FPSes are neither dumb nor simplistic, even if you want them to be.

[DocSeuss]

Read this.

 

I wrote it, therefore, it must be true. Also, the less-important first parts can be located here and there.

 

Basically, I got tired of people saying FPSes were dumb, because they aren't, so I set about proving that fact. I've found FPSes to generally be some of the smartest, most engaging games I've ever played. They're also the closest to what I feel a game should be in that they are the most effective at placing a player within a world.

 

Anyways, um, yeah, please read it and tell me what you think.

[Johnny]

FPSes are treated as dumb things because Modern Warfare and BFBC2 (Yeah, I said it) are pretty dumb, and that's what most people look at when they talk about FPSes.

[DocSeuss]

...and my point was that that take is entirely stupid.

[Thorgi Duke of Frisbee]

I completely agree. FPS titles get an unfair amount of shit flung at them.

[Strangelove]

But they are dumb. You don't need a lot of intelligence to be great at them. Just good reflexes and accuracy. Something that isnt determined by your IQ score.

 

Also, you knocking Mass Effect and Dragon Age while saying CoD4 and Halo Reach having a good story is ridiculous.

[Hot Heart]

I'm not a fan of these 'he said, she said' sort of articles, especially when they concern 'dumb internet opinions'. Do people say they are dumb or have some just earned the 'dudebro' labels because of how accessible they are? Does this actually have an impact on anything? Just seems more relevant to focus on the positive points rather than going after other games you may perceive people put on a pedestal.

 

Anyway, I think 'cleverness' can work two ways. For high quality shooters the intelligence in design goes into making things well-paced and varied while getting the player thinking about their weapon choices and environment without overloading them. Gears of War, for example, was always intended to be more overtly tactical than most whilst retaining a certain immediacy, and it succeeds. The cleverness isn't always as obvious because sometimes it's a matter of 'if you go through this way to the side, you can flank them' over more advanced environmental thinking (which the series has always built on). A lot of the intelligence is in the smooth design.

 

The other sort of cleverness stems from the design but will also get the player thinking on many levels and allow more flexibility. Obviously, a lot of the more successful RPG (and RPG hybrids) tend to tone down these elements but I'm sure there are examples of RPGs and RTSs that tax a player more than something like Gears of War. Strategies like chess gambits aren't really feasible in shooters if there is just one player (might work as a multi-player strategy in certain circumstances, I'm not sure). Throw in the multitude of options, provided they're well-balanced, an RPG or RTS can incorporate adds a whole depth that shooters rarely touch (class systems scratch the surface) and allow players to really experiment. Obviously, as a result of requiring more investment to learn, they might not appeal to everyone like shooters do. Neither is at fault.

 

Anyway, both of these alternatives are good, and neither are better than the other. I just think it's notable that a lot of the more successful games have a lot of 'behind the scenes' intelligence, and that's encouraging.

 

I hope that makes some sort of sense. I'm tired as hell and going to sleep now.

Edited September 18, 2011 by Hot Heart

[DocSeuss]

I completely agree. FPS titles get an unfair amount of shit flung at them.

 

That they do.

 

--

 

But they are dumb. You don't need a lot of intelligence to be great at them. Just good reflexes and accuracy. Something that isnt determined by your IQ score.

 

Also, you knocking Mass Effect and Dragon Age while saying CoD4 and Halo Reach having a good story is ridiculous.

 

Or is it? Because I can totally prove the former are shit and the latter are not. Already started work on the posts a while ago.

 

Is there any game you truly need a lot of intelligence to beat? Adventure games are mostly just about trying shit until it works. RPGs, last I checked, didn't make me think at all. It's a different way of thinking about things, but it's still all thinking. Gaming generally isn't a terribly intellectual pursuit any more than reading or watching films is, other than the fact that you act. That poor players tend to take reactionary strategies while playing shooters does not reflect on the genre, merely the player.

 

FPSes take up all of my attention. RPGs, for the most part, I generally play while listening to TV shows or something. They're very much my cooldown relaxant games.

 

--

 

I'm not a fan of these 'he said, she said' sort of articles, especially when they concern 'dumb internet opinions'. Do people say they are dumb or have some just earned the 'dudebro' labels because of how accessible they are? Does this actually have an impact on anything? Just seems more relevant to focus on the positive points rather than going after other games you may perceive people put on a pedestal.

 

I'm not sure how you consider it a 'he said, she said,' sort of thing. Many FPSes, when they come out, get complaints of "not another shooter," and "shooters are so dumb." It's gotten to the point where even games writers on sites like Kotaku or RPS or whatever spout it, as if it's all accepted fact, which is utterly silly.

 

I merely explored why that was. I certainly don't think it was about going after other games that people put on pedestals. I have other posts for that sort of thing.

