Not just a horse…..

[Shane WilloughbyKeymaster]

I was playing the HD version of Shadow of the Colossus there about an hour ago and as I was on my way to the final colossus fight……….

************************************************SPOILER ALERT***********************************************************

 

 

 

 

 

……………………I was so surprised by how Argo’s fall still completely gets me everytime. It’s incredible when a game actually makes you feel something. Playing games like SOTC actually make me really frustrated with what modern gaming has become…brown shooters, load-outs, poor dialogue, chase sequences, online lobbies and exploding red-barrels etc. With the exception of a handful of titles in 2012, I honestly think I didn’t actually care about a single character or storyline in a game, other than a handful of exceptions.

Has storytelling peaked? Does the drive to improve visuals, online connectivity and cultivate shooter co-op (for example) eroding away at the characters, worlds and storylines we used to so easily cherish and love and care for?

[The-JoyParticipant]

I have to agree with you 100%.

I skipped so many cut-scenes in 2012. I just felt like I was playing the same game over and over again. And today I was thinking about Dead Space 3, a game that I would 2 years ago, have been 100% excited about playing. But now, from what I have seen of it, I kinda don’t care, because I just feel like I’m going to have to just complete the same bloody game I completely last week, only with a different name.

I don’t know, I mean, I read books and get overwhelmed. I watch movies and find myself relating to characters and seeing myself in them and there are 100s of songs that make me feel every possible feeling, joy, hope, sadness, despair – they make me feel alive.

Gaming used to do that. ICO, Shadow of the Colossus, FF VII through 12, Jenny in The Darnkness, Episode 2′s ending, the death of the Boss in MGS3 (all MGS games make me feel alive to be fair), but I can honestly say that nothing makes me feel anything at the moment. I used to love and feel attached to Raccoon city in Resident Evil, then I played the Operation Raccoon City game. I wanted to waste the controller off the walls.

Games are running out of substance. What’s going to change and how?

"My friends, let us fight together again."

[NateDogParticipant]

It’s funny, this is the third forum this week where I have seen a similar topic / discussion appear (granted, I began it on another forum to see the views of  members there, but I already knew how many of them felt). Right now I find myself playing games more to say “I have played that game now, now I can forget about it” rather than just for fun and amusement. It’s something I need to change, because if you come to a point in your gaming life where you’re not enjoying it or doing it for enjoyment then things will go downhill and you’re doing it all for the wrong reasons.

On the whole, I agree. What games have really touched me and had an effect on me this generation? Red Dead Redemption did to a certain degree, Assassin’s Creed and arguably Assassin’s Creed 2 did OK but then Ubisoft began to become greedy and ruined it all, Lost Odyssey (especially for the short stories) was probably the only game that really pulled at my heart and my mind an extreme amount like some older games still can. But for the most part, everything has been repetitive. This generation and almost everything about it has put me off console gaming I think. I genuinely have no desire to get and no interest in next-generation consoles now. I want to move to PC, I want to experience the whole Witcher series and Cyberpunk at their best and support a team of amazing developers who genuinely care and love their fans like all developers should (after all, who keeps these companies in business?). But look at Sony and Microsoft copying Nintendo with the Move and Kinect. The Move has been left out to dry, while the Kinect is all Microsoft focus on in terms of gaming while they ignore the gamers that initially made the Xbox a success. The Vita is just full of side titles (for the most part) and probably in the future will be full of ports. The WiiU will get other blockbuster hits but will again be full of endless series sequels of titles that have been around for donkey’s years, although arguably this is better than much of the trite we receive these days as our screens are filled with more and more brown, bullets and mediocrity. I don’t see Sony or Microsoft really changing things that much even though I’d like to and I see investing my time and money into a PC as being better.

I look at the ridiculous amount of FPS titles this generation and how poor the vast majority of them are. I look at what Capcom has done to some of its series and to almost all of its fans. I look at how Ubisoft created a series with great promise and then dragged it into the ground with greed. And as for companies like EA and Activision, I don’t think I need to comment on their exploits this generation. My principles are beginning to cross with my ability to enjoy games a bit now, but even then all I see are attempts to manipulate and exploit customers now, and apart from the odd gem here and there, this generation has been more draining than anything to me.

[Shane WilloughbyKeymaster]

@NateDog….couldn’t have put it better myself. I’m drained and zapped by the soul-less excess of this generation.

