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That's... a rather uninformed opinion. But then you do admit that you haven't been up to date in 15 years. Play for an hour and be the best? I think you're wearing sligtly delusional rose-coloured glasses. Games these days are overall easier than they have ever been with a few specific exceptions like the "Souls" series and their imitators and relations, and they use the difficulty as their USP.

Grind is a separate factor, but not worth explaining here.

As for the OP - I think Melissa needs to read/watch different (or fewer) games media if she keeps seeing SS2 references everywhere. Also, they don't suck.

I've found there's many reasons why reviews lean towards being overly harsh. Particularly when the game was hyped / the developers promised X, Y and Z and didn't deliver, the game gets slammed. Also if the game is a sequel that wasn't a big leap up from its predecessor it's ratings tend to suffer. You could say all of this is fair enough, but the reviewers disappointment often gets in the way of evaluating the game fairly.

 thegreatchimp wrote:
I've found there's many reasons why reviews lean towards being overly harsh. Particularly when the game was hyped / the developers promised X, Y and Z and didn't deliver, the game gets slammed. Also if the game is a sequel that wasn't a big leap up from its predecessor it's ratings tend to suffer. You could say all of this is fair enough, but the reviewers disappointment often gets in the way of evaluating the game fairly.

This could be also from "over adjustment".
If they rate it too nicely people think they were bought off, an extension of the marketing machine.
If they had too much hype, it is a bit of a grind debunking them all, good game or not.
I find I am a "promiscuous gamer" where usually it is all good in the end: there are few games I selected that were so awful I uninstalled shortly after.
I may have been lucky.

 thegreatchimp wrote:
I've found there's many reasons why reviews lean towards being overly harsh. Particularly when the game was hyped / the developers promised X, Y and Z and didn't deliver, the game gets slammed. Also if the game is a sequel that wasn't a big leap up from its predecessor it's ratings tend to suffer. You could say all of this is fair enough, but the reviewers disappointment often gets in the way of evaluating the game fairly.

Reviews should be more harsh. The overly-fellative and 7-10 system is severely broken. At least these days some are becoming a bit more critical. I've seen discussion of how something like The Order would have gotten a great review just a few years ago based pretty much on its graphics, but reviewers are starting to look beyond that (sometimes). Similarly, Star Wars Battlefront's reviews weren't the glowing ones that EA expected since behind the (amazing) graphics, the gameplay and features are pretty bloody shallow for a Battlefront game.

In some cases, like WoW, the original (well... kind of) is indeed best.

In some cases, like DOW versus its sequel, it is not at all the case.

It varies as do other things.

 Ashiraya wrote:
In some cases, like WoW, the original (well... kind of) is indeed best.

So by "the original" meaning you think Ultima Online is best?

Ultima Online actually has little to do with WoW. While both being MMO, their similarities soon end. The core mechanisms of WoW and UO are vastly different as the latter is more of a sandbox MMO compared to the former that is brilliantly designed for the broad market using simple yet effective mechanisms to entertain its still vast customer base.

 Talizvar wrote:
This could be also from "over adjustment".
If they rate it too nicely people think they were bought off, an extension of the marketing machine.
If they had too much hype, it is a bit of a grind debunking them all, good game or not.
I find I am a "promiscuous gamer" where usually it is all good in the end: there are few games I selected that were so awful I uninstalled shortly after.
I may have been lucky.

Same here, I always research a game before I buy, and like that I've rarely not finished a title.

My main issue of misleading reviews was certain sequels that were given ratings of 60-65% for various reasons that they disappointed the reiviewers. Some of these titles (Dead to Rights: Retribution is one that comes to mind) I later picked up anyway, and found they were thoroughly enjoyable, more deserving of an 80-85%. So I would say the rating is fair as an evaluation of the develoment of the series, but can be misleading for the individual game, particularly to anyone who is new to the series and hasn't played the earlier games.

Games don't suck, people do. Stop paying attention to other people's opinions of games you enjoy. The gaming community is far too large to agree on anything, so who the hell cares what anyone else thinks?

 Sigvatr wrote:
the former that is brilliantly designed

Moment while I laugh my ass off.

Moving right along.

 thegreatchimp wrote:

 Talizvar wrote:
This could be also from "over adjustment".
If they rate it too nicely people think they were bought off, an extension of the marketing machine.
If they had too much hype, it is a bit of a grind debunking them all, good game or not.
I find I am a "promiscuous gamer" where usually it is all good in the end: there are few games I selected that were so awful I uninstalled shortly after.
I may have been lucky.

Same here, I always research a game before I buy, and like that I've rarely not finished a title.

