FMW Posted February 1, 2011 Report Share Posted February 1, 2011 Hello, here we should post our rants/pet peeves/secret furies. However, we should take pains not to fill up too much space with them. It's really easy to go overboard when you're really upset about something, so let's be careful not to do so. Example Rant: The Sales of Innovation The most polished products on the market are always going to be the derivative titles that build upon ideas/mechanics of their predecessors. Video games are not necessarily stagnant as some have claimed. However, the innovative games just aren't selling like the less daring AAA games nowadays. Nintendo is in a bit of a tight spot with this right now. There have been some GREAT games that made innovative use of the DS, but almost without fail those games were reviewed more harshly and sold less than traditional competition. Why am I mad about this? After all, I can still buy the innovative games for myself, no? Sure. I can right now. However, I don't see third parties making innovative gems like Contact, Away Shuffle Dungeon, or 999 for future consoles. Hell, even TWEWY which was well polished and used the DS features sold far less than more traditional JRPG fare. The same goes for Wii except doubly so. Budgets are bigger for console games, and publishers are getting burned even worse on sales. Seriously, Dead Space Extraction was the most innovative in that franchise. It was really really great. It was different and on Wii though, so it didn't sell nearly as well as it deserved to. (Note: I recognize that it doesn't take much to be more innovative than the main Dead Space games) In conclusion: it is logical for consumers to purchase the most polished product. However, if we consumers ever want more from our video games than we're getting right now, then we must be willing to buy less polished games that try new things. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HotChops Posted February 6, 2011 Report Share Posted February 6, 2011 I hate the way that stupid, bullshit marketing actually works. Call of Duty sells a bagillion copies simply because it's called "Call of Duty." The new Goldeneye sells well and gets everyone excited simply because it's called "Goldeneye" and it's on a Nintendo console. I also hate it when a game deserves to sell well, but when it does, it usually sells well for the wrong reasons. Mass Effect was an epic sci-fi opera with an incredibly dynamic dialogue system, but it doesn't really get noticed until it puts combat in the spotlight and puts angry Shepard on the box cover. Grand Theft Auto IV recreated New York in awesome detail, but most people bought it so they could fuck virtual hookers and then run them over. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 features great vehicle-based combat and environment destructibility, but 3 out of my 4 friends bought it because they mistakenly thought it was going to be like Modern Warfare 2. I know some of those are generalizations, but it's basically the reality. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strangelove Posted February 6, 2011 Report Share Posted February 6, 2011 Games are 60 dollars, man. People cant afford to take a risk on something new. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SeniorPuffyPants Posted February 6, 2011 Report Share Posted February 6, 2011 5$ for new maps and content? Dammit! why can't game company's be more like Valve!!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
excel_excel Posted February 6, 2011 Report Share Posted February 6, 2011 (edited) This whole blame COD for everything else selling bad annoys me. Its not COD's fault that Vanquish sold poorly, if COD didn't exist sales for Vanquish and similar niche games would be the same. There's always people going "oh COD sold a bajillion copies and {insert niche game here} only sold half a million waaaah gaming is ending as we know it" I have no interest in COD but I'm not going to blame it for all of gamings problems. Also, the way the gaming industry keeps on bleating on about an eventual DD only future for consoles. Why the hell aren't they actually making console gaming DD an attractive offer to gamers then? Case in point: On the PSN Assassins Creed 1 costs you €30. Mass Effect 2? €60. Why don't these companies sit down to themselves and think this stupid pricing through Edited February 6, 2011 by excel_excel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimmuhpage Posted February 6, 2011 Report Share Posted February 6, 2011 I always thought companies don't sell their games with DD at reasonable prices because retail stores can/have threaten/ed to not sell those games on their stores, cutting off a massive portion of the available market. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
excel_excel Posted February 6, 2011 Report Share Posted February 6, 2011 That's the excuse yeah. that explains why new releases are so expensive. doesn't explain something like Assasins Creed 1 showing up last year for that price though Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mal Posted February 6, 2011 Report Share Posted February 6, 2011 Eh, excel, I think the COD thing you said has some merit to it. If I go out and buy it new, on or close to launch, I would be out of $60 that I could use to buy something else. Now about DD, I wonder how much they can cut the cost of a new game with DD. -sigh- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
excel_excel Posted February 6, 2011 Report Share Posted February 6, 2011 I suppose your right. But that's a fairly low number of people that would apply to. Average Joe who games only on madden and COD isn't going to suddenly buy Vanquish because COD isn't there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheRevanchist Posted July 19, 2011 Report Share Posted July 19, 2011 I was bored last night, so I flipped the TV to G4 to see some pre-Comic Con stuff. AOTS was on, and they were talking about the Sega systems and some of the old games. They brought up how it was a jump in tech, the pricing, the changes from previous console choices, and some of the issues facing the system. A decent piece. I thought, 'Wow! AOTS isn't nearly as bad as I thought it was.' Then came the dribble. The next piece was a trip to Hasbro HQ to see the toys that will be exclusives to SDCC. Holy shit! It was basically a correspondent saying "Look at me! I'm on TV!" the entire time. Not too many details on the actual toys, because that would have interfered with her face time. Even though she was selected to do this report, she had no knowledge of anything going on, which is too often the case on AOTS. They hire women based upon personality and looks, not their knowledge and ability to connect with the audience on certain topics. This is just terrible. Just fucking terrible. