476259803360210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-43201079897667913832012-01-04T03:36:57.779-08:002012-01-04T03:36:57.779-08:00In addition, speaking to that notion of how people...In addition, speaking to that notion of how people felt about games as kids, I linked to that Jim Sterling video because I think he makes a very valid point here:<br /><br />When we played games like that back in the day, we did it through the eyes of five or six year old children, who frankly weren't intelligent enough or worldly enough to see when we were being bilked out of our money (go to Wikipedia and look up "Spocket", but be warned the cover art is basically a screamer image) and so we just loved whatever game was there as long as the gameplay was moderate or good, never asking for any actual innovation or diversity despite what people who look back may think.<br /><br />Realistically speaking, when people talk about how military shooters "all look the same" I could reword every single argument to cover mascot games and barely change more than five words. That's because these games were not just reskins of each other, the way that Medal of Honor was basically a reskin of Modern Warfare 2 with all the fun extracted, but literal copies of one another--I dare anyone to actually explain to me the actual difference between Zool, Aero the AcroBat and Mr. Nutz. Other than the fact they're all shameless, terrible duplicates of Sonic from a Bizarro world where Sonic's story, character, personality, energy and fun were all outlawed.<br /><br />If you want to argue that games have "some ways to go" before we gain some mythical AAAART status then fine, ok. But you simply cannot logically argue that games are not better than they have ever been in every conceivable way, from story to graphics to gameplay. The only thing mascot games did better was marketing, but that's style over substance at best, none of them (save for Sonic, again) could actually muster the effort to form a coherent plot for more than two seconds, or even casually glance at this thing called "characterization" that's all the rage now.Janniehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07704476259803360210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-84358406370595814482012-01-04T03:20:06.098-08:002012-01-04T03:20:06.098-08:00Well, I wouldn't say he doesn't like being...Well, I wouldn't say he doesn't like being a gamer anymore, but I get the impression he doesn't like what most people would call "gaming" in the 21st century.<br /><br />If I may speculate, of course I could be completely wrong.<br /><br />Bob is kind of in the same boat as a lot of Retrogamers and--and this is why a long while back I mentioned Transformers--a lot of fans of older franchises that were rebooted and let's be fair, rebuilt from the ruins up after they'd completely collapsed, Transformers being one example. <br /><br />Gaming really was completely rebuilt after the emergence of online multiplayer and Halo made FPS games pretty much dominant in the medium, and as a result a lot of people feel left behind. But in some ways I'd say this is their own fault. I think it's telling in an older, YouTube video when Bob was decribing Nintendo his ideal of what they represent was basically his childhood memories personified, because you get that a lot with older fans of many franchises, "you raped my childhood" or some such when something changes.<br /><br />Because, you see, retrogamers don't WANT to play video games: they want to play SPECIFIC video games of SPECIFIC types and forms with no change or evolution whatsoever, completely frozen in time at the moment they first became part of the franchise. Just like older Transformers fans simply CAN NOT accept or internalize the idea that a whole generation of kids will now grow up with Bayformers and not their immobile plastic bricks (and let's be fair, that's all they were for more than two decades) because to them that, that precise concept, with Optimus as a certain kind of truck, Megatron as a gun and Starscream as a shrieking homosexual stereotype, that is the only conceivable version of Transformers that can EVER exist because that is the version they knew. The Japanese shows and movies, the mangas, the comics, all of that is "not really Transformers" the way that people who play COD and Halo are "not really gamers". The counterpoint to this, that a whole generation of people disagree with them and may feel the same way in reverse, simply doesn't register because it can't. Because that would be admitting or even legitimizing the change, instead of dismissing and marginalizing it, or trying to. <br /><br />Of course this is all speculation on my part and I make no claim that I can prove this at all, but if I were going to further speculate on the hatred towards modern gaming conventions...it's not exactly hatred per se, not on it's own, but hatred tempered in fear. Fear that some