My main issue of misleading reviews was certain sequels that were given ratings of 60-65% for various reasons that they disappointed the reiviewers. Some of these titles (Dead to Rights: Retribution is one that comes to mind) I later picked up anyway, and found they were thoroughly enjoyable, more deserving of an 80-85%. So I would say the rating is fair as an evaluation of the develoment of the series, but can be misleading for the individual game, particularly to anyone who is new to the series and hasn't played the earlier games.

That's a problem I've had as well...

 Melissia wrote:
Moment while I laugh my ass off.

Moving right along.

If it had not been brilliantly designed, I doubt it would have remained the biggest MMO after spending over a decade fighting off competitors in the incredibly fast-developing video games branch.

 Melissia wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
the former that is brilliantly designed

Moment while I laugh my ass off.

Moving right along.

Oh come on. Blizzard could hand you a game that gives you the cure for cancer, $1,000,000,000 and the secret to immortality and eternal youth and you'd still be all "total garbage, 0/10, would not play". The average Red Sox fan has more realistic and unbiased view of the Yankees than you do Blizzard.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
Moment while I laugh my ass off.

Moving right along.

If it had not been brilliantly designed, I doubt it would have remained the biggest MMO after spending over a decade fighting off competitors in the incredibly fast-developing video games branch.

You're right and then some.

There's no doubt that WoW was an immense step forward in terms of accessibility, polish and pacing for MMOs. While it's hard to claim they did anything 100% original at least in vanilla what they did was tuned much much tighter than any predecessor. In terms of their design goals I don't think there is much room to argue that they didn't execute to amazing success.

They were able to use existing ingredients to cook up a new recipe that had far broader than any other MMO, and far broader appeal than anything they'd previously made. WoW took a hyper-niche genre of games for the neckbeardiest of neckbeards and somehow got it mainstream appeal. You can't even lay the success at the feet of their established fan base since WoW reached so far beyond what their other games had up to that point.

 Melissia wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
the former that is brilliantly designed

Moment while I laugh my ass off.

I do hate to say, literally millions would disagree.
No easy task maintaining addiction and keeping the hordes in check.
This little article came to mind http://www.denofgeek.us/games/world-of-warcraft/240971/world-of-warcraft-25-best-moments-in-the-games-history
Not my kind of game but having been in charge of a MUD way back, it is amazing what players do to try to "break" the game so I can appreciate the "brilliance".

 Chongara wrote:
Oh come on. Blizzard could hand you a game that gives you the cure for cancer, $1,000,000,000 and the secret to immortality and eternal youth and you'd still be all "total garbage, 0/10, would not play".

On the contrary, I liked Diablo 3, though sadly it did not cure cancer or give me the billion dollars.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Talizvar wrote:

 Melissia wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
the former that is brilliantly designed

Moment while I laugh my ass off.

I do hate to say, literally millions would disagree.

Millions of people also think Beiber is the best musician out there.

 Melissia wrote:
Millions of people also think Beiber is the best musician out there.

So the question would still stand would he not be "one of the best" despite your inferred opinion to the contrary?
I am unsure if we are heading into "straw-man" territory dragging in Beiber of all topics.
Would not millions of "happy" customers playing a game that did not appear to "break" badly not be impressive or "brilliant"?
I will drag out a more apt parallel: McDonalds is not the height of fine dining but billions are served: it is "good" despite having the dubious title of the "most popular" fast food.

Do you really want to go on record saying your definition of quality is "a lot of people like it"?

I find that idea obnoxious.

Most video games suck but not for these reasons. When I want to play a video game I want to play it for myself with myself. The overly stressed multiplayer aspect of the video game market make most of them suck in my opinion. It is at the point where a game that would be traditionally for a single player (Mass Effect 3) gets a large portion of it for the multiplayer part of the game. I get enough multiplayer in my life with facebook and work. When I play a video game I don't want to be bothered by other people.

Sadly developers learned that buyers will get a game and play the same part over and over again (shoot the badguys on the other team) for hundreds of hours. So why bother making a game that has unique content over the course of the same amount of time? Games like The Witcher 3 are slowly dying out as players prefer the same thing over and over (Call of Duty)

But that is just my unpopular opinion.