 

Anyway, I think 'cleverness' can work two ways. For high quality shooters the intelligence in design goes into making things well-paced and varied while getting the player thinking about their weapon choices and environment without overloading them. Gears of War, for example, was always intended to be more overtly tactical than most whilst retaining a certain immediacy, and it succeeds. The cleverness isn't always as obvious because sometimes it's a matter of 'if you go through this way to the side, you can flank them' over more advanced environmental thinking (which the series has always built on). A lot of the intelligence is in the smooth design.

 

Certainly. There are a lot of choices available to the player at any given time in the game, even if it is quite linear and has a limited set of distinct weapons. That doesn't make it a stupid game, but people love to insist that it is.

 

The other sort of cleverness stems from the design but will also get the player thinking on many levels and allow more flexibility. Obviously, a lot of the more successful RPG (and RPG hybrids) tend to tone down these elements but I'm sure there are examples of RPGs and RTSs that tax a player more than something like Gears of War. Strategies like chess gambits aren't really feasible in shooters if there is just one player (might work as a multi-player strategy in certain circumstances, I'm not sure).

 

From experience: it does work in MP strategy. The fact that it's real-time in no way mitigates the fact that it requires intelligence. It merely requires that you think faster.

 

 

Throw in the multitude of options, provided they're well-balanced, an RPG or RTS can incorporate adds a whole depth that shooters rarely touch (class systems scratch the surface) and allow players to really experiment. Obviously, as a result of requiring more investment to learn, they might not appeal to everyone like shooters do. Neither is at fault.

 

My argument, again, was that it's a different sort of intelligence at play, Hot Heart. Of course RUSE, which I played for several hours yesterday, requires a layer of depth that shooters don't have. STALKER (what is it with me and games with acronym names?) requires a wholly different sort of intelligence to play, where you must think about things like time of day, bullet drop, how much supplies you can carry, what sort of environment you're going to be traversing, whether or not you'll have a place to take cover from blowouts, and so forth.

 

There was this one bit in Call of Pripyat where I found myself inside of a snork hill (like an ant hill, but full of snorks and anomalies) because a blowout was imminent and I wasn't able to make it anywhere in time. I was also overloaded and chugging energy drinks to race across the terrain, and I thought I was going to die. I had been running to the nearest shelter when I... sort of fell in.

 

Not smart. I became a better player after that.

 

It's a different sort of intelligence, but by no means is it a lesser sort of intelligence. In an RPG, things like route aren't super important, and in most RPGs, you only really need to use your weapon with the biggest stats and/or your magic. Sometimes, in particularly complex RPGs, you'll have to think about things like how your fire elemental damage sword won't do damage to that ifrit or whatever... but none of this is really touched on in shooters. In shooters, of much greater importance is thinking about route and environment: "how do I navigate this cliff space while avoiding shots from those guys while maintaining health and eliminating all resistance and completing my goal?" On top of that, it's about thinking about enemy types.

 

Generally, an RPG enemy, in a turn-based game, is just a set of numbers with a series of attack types. There's really no intelligence required to play Earthbound at all, for instance. Attack the enemy and manage your health/pp. You'll be fine. In an FPS, well... look at Halo. You've got Elites with their recharging shields. They're on par with you in terms of stats, if I remember that Bungie AI GDC talk thingy properly; the only difference is that they have a limited amount of tactics and you are, well, human. You've got your intelligence to rely on. They haven't. Then you've got guys who can fly, snipers, guys with more traditional shields, guys who go berserk when you take out their armor, suicidal explosive guys... there are a TON of different and varied combat encounters that you must change up your tactics for, all in real-time. When facing the Flood, you need to kit yourself out differently than when you face Covenant. In Dragon Age: Origins, I just gave myself the best gear and proceeded to wade through lots of enemies; however, in DAO, I was also managing four characters in real-time and had to manage their health, mana, and the enemies around each one, which created a much different experience.

 

Obviously, none of this really applies to an action RPG (Witcher 2) or an RPG shooter (Deus Ex: Human Revolution, which also has the greatest conversation minigame in the history of gaming and I could go on at length about why it's so great), which is a whole nother ballgame of, in my mind, much more fun gametypes.

 

My point is: different types of intelligence is required to play these games. All those people who like to say FPSes are dumb because they operate on a relatively easy to learn mechanic... aren't really thinking clearly. RPGs are not some sort of uberintelligencerequiring supergame. Honestly, when it comes to games that challenge me intellectually, the only ones that have truly done that are RTSes, but that's another discussion for another time.

 

Anyway, both of these alternatives are good, and neither are better than the other. I just think it's notable that a lot of the more successful games have a lot of 'behind the scenes' intelligence, and that's encouraging.

 

I hope that makes some sort of sense. I'm tired as hell and going to sleep now.