nebulous concept of innocence and aforementioned "childhood" will vanish if things change. Ironically I'm reminded of a children's movie I saw as girl, the name escapes me--some malarky based on a book. Anyway, the crux of it was that the villainess, a "Dark Princess" who resembled a little girl made of ice, was actually hundreds of years old and had frozen her kingdom in ice because she had such a wonderful childhood she couldn't bare losing it, which ironically she already had simply because, well, time passes. When the heroine, a girl from Earth, ended up there and started thawing things out (with the power of love, of course) it terrified the Dark Princess, and that fear turned into hate and anger and a feeling that SOMEONE was intruding on her perfect, shining childhood. It's like that.<br /><br />Well, except for the part when she's forcibly thawed out at the end by the heroine and ages into dust; presumably if Nintendo folds and Mario disappears retrogamers won't all age into dust and die. <br /><br />Presumably.Janniehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07704476259803360210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-55003812348242638472012-01-04T01:02:58.692-08:002012-01-04T01:02:58.692-08:00Bob, this episode made me feel bad for you. I mean...Bob, this episode made me feel bad for you. I mean, you still enjoy gaming, right? I understand that OT and RT are just characters and the story is partially written to illustrate a point, but I thought this was the one time we would see you actually be positive about gaming. Having someone who's receptive to a gamer to share all of their favorite experiences of the last 20 years with them is like a fantasy come true for many I'd think.<br /><br />I mean, I'm not saying that you're wrong about what you said or anything, but after the huge Steam sale I've been playing a ton of amazingly fun games, both mainstream and indie from the past couple years, and this seems like an unnecessary bring-down.<br /><br />This actually goes for the entire community, but if you don't enjoy most games you play, aren't you not a gamer?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-34775646946185718612012-01-03T22:09:49.983-08:002012-01-03T22:09:49.983-08:00Edit, hit send instead of preview:
"If anyth...Edit, hit send instead of preview:<br /><br />"If anything Modern Warfare is about the FAILURE of nations to hold themselves together. Time and again the best laid plans of America fail miserable, Russia gets completely played by one of their own, and the main character makes no bones about his utter and open disdain for nationalism in general and patriotism in particular. It's a wildly un-jingoistic game whose main thrust..."<br /><br />Is that people have to depend on themselves not on some nebulous concept like a nation or an army to protect them. Because every time anyone does in the game, it ends horribly.Janniehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07704476259803360210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-73601338626371902842012-01-03T22:06:18.001-08:002012-01-03T22:06:18.001-08:00Also, just to finally put to lie this "jingos...Also, just to finally put to lie this "jingosim" bull that people like to throw around about military shooters (people who never played them I presume) let me expand on something:<br /><br />The entire crux of the Modern Warfare series is, in a nutshell, that patriotism is bullshit and those kinds of people are insane. <br /><br />Makarov is the leader of the ULTRANATIONALISTS and is roundly portrayed as a psychopath; likewise General Shepherd is also a staunch patriot, and a nutcase, and a mass murderer who ironically betrays his country in pursuit of his goal of uniting it.<br /><br />But even if that weren't the case, Price, the main character, SAYS that patriotism is bullshit every. Time. He. Speaks.<br /><br />There are literally whole monologues in the game that amount to little more than "Are you a nationalist? Then you're an idiot!" or "America sucks, bunch of hypocrites!" and "Britain sucks too and I'm a Brit, I should know!"<br /><br />Yeah real jingoistic. <br /><br />Moreover the whole thrust of the game series in general is the failure of two nations, driven by jingoism, to see they're being played by someone smarter than their respective elected leaders. America gets conned by both Makarov and Shepherd, while Russian just by Makarov. Not only do they get conned, but conned into a world war which kills millions of Americans and Russians and millions more Europeans, Brits and even Africans. In the end it is not a nation, or even America, that brings down Makarov and Shepherd but one man, without back up or allies, who does it.<br /><br />If anything Modern Warfare is about the FAILURE of nations to hold themselves together. Time and again the best laid plans of America fail miserable, Russia gets completely played by one of their own, and the main character makes no bones about his utter and open disdain for nationalism in general and patriotism in particular. It's a wildly un-jingoistic game whose main thrust. <br /><br />But of course some people confuse "has modern military stuff in it" with "jingoism" because some people are Ben Crenshaw and apparenly anything that isn't Silent Hill just isn't good. Period. Course he hates Mario too so I know he must give retrogamers migraines too.Janniehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07704476259803360210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-74784226551550911062012-01-03T21:50:03.023-08:002012-01-03T21:50:03.023-08:00Sylocat, stop being so obtuse.
