Great games are rare these days?

[Alex_68]

Honestly, I believe PS4 would be more popular in most states just based off of the actual units sold.

I think you are right Max. Good then, it means there is still competition among the two main brands. We can only have advantages from that.

I'm flipping between tabs looking at a new stuff for my Jeep

OT: Cherokee? Damn... I love that car.

 

[Titan]

OT: Cherokee? Damn... I love that car.

2006 liberty Renegade. Though in Europe I think they call it Cherokee. Still not sure how I feel about the new Cherokees though. The Trailhawk version looks nice but I can't take the others serious. Jeeps are supposed to be 4x4s, not front wheel drive built on a car platform.

 

[Alex_68]

2006 liberty Renegade. Though in Europe I think they call it Cherokee. Still not sure how I feel about the new Cherokees though. The Trailhawk version looks nice but I can't take the others serious. Jeeps are supposed to be 4x4s, not front wheel drive built on a car platform.

Yep, it's what we call Cherokee here. A damnate strong car. I had the previous model '98, green, 4x4, gear reductions, with the 5th weel outside, mounted on the rear door. It was a special version with a 2.5 diesel motor, produced in Italy by a company called VM Motors. An unbreakable car, I loved it.

(sorry guys for the OT) Cars thread here.

 

[nghia2518]

Just came by to say that God of War 3 is going to have a remaster too. This is getting too annoying. We all should be really worried about Bloodborne launching next week, one of the few original games we get for the PS4.

 

[Sekelani]

Just came by to say that God of War 3 is going to have a remaster too. This is getting too annoying. We all should be really worried about Bloodborne launching next week, one of the few original games we get for the PS4.

I understand your frustration . But personally God of war 3 is one of the best games to date for me..... It's a masterpiece and I don't mind it getting remastered. I'm not complaining but I do understand that it would be awesome to get fresh games for the new generation instead of ltd games being tweaked.

 

[nghia2518]

I think that I don't have much of an issue with remasters themselves, but they become a problem when they just dominate the library of the PS4. PS4 needs to find its own identity and not rely on past games to fill the vacancy. They can make remasters all they want, just keep the new games coming. If the devs are only focused on repackaging old games, it certainly feels like they are resorting to cheap tactics to milk cash from us gamers. Did we ever get so many remasters for a new console? During those past transitions, there were never so many remasters. I understand that costs are an issue, but I can't help but feel frustrated with things as they are.

And why not deliver a great bundle of many God of War games instead of just one, just like Microsoft did with the Master Chief Collection?

To be honest I'm not going to boycott these remasters myself, I just find it irksome to have to keep buying old games released with new graphics and all. I personally love God of War 3 too, and it's almost certain I will grab the PS4 version when it comes out.

Lastly, if console games still follow this deplorable trend, then people will be flocking to PC and consoles will die. The PC's library is infinitely backward compatible, supporting games as old as twenty years old. Graphics is always scalable; if you get a new shiny GPU you can always take the settings up several notches without having to buy a whole new product. The PC is invading the living room too, with many products designed as sleek, console-looking machines. Though the initial set-up costs for a powerful PC can be prohibitive, gaming on PC is always cheaper thanks to ridiculous discounts. The consoles are already way behind in terms of raw power, and so if they can't keep up at least on the software ( in which honestly I think they are losing too), then the PC's triumph will be inevitable.

I dread the day consoles become a distant memory.

 

[Titan]

I think that I don't have much of an issue with remasters themselves, but they become a problem when they just dominate the library of the PS4. PS4 needs to find its own identity and not rely on past games to fill the vacancy. They can make remasters all they want, just keep the new games coming. If the devs are only focused on repackaging old games, it certainly feels like they are resorting to cheap tactics to milk cash from us gamers. Did we ever get so many remasters for a new console? During those past transitions, there were never so many remasters. I understand that costs are an issue, but I can't help but feel frustrated with things as they are.

And why not deliver a great bundle of many God of War games instead of just one, just like Microsoft did with the Master Chief Collection?

To be honest I'm not going to boycott these remasters myself, I just find it irksome to have to keep buying old games released with new graphics and all. I personally love God of War 3 too, and it's almost certain I will grab the PS4 version when it comes out.

Lastly, if console games still follow this deplorable trend, then people will be flocking to PC and consoles will die. The PC's library is infinitely backward compatible, supporting games as old as twenty years old. Graphics is always scalable; if you get a new shiny GPU you can always take the settings up several notches without having to buy a whole new product. The PC is invading the living room too, with many products designed as sleek, console-looking machines. Though the initial set-up costs for a powerful PC can be prohibitive, gaming on PC is always cheaper thanks to ridiculous discounts. The consoles are already way behind in terms of raw power, and so if they can't keep up at least on the software ( in which honestly I think they are losing too), then the PC's triumph will be inevitable.

