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| Grave 507th Post
 
New Red Carpet Member
    
    
|  "Quality of games declining over time?"
, posted Tue 5 Aug 12:00
On the SvC for DC thread, something Rugal mentioned got me thinking. When I think about myself and the games I enjoy most, most of them aren't new games... Most aren't even on current consoles. When I think back to SNES games I loved, like Actraiser, F-Zero, Chrono Trigger, Super Mario RPG, Super Mario World 2, and so forth, it just seems to me that so many more quality games came out back then.
Of course, a lot of good games still do come out, but it seems to me that mainstream games have gone down in quality. Sure, we still get things like Metal Gear Solid, Zelda, and GTA games that satisfy a lot of people, but it just seems like there's not of a lot of good original content out there.
When I look around for action/platform-style games to play, it seems like most of the stuff available is poorly-designed games with sloppy gameplay and uninspired characters. I don't know if it's really the case, or I'm just jaded by the stuff I grew up with.
So I'm looking for some opinions. How do you guys feel about this? Are games just as good as they were, or has quality and originality really declined in the last few years?
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| Fro Boy11 1824th Post
Silver Carpet V.I.P- Platinum Executive
  
    
   
| "Re(1):Quality of games declining over time?" , posted Tue 5 Aug 12:08
quote:
On the SvC for DC thread, something Rugal mentioned got me thinking. When I think about myself and the games I enjoy most, most of them aren't new games... Most aren't even on current consoles. When I think back to SNES games I loved, like Actraiser, F-Zero, Chrono Trigger, Super Mario RPG, Super Mario World 2, and so forth, it just seems to me that so many more quality games came out back then.
Of course, a lot of good games still do come out, but it seems to me that mainstream games have gone down in quality. Sure, we still get things like Metal Gear Solid, Zelda, and GTA games that satisfy a lot of people, but it just seems like there's not of a lot of good original content out there.
When I look around for action/platform-style games to play, it seems like most of the stuff available is poorly-designed games with sloppy gameplay and uninspired characters. I don't know if it's really the case, or I'm just jaded by the stuff I grew up with.
So I'm looking for some opinions. How do you guys feel about this? Are games just as good as they were, or has quality and originality really declined in the last few years?
I think that the games these days arent as good as they used to. I think because back then graphics didn't really matter. I go to my friends house and all we play is his NES, (Wheel of Fortune and Jackal mostly), back then it was all about the gameplay. These days most people pay attention to the graphics. A lot of people think that if the graphics are good then the game HAS to be the same way. A lot of things in videogames has been done already. Its hard to innovate these days, and when companies do try to innovate, the fans usually don't like what they came up with.
There are a few great games on the modern consoles, but there aren't that many. I don't play my PS2 or GC much anymore. I usually play my DC to the most. I got a Genesis the other day, and I can't wait to get some games for it.
Still waiting for a Dan Hibiki and Robert Garcia dream match!
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| Grave 508th Post
New Red Carpet Member
| "Re(3):Quality of games declining over time?" , posted Tue 5 Aug 12:35
quote:
Besides, when good games like Silent Bomber or Klonoa appear they are overlooked for everybody, so it's the fault of gamers that don't buy them.
Whoa, great point. When titles do come out make me take notice, in either amazing gameplay or excellent presentation/concept, no one else cares!
Examples:
I think the Mark of Kri is a very good action/adventure game, though it does get a bit repetetive, it's still very cool. The lock-on system is especially awesome... and hardly anybody noticed it! Sony barely advertised it in the US... sad.
Like you mentioned, the Klonoa games... Klonoa 2 is mindblowing, both visually and in terms of gameplay. Every friend of mine I showed the demo to or told to buy it has done so, and has been thrilled with it. I'm sure Namco will produce a third game someday, and I don't mean on GBA, but imagine if the game did well worldwide. That could lead the way for a lot more games like it.
A game I've also enjoyed a lot, recently, is Way of the Samurai. The way the game plays out is like a choose-your-own-adventure samurai story. Though once you've played through enough times, there doesn't seem to be anything new to do, it's still a very cool concept and a fun game. There's a sequel on the way, one I certainly hope will get a US release.
I think what KTallguy said is very true... with more developers and a more profitable industry, yeah, there's going to be a higher percentage of crap out there. It's a lot easier to make a game now than it was years ago, I think, and everyone wants in on it... quality isn't always a consideration.
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| Hungrywolf 2143th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
 
| "Re(3):Quality of games declining over time?" , posted Tue 5 Aug 13:24
quote:
Hummm... as much as I enjoyed old games, I can't really say that the Joe & Mac or Mappy gameplay was that good... it just worked back then. It would be like saying that International Karate had better grameplay than SF3...