One of my few personal hatreds is for the spread of Quick Time Events in FPSs, and particularely 3rd person action games. There is nothing more mood-killing and frustrating then having an untarnished run through a level only to be killed 5 times in succession by the "escape the giant rolling bolder scene" becasue you couldn't mash buttons fast enough

One place I don't mind QTE's is when they're presented opportunites to deal additional damage to enemies, particularely bosses in action games because it actually adds a level of excitement to the action. But beyond that, they are a plague upon the culture of gaming, and I wish developers would get over their obsession with them, because it's not an affinity that's generally shared by their target audiences.

 thegreatchimp wrote:
One of my few personal hatreds is for the spread of Quick Time Events in FPSs, and particularely 3rd person action games. There is nothing more mood-killing and frustrating then having an untarnished run through a level only to be killed 5 times in succession by the "escape the giant rolling bolder scene" becasue you couldn't mash buttons fast enough

One place I don't mind QTE's is when they're presented opportunites to deal additional damage to enemies, particularely bosses in action games because it actually adds a level of excitement to the action. But beyond that, they are a plague upon the culture of gaming, and I wish developers would get over their obsession with them, because it's not an affinity that's generally shared by their target audiences.

It's like a reversal of the arcades...

Before:

1) You have died! Quickly, insert coin! Too late, Game over.

Now

2) Quickly, insert coin! Too late, you have died! Game over.

 Melissia wrote:
Do you really want to go on record saying your definition of quality is "a lot of people like it"?I find that idea obnoxious.

You changed what was said: "brilliant" not "quality".
From a technical and social psychology addiction view it is brilliant proven by "a lot of people like it".
For aesthetics, plot line, interface and imagery: there are issues.
If it is "garbage" why does it make so much money and have a huge player base without sounding elitist?
What makes one opinion worth more than the unwashed masses?

Wait, I'm confused. Is the OP asserting that no good games have come out since the late 1990s and our love for games of that era is why? Or is the OP saying that nostalgia is what's leading to the overall decline of video game quality? Neither of those assertions make any sense. There have always been poor quality games and lots of them . Plus... If there is a decline in the mainstream game market it has a lot more to do with overbloated budgets, hype culture, corporate mandates and greed than people poo-pooing games for not being system shock 2.

 Melissia wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
the former that is brilliantly designed

Moment while I laugh my ass off.

Moving right along.

...speaking of obnoxious.

World of Warcraft, which I have not played in several years and have no intention of returning to is very obviously and objectively a brilliantly designed game. While they have made any number of serious missteps over the years, there's no arguing that it's not a brilliantly designed* game, taking the basic Diku framework of EverQuest and taking it to the next level of polish, accessibility and playability.

Please don't confuse objective opinion with facts.

*"lolno" and "Justin Bieber" are not actually arguments of any kind.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Lord Scythican wrote:
Most video games suck but not for these reasons. When I want to play a video game I want to play it for myself with myself. The overly stressed multiplayer aspect of the video game market make most of them suck in my opinion. It is at the point where a game that would be traditionally for a single player (Mass Effect 3) gets a large portion of it for the multiplayer part of the game. I get enough multiplayer in my life with facebook and work. When I play a video game I don't want to be bothered by other people.

Sadly developers learned that buyers will get a game and play the same part over and over again (shoot the badguys on the other team) for hundreds of hours. So why bother making a game that has unique content over the course of the same amount of time? Games like The Witcher 3 are slowly dying out as players prefer the same thing over and over (Call of Duty)

But that is just my unpopular opinion.

On the contrary, The Witcher 3 and Fallout 3 have just proved to publishers that there is a huge and willing market for high quality, single-player experiences. Meanwhile, CoD's overall numbers had been flattening and even declining until Blops3. Assassins Creed (a big, AAA SP title) has taken a major hit in the past 2 years, not due to the MP aspects of Unity, but the unfinished-ness of it, and I think it's fair to say the samey-ness of AC games, particularly after Black Flag embraced something different.

I agree that bolted-on multiplayer is awful, especially TDM and FFA modes, but I'm a huge fan of optional co-op modes, and quite frankly it's a huge selling point for me. I find single player games can often become quite boring while playing the same game with a partner makes the whole thing much, much more fun. That's why I bought Black Ops 3 - full co-op campaign? Yes please. Then again, I skip facebook.

You're welcome to think that they suck though - because "suck" is clearly opinion, and you're certainly entitled to opinion. At least you didn't say that they were all "objectively bad games"

 Azazelx wrote:

World of Warcraft, which I have not played in several years and have no intention of returning to is very obviously and objectively a brilliantly designed game.

Its a very polished game but there is little to the game itself that is particularly well designed, when compared to other MMOs of its era the only thing that stands out as a 'good' design that wasn't already in other similar games is the Auction House.

Its obviously been a huge success for Blizzard but I strongly suspect that is mainly due to its accessibility, branding, and latterly, nostalgia/habit.

Blizzard make very polished games but not necessarily great ones.

 Silent Puffin? wrote:
Blizzard make very polished games but not necessarily great ones.