 

It does make sense. As someone who used to design stat systems for online RPGs all the time (one game I tore apart and rebuilt from the ground up is still around, six years later, without any major changes and despite the fact that I left it ages ago, so I like to think I'm pretty good at designing stable systems), I totally understand just how much skill and thought goes into designing RPG balance. It's a much more... tangible thing than it is in a shooter. Generally, gamers aren't looking at a shotgun and thinking about its weapon spread and rof and dps and reload speed and magazine size and so forth, even though those skills are all very much present. It's less tangible, so they tend to think it isn't there.

 

The intelligence behind the design isn't really the intelligence required of the player, though.

 

In retrospect, I should have given the series a different name, but I was sort of intending it as a way to talk about a hypothetical perfect game, and I never really got around to doing that, so it seems to imply I think shooters are the best. They're certainly my favorite, but not the best. The best is this thing I'll have to write about later. I may add a final line into the post commenting on that.

Edited September 19, 2011 by DocSeuss

[Johnny]

But they are dumb. You don't need a lot of intelligence to be great at them. Just good reflexes and accuracy. Something that isnt determined by your IQ score.

 

Also, you knocking Mass Effect and Dragon Age while saying CoD4 and Halo Reach having a good story is ridiculous.

 

Or is it? Because I can totally prove the former are shit and the latter are not. Already started work on the posts a while ago.

 

I do not feel like I should need to explain why this is bullshit. You can't prove that dragon age and mass effect are shit, because that's subjective opinion.

[Connorrrr]

I'm sorry but you seem to be treating your articles and replies here as if you have this nailed to the wall as cold, hard science, and it isn't. As Johnny already said, this is all opinion and some people are going to find FPS games boring or just shitty and others aren't. I, personally, am not into many FPS games, but I wouldn't begin to think I could "prove" why the kind of game I enjoy are better than the kind of games you enjoy, You enjoy your thing, I'll enjoy mine.

 

Further to that, I think writing an article about how X is so much better than Y and Z is kinda...Not cool. I mean, I bring up again your desire to "prove" that COD and Halo is better than Dragon Age and Mass Effect but I feel like you're so into your thing that you're pissed off that other people like other things more, that you don't hold in such high regard, but I'm a DA and ME fan and I'm not about to start trying to "prove" why they're so much better than the million-selling franchises that are those you mention.

 

Edit: And after just now seeing your reply to Rockyran's "RPG-ification" topic I really can't help but think you've just got a vendetta against RPG's for some reason.

Edited September 19, 2011 by Connorrrr

[GunFlame]

I think that FPS's get the amount of flack that they do, because they are not the genre of taste for the vocal party.

 

A lot of RPG gamers, especially JRPG gamers dislike them a lot. And rather than critique them, they just dumb down arguments and generalize. But that's the way most things happen to be criticized.

 

I think the reason why they get as much hate as they do, is because they get as much love as they do. I mean, if you take an RPG, and read the media response to it, it usually refers to originality a lot, and the lack of. This is a comment that always gets mentioned with RPGs. More so than any other genre. But, this same argument is almost never used for FPS's. Regardless of some being no more than re-skins of the same mechanics almost. This then builds up a lot of dislike.

 

People dislike FPS games because they are popular. It's as simple as that. There are some arguments that people may present to extend why they dislike them, but this is why THEY dislike them. Not that they are not good. Another case of good and like getting mixed up. And we can't really have an issue with a lot of people saying they don't like something, if they really don't like it.

 

Is an FPS clever? It depends on the design. This is the same with those RPG's. A game should never be judged or praised so much, just because the playing view. If the game isn't good, it isn't good and vice-versa.

[DocSeuss]

But they are dumb. You don't need a lot of intelligence to be great at them. Just good reflexes and accuracy. Something that isnt determined by your IQ score.

 

Also, you knocking Mass Effect and Dragon Age while saying CoD4 and Halo Reach having a good story is ridiculous.

 

Or is it? Because I can totally prove the former are shit and the latter are not. Already started work on the posts a while ago.

 

I do not feel like I should need to explain why this is bullshit. You can't prove that dragon age and mass effect are shit, because that's subjective opinion.

 

Believe it or not, there are rules for good storytelling. There are things that make for good stories and bad. There's a reason that Twilight is not considered by human culture to be a good book, and a reason that The Count of Monte Cristo is. Good and bad, within the context of culture, is objective, but fuzzily defined, because culture evolves over time. For instance, The Count of Monte Cristo was considered bad at one point because Dumas was of mixed heritage, and people were racist.

 

Now, like/dislike? That's a different matter. What you like or dislike is entirely subjective and would be impossible for me to prove in any way, shape, or form. I will not endeavor to prove that you like or dislike something, as it's ubsurd.

 

What's good or bad, is, however, fair game.

 

-----

 

I'm sorry but you seem to be treating your articles and replies here as if you have this nailed to the wall as cold, hard science, and it isn't. As Johnny already said, this is all opinion and some people are going to find FPS games boring or just shitty and others aren't. I, personally, am not into many FPS games, but I wouldn't begin to think I could "prove" why the kind of game I enjoy are better than the kind of games you enjoy, You enjoy your thing, I'll enjoy mine.