Evolution isn'...Sylocat, stop being so obtuse. <br /><br />Evolution isn't something that Ayn Rand came up with, the concept existed long before that sociopathic hag coughed up Atlas Shrugged. The fact is that you simply can not argue that the market has in fact spoken. You could theoretically argue that, maybe, what has been discarded was in and of itself good and not worthy of being left behind, but you can't logically say that ALL of the people who buy Madden or COD or Skyrim are stupid because they refused to buy Rayman Origins. FYI, I actually did buy Rayman Origins, so suck it.<br /><br />I also love how you use "FPS fan" as if it were an insult. If I used "platformer fan" or "casual gamer" in the same way, hypocritical little snobs like you would throw a pissy fit, but I guess that's just one of the perks of being among the Master Race. <br /><br />But ok, I'll bite. HOW precisely is it hogwash? What precisely is jingoistic in Modern Warfare 2? Describe actual plot points please, and for the love of Christ, no ancient meme "jokes" if you'd be so kind. And how does it "dumb down" real warfare (which obviously you've been in, so you'd know what it was like) any more than, say, Command and Conquer or Dynasty Warriors? Or for that matter, Mario--a game where you play as an interdimensional mercenary hired by a monarchy to put down a rebellion and save their princess from being raped by a turtle.<br /><br />And Skyrim is so far away from the manic animal platformers that comprise retrogamers' libraries it's scary. And that's not just because it's a "brown and grey" first-person camera game with dual wielding (dual wielding MAGIC no less; when I heard that I thought they should have just called it "The Elder Scrolls: Janie Give Us Your Money!") In fact it's different in most ways from the JRPGs that it ostensibly grew out of. It's basically a D&D game run by a computer, not a retrogame. But I'm sure you're too hip to play D&D so I'll explain what that means to the Hipster elite: see, back in the day, before Final Fantasy was just a verbose twinkle in Japan's eye, people used to play these things called "tabletop RPGs" which were basically Skyrim but without the graphics. Skyrim is a throwback to that kind of freewheeling, open ended type of game, and takes modern concepts from gaming along with it--many of them from RPGs of the last few years like Mass Effect or Fallout 3--to build a realistic word with actual plot arcs and characters and story progression (Verisimilitude? In my RPG? It's more common than you think!) where you can also kill Godzillas with magical screams. That's why it sold seven million copies in less than a week while Skyward Sword sold under a million in the same period of time. That's also why it "focuses on singleplayer", not because that's some holy grail to aim at but because that's how Bethesda decided to focus on ROLE PLAYING instead of dropping you into the role of the same floucy-haired blonde pretty boy again and again and again...ironically, my Skyrim character looks like Cloud, complete coincidence.<br /><br />But I'm sure that all doesn't matter to you because you already made up your mind. I didn't by the way, I don't JUST play FPS games. I love Bastion for example, and open wold games like Just Cause and Saints Row (though Saints Row 3 was a disappointment) I'm a long-time RPG player and have a collection of the newer ones including Mass Effect, DX 1, Fallout 1-3 and yes Skyrim, though statistically everyone in the world apparently owns a copy of Skyrim. I also loved Rayman Origins, it sold like shit but it's a beautiful game and superbly well crafted. In fact, I bought Stacking. Did you buy Stacking Sylocat? Have you ever played as a Russian doll version of the Thing, assimilating other Russian dolls and using them to solve puzzles? Because I have.Janniehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07704476259803360210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-51481028143708261162012-01-03T20:28:37.621-08:002012-01-03T20:28:37.621-08:00Another episode where Moviebob pulls the same old ...Another episode where Moviebob pulls the same old ""FPS games are popular so modern gaming is bad!""