bukary on 3/4/2013 at 20:39

---

Truly Canadian NuGarrett:

http://img202.imageshack.us/img202/5672/garrethockey2beer.jpg

Renzatic on 3/4/2013 at 20:45

---

You're a special case.



He's sporting Molson's right? Eh?

Jomero on 3/4/2013 at 21:31

---

I'd challenge the nostalgia folks with looking up a popular game from the year they think games were great, specifically one they haven't played before, loading up an emulator and giving it a go.

If you could go back in time, grab your former gaming self, bring him back to the present, and then show him half of the games you purchased this year alone... he'd crap his pants and think the games he's playing now (in the past) were utter crap by comparison. We've gotten used to really, really awesome things about games and we take them for granted. So much so that we don't even look at the cool stuff anymore and focus only on the bad.

Sure games feel more linear, but look at how much virtual freedom a game has because it's in a fully rendered 3D environment. Giving too much freedom can be really tough and some (most... all) players actually would like a game less if they were given too much freedom. How many folks here NEVER look at where they need to go to complete a quest, what they need to do, how to get there, etc.?

Sure some games might seem "easier" but you have to realize that you've been playing games for so long that you're an advanced player. On top of that, older games difficulty were purposefully and forcibly "cheap" in order to hide the fact their game only had 2 hours worth of content to go through. They weren't "harder," they were more aggravating... on purpose.

-Jomero, who is a veteran of "hard" games such as Battletoads, TMNT (the first), The Ultima series, etc.

Renzatic on 3/4/2013 at 22:37

---

This doesn't apply to everyone, just some.

If you ask me, games aren't any worse now than they were in the 80's, the 90's, the 00's. They're certainly better looking. In some ways they're more complicated, but you don't immediately notice it because they're also more ergonomic and easier to come to terms with. In some ways they've regressed a little bit. For instance, RPGs today might simulate vast environments far better than the games of old, combat is generally a much more strategic, deep affair, but there hasn't been a game that's simulated the day to day activities of your average unnamed NPC as well as Ultima VII did.

You take all of it together and you realize there hasn't been a dumbing down of the industry at all. There are just as many good games coming out now as there were back then. Just as many bad. Things might not be quite the way we've envisioned them, and they've grown in different ways than we've expected, but the improvements have been steady and strong all throughout.

There's only one genre that's truly been dumbed down, and that's the good old first person shooter. They really don't make those like they used to. But everything else? RPGs? Turn based strategy (which is making a huge comeback thanks to the tablets and games like XCOM)? Sports? Platformers? Shoot-em-ups? They've done nothing but grow and improve over the years.

Also what Jomero said.

I think the biggest problem isn't that games are so much worse than what they used to be. It's that we're all older, and a little harder to impress.

edit: and lets not forget the indie scene, and all the cool stuff they're doing. Thanks to the wide proliferation of SDKs out these days, and the fact it's much, much easier to make games in general now, we're seeing a huge variety of fun games full of awesome ideas being produced by teams of two or three people.

I'm looking forward to the new Shadowrun that's coming out soon. They're using an engine any one of us can download for free as we speak, and it's made by a team so small you could probably fit them all in one room. It's just like the good old days, except they don't have to spend months and months building an engine from scratch that works on a severely limited set of hardware. They're free to tell their stories and work on their gameplay. It'll probably be pretty damn cool.

Renzatic on 3/4/2013 at 23:49

---

I have to disagree with your disagreement. Bioware hasn't ever been one of my personal A list developers, but they do have some good games. The Mass Effects are pretty decent (haven't played 3 yet), but they exist in this weird niche between action games and RPGs, but aren't action RPGs. Dragon Age 1 was more than decent, and a nice return to their BG1 & 2 glory days.

Bethesda? They've always made fun RPGs, but they are pretty simple when it comes right down to it. If you want to play a pretty, entertaining game that's more about the experience than it is the challenge, you play one of the ES games.

Fallout New Vegas? That was more obsidian.

But lets look at the harder RPGs. Like the Risen series. Much like the series they succeeded, they're tough as hell and not at all forgiving. Legend of Grimrock is a glorious return to form for the tile based dungeon crawler. Basically a rebirth of Dungeon Master. You've got the indie RPGs like the Spiderweb Software titles and Eschalon series. The Witchers, of course. The Nintendo DS of all places is host to a series of games old schools like Goldmoon would probably bust a nut over: Etrian Odyssey.

On the up and coming front we've got Wasteland 2, Shadowrun, and the new Torment game coming out. The latter three being made by golden age developers without any big studio say whatsoever. They succeed or fail by the strengths of their own talent.

And of course one of my personal supreme favorites: Dark Souls. It's easily the best game I've played in years.

I guess the one downside is that there aren't many pure RPGs any more. We're in the age of blended genres. RPGs have a little bit of everything in them, and everything has a bit of RPGs in them. You don't have quite as many "this is your party in a dungeon, live or die" type games anymore. They're still around, but they tend to pop up more in the indie scene than they do from the AAA studios.

But anyway, great games are still around. You don't even have to look very hard for them. Just glance around and see what you find.