 

I wouldn't say cold, hard science, but it is something I am quite confident in. Why bother to say a thing at all if you want to say it without conviction? How does that make any sense at all?

 

Look, some people are going to find FPS games boring. Absolutely. I have no problem with that whatever. If you're not into FPSes, you're not into them. I did say earlier that I wasn't arguing that you should enjoy them, only that the people who are insulting them for being stupid are wrong and should stop doing that.

 

I am not out to prove what you ought to like, and I did say this, so you are remiss in your duty for reading comprehension.

 

By all means, enjoy what you enjoy, and don't enjoy what you don't, but don't you dare criticize something wrongly. That, Connorrrr, is, and always has been, my approach to the matter.

 

Further to that, I think writing an article about how X is so much better than Y and Z is kinda...Not cool. I mean, I bring up again your desire to "prove" that COD and Halo is better than Dragon Age and Mass Effect but I feel like you're so into your thing that you're pissed off that other people like other things more, that you don't hold in such high regard, but I'm a DA and ME fan and I'm not about to start trying to "prove" why they're so much better than the million-selling franchises that are those you mention.

 

Hm... I didn't communicate this well.

 

They're two separate articles. Basically, on one hand, you have people saying "bah, shooters, particularly Call of Duty, are dumb." I can prove that they're not and that they've got some good writing. I also intend to criticize the Modern Warfare games for their shortcomings and explain why the series isn't as effective as it could be. Did you know that some people think that multiple narratives is a sign of stupidity? It's absurd. They couldn't keep up with the shifts, so they were whining and saying it's stupid. Classic whiner behavior; can't understand something, insult it. People were doing this to Inception last year.

 

On the other hand, we have Bioware. I fully intend to write an article on why Dragon Age 2 is a Bad RPG, because, you see, I have some experience designing RPGs, as well as some experience in terms of general gameplay design, particularly in relation to action RPGs. There are reasons it's a Good RPG too, and I'll be covering them as well. Likewise, there's Mass Effect. I've got a few interesting articles planned out for that one, one of which explores the idea that Bioware actually stole (if they'd been inspired by, they would have cited it, but no, they cited, of all things, Aliens) the story from other sources (and, for that matter, I could actually do this for a lot of Bioware games). Another Mass Effect article deals with the various problems the game has, and things that, had they been in other games, most game reviewers would have pointed out (bad arena design, a lack of a good plot, etc). I'd also toyed with the idea of restructuring the entire Mass Effect plot to make it work better, just for fun.

 

I love Dragon Age Origins and Mass Effect, and was deeply disappointed by the genuinely bad games that Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age 2 turned out to be.

 

I'm sorry that you don't like my opinions, but surely you'll agree that I do have the right to voice them, just as you have the right to counter my complaints, no?

 

Look, don't you like it when you convince someone to like a game? Just yesterday, I convinced a friend to try out Deus Ex: Human Revolution. He's really enjoying it. Earlier, I convinced friends to try STALKER, and they loved it. That makes me feel really good. Wouldn't you relish the opportunity to let me say "this is why I don't like X?" and then to counter my claims and convince me I'm wrong? I know I would.

 

Edit: And after just now seeing your reply to Rockyran's "RPG-ification" topic I really can't help but think you've just got a vendetta against RPG's for some reason.

 

Oh, god no, just Bioware. This comes after talking with Brent Knowles on why he left (like, I literally emailed him and asked about it and we talked about originality in games, why Bioware couldn't ever have made a game like Planescape: Torment and why the aliens in Mass Effect are nearly all humanoid in skeletal structure and so forth) and playing Dragon Age 2.

 

I'm going to be popping Xenosaga into my PS3 fairly soon, actually, and until Deus Ex: Human Revolution came along, The Witcher 2 was my Game of the Year. Both of those are RPGs, are they not?

 

-----

 

I think that FPS's get the amount of flack that they do, because they are not the genre of taste for the vocal party.

 

Right. One of the claims I made was that the FPS had supplanted other genres in terms of popularity. Another was that it could be said to have driven certain genres extinct.

 

The very vocal party seems to be long-time hardcore gamers, who, as the industry explodes, are increasingly the vocal minority.

 

A lot of RPG gamers, especially JRPG gamers dislike them a lot. And rather than critique them, they just dumb down arguments and generalize. But that's the way most things happen to be criticized.

