Final Fantasy XIII -3

[Senip]

I never finished 13, just lost interest. That said, FF6 is finished: FF4, with it's continuation, was really fun, and I enjoyed the hell out of it. I'd like to see Square do more Secret of Mana type games, but since Kingdom Hearts killed that...

[Tyson ultima]

You also have to remember that there is final fantasy versus 13 coming out also which i admit looks really good

[StoneMcKnuckle]

Originally Posted by Reincarnate

extremely profitable but they're all just carbon copies of each other

I don't know where you get "extremely profitable" from, really. The fact that everything is a carbon copy of The One Game That Made It is exactly what's killing studios, as nobody wants to play a game that's a carbon copy of another better game. I don't know shit about the Flash game industry, so you may be correct there, but it definitely doesn't apply to the general MMO industry.

I reckon there's a point where people get fed up with the streamlining as critics almost unanimously agreed FFXIII was terrible, and although sales were initially quite good, they quickly declined to the point where stores wouldn't even accept used copies of the game anymore.

Originally Posted by Reincarnate

The casual market has taken off -- which leads to games that are linear, easy, short, and braindead. The FPS genre has especially suffered for this.

The casual market has absolutely nothing to do with this. The FPS genre has suffered partially because of games like Call of Duty cashing in big-time, and partially because games are becoming increasingly expensive to make.

Anyway, I thought they scrapped Versus just recently? Or at the very least put it on hiatus for an indefinite time.

[Mike Weedmark]

Originally Posted by Reincarnate

I know I'm delving into fanboyrantmode with this post, but it's one of the reasons I've gotten jaded with the state of gaming. A lot of awesome franchises have failed to produce anything truly awesome in recent years. Personally, my preferences are pretty much lodged back in the 90's and early 2000's. Then again, it might just be childhood nostalgia overriding reason. :P

Right is right regardless of how fueled by fanboyrage it might be. Comparing something like FF13 to FF6 is so impossibly stupid it would take someone who just discovered games last year to do it. FF13 is such baffling garbage compared to the legacy it borrowed its undeserved name from.

[Senip]

FF 13 versus looks ridiculously fun though!

[Reincarnate]

Originally Posted by StoneMcKnuckle

I don't know where you get "extremely profitable" from, really. The fact that everything is a carbon copy of The One Game That Made It is exactly what's killing studios, as nobody wants to play a game that's a carbon copy of another better game. I don't know shit about the Flash game industry, so you may be correct there, but it definitely doesn't apply to the general MMO industry.

I'm referring to the Flash industry in this case -- it's still extremely profitable because it costs a lot less to develop compared to PC MMO's (which nobody is buying these days), so there's a *bit* more liberty to change things around, but it's still the same formula in the end. A massive portion of Kongregate's revenue comes from games like Dream World, Heroes of Gaia, etc, which is impressive when you consider how many non-MMO games are on that site and how well they've done. The Flash MMO's are Kong's cash cows.

Originally Posted by StoneMcKnuckle

The casual market has absolutely nothing to do with this. The FPS genre has suffered partially because of games like Call of Duty cashing in big-time, and partially because games are becoming increasingly expensive to make.

The paragraph you're quoting from was talking about the shift in market distribution. By "this" I didn't mean to imply that the casual markets led to the decline of the FPS -- I was referring to the distribution shift in general. I probably should have rewritten that to be clearer (that's what you get for typing @ work I guess).

Call of Duty is a good example, really -- it's an easy game that isn't geared towards the hardcore gamer. It's a mass-market game that acts as more of a "fix" for a greater number of people who aren't necessarily gamers in the same sense. Unfortunately, these type of people make up a significant part of the new market and they are now the ones dictating the direction of game development.