<br /><br />YAWN. Get a new argument. It reeks of aged milk. <br /><br />But that would require work and research, which I know Moviebob stinks of...<br /><br />Remember this is someone who claimed...<br /><br />""PC gaming is dying, because Laptops are getting more powerful to play games!""Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-18107793082503508052012-01-03T19:19:25.494-08:002012-01-03T19:19:25.494-08:001. Sonic came after the Retrothinker was frozen! H...1. Sonic came after the Retrothinker was frozen! He shouldn't know about the series!<br /><br />2. Honestly, my problem isn't that you like video games before the present day. My problem is why. You're pretty much saying that every single video game today is terrible, and they're all similar to CoD or Madden. Nobody else I know, not even the media, shares this view. This episode should really be called Jade-Colored Reality rather than what you named it.Link0306https://www.blogger.com/profile/06338157101434986215noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-74021122849119382772012-01-03T15:31:27.402-08:002012-01-03T15:31:27.402-08:00@ Sylocat
"No, I don't blame CoD for its...@ Sylocat<br /><br />"No, I don't blame CoD for its godawful knockoffs, I blame CoD for being a fairly-decent, at best, knockoff of every military FPS that came before it."<br /><br />In which case, Mario is a Manic Miner ripoff. Except, it's not, and neither was CoD4; I think you're mistaking 'It's not the first ever military FPS, therefore it's a ripoff' with actually ripping something else off. To be fair, Call of Duty 4's main innovations were in multiplayer which means that it must be shit, and in gameplay speed over player speed. But that's besides my main point; that people for some reason hate CoD and Halo for all the ripoffs of them that circulate, while Sonic the Hedgehog still gets an easy ride despite being ripped off millions upon millions of times.<br /><br />"You're right that we've seen the full potential of the genre. The genre in the 2007-2008 release years, with the one-two-three release of BioShock, Portal, CoD4:MW, and a strong lineup of lower-budget/indie projects, like Painkiller."<br /><br />Well, with that I actually meant specifically military-based shooters, rather than FPS's as a whole. First person is really just a camera angle; to say we've seen the full potential is like saying we've hit the full potential of the pencil. It's a tool, not a genre. I still always like the games that give you the option to switch between 3rd and 1st person, like Skyrim and Star Wars Battlefront.<br /><br />As for FPS's, I think we're yet to hit the full potential, at least until someone makes a 3D porno with the genetic cross between Samus Aran, Audrey Hepburn and a chocolate sundae, or when that 'Beat up Nick Griffin until his eyes bleed' simulation comes out for the Wii.Spongey Blobnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-61944717018856945602012-01-03T14:20:26.386-08:002012-01-03T14:20:26.386-08:00@Jannie: Well, at least retro gamers don't see...@Jannie: Well, at least retro gamers don't seem to use the same logic that Social Darwinists use to justify the Prosperity Gospel, just in order to justify the belief (which you consistently attribute to them, no matter how many times it is explained to you that this is not actually what they want) that nobody should be making games that cater to anyone's tastes but their own.<br /><br />It is odd, however, that the only one here openly applauding the death of entire genres is the Argumentum-ad-Populum-qielding FPS fan.<br /><br />As for what's wrong with military shooters. There's nothing wrong with the genre itself, except for the fact that this "verisimilitude" you bring up as a point in their favor is complete hogwash. It's just a shame that many of the individual games dumb down and trivialize real warfare and spread childishly jingoistic propaganda.<br /><br />Also, Skyrim is not the "antithesis" of yesteryear's games. It's a game focused on singleplayer rather than tacked-on multiplayer, involving distinctive art design and fantasy elements, rather than this phony "verisimilitude" you're so fond of. It has more in common with the "retro" games than CoD ever did.<br /><br />And, if the Madden games were "good," they would release the updated rosters as DLC rather than as a brand new game every year. As it stands, anyone who willingly pays money for those games year after year is a sucker, at best.<br /><br />@Spongey Blob: No, I don't blame CoD for its godawful knockoffs, I blame CoD for being a fairly-decent, at best, knockoff of every military FPS that came before it.<br /><br />MW1 was the last game in the series that tried anything new (and, coincidentally, it was also the best one); every installment since then has basically been an oversized expansion pack, just with worse pacing and worse writing.