 

Right. The Most Popular Game for a while was Halo, so it was called dumb, stupid, blah blah blah, everyone seemed to hate it. Now that it's Call of Duty, Call of Duty gets that hate. Generally, this hate comes from various frustrations, like the ones I just mentioned. One I didn't mention was the... "I can't do it so it's stupid" mentality that so many people seem to have. I know people who just aren't capable of playing FPSes, so instead of admitting it, they say things like "hey, what's there to like? It's just running around and clicking on things." Sometimes, it's not even an issue of incapability. I had a friend who had played mostly Japanese games (and Japanese developers have a different mindset on how players should interact with games), and he told me that his first foray into shooting was confusing. He didn't understand why there was no auto-lock-on, for instance. He would have discarded it because he didn't understand how to play. This seems to be more of an issue with long-time gamers as opposed to people like me; it's hard to teach an old dog new tricks and all that stuff.

 

Generally... I dunno. The friends I have who are into Japanese games/consoles aren't as versatile as those who started elsewhere. This isn't a dig at them... just a pattern I've noticed. I have a friend who tells me that Bulletstorm is the Worst Game Ever Made and I can count on one hand the number of PC games he likes.

 

I think the reason why they get as much hate as they do, is because they get as much love as they do. I mean, if you take an RPG, and read the media response to it, it usually refers to originality a lot, and the lack of. This is a comment that always gets mentioned with RPGs. More so than any other genre. But, this same argument is almost never used for FPS's. Regardless of some being no more than re-skins of the same mechanics almost. This then builds up a lot of dislike.

 

I'm confused by one bit of your statement.

 

Like... I get that people say RPGs are super original, even if that could be said of plenty of genres (did you know that more Final Fantasy games have been released since the release of Final Fantasy XIII than brown and grey modern military shooters? It's a fact.). Personally, I look at Bethesda and CD Projekt and Larian and especially Bioware and I can't say I'm seeing much originality out there, and I would know, 'cause I'm a sucker for any sort of original-sounding story and universe. I've got literally dozens of original story ideas filling up my notebooks waiting for the day I can start developing games.

 

Woah, got sidetracked.

 

Anyways, are you saying that people say RPGs are super original and everything and FPSes aren't, even though most RPGs really are little more than reskins of the same mechanics? Or are you saying that RPGs are original and FPSes aren't and that FPSes tend to be reskins?

 

People dislike FPS games because they are popular. It's as simple as that. There are some arguments that people may present to extend why they dislike them, but this is why THEY dislike them. Not that they are not good. Another case of good and like getting mixed up. And we can't really have an issue with a lot of people saying they don't like something, if they really don't like it.

 

It's definitely one of the reasons I mentioned.

 

I don't have an issue with someone saying that they don't like something. I mean, yes, this is me. If someone says "I don't like STALKER," then I'll feel compelled to ask why and then try to convince them it's good, particularly if they don't like it for a silly reason (if someone says "it's super buggy," then yeah, that's a good reason not to dislike it. If they say "it didn't train me," then, well, that's a silly reason.).

 

What I had an issue with was the suggestion that FPSes are inherently stupid. My entire article was that many FPSes aren't just good, they're better than other highly-praised games. FPSes can be superb. Some of my worst gaming experiences have also been FPSes.

 

I was convinced earlier to do a part 4 and talk about story. When I do, I'll probably write that bit right away.

 

Is an FPS clever? It depends on the design. This is the same with those RPG's. A game should never be judged or praised so much, just because the playing view. If the game isn't good, it isn't good and vice-versa.

 

I totally agree with this. A genre, in and of itself, is not inherently good or bad. I mean, look at LucasArts adventure games--they were, by all accounts, absolutely amazing! Then look at Gabriel Knight. Utterly terrible, according to Old Man Murray.

 

If life were up to me, all linear FPSes would emulate and iterate on Halo, and all nonlinear FPSes would borrow from games like System Shock 2, STALKER, and Deus Ex/Deus Ex: Human Revolution. I wish all FPSes were inherently good, but they aren't, and that's terrible.

[GunFlame]

I'm confused by one bit of your statement. Like... I get that people say RPGs are super original, even if that could be said of plenty of genres (did you know that more Final Fantasy games have been released since the release of Final Fantasy XIII than brown and grey modern military shooters? It's a fact.). Personally, I look at Bethesda and CD Projekt and Larian and especially Bioware and I can't say I'm seeing much originality out there, and I would know, 'cause I'm a sucker for any sort of original-sounding story and universe. I've got literally dozens of original story ideas filling up my notebooks waiting for the day I can start developing games. Woah, got sidetracked. Anyways, are you saying that people say RPGs are super original and everything and FPSes aren't, even though most RPGs really are little more than reskins of the same mechanics? Or are you saying that RPGs are original and FPSes aren't and that FPSes tend to be reskins?

 

Let me clarify that.

 

Basically, both genres can be original and unoriginal. All games infact. But FPS's generally don't get critiqued on this as much in the media (It's becoming more common recently). But, originality is what RPG's always get judged by.