Besides, when good games like Silent Bomber or Klonoa appear they are overlooked for everybody, so it's the fault of gamers that don't buy them.
Final Fantasy VIII was the best selling FF, it's logical that the games will follow its way.
I agree with KTallguy, Rugal, and Rid. I don't think the quality has necessarily declined. I still play plenty of new games. In fact, I think I buy more games now then I used to. I still love playing old games, but I don't consider older games better than newer or vice versa. I'm older myself now too and don't have as much time with games as I did when I was a kid so I don't think I can judge them the same way. At least I do still get enough time with them, just when I was a kid, that was all I did. Heh.
"You're good baby I'll give you that.....but me? I'm magic!"
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Hungry Like the Wolf
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| Gojira 1100th Post
Red Carpet Premium Member+
| "Re(1):Quality of games declining over time?" , posted Tue 5 Aug 13:40:
When you look at games like those of the SNES era, you're looking at games that were good in spite of the hardware's limitations. Back then, our biggest concerns were flicker and slowdown. If a game could display lots of colorful, nicely-drawn crap without flicker or slowdown and be a marginally fun experience it was a GOOD GAME. That was it. Forget about going back and playing them NOW, because you're not going to get the same impressions. But back THEN, it was easier to consider something a good game.
Now that hardware limitations are harder to reach, and controllers are bigger and full of buttons and have multiple pads and analog crap all over it's harder for anyone to be impressed with what they see or how it plays. If a game looks and sounds good and plays good it must be good right? NO, it has to have original characters, original storytelling, a completely new game concept, Dolby Surround, 16:9 ratio support, antialiasing, trilinear buffers, bump maps, NURBS curves, analog support, 800,000 polys per character, wind/fabric physics, spotlight/shadow effects, etc etc etc etc!!!! This kind of stuff can take dozens, even hundreds of people to pull together and if there's ANY SKIMPING on ANYTHING, somebody, somewhere is going to hate it. Not mildly, not "I like this but this isn't good"; there are no shades of gray in the majority of gaming fandom these days. They will simply HATE it.
Such is the current state of gaming. Until people can start realizing how fucking spoiled they are the dissatisfaction will never end and the games will be just as "bad" as ever.
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[this message was edited by Gojira on Tue 5 Aug 13:42] |
| KTallguy 274th Post
Copper Customer
| "Re(2):Re(10):Quality of games declining over " , posted Tue 5 Aug 17:08
I know, I was just saying =)
You're absoulutely right. Most games eschew scores and focus on either an 'experience', or on collecting a bunch of stuff. 'Final Fantasy' type games are just about going through a story more than anything. Metal Gear Solid 2 had the whole 'time' ranking thing. Dark Cloud 2 and Pokemon are all about collecting stuff.
I did like how Ikagura has that online ranking system though. CvS1 had that 'groove' meter which I thought was a pain in the ass...but I guess you could call that a scoring system. Dance Dance Revolution is all about scoring at higher levels too =)
However, I pose a question to you Rugal. Other than comparing your scores to other people, what good are scores? I understand that you might be personally satisfied by them... and online rankings like Ikagura really help. But without the online rankings, it seems like, you'll have no one to compare to, and it's worthless. Scores kind of 'judge' your effectiveness in a game, but I like grades better. Certain games give you a grade at the end, and you unlock more crap with a better grade. I like that system.
Insertcredit.com posted an article a few days ago about the sequal to the 'push the guy down the stairs' game. This time it's in a truck =P Get it !! My high score is about 80,000... but no where near the 250,000 mark(the current highscore on the online ranking).
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| OmegaDog 715th Post
Red Carpet Regular Member
| "Re(5):Re(10):Quality of games declining over" , posted Tue 5 Aug 18:00
quote:
Back when people still went to arcades, having a high score actually mattered amongst people who recognized you, and I miss those days. Nowadays, I more or less just compare with buddies, or get the personal satisfaction of beating an old high score. See, you're speaking from what I consider to be a very "new" perspective on games; keep in mind Centipede is my all-time favorite game.
Oddly having the highest score on Metal Slug X at my old college rec room did not improve my popularity.
Ah, but it was kinda nice seeing the scores regardless. Our local arcade joint, which wasn't that big, had a Neo Geo machine that was played relatively often. I had the local high score on Metal Slug 3, and it was kind of an ego boost walking past it and seeing the score and my initials next to them (er, DOG ^_^;). When they decided to host a high score contest with that game (prize, 300 tokens), they wiped the scores -- but I ended up entering and getting an even higher score. And even after that, I still played the game to try to get as high a score as possible (because I'd seen higher scores on the net).
[Then the arcade went bankrupt and closed down. I miss it dearly... games that cost US$2.50/credit at Dave & Busters cost US$0.50/credit or less at this arcade joint.]