<br /><br />You're right that we've seen the full potential of the genre. The genre in the 2007-2008 release years, with the one-two-three release of <i>BioShock</i>, <i>Portal</i>, CoD4:MW, and a strong lineup of lower-budget/indie projects, like <i>Painkiller</i>.<br /><br />There's been a few interesting entries since then (though the only ones I can think of offhand all have "2" at the end of their titles, which says something), but it's way overdue for a shakeup, and at this point I'm counting on <i>BioShock: Infinite</i> to provide a much-needed kick in the pants, if anything.nullhypothesishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11784779286499862559noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-52182765101542028912012-01-03T12:35:54.040-08:002012-01-03T12:35:54.040-08:00Bob...I respect your work...I really do but someth...Bob...I respect your work...I really do but something I have noticed you doing a lot recently is putting modern gaming under the umbrella of Generic FPS games. Go look at the metacritic user score for MW3...it's really low. you want something interesting? how about Deus-Ex...oh right you think that game is racist when you have not even played it and are looking at that one scene out of context. Fine how about amnesia...oh wait it's not on a console so you don't want to even consider touching it. Fine. How about Borderlands, TF2, Left 4 Dead. None of these are samy brown shooters. I can list more good FPS games. There's Tribes, there's Section 8, Serious Sam. I could go on but you don't seem to enjoy FPS games anyway so I'll go to other games. There's Skyrim, there's the Witcher 2, there's Magicka, there's the Binding of Issac, Bastion, Limbo, Solar 2, Limbo. You talk about how there is no moce creativity in AAA games but I believe that there does not have to be. The same thing about risky projects and such can still happen in the indie scene. sure they're not selling as well as modern warfare but they don't have to. Most real gamers look at the people who play nothing but CoD or BF3 as non gamers. The real gamers know that there can't be as much innovation in the high profile games because they are too expensive.<br /><br />I guess the point I'm trying to make is please don't judge all gamers by MW standards because we hate MW. And don't assume all games are like MW when they clearly are not.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-42500072750207989052012-01-03T11:19:47.513-08:002012-01-03T11:19:47.513-08:00@Spongey Blob:
Is Metropolis the worst film ever ...<i>@Spongey Blob: <br />Is Metropolis the worst film ever made because Transformers exists?</i><br /><br /><i>Jannie said...<br />Bob is correct when he says that people today want every shooter to be COD or Halo, every sports game to be Madden, every third-person game to be Gears or Assassin's Creed, etc.<br /><br />There is a good reason for that: those games are good.</i><br /><br />These two points taken together, form the strongest argument for me. Not every "good" game has to reinvent the wheel. In the history of cinema, there are those landmark films that influenced how the movies after them would be filmed or distributed or marketed: Citizen Kane, The Wizard of Oz, The Ten Commandments, The Wild Bunch, Rocky, Jaws, Star Wars, Pulp Fiction, The Matrix, and so on. But there are hundreds of other good films that didn't change the rules of filmmaking, but told excellent stories using just the tools available. <br /><br />The same is true of video games. The 2D platformer and 2.5D beat-'em-up were popular in the 8-bit/16-bit days because the hardware at the time could handle them, the controls were fairly simple to pick up and play, and they were open enough to accommodate a variety of different settings and stories. E.g., Streets of Rage, Golden Axe and Alien Storm are practically sprite-swaps of the same basic beat-'em-up game. But in the first, you're vigilantes fighting street gangs, in the second, you're Conan-esque barbarians fighting with sword and sorcery, and in the third, you're a quirky Ghostbusters-esque team fighting alien infestations. <br /><br />When PC gaming had <i>its</i> glut of same-y FPSes in the late 90s, developers took the basic FPS engine, but did interesting new things with it. The result were several games now considered among the best of all time: The Elder Scrolls, Half-Life 1 and 2, the original Deus Ex, Thief, Myst, System Shock 2. Once in a while, someone still does something original or at least interesting with the FPS: BioShock, Portal, Mirror's Edge, etc. <br /><br />So if devs want to take the time-tested and true format of the 2D platformer, and use it to make games as different from each other as Limbo, Braid and Super Meat Boy, is that so different from George Lucas ca. 1976 making a pastiche of 30s pulp serials, 40s war movies and 50s samurai films? Or Quentin Tarantino taking the basic template of the French New Wave heist-film and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0105236/" rel="nofollow">putting his own spin on it</a>?Joehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12205684816801345851noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-7510249166873756072012-01-03T08:54:50.843-08:002012-01-03T08:54:50.843-08:00Yay more bitching about shooters? I mean, you made...Yay more bitching about shooters? I mean, you made a whole episode about the damn things. Give it a rest.