 

Perhaps it's seen as not being as important for an FPS, but why would this be the case? I will assume that it is because we have only really been playing them on consoles for around 5 years. Or at least in a mainstream way. Sure we had primitive FPS's on the 16-bit consoles, but it's only in the past few years where they have gained popularity and also the hate they have to go with it.

 

So because you could say that they are 'new', we can be more lenient with how we judge them in regards to originality.

 

But on the other side, we have RPGs. We have been playing those in full force for a long, long time. You could say that they have been the main gaming genre ever since Nintendo entered the console market.

 

So to and extent, I can understand why and RPG is judged on originality and why an FPS (again, until now) had not been. But, I don't agree with that justification.

 

Original games are nice and all, but if they are mechanically flawed, then they can also be bad games. An original game is not necessarily a great game, but also, an unoriginal one is not necessarily a bad game. I think this is where some bitterness may have come from. Fans see their genre of choice get ridiculed for something that another genre gets a free pass on.

Edited September 19, 2011 by GunFlame

[DocSeuss]

Basically, both genres can be original and unoriginal. All games infact.

 

Alright. That's a fair point.

 

But FPS's generally don't get critiqued on this as much in the media

 

Wait what?

 

Generally, the first complaint made about FPSes is that they are not original. The next remark is "unlike RPGs, which are original."

 

I personally find this a bit odd, as none of the fantasy RPGs I've played seemed the least bit original. Dragon Age Origins, as much as I love it, borrows the "orcs are invading" plot from Tolkien while hamfistedly using the politics (and even certain names/roles!) from A Song of Ice and Fire. The Witcher's Act IV is based on Cthulhu and Arthurian Legend, and the overall franchise is basically Sapkowski taking the piss on fairy tales and Tolkien. Risen's probably the most original fantasy RPG I've played in a while, and even it was brazen enough to make the bad guys a thin imitation of the Spanish Inquisition, which is something I wasn't expecting.

 

But there are other RPGs, right? Right. Fallout was pretty original as a Wild West tale juxatposed with a 50s "everything's fine" aesthetic and a post-apocalyptic world. Mass Effect put you in command of your own space ship (other games have put you in space before), and in terms of games, this is surprisingly unique. I can't think of any other RPGs that have put me in space. Good on them. But... as stories go, it's a pretty generic "ancient evil wakes up and tries to kill us." The first game had some good effort put into its worldbuilding, with things like the genophage and the different race politics and nuanced characters, but Mass Effect 2 threw that out the window and tried to emulate the Dirty Dozen (they literally called it that on Bioware's forums). Unoriginality again. :\ Alpha Protocol was another idea that hadn't been done as an RPG, but was pretty generic. Yes, it had some weird and wacky characters, but ultimately, it was a game where terrorists stole a weapon and you have to get it back.

 

None of these games really get called on the carpet for being unoriginal. Any FPS that comes out these days, on the other hand, will get cries of "generic!" and "unoriginal!" in spades. They have ever since the advent of Halo and the FPS's mainstream popularity. Even before then, you had people talking about how FPSes didn't have great stories compared to Adventure gaming. I mean, look at XCOM. There is literally no other FPS like it on the market, nor has there ever been, in terms of aesthetic and gameplay design, although there are some similarities to two or three games in terms of squad command abilities (and even that is reliant on time units rather than cooldowns, from what I can see). People are screaming about how generic it is, though.

 

Meanwhile the bland Mass Effect 2 comes out and, despite ripping a plot from The Dirty Dozen and having some shot-for-shot space combat scenes from Star Trek 11, it's called incredibly original and everyone says it has great writing.

 

There is a genre bias out there that says FPSes are always generic and RPGs are not. Literally the only FPSes that come to mind as not having been considered generic were Bioshock and Half-Life 2, though I can think of plenty of others that were definitely not generic.

 

Perhaps it's seen as not being as important for an FPS, but why would this be the case? I will assume that it is because we have only really been playing them on consoles for around 5 years. Or at least in a mainstream way. Sure we had primitive FPS's on the 16-bit consoles, but it's only in the past few years where they have gained popularity and also the hate they have to go with it.

 

...are you... from the past?

 

XD

 

It's been ten years, man, since Halo came out and shooters went mainstream.

 

So to and extent, I can understand why and RPG is judged on originality and why and FPS (again, until now) had not been.

 

I don't agree that it had not been. Even Doom, the grandfather of the FPS, was judged for not being very original or intelligent when it was first released.

 

Again, I think FPSes are under harsher criticism than RPGs in this regard.

 

Neat suggestion, but I fundamentally disagree.

 

An original game is not necessarily a great game, but also, an unoriginal one is not necessarily a bad game.

 

I TOTALLY agree with this, however. Red Dead Redemption, Max Payne, and Alan Wake are all unoriginal games, at least in terms of story and aesthetics, but they are all absolutely phenomenal games (well, Alan Wake has bad facial animation and not enough enemy types and is too short, and Red Dead Redemption was too hamfisted in telling its story, as far as Westerns go, and got all preachy, so they weren't perfect). Likewise, I don't think a game like STALKER or System Shock 2 has ever existed before, and they're two of the best games ever made.