I was pleasantly surprised with Diablo3... much later on.
I got the big collector box.
Was there at launch and waited.
Saw the auction house go up and item drops wither and die.
Had my main character stripped of stuff within days of hitting 60th level by "pirates" and got blamed by Blizzard that my 18 character password was too weak...
So it got shelved for about 3 years.
They fixed things quite nicely (especially after getting rid of the auction house).
For many, it may have been too little too late.
Well, "Path of Exile" is dark and ugly but it seemed to meet the need.

Oh, I really enjoyed Path of Exile! I made a character who spammed attacks as fast as possible and would lifetap on each hit. It was really great until I got hit by a lagspike, so didn't count as attacking for a few seconds and consequently died.

I never played Diablo II when it was 'new'... well I rolled a couple of trash characters on my friends computers when I was at their house. I picked up the disc for £1.50 from a charity shop last summer and really enjoyed it.

 Lord Scythican wrote:
Most video games suck but not for these reasons. When I want to play a video game I want to play it for myself with myself. The overly stressed multiplayer aspect of the video game market make most of them suck in my opinion. It is at the point where a game that would be traditionally for a single player (Mass Effect 3) gets a large portion of it for the multiplayer part of the game. I get enough multiplayer in my life with facebook and work. When I play a video game I don't want to be bothered by other people.

Sadly developers learned that buyers will get a game and play the same part over and over again (shoot the badguys on the other team) for hundreds of hours. So why bother making a game that has unique content over the course of the same amount of time? Games like The Witcher 3 are slowly dying out as players prefer the same thing over and over (Call of Duty)

But that is just my unpopular opinion.

Multiplayer has been put into modern video games for several reasons, not all of the in the best interests of players:

1. It has become possible with modern network spread and soeed. How many households aren't on at least 10Mbps these days?
2. It's cheaper to put in multi-player than write good scenarios and levels for single-player mode. It lets you make the players supply the AI that makes the game interesting.
3. All the console manufacturers also want their machines to be multimedia entertainment hubs, so they can sell you VOD and new maps and stuff. This requires consoles to be networked, hence games that only work on network. Ultimately, console manufacturers want you to buy most of your games as digital downloads direct from them. It makes more profit.
4. A surprising number of men aged 15 to 25 really enjoy pretending to shoot people in the head with a sniper rifle.

There are positives to network, of course, like free levels made by fans for Little Big Planet, and so on.

I have for a long time felt that one of the points of computer games was to be able to play fun games by yourself, not needing a network connection for opponents.

I disagree, most modern 'bad' games are a result of us, the game buying public, accepting rush jobs, shoddy ports, full priced games built like gakky freeium phone games', season pass and whatever other crap the likes of EA and Konami inflict upon us.

I struggle to under why this keeps happening as the average age of gamers is on the increase and you'd really think we'd know better by now but it seems not.

As a grumpy old bugger the wrong side of 40 I've pretty much given up buying anything 'new', especially given how far £50 can go on GOG, Steam or Humble, I've still ended up with some gakky games but if they only cost a pint or a takeaway ho-hum

Well pre-order is a bit of a plague lately which does little to push a developer to do a good job.Then there is "downloadable content" which looks suspiciously like "crippleware" of old.
Something about selling an add-on piece to a game later (or the evil day of launch) seems wrong.

My nostalgia would seem to give permission to use "retro" graphics or copy the style/interface/mechanics of a game of old.
Pre-order and DLC is something that is a carry over (if not refined) to the modern day.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
Moment while I laugh my ass off.

Moving right along.

If it had not been brilliantly designed, I doubt it would have remained the biggest MMO after spending over a decade fighting off competitors in the incredibly fast-developing video games branch.

Chaka. The original was great, but I even loved it right through Lich King. Cataclysm is where I bowed out, but even then, it was still fun and Blizzard had some good ideas.

That being said, Blizzard is not being TFG by refusing to provide legacy servers and shutting down anyone who runs such thing.

Going back to what the OP is saying, I have mixed feeling about modern games emulating / aspiring to old ones, it can be good or bad depending on how it's executed...but one thing I don't get is how manic some gamers are about still playing the classics. To give an example: I was in a game design course with about 20 other lads. We got talking about beat-em ups one day and 4 of them agreed that Streetfighter 2 is still their favourite. I had my fun with that game when I was 10, but tbh I'd have more fun playing a few rounds of the latest Tekken or DOA than the 2d Grandaddy that spawned them. Same with some of my friends going and buying old Sega Mega Drives and N-64s. Wouldn't I enjoy playing F-Zero? Sure, For about an hour. Then I'd turn it off and go back to playing Wipeout HD. Not sure I get the whole craze.