But yeah -- high score does increase incentive to keep on playing games over and over -- you consistently get better at the games every time. It doesn't even have to necessarily be the score that you're directly after: for me, with Ikaruga, it's the Chain count; with Sin and Punishment, it's the HIT count; and maybe with Mischief Makers, the number of S Rankings I've been able to get...
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| Radish 1503th Post
Red Carpet V.I.P- Platinum Member
| "Re(6):Re(10):Quality of games declining over" , posted Tue 5 Aug 18:06
quote:
Back when people still went to arcades, having a high score actually mattered amongst people who recognized you, and I miss those days. Nowadays, I more or less just compare with buddies, or get the personal satisfaction of beating an old high score. See, you're speaking from what I consider to be a very "new" perspective on games; keep in mind Centipede is my all-time favorite game.
Oddly having the highest score on Metal Slug X at my old college rec room did not improve my popularity.
Ah, but it was kinda nice seeing the scores regardless. Our local arcade joint, which wasn't that big, had a Neo Geo machine that was played relatively often. I had the local high score on Metal Slug 3, and it was kind of an ego boost walking past it and seeing the score and my initials next to them (er, DOG ^_^;). When they decided to host a high score contest with that game (prize, 300 tokens), they wiped the scores -- but I ended up entering and getting an even higher score. And even after that, I still played the game to try to get as high a score as possible (because I'd seen higher scores on the net).
[Then the arcade went bankrupt and closed down. I miss it dearly... games that cost US$2.50/credit at Dave & Busters cost US$0.50/credit or less at this arcade joint.]
But yeah -- high score does increase incentive to keep on playing games over and over -- you consistently get better at the games every time. It doesn't even have to necessarily be the score that you're directly after: for me, with Ikaruga, it's the Chain count; with Sin and Punishment, it's the HIT count; and maybe with Mischief Makers, the number of S Rankings I've been able to get...
Yeah for a while some guy (my archnemesis "A " and I were battling it out for 1st place but I eventually got some score that was 200 points higher than his and he gave up. It was pretty funny since our lowest scores were generally untouchable by other players so the score board read like this:
MAT
A
MAT
A
MAT
A
MAT
A
SNK
And yeah D&B is a ripoff.
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| DarkZero
181th Post
Regular Customer
| "Re(7):Re(10):Quality of games declining over" , posted Tue 5 Aug 20:50
I think there has definitely been a decline in the overall quality of video games, but I'm not sure if we're coming out of that decline or just descending into a steeper one. I see three reasons for why games have declined to some degree.
The first is 3D games. I don't think anyone really respected the fact that when the PS1 officially ushered in the era of 3D games, we weren't going UP in quality, but rather going back to Atari 2600-quality games as developers worldwide struggled with a brand new medium for gaming. Say what you want about some old SNES games, but there are many more PS1 games that are just unplayable. The PS1 and N64 suffered from camera problems, horrendous clipping, bad graphics, asinine gameplay concepts, and basically every other problem that 3D games could ever have. And we're still in that rut to some extent, because it's still very hard for a developer with a budget to fix the game's camera on their PS2, GameCube, and Xbox titles. I just got through renting Hitman 2 and Sonic Adventure 2 Battle for the PS2 and GameCube (respectively). Great games, but the camera is HORRENDOUS in both. The SNES produced great 2D games because it was the apex of 2D gaming. If a developer wanted to do something in 2D, then the SNES let them do it, and let them do it well, including pretty pre-rendered graphics and Mode 7 effects. The PS2, GameCube, and Xbox are not the apex of 3D gaming. If a developer wants to do something in 3D, then they still have to struggle with the same camera, level layout, and physics problems that they did when the first PS1 games were made. The SNES let a developer ignore the minutiae of 2D gaming and focus on their game concept, but current 3D consoles do exactly the opposite. There is an annoying heap of crap in the way of expressing their concept and making it a good game.
The second is casual gamers. A lot of people complain that Western movie viewers, regardless of country or continent, are too content to watch asinine movies and not expect quality. Well, Western gamers are worse. Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life took it in the ass at the box office, but Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness is a chart-topper that's making way too much money. The reason for this is that casual gamers just haven't become as sophisticated as casual movie viewers. They don't ask around before buying or renting a game, they don't take the same casual glance at game reviews that they do before they see a movie, and they BUY games instead of renting them, cheating themselves out of fifty dollars. Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness and Enter the Matrix are two of the top games in North America right now and they're taking up a lot of shelf space. Also, if no casual gamers read reviews, then no casual gamers find out about critically acclaimed gems like Ico, Devil May Cry, or The Mark of Kri. They just continue to play crappy games without ever finding better ones.