 

It's like... linearity. Some people say "if it's linear, then it's bad," even though tons of great games have been linear. They're simply overzealous about in-game freedom. Likewise, people are like "If it's original, it's good," and that's not always the case. A good game is reliant on good writing (if it's a game with a story, of course) and good gameplay. It's how both of those things work together that defines a good game, not whether an idea hasn't been done before. Ocean's 11, the new one, is a great movie, even if its story has been told before, for instance, and The Empire Strikes Back is great even if it's not original. Meanwhile, some original stories (nothing's leaping to mind at the moment, even though I feel like it should) totally suck.

Edited September 19, 2011 by DocSeuss

[Thursday Next]

I don't see how you can say "FPS's are neither dumb nor simplistic". The genre itself has no special protection from dumbness or simplicity. Simplistic, dumb shooters are both simplistic and dumb. Just like simplistic dumb rpg's are.

 

There are a great many FPS's made these days, as a result there are more simplistic dumb shooters than there are simplistic dumb RPG's even if the % is the same.

 

It should also be borne in mind that with so many shooters, and the average length of the shooter being far less than an rpg, ideas quickly become stale, while the rpg tends to take longer to build up the mechanics and they often change between iterations. Take for example the FF series where the combat mechanics change greatly from game to game, while Halo has kept the same weapons, enemies, tactics and so forth throughout the 3/4 games in the series.

 

In Halo you used plasma weapons to take down Elite shields, then projectiles to finish them off. You do the same in Halo 3.

 

FPS are seen as dumb because the core mechanics don't change from game to game, there's no (or little) learning curve in a new game. In RPG's the learning curve is more obvious as you start weak and increase from there. You can't start a lvl 1 in an RPG and headshot everything, you can in an FPS.

[Saturnine Tenshi]

It seems to me like you're approaching this topic from a myopic view. At first, you seem to temper it with mention of playing role-playing titles while watching television. Then I read quotes like "Again, I think FPSes are under harsher criticism than RPGs in this regard." These things tell me you are removed from a critical part of your argument: the other side. Role-playing affairs receive ample criticism. More, I would say, given that the majority of western gamers prefer first-person shooters and abhor anything with doe eyes.

 

Additionally, you don't seem to touch titles like Digital Devil Saga, the bountiful strategy RPGs that will friggin' garrote anyone who disregards strategy or strategy games as a whole.

 

First-person shooters are largely dumb, simplistic things. Deal with it. That doesn't make them bad games. They're created chiefly for the shoot-fuck-kill and forget everything else market, and that's fine. I like it; they like it. Let's not fool ourselves. It is what it is.

 

I'm not trying to claim any genre, especially those mentioned in counter-argument, is faultless. They can all be condemned in some "fatal" way. What is ultimately important is whether or not you enjoy a video game. Not some arbitrary intelligence rating.

[Yantelope]

RPGs had their turn now FPS get their shot.

[Thursday Next]

RPGs had their turn now FPS get their shot.

 

Platformers jumped to the top before either of those...

[Saturnine Tenshi]

RPGs had their turn now FPS get their shot.

 

Clever.

[Battra92]

First-person shooters are largely dumb, simplistic things. Deal with it. That doesn't make them bad games. They're created chiefly for the shoot-fuck-kill and forget everything else market, and that's fine. I like it; they like it. Let's not fool ourselves. It is what it is.

 

I'm not trying to claim any genre, especially those mentioned in counter-argument, is faultless. They can all be condemned in some "fatal" way. What is ultimately important is whether or not you enjoy a video game. Not some arbitrary intelligence rating.

 

Hear Hear! Saying FPS are dumb is like saying Shmups are dumb. Neither require much intellect and rely on your reflexes and wits. Honestly I'd say shmups have better story-lines most of the time.

 

I don't play FPS games because I got bored of them when Half Life came out. Really, the genre has shot its load. It's not fun to me. I could go and say that it's the genre for man-babies who do nothing but eat Slim Jims and drink Mountain Dew all day but that's just fueling a stereotype. I don't like FPS so I don't buy them. If you like them, then buy them and leave my JRPGs and platformers alone.

[Vargras]

I don't play FPS games because I got bored of them when Half Life came out. Really, the genre has shot its load. It's not fun to me. I could go and say that it's the genre for man-babies who do nothing but eat Slim Jims and drink Mountain Dew all day but that's just fueling a stereotype. I don't like FPS so I don't buy them. If you like them, then buy them and leave my JRPGs and platformers alone.

