Corporate brand building

[ewanm]

Well, at 19 I play tetris and trek, a few MUD's, nethack...

[xander]

Well, at 19 I play tetris :P and trek, a few MUD's, nethack...

Tetris will never grow old. I will be playing Tetris until I die!

xander

[NeoThermic]

Well, at 19 I play tetris and trek, a few MUD's, nethack...

Tetris will never grow old. I will be playing Tetris until I die!

xander

And even then, I'll be re-organising the other coffins to make complete lines so we can all go into the afterlife!

NeoThermic

[Crazy George]

Regarding COD 4 I'm sorry but a single player campaign that lasted for 6 hours and 45 minutes is not what I call 'classic'. The vast majority of classic games had a very strong single player element regardless of genre. Six hours and 45 minutes, that's more or less 10 euros/pounds per hour if you think of it. Sure, it was a very very good game but suffers from lack of content.

As for Bioshock, well it was full of gimmickry. Besides the opening cutscene and a few short instances, it was impossible to realize that the plot takes place underwater. Add to that the Doom 3 gimmickry where your field of view is very limited since 95% of the screen is dark.

Distinct lack of ammunition forced the player to use various 'spells', the only innovative gameplay element. Add to that the erratic enemy movement and there you have it. Frustrating to the core. On top of that, the plot is supposed to take place in the 60's. Well, the overall artistic approach fits more the 30's so it's another miss. If you strip down Bioshock from the hype, it's more or less a re-make of System Shock taking advantage of strides in hardware technology. Nothing more, nothing less. Not an unplayable game but not a great one either.

[Pox]

Crazy George: Rapture was built in the forties, so the art-deco style is actually quite appropriate.

My opinions on Bioshock were mixed... creatively, I think it was one of the best games ever - the art, sound and storyline were some of the best (if not the best) I've seen in any game to date... and I don't see what the qualms are about not seeing the water enough, it is a city, not a waterpark...
However, as a game, I didn't enjoy it much: it felt like a dumbed-down console FPS with spells. A real shame.

[Phelanpt]

I would hope that Shadow of the Colossus and Tetris are on that list.

Isn't Tetris already on the list? If you consider the amount of clones, variations, and handheld tetris machines there are, I'd assume it already is.

As for Shadow of the Colossus, I'd also hope it is. I fell in love with it on a friend's PS2, and I'll probably buy one for me just for that game. (and also to try Ico )

[KingAl]

Regarding COD 4 I'm sorry but a single player campaign that lasted for 6 hours and 45 minutes is not what I call 'classic'. The vast majority of classic games had a very strong single player element regardless of genre. Six hours and 45 minutes, that's more or less 10 euros/pounds per hour if you think of it. Sure, it was a very very good game but suffers from lack of content.

As for Bioshock, well it was full of gimmickry. Besides the opening cutscene and a few short instances, it was impossible to realize that the plot takes place underwater. Add to that the Doom 3 gimmickry where your field of view is very limited since 95% of the screen is dark.

Distinct lack of ammunition forced the player to use various 'spells', the only innovative gameplay element. Add to that the erratic enemy movement and there you have it. Frustrating to the core. On top of that, the plot is supposed to take place in the 60's. Well, the overall artistic approach fits more the 30's so it's another miss. If you strip down Bioshock from the hype, it's more or less a re-make of System Shock taking advantage of strides in hardware technology. Nothing more, nothing less. Not an unplayable game but not a great one either.

I bought Disraeli Gears for $35 the other day. That's, like, $35 per hour. It must have no redeeming features by virtue of that fact, and indeed cannot be termed a classic as a result.
Regarding Bioshock, what you call 'gimmickry' is what others call 'atmosphere', and is indeed irrelevant if you're taking a purely pragmatic perspective, which would be a stupid perspective to take - though moaning about the 'variety of weapons' doesn't exactly suggest an enthusiasm to think otherwise. Aspects of gameplay which you criticise such as the paucity of ammunition and the "whack-a-mole AI" perform a similar atmospheric task. What you're doing is criticising the game's premise, rather than flaws in its realisation. Similarly, I disliked 1984 because it deviated too far from the mould that the Oxford English Dictionary had already set. There certainly are flaws in its realisation, by the way, such as death without penalty (though I believe they've now released a patch to allow that particular oddity to be disabled). I also like how you criticise it for retreading System Shock yet accuse it of aping Resident Evil in its central design - have you played the former, and if so did the obvious intent of homage displayed in the title of this game clue you in to the fact that, like its predecessors, you may not enjoy it?