I dread the day consoles become a distant memory.

Damn fine post there.

I want to share an article I read while on lunch today. It's from Push Square and it really does put everything in perspective of what we're talking about, even though I felt sad and depressed after I read it. But the author hits on some good points.


http://www.pushsquare.com/news/2015...r_games_or_is_this_simply_a_sign_of_the_times

Soapbox: Has It Just Been a Bad Week for Games, Or Is This Simply a Sign of the Times?

Posted Fri 20th Mar 2015 12:45 by Sammy Barker

Sammy Barker reckons that the industry’s in one big scrap
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You've got to take the rough with the smooth – but these past few days have been more rugged than Vin Diesel's right-angled jaw. It's not been a vintage week for the games industry, with Metal Gear Solid creator Hideo Kojima seemingly being pushed out of Konami, first-party developer Evolution Studios struck by a round of redundancies, and even indie developer Jeff Minter blocked from releasing TxK on the PlayStation 4. But has this just been a bad week, a catalogue of catastrophes all occurring within the same small timeframe – or is this more a sign of the times?

It's becoming clearer to me that gaming is in a transitional period right now, and I'm not sure that it's going to land on its feet for a while. Sales of the PlayStation 4 – now at an impressive 20.2 million units – show that console gaming is alive and well, but I am starting to wonder whether this staggering statistic is covering up some real unrest under the surface. It occurs to me that very few people are happy at the minute: creators are curbed, publishers risk-averse – and you only need to glance at our Facebook page to see that some consumers are seriously unsatisfied.
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These people are the vocal minority, of course, and not everyone has a gripe to bear – but it feels like we're in a pressure cooker at the minute, and at any point it's going to burst. We've certainly seen a few cracks begin to emerge over the past few days, with the occurrences at Konami. I'm not on the inside, so I don't know anything for sure, but it strikes me that the situation with Kojima comes down to a disagreement over the future of Metal Gear – presumably with the publisher wanting to make more. Heck, it announced this morning that it's already recruiting for the next entry, despite Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain still being some six months away.

I can certainly see boardroom executives taking issue with the rockstar status of the series creator, but let's be realistic here: Konami owns a best-selling brand, and it wants to exploit it – regardless of whether one of its employees commands a ridiculous amount of media and consumer sway. But this isn't an issue that's specific to the Metal Gear – it's happening all over the globe. Activision, for example, is doubling down on Destiny and Call of Duty, while EA focuses on its litany of sports games and Star Wars. Where are the Dead Spaces of the PS4? They don't exist.
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Even the new brands like Watch Dogs and Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor feel fundamentally familiar, subscribing to a gameplay structure that we've seen time and time before. Last year, I was forced to capture strongholds in vapid open world maps in no less than five different games – and I haven't even played Far Cry 4 yet. And that's because as budgets increase, risks are being reduced – and innovation (as much as I hate that word) is being thrown out of the window. The blockbuster games space is turning into a production line – no wonder so much talent is abandoning ship.

There is refuge, much to the dismay of many, in the indie games space – but even this segment of the industry has become toxic. While simultaneously complaining about the homogenisation of the aforementioned tentpole titles, consumers are also taking potshots at the smaller games – be it because their production values can't compete with The Order: 1886 or because they don't have infinite replay value like Assassin's Creed Unity. It really feels like no one can win right now: expectations are at an all-time high, and very, very few can actually afford to meet them.
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And it's why, in my opinion, we're ending up with situations like DriveClub, where developers overpromise in order to standout – but ultimately under deliver. Don't get me wrong, I hold Evolution Studios fully responsible for the issues that occurred with the PlayStation 4 exclusive racer, but would it have had to stretch itself so thin, building such complicated social and graphical features, if consumers and critics didn't expect so much? The irony is that, even if the release had worked, the game apparently wasn't good enough anyway; read the reviews and you'll realise that most demanded an open world. Clearly it would have been better with radio towers to capture.

I'm not letting the Runcorn first-party off the hook – it absolutely should have delivered, and on time to boot. But the layoffs that occurred at the studio this week almost seemed inevitable – it feels like you get one shot these days. There's no time for a second chance; I doubt that we'll see an Uncharted: Drake's Fortune to Uncharted 2: Among Thieves type transition this generation, because if something doesn't hit straight away in the AAA space, then all resources will be invested back into the tried and tested.
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It just feels like everyone's in a scrap right now to me: publishers are sparring with creators who are doing battle with consumers – and so on. This week was summed up by Atari's attempts to remove TxK from the PlayStation Store, a game that's probably sold a few thousand copies at most on the PlayStation Vita. While it seems like it had the option to work with Jeff Minter in order to resurrect the Tempest brand, it instead decided to trade legal blows with Llamasoft just to protect an intellectual property that it's never going to use.