 

I like FPSes - somewhat. There's some I like (Mass Effect series, TF2, Killing Floor, Space Marine), and some I detest (CoD and BF. In my defense, I loved BF2 and 2142, but all the Bad Company stuff is awful). You could classify Deus Ex as a RPG/FPS I suppose, but the best parts of that game involved not shooting at all.

 

I think most FPSes are called dumb or simplistic because... well, they are. In campaigns, it's essentially going from Point A to Point B and killing enemies that spawn at pre-determined spots. In multiplayer, it's fulfilling a single objective, like "get more points/kills than the other team" or "take this thing from the other guys", and TF2 largely seems like the only one to have broken out of that, if only because of how mod-friendly it can be. Try finding prophunt or dodgeball in another game. But that's actually okay! That's what makes them so accessible to so many people. If you've played one shooter, you've essentially played them all - you might miss some of the little tricks specific to each game, but for the most part, you already know what you're doing.

Edited September 19, 2011 by Vargras

[Yantelope]

That's funny Battra because I'm the exact opposite. I can't play JRPGs or platformers anymore because I feel like they're always the same thing over and over. I know FPS games are the same thing over and over too but for whatever reason I still find them fun. Go figure. Anything that is popular will be criticized and the level of the criticism is directly proportional to the popularity of said thing. Case in point would be Twilight. Nobody cared until the movies came out. I think it has to do a bit with other people discussing things you're uninterested in. The more people talk about Halo around you when you are disinterested in Halo makes you resent Halo all the more.

Edited September 19, 2011 by Yantelope

[Hot Heart]

Man, a lot of talking here. Unfortunately, I am wasted from shifting bricks around since 8:30 this morning (!) and had to skim a lot of it.

 

It may sound like fanboyism but I think BioWare know their audience and write to them. I also like to think there is a separation between story and story-telling. Stories are easy to identify but the medium of games opens up the way they're told.

 

I did write a whole massive article on ways Mass Effect could've been improved (mostly focusing on 2) but I think BioWare set out to tell a silly space opera story where you can pick and choose your favourite party members and romance whichever one you want (well, most of them) while going off to shoot the baddies and save the galaxy. It is pure empowerment and unashamedly so.

 

I will say, I absolutely agree on the Deus Ex: Human Revolution conversation thing, DocSeuss. I loved that, although I have been reading that there seem to be many 'ways' through them (besides the augment for it). I would love to see a bit more of the conversational stuff from The Witcher 2 as well; where people are putting questions to you. Even if I can't recall whether what information you choose to reveal does affect anything I think that'd be an interesting element to include.

 

And also, I think a lot of people get the impression you have some real beef with a lot of games, even if that's not the case. It's great that you're passionate about things and you're an educated guy, but I think a little tact helps. There's a way of making a point without making an enemy, that's all.

 

Now to go collapse...

Edited September 19, 2011 by Hot Heart

[Vargras]

I will say, I absolutely agree on the Deus Ex: Human Revolution conversation thing, DocSeuss. I loved that, although I have been reading that there seem to be many 'ways' through them (besides the augment for it). I would love to see a bit more of the conversational stuff from The Witcher 2 as well; where people are putting questions to you. Even if I can't recall whether what information you choose to reveal does affect anything I think that'd be an interesting element to include.

 

From what I've seen, some of the conversations in DX:HR are actually slightly randomized. For instance,

 

I failed the conversation with Hugh Darrow towards the end, so I reloaded an earlier save and tried again. Only thing was, it was different. I had to completely rethink my choices, instead of simply going "Those didn't work, I'll use this instead".

 

 

So walkthroughs for some of the conversations actually won't work for everyone. Also, I actually LIKE that I can "fail" conversations. I like that I have to actually pay attention and tell the other person what they want to hear.

[Baconrath]

A possible reason for this stance is the fact that the market is saturated with FPSs. The genre has kinda been swung around like a dead cat, thus making it an easy target for hate.

 

I've lost track how many times I or someone else have uttered the phrase "Ugh, not another WWII shooter."

 

An incomplete but still lengthy list:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_first-person_shooters

[Johnny]

 

I do not feel like I should need to explain why this is bullshit. You can't prove that dragon age and mass effect are shit, because that's subjective opinion.

 

Believe it or not, there are rules for good storytelling. There are things that make for good stories and bad. There's a reason that Twilight is not considered by human culture to be a good book, and a reason that The Count of Monte Cristo is. Good and bad, within the context of culture, is objective, but fuzzily defined, because culture evolves over time. For instance, The Count of Monte Cristo was considered bad at one point because Dumas was of mixed heritage, and people were racist.

 

Now, like/dislike? That's a different matter. What you like or dislike is entirely subjective and would be impossible for me to prove in any way, shape, or form. I will not endeavor to prove that you like or dislike something, as it's ubsurd.

 

What's good or bad, is, however, fair game.

 

Well, then, because Dragon Age is generally accepted to be good storytelling... Wouldn't that make you wrong?