That said, BioShock to me felt quite clumsy; I would've liked to have liked it as much as shiny. Perhaps I'll try re-playing it with the new patch.

[Xocrates]

Regarding COD 4 I'm sorry but a single player campaign that lasted for 6 hours and 45 minutes is not what I call 'classic'. The vast majority of classic games had a very strong single player element regardless of genre. Six hours and 45 minutes, that's more or less 10 euros/pounds per hour if you think of it. Sure, it was a very very good game but suffers from lack of content.

I can finish Portal in about 1 hour, that makes it about 20€/hour and I still found it one of the best games I played in recent times and will be surprised if it does not turn into a modern classic.

Similarly, I finished Max Payne 2 in less than 6 hours and consider it one of the best third person games I've played.

Heck, my favourite games for my Sega megadrive/genesis and Saturn can be finished in about one hour.

Lenght is not a measure for classic. Even more so because that invalidates multiplayer games as classics.

[Nutter]

I do think a lot of console games these days are paint by numbers, though there are ones that occasionally break this and brings something new to the table. Downloadable games for ps3 and xbox 360 are often more interesting than their full fledged game brothers. Of course there are a lot of crap there too (is three different versions of pac man really required on xbox live and god knows how many tetris variations?) but because of ps3 and xbox 360 it seems theres more attention on indie/smaller games that try something different, and now they are able hit more people than those just on pc who knows where to look for these hidden gems.

So not everything is bad with consoles

[Cooper42]

Bioshock is also the perfect example of what you are talking about. Innovativity and creativity are two very different things, and both have their place; no game necessarily needs both. Bioshock was creative, which made it different; it was not innovative, but nonetheless I have never played anything quite like it.

I liked Bioshock. It looked very purty and was well written. But as a game, it left me wanting. Especially as I spent the first few hours being reminded of SS2 game mechanics and how novel they seemed at the time, and how they now seem a bit clunky, as well as watered-down. Ken Levine's movie background was very obvious in that game.

The games industry has matured quickly I think, and has too many parallels to the movie industry for comfort. I hate having the mediums compared, as that tends to belie the potentiallity of games as interactive and so very different from what we expect. Because the industry at large mimics the movie industry, you either go your own way and do what you want, and you'll never, ever get the funding required for Bioshock-esque pretty. Or you get a publishing deal, and they pour millions into the purty at the expense of anything really new / novel / different. I've always been a fan of novelty for the sake of novelty.

Valve, as a company, seem to suggest a way out of that, by keeping those who love games at the heart of the game making process.

[RabidZombie]

Regarding COD 4 I'm sorry but a single player campaign that lasted for 6 hours and 45 minutes is not what I call 'classic'. The vast majority of classic games had a very strong single player element regardless of genre. Six hours and 45 minutes, that's more or less 10 euros/pounds per hour if you think of it. Sure, it was a very very good game but suffers from lack of content.

I can finish Portal in about 1 hour, that makes it about 20€/hour and I still found it one of the best games I played in recent times and will be surprised if it does not turn into a modern classic.

Similarly, I finished Max Payne 2 in less than 6 hours and consider it one of the best third person games I've played.

Heck, my favourite games for my Sega megadrive/genesis and Saturn can be finished in about one hour.

Lenght is not a measure for classic. Even more so because that invalidates multiplayer games as classics.

You FOOL! Why did you not purchase it as part of the Orange Box!?

As for COD4, I'd say the Multiplayer was well worth what I payed for it (which was less than £60 might I add).

[Xocrates]

You FOOL! Why did you not purchase it as part of the Orange Box!?

I regret NOTHING!

[xander]

I would hope that Shadow of the Colossus and Tetris are on that list.

Isn't Tetris already on the list? If you consider the amount of clones, variations, and handheld tetris machines there are, I'd assume it already is.

As for Shadow of the Colossus, I'd also hope it is. I fell in love with it on a friend's PS2, and I'll probably buy one for me just for that game. :D (and also to try Ico :P)

The only reason I bought Shadow was because Ico was so damn good. ;)

xander

[ChristopherS]

I love hearing about the inside workings of games companies, and the decisions that people make along the way

As a member of a german hobby gamedev team (http://www.sechsta-sinn.com) I enjoy reading your posts a lot, so please keep on posting