And, as is so often the case, the issue at the very core of all of this drama is money. Consumers want more and more, publishers want to spend less, and creators – caught between risk-averse companies and indie detractors – can't seem to catch a break. This is very much a war of attrition, and I don't think that anyone's going to win. Sure, strong sales of the PS4 may be keeping consoles alive – but if the industry's going to continue like this, it won't be too long before I start to ponder whether they'd be better off dead.

 

[Oberon]

Have you heard about the online petition started by an Aussie wanting a remaster of CoD Modern Warfare 2?
You wouldnt think much of it but about 4 or 5 days ago Todd Alderman (part of the group that sued Activision) who worked on the original Call of Duty and Modern Warfare has returned to Infinity Ward as its multiplayer project director.
Although CoD games now have a 3 year dev cycle this year being Treyarch's turn maybe will see Infinity Ward's Modern Warfare 2 on PS4 sometime after all?
Ill believe it when I see it and as much fun as playing MW2 on PS4 might be Id still prefer a new CoD game.
Hmm,perhaps a Call of Duty Classic Collection?

 

[Titan]

Have you heard about the online petition started by an Aussie wanting a remaster of CoD Modern Warfare 2?
You wouldnt think much of it but about 4 or 5 days ago Todd Alderman (part of the group that sued Activision) who worked on the original Call of Duty and Modern Warfare has returned to Infinity Ward as its multiplayer project director.
Although CoD games now have a 3 year dev cycle this year being Treyarch's turn maybe will see Infinity Ward's Modern Warfare 2 on PS4 sometime after all?
Ill believe it when I see it and as much fun as playing MW2 on PS4 might be Id still prefer a new CoD game.
Hmm,perhaps a Call of Duty Classic Collection?

That, to be honest doesn't bother me so much for some reason. I had some great memories in Modern Warfare 2. But then again, there is that part of me that's starting to go into a rage screaming "not another damn remake".

And on a side note, I never got the 3 year development cycle for the CoD games. I just don't see how it takes them 3 years to make. It's the same damn game every time!

 

[Poking]

I think Oculus is the future of video games. Playstation has their own patent coming out eventually. The ps4 have a lot to offer. We're just not there yet. 2016 will be it

 

[Titan]

I think Oculus is the future of video games. Playstation has their own patent coming out eventually. The ps4 have a lot to offer. We're just not there yet. 2016 will be it

I hope your right. VR could be the revolution that gamers need right now. It seems in the last couple years games have been starting to get stale. There haven't been any true revolutionary games that came out that add something new to the table; and where everyone loses their mind to have to have it. VR could spur some new creative games that developers and publishers are willing to take a risk on. VR is going to go two ways. It's going to be accepted and people are going to like it. Or it's going to be like PS Move and Kinect and no one will give a crap about it. Honestly I haven't made up my mind on VR just yet. What they do have to do is make sure the headsets are affordable and then have some great games come with it to make you want to buy it.

 

[allyghee]

Gamers, studios and game Journalist 'redefined' the meaning of good quality games. It's all about 1080p and anything less on a particular platform starts a clan war. So the studios now rehash the same games in 1080p for us....

 

[jeffnz]

Does anybody feel that great games are so rare to come by these days? I have followed video games for a decade now, and I am quite disappointed with things as they are. The PS4 has been great at handling multiplatform games and remasters, but it has yet to get a must-have exclusive, don't you think? We are now two years into the new cycle, and all we have got is a plethora of remasters and very few new quality IPs. Games are delayed again and again, and when they are eventually released, they never live up to the hype. My faith in this generation is really wavering!

We have a choice here, stop buying FPS games and buy more indie games. If we encourage small studios, they'll eventually make larger projects. The issue as I see it, is that gamers are willing to spend all their money on big releases by big companies (Zenimax and EA). Such companies have made a formula for games: they use data to predict which games will sell, and they create their games based on the success (sales data) of previous games. Fortunately there are many indie games out there on PSN and XBL.

 

[Oberon]

I get it your point.
But I didnt buy the PS4 for crappy 8 and 18-bit titles of yesteryear.No matter how good they are.