<br /><br /><br />On the topic of New vs. Old, I think there's something people are missing. The Internet.<br /><br />Good games, great games, bad games, bad therefore good games and terrible games have always been around. However, people were only exposed to whatever games the local game place sold, and what the gaming magazines talked about. Which, I'm guessing, had quite an overlap.<br /><br />Nowadays, we have forums and the Youtube. You tell people about the bad game you found. Made a video of it. Let's Play it and lol about the badness. This leads to more people seeing the game and it's badness. If this happens for lots of bad games, it seems like gaming has declined, however, the proportion of bad games to good game has always been similar. People just didn't know about the bad games. Now they do. This makes it seems as if there are more bad games overall, even though they aren't.<br /><br />tl;dr: There have always been bad games, you just think there are more now due to increased exposure to bad games.Hypermenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6031707140462457270.post-7878525855124416492012-01-03T08:14:15.788-08:002012-01-03T08:14:15.788-08:00Yeah, he probably DID get a lot of heat for the la...Yeah, he probably DID get a lot of heat for the last episode, and most of his other episodes, for his apparent love for Nintendo and old school games...<br /><br />I doubt this episode will help at all. But we'll see.<br /><br />I can't help but chuckle a little at the idea that the guy is about to kill himself over video games... Then again, he DID throw his entire past life away just to see the future of video games. Still, can't help but feel like the culture shock has gotten the best of him...<br /><br />I like how Ivan is both taking this seriously, but at the same time making fun of the situation... It's too bad that most people will hate him simply because he's a cheap-looking fairy sidekick used to inflate the ego of the guy making these videos.<br /><br />I DO see this a lot. There's almost too many people taking about how awesome games were back in the day, and not many, or at least not NEARLY enough people talking about gaming today... The only guy I can think of who talks about modern gaming on a regular basis with almost no references to the "Golden Age of Gaming" is Yahtzee, although he's also suspect to Nostalgia (see Fantasy World Dizzy).<br /><br />That's an interesting look... And it's also one he brought up with the Supreme Court decision. It's hard to say what kind of impact games today will have, good or bad, because we don't know if they'll be remembered or forgotten in years to come... Usually it's either the best or the worst that are remembered, the middle ground usually gets swept under the rug.<br /><br />When he brought up the whole "samey & stagnent" state of games back in the day, I immediately thought o Benzaie, even before he mentioned him. Benzaie is... interesting. A very colorful contributor to TGWTG. His Let's Play of Heavy Rain is freaking HILARIOUS, if only because of his accent (he's French)! XP<br /><br />I love the examples he uses, even though there WERE a lot of the same kind of platforms back in the day, there was still more variety to them, to the point where you can actually TELL what each of them were, as opposed to modern FPS's these days. You can actually see the character you're controlling for one.<br /><br />I also like the reasoning behind it, not because the people making it were these creative artist who wanted to do something different, but because it's still the same kind of market today, and what the market demands dictates what gets made.<br /><br />And wouldn't you know it, we blame the publishers and developers rather than blame ourselves. What a surprise. :/<br /><br />When was The Goonies released? I never saw that movie, actually...<br /><br />Oh, dude, there's a trailer/commerical for The Muppets on TV! THAT'S got to make the RetroThinker happy!<br /><br />Okay, I think he messed up. Overthinker, get your facts straight before you go out and say something. Sonic was released in 1991, a year AFTER RetroThinker supposedly froze himself! It's just like with Kirby and Donkey Kong beforehand, there's no way he could have possibly known about them if he froze himself BEFORE they were released!<br /><br />...But, whatever, the RetroThinker knows about Sonic now. Hopefully, he'll check out Sonic Generations by the next episode and realize hope is not lost for the blue blur.Smashmatt202https://www.blogger.com/profile/05993678210896932119noreply@blogger.com