Just give me a boy with horns on his head holding a girl’s hand………..

[Rob2DParticipant]

Agreed. I was just having a conversation about this with friends last week.

It seems everyone is getting sick of the same old shit being pumped out these days.

It was Gravity Rush that actually spurred the conversation. The first game to really make me care about it in a long long time.

I want his face.....off.

[Joseph MurphyKeymaster]

@Nate

Lost Odyssey, for me, was like the old days. A great example of a game with real emotion, believable and loveable characters, and a TONNE of smaller stories that grab you like very little else.

Pair that up against something like Crysis 2 for example. Crysis 2, as beautiful as it looks, is very shallow. All eye-candy and little content, shabby multiplayer to say the least.

The more “mainstream” video games become, and the more socially acceptable it “becomes”, the worse off genuine gamers are I think. The industry is heading in a new direction, a direction that could see moments like the moments mentioned above becoming a rare sight, instead of an aim for developers: it’s becoming more about chugging down bottles of coke, high-fiving your friend as he takes a piss and chomping down bags of stinking doritos as you read 4chan at 3am in the morning.

I hope it’ll all work out, I hope we’ll go back to the way we used to be, but something in me knows I’m wishing for something that’s gone.

Don't tickle with your fingers, smash with your fist

[NateDogParticipant]

Lately I’m finding myself boycotting certain developers because of their actions and the way they treat gamers and I think that’ll continue. I look at CD Projekt Red with The Witcher II. I remember reading reviews of that game early on because all of them were incredibly high and numerous commenters said “this is the best RPG I have ever played”. I had no PC and no plans to get one but I said “I want to play this game sometime”. Then CDPR were so great to port it to X360 and what do they do with that? Give us 5 hours extra content. And what did they do to PC gamers? Did they say “hey we made this content way after development of the main game (which they did) so you’ll have to pay for it if you want it”? No, they give it to every single PC gamer for free in a patch. They hide secret notes in trailers and images, they tease gamers but like Mike Pondsmith has said about working with them for Cyberpunk 2077, they’re nerds just like all of us and that’s why he is so excited to finally find a fitting developer to make that game with.

Capcom have been a disgrace this generation (and I admit, I have shamefully copped-out of my boycott of them as I wanted a copy of EX Troopers and I’ll never find a used copy outside of Asia), Square Enix are doing nothing more than faffing about trying to make a franchise that barely anyone wants successful, Ubisoft have made a 7-game trilogy drag on for so long and made Splinter Cell such an easy game, EA have probably been the worst of it this generation in beginning and continuing on a pathetic war of words with Activision with the releases of BF3 and MW3 coinciding, making Dead Space into probably nothing more than an average shooter and explotation of gamers in general.

CDPR is the sort of company I want to support and give my money to. These guys and a lot of Japanese developers who still understand what gaming is supposed to be about. I read a large article about Fumito Ueda about his process of making ICO and watched the videos you get with a new copy of the HD Collection and some of his ideas and thoughts (along with Kenji Kaido) are astounding to listen to and read. Just watching the trailer for games like Rain and Puppeteer could just bring a smile to my face because of how beautiful they are. Lost Odyssey gave me some of the best, heart-touching short-stories I’ve ever read. Right now Tales of Vesperia is enthralling me – I played just 30 minutes and was hooked, when has any game ever sucked me in within 30 minutes? It even has some amazing social commentary and genuinely witty and funny dialogue – and when I began it I expected to have a very typical JRPG with annoying characters, bad voice-acting and usual run-of-the-mill story, not having humorous dialogue and commentary on things like class divisions, how innocent people and people who have always been sheltered see the world, how two people with almost the exact same beliefs and desires can differ so much, and other similar things.

But nope, let’s have more boom boom and bang bang with teh gunz and teh shootings and killing people. That’s the future.

(These comments always turn into long-winded rants or essays in general, I don’t know why.)

[Rob2DParticipant]

The kids love dem shot bangs.

I actually feel really bad for the kids these days and sort of shit they’re forced to buy. They’ll never know. They’ll never know how good it was…..

I want his face.....off.

[Joseph MurphyKeymaster]

Speaking of horse…

Don't tickle with your fingers, smash with your fist

[NateDogParticipant]

[Author]

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