 

[LilMissRage]

I actually fan of the indie games more so than the big same old fps thy has no imagination or evolution since they came out.

I am enjoying the more emotional story driven games (guess I am a chick), likes of Life is strange, telltale games...I understand they are maybe more interactive movies then actual gaming, but it suits me.

 

[jeffnz]

I get it your point.
But I didnt buy the PS4 for crappy 8 and 18-bit titles of yesteryear.No matter how good they are.

I use the term "indy" loosely. There are good modern games that are either free, or made by a small studio of 40-100 staff. Battle For Wesnoth is a very good turn-based strategy game for Windows, Mac and Linux (cartoony graphics but unique and modern-feeling gameplay). Also, a guy at work told me about Tropico 5 which is now released. Tropico lacks in graphics but I couldn't care less about that, after having broken Oblivion on Xbox 360, and hearing of the total flop of Skyrim on PS3. Wesnoth is an excellent distraction for me, I refuse to buy any new games until I see what the early users say.

I'd rather play a bit of the Wesnoth campaign every now and then, and consider buying Tropico 5 before I chuck money at another big production. Besides Tropico and Wolfenstein: The Old Blood, I don't think I'll buy another game until 2016. I intend to keep as much money in my pocket as I can, then I might move to Auckland and study game development in a couple of years, then I'll make my own games! It isn't only the technical failures which companies won't fix (eg. the a-bomb glitch in Oblivion), the other thing that makes me irate is the lack of creativity. What happened to hybrid-genre games like BattleZone 2?

If I get pro at coding I'd like to create a game that's a mix of elements taken from pacman, bomberman and minecraft. Unlike bomberman, my future game could include a balance between planting bombs and shooting. Perhaps shooting could be the main part, and placing bombs could be used to get into new areas of the map. Then like minecraft, players could place a block or two as an obstacle for other players, o yeah and you'd be able to build your own world of course kinda like minecraft. Plus I could chuck in access cards or buttons/levers like in Duke Nukem on n64. I'm sure that sounds whack, but when you think of it Minecraft is kinda like a bomberman game, perhaps in reverse, and it's 3d. Having a game based on blocks isn't an original concept but it can be made to look like it.

Anyway that idea above is for 2d. If I were to make a 3d game it'd be an RTS, or an RTS-FPS hybrid (like Battle Zone 2). I'd like to see genre experimentation and varied gameplay mechanics in today's games. Okay that was a huge tangent but it's fascinating stuff: old school games, fresh ideas, and the fact that not all new games totally suck. I love Wolfenstein's implementation of perks, the laser craftwork gun, and secrets. I don't think there's another FPS that's worth buying on console, except maybe Destiny which I don't have time for.

 

[Poking]

Some Indie games are great but lets be honest, they dont have budget! The think is these games could run on my pentium 2... We want block busters like GTA5 to run on our 500$ console. But like mention b4 these games cost a sh$t load of money to produce. Same thing in the movie industry. Theres no studios who want to invest millions of dollars in a movie "with potential" unless theres Will Smith in it. You gotta have some sort of guarantee. Thats why all the blockbusters got the same recipe, because it works. In the 8bit era we didnt have this problem All we needed was a bunch of geeks

 

[Titan]

Some Indie games are great but lets be honest, they dont have budget! The think is these games could run on my pentium 2... We want block busters like GTA5 to run on our 500$ console. But like mention b4 these games cost a sh$t load of money to produce. Same thing in the movie industry. Theres no studios who want to invest millions of dollars in a movie "with potential" unless theres Will Smith in it. You gotta have some sort of guarantee. Thats why all the blockbusters got the same recipe, because it works. In the 8bit era we didnt have this problem All we needed was a bunch of geeks

Also, in the 8 bit and Atari 2600 days, games were much simpler to produce. You could pump out a game in a matter of weeks, if you wanted, with minimal people working on it. If it didn't do well, then oh well. Move on to the next title. But then again, that mentality is what brought about the Video Game Crash. As games got more complex, they take more time to produce and need bigger staffs to produce. So naturally, the cost and budget to make a game has gotten bigger. It's harder to take those chances today because if you spend 2 years producing a game and spending millions to get it made, then it flops, you go the way of THQ.

 

[jeffnz]

Forget indy. There are games that are in-between "indy" and "big production". Have you guys heard of Petroglyph? Several years ago (2008-2009) I read their job descriptions and they said "3 years game dev experience, minimum" so they're serious, but I'm sure many are unfamiliar with Petroglyph. They mainly make strategy games for PC, from what I know. I'd buy their games but I don't want Windows on my PC

 

[duanegrundy]

I agree the games have same old functionality.