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Enervation Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 I tried Planetside this week. I expected to die, but not THIS much. What the fuck is everyone using, ubered heavies? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 Saints Row II doesn't have enough cars lying around. Also even your saints driving around won't let you just nab their cars. There should be a way yo go "ring ring, car please" to make up for it. GTAIV would have cars everywehre, jsut lining streets, in car parks etc. Also the weapon changing/health eating system is messed up. If you're getting shot at from all sides, say a cemetery, you're fucked. Also that boat mission with the Brotherhood. I've still not completed it yet. I've got as far as wave 3. There's no check points. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 inFamous. Blast shards. 350 of the fecking things and no way to easily track them all down. I mean, they could have had them tagged on the map permanently when you manually sensed them so that if you're in a mission and can't stop to dick about getting shards you can just tag them and get them later. They could at least have made them detectable based on the mini-map radius rather than a sphere so that I could sail around at altitude and pick them off rather than having to cock-hole about at street level clicking the R3 button. I've got about 100 left to find. Collectibles should never total more than 100. Shard sense in inFamous 2 was a god send. I'd probably pay £1 for that power as an inFamous 1 DLC item. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. GOH! Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 I came here expecting a rant about mail delivery. I feel cheated and bit used. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slagathorian Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 (edited) Hello, here we should post our rants/pet peeves/secret furies. However, we should take pains not to fill up too much space with them. It's really easy to go overboard when you're really upset about something, so let's be careful not to do so. Example Rant: The Sales of Innovation The most polished products on the market are always going to be the derivative titles that build upon ideas/mechanics of their predecessors. Video games are not necessarily stagnant as some have claimed. However, the innovative games just aren't selling like the less daring AAA games nowadays. Nintendo is in a bit of a tight spot with this right now. There have been some GREAT games that made innovative use of the DS, but almost without fail those games were reviewed more harshly and sold less than traditional competition. Why am I mad about this? After all, I can still buy the innovative games for myself, no? Sure. I can right now. However, I don't see third parties making innovative gems like Contact, Away Shuffle Dungeon, or 999 for future consoles. Hell, even TWEWY which was well polished and used the DS features sold far less than more traditional JRPG fare. The same goes for Wii except doubly so. Budgets are bigger for console games, and publishers are getting burned even worse on sales. Seriously, Dead Space Extraction was the most innovative in that franchise. It was really really great. It was different and on Wii though, so it didn't sell nearly as well as it deserved to. (Note: I recognize that it doesn't take much to be more innovative than the main Dead Space games) In conclusion: it is logical for consumers to purchase the most polished product. However, if we consumers ever want more from our video games than we're getting right now, then we must be willing to buy less polished games that try new things. See I'm in the opposite boat. I love sequels. Sequels are a chance for the devs to step away from a product (the first) gather user feedback, and then hit the drawing board again for the second time with good feedback, and a fresh outlook. And as most of the game assets are already done, it allows for a shorter and cheaper development cycle. Which ultimately allows them to put on more polish and add more features. (Uncharted 2, Gears 2 and Infamous for example) I usually buy a sequel before I buy a new IP. Edited July 20, 2011 by Slagathorian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slagathorian Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 inFamous. Blast shards. 350 of the fecking things and no way to easily track them all down. I mean, they could have had them tagged on the map permanently when you manually sensed them so that if you're in a mission and can't stop to dick about getting shards you can just tag them and get them later. They could at least have made them detectable based on the mini-map radius rather than a sphere so that I could sail around at altitude and pick them off rather than having to cock-hole about at street level clicking the R3 button. I've got about 100 left to find. Collectibles should never total more than 100. Shard sense in inFamous 2 was a god send. I'd probably pay £1 for that power as an inFamous 1 DLC item. Lol, that's the only trophy I'm missing from Infamous, i have only 1 left to find. But gave up after about an hour of searching. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slagathorian Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 My pet peeve rant: Innovation. I hate people who clamor for it. Or who even bring it up in any kind of video game discussion. Its usually just a word they use so they don't have to educate themselves, and so they can disguise their fanboyism. Yes, the Move looks like the Wiimote. Guess what? The Wiimote was successful, so another game company followed suit. This is the EXACT same in absolutely EVERY industry. From any food franchise to car manufacturer. If people want motion control in their videogames, and Sony makes videogames, then Sony would have to be VERY irresponsible to not have such a device/feature. Does anybody here REALLY care which car manufacturer was the first to put a sound system in their car? No, all we know is that its a much loved feature, so any car I buy better have it. Maybe we should all be mad at Apple, because they were not even close to the first company to put a camera in their phone. They are just COPIERS! This is forgetting the fact that NOTHING is really innovative anymore, and all things are just upgrades of previous ideas/concepts/technologies. Gears of War wasn't the first to use a cover based mechanic. Tomb Raider does not hold a monopoly on the "adventure" genre. I could go on and on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr W Phallus Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 Slagathorian: Do you subscribe to the theory of evolution? Because frankly, if you do, that should be argument for innovation enough. But even within your own argument you mention the car manufacturer who first put a sound system into a car. This was a moment of innovation. You then go on to say that you would never buy a car without the product of this innovation. This proves the value of innovation, if people had sat back before cars had sound systems and said 'there is nothing more we can do to improve the automobile', no car would have a stereo and we would all suffer for it. So there you go, you've disproved your own point. There is a huge difference between not being innovative and incorporating existing good ideas. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockyRan Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 (edited) Slagathorian: Do you subscribe to the theory of evolution? Because frankly, if you do, that should be argument for innovation enough. But even within your own argument you mention the car manufacturer who first put a sound system into a car. This was a moment of innovation. You then go on to say that you would never buy a car without the product of this innovation. This proves the value of innovation, if people had sat back before cars had sound systems and said 'there is nothing more we can do to improve the automobile', no car would have a stereo and we would all suffer for it. So there you go, you've disproved your own point. There is a huge difference between not being innovative and incorporating existing good ideas. I agree with this. Innovation is the natural product of evolution, and innovation isn't simply about making up new concepts entirely but can also mean splicing existing things together that haven't been put together before. An industry that doesn't clamor for innovation is a stagnant industry, and while I like sequels to well-known established IPs as much as the next guy, there comes a time when sequel-itis starts to take away from the series and/or industry. For instance, the current industry's infatuation with FPS's because they have this weird idea that "only FPS's sell these days" stuck in their heads is the result of thinking that innovation isn't the answer for anything. Thinking that recycling old ideas is fine because it worked for "that other game" doesn't get anyone anywhere and more often than not actually results in lukewarm reception and poor sales. Although at the very end of the day I simply say this: I just have more fun with games that have novel ideas than games that regurgitate existing ones with no real change to them. Edited July 20, 2011 by RockyRan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 I don't think Slag was "innovation is not allowed ever" but "innovation shouldn't and doesn't need to be in everything". What's wrong with a solid idea being repeated, such as a sound system in your car. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slagathorian Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 Slagathorian: Do you subscribe to the theory of evolution? Because frankly, if you do, that should be argument for innovation enough. But even within your own argument you mention the car manufacturer who first put a sound system into a car. This was a moment of innovation. You then go on to say that you would never buy a car without the product of this innovation. This proves the value of innovation, if people had sat back before cars had sound systems and said 'there is nothing more we can do to improve the automobile', no car would have a stereo and we would all suffer for it. So there you go, you've disproved your own point. There is a huge difference between not being innovative and incorporating existing good ideas. I'm not at all saying its bad. I'm saying its bad to get upset when you see a repeated mechanic/concept/idea. I'm referring to people harping on Microft for borrowing from the Eye Toy, or saying that Uncharted is a Tomb Raider Rip off. I'm ranting about the people who claim to hold innovation above all, but aren't willing to accept that not every aspect of a game needs to be innovative. Like does anybody really get upset when they see yet another phone with a camera in it? No, we like camera's in our phones. Nobody needs to yell at the next phone to also have a phone. Just like we like a cover mechanic in our third person shooters. What's wrong with keeping the things we like? Square Enix can't understand this concept whatsoever. Every Final Fantasy has to be so vastly different from the previous version, that they forget to keep aspects that people love. I loved the Materia system, but I've never seen it since. Hell, Chrono Trigger's double and triple techs was one of the coolest battle systems ever, and yet I've rarely seen it since 1995. What's wrong with keeping the things we love, maybe tweaking them minorly to make them even better, and discarding the stuff we don't like, until we are left with a truly great game? And no, I don't beleive in evolution Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yantelope Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 (edited) Some people refuse to see minor innovation. CoD had some minor creative innovations regarding multiple playable characters in the story and even main characters dying in first person. That freaked me out first time it happened. There's also the way that Halo created the melee and grenade buttons and also kicked up the regenerating health craze. I just hear so many people saying "Call of Duty is boring and deriviative!" It's not though. There are tons of other shooters which may be boring or derivative but Call of Duty and Halo are premier games. Others are imitating them. It's kind of like if you said Star Wars is just another derivative sci-fi movie. Edited July 20, 2011 by Yantelope Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strangelove Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 The Ultimate MvC3 hate. Its annoying. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yantelope Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 Is it really going to be the final MvC3 though? Should it really be called Penultimate MvC3? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toxicitizen Posted July 20, 2011 Report Share Posted July 20, 2011 The Ultimate MvC3 hate. Its annoying. Can't really blame people for feeling ripped off, though. I mean, the "incomplete" version came out like 6 months ago. Personally, I'm really glad I held off on buying. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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