And it's not just a Western problem, either. Read any interview with any of the staff of Devil May Cry, Shinobi, or similarly hardcore action games, and they'll talk about all of the hate mail and poor sales that they have to put up with in Japan. Hardcore Japanese gamers are probably more hardcore than any of their Western counterparts, but casual Japanese gamers are just as foolish as casual Western ones. They buy pathetically easy click-the-right-button-like-a-good-little-monkey games like Final Fantasy X and Final Fantasy X-2 and then bitch at the developers of Devil May Cry and Shinobi to tone their sequels' difficulty levels down to "Fucking Retardedly Easy". This is how we end up with bad games like Devil May Cry 2 and a sad plethora of other action games that are permanently set to Easy Mode without even an Options setting to change it.
Problem Two directly created Problem Three, which is shelf space. I've wanted to play niche titles like Robot Alchemic Drive, Skygunner, and Ka (Mr. Mosquito) for some time now, but games like that can't be rented at Blockbuster because Blockbuster has to make space for thirty-five copies each of Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness and Enter the Matrix. The fact that no one can try before they buy, which is traditionally something than niche gamers would do, keeps Electronics Boutique and Gamestop from selling many copies, which means that the game's price never drops. If I want Robot Alchemic Drive, I will have to pay full price for a game that may or may not suck. I am not that sort of consumer, so I simply haven't bought it. Worse, this lack of sales (which is directly caused by the static price, which is directly caused by a lack of rentals) causes the game to be pushed off the shelf, which means that you often can't get games like Ka ANYWHERE. This, again, is not the way that Blockbuster and Suncoast run their movie businesses. It is distinctly worse, which makes the overall gaming scene worse, which makes the original problem even worse, because it encourages playing the only games on the shelves.
Are we going through a decline in gaming? Well, I know we were in the PS1 days, and I think we might be going through one now as more and more licensed shlock is released and subsequently becomes popular enough to shove good games off the shelves. In the days of the SNES, games like Actraiser were being made and were readily available at any rental or retail store that you went to. Today, a game like Actraiser wouldn't even get a spot at Blockbuster and it would cost distinctly more than most other games at a retail store. That's an indisputable decline in game quality, but hopefully casual gamers will learn and the better games that are out there will get a little more respect.
Yes, that was very, very long. No, it was not meant to be. Thank you for reading long enough to find this message.
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| DarkZero
182th Post
Regular Customer
| "Re(9):Re(10):Quality of games declining over" , posted Tue 5 Aug 21:37
quote:
Not to be picky but RAD (which is great BTW) was on a demo disk and Atlus was giving out free demos of Sky Hunter as a promotion. I agree that it's much harder to find quirky games that pieces of crap like like ETM but from my perspective none of those games would have even been brought over to this country if the casual gamers hadn't made gaming as lucrative as it is now. I guess it's a double edged sword.
Just to get this squared away before more people misunderstand what I meant, I'm not actually complaining about casual gamers themselves. Casual fans are the lifeblood of any entertainment industry and I have no complaints about that at all. My only problem is with their current lack of education about video games. Gaming in North America is currently in that thorny patch between a bunch of geeks and little kids playing SNES games obsessively and the medium becoming an accepted part of society like movies or music, which provides educated game reviews in Entertainment Weekly and the gaming equivalent of Roger Ebert and his column in your local newspaper letting you know if a game is really good or just an over-hyped piece of crap. Eventually we'll be at the point where intelligent game reviews are ubiquitous and the average gamer knows, at the very least, to let games like Enter the Matrix rot on the store shelves, and that will be a great thing that will be good for all of us. We're not quite there yet, though, which I think is going to put gaming through a bit of a slump for a year or two.
The majority of gamers used to know that licensed games are shlock, that you should "try before you buy", that you shouldn't buy a game if its review copies were mysteriously lost in the mail on their way to reviewers, etc. Soon, the majority will know that again, and bad games will start bombing like Tomb Raider, Charlie's Angels, and Gigli have this year. Just not yet.
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| Grave 510th Post
New Red Carpet Member
| "Re(6):Quality of games declining over time?" , posted Tue 5 Aug 23:50
quote:
As I said earlier in this thread, companies make different KINDS of games now; shooters, platformers, and simplistic action games are all waning in popularity with the mass market, thus you see fewer and fewer of them; I happen to like most of these sorts of games, I'm a "play for points" kind of guy, and the whole "play for points" mindset is kind of dead in most circles. Notice that fewer and fewer games actually keep score now...
A few nights ago, as a friend and I played Galaga, trying to top each other's score, it dawned on me how much I miss playing for points. Points matter less and less in new games, it seems, though indirectly, most of the arcade competition you see in malls and such is based on points... look at the Bemani games. People strive to get more perfects and longer combos than people they compete against... it's the same concept applied differently, at least, it feels that way to me.
This comes from a day where I played too much Galaga and too much Guitar Freaks.
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