And you're definitely right about the costs. They have gone up for a variety of reasons (3D artists/modellers, voice actors, skilled programmers, bigger marketing teams/expenses, licensing and distribution, etc). If you make an easy, pretty, short game, tons of people will play it and be willing to throw money at it. It just isn't profitable anymore to make your game a long, difficult, epic journey -- especially since fewer and fewer people actually reach the end, which makes ROI shittier and shittier towards the endgame with respect to resources used: http://articles.cnn.com/2011-08-17/t...ers?_s=PM:TECH

The profitable idea is to get your player done with single-player mode as fast as possible so you can move them into multiplayer. Some even worry it will eventually go a step further: http://www.industrygamers.com/news/m...ne-in-3-years/

Stuff like this, though, is a breath of fresh air:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ilw7qreDlOk

[StoneMcKnuckle]

Ah, I had an inkling you were referring solely to the Flash industry there, but that definitely wasn't obvious from your first post. And derp, I completely misunderstood what you meant when you were referring to the casual market as I've seen people pushing that exact same misinformed and idiotic point before. Glad to have been wrong about you there.

You're right on all the other accounts, and although I'm saddened by the constant reminder that the meat of action games are declining, I'm really not all that concerned about it - various studios continue to prove that long, meaty games are still very much viable as far as profitable products go, and indie game studios are never afraid to innovate. It really boils down to whether the studio (and often consequently also the other parties involved) cares about making a great product or simply their own bottom end.

ps I find it hilarious that you refer to a game released almost eight years ago is a "breath of fresh air".

anyway discussion over let's stop trying to derail the thread heh

[Emanresu13]

YEAH THIS IS ABOUT FF

i'm gonna bring up ff8 again cause it's like the bastard child or something but i like it

laguna is 2 cool

gameplay sux

music top tier

get rid of squall

also i don't like ff5 very much

[Senip]

Originally Posted by Emanresu13

YEAH THIS IS ABOUT FF

i'm gonna bring up ff8 again cause it's like the bastard child or something but i like it

laguna is 2 cool

gameplay sux

music top tier

get rid of squall

also i don't like ff5 very much

I loved FF8. FF5 was much better once I did the GBA version, rather than the translation.

[Mike Weedmark]

Originally Posted by Reincarnate

The profitable idea is to get your player done with single-player mode as fast as possible so you can move them into multiplayer. Some even worry it will eventually go a step further: http://www.industrygamers.com/news/m...ne-in-3-years/

I want it to be acknowledged that I read that link and think it's a load of shit, but I don't feel like it justifies going into detail. This guy is simply a sensationalist videogame doomer.

[Emanresu13]

really i'm just biased against ff5 because of the job system, it feels like too much micromanagement

this is also the reason i don't like/suck at srpg/rts games

[Reincarnate]

Originally Posted by Mike Weedmark

I want it to be acknowledged that I read that link and think it's a load of shit, but I don't feel like it justifies going into detail. This guy is simply a sensationalist videogame doomer.

I agree w/you that it's a little extreme; I don't agree with his stance -- just showing it. It is true, however, that single player mode has taken a serious backseat to multiplayer over the past decade.

Originally Posted by StoneMcKnuckle

You're right on all the other accounts, and although I'm saddened by the constant reminder that the meat of action games are declining, I'm really not all that concerned about it - various studios continue to prove that long, meaty games are still very much viable as far as profitable products go, and indie game studios are never afraid to innovate. It really boils down to whether the studio (and often consequently also the other parties involved) cares about making a great product or simply their own bottom end.

I agree that they're viable -- they're just tougher to get going in today's climate. Indie gamers today face all sorts of nutty challenges that simply weren't there years ago.

Originally Posted by StoneMcKnuckle

ps I find it hilarious that you refer to a game released almost eight years ago is a "breath of fresh air".

I refer to HL2's scale. Look at how short that credits list is. However, it's important to note that the game itself took a longer time to develop.

Alright done derailing. XD

[Arntonach]

I liked FFV, X, X-2, VIII, XII, XIII & XIII-2.

The main reason is because they're way different from what RPGs usually are, which is why I like the Final Fantasy series; it's not afraid to do try new things in a genre of stagnation and copy-pasting. Yeah, the linearity of XIII was glaring, but it's nothing new for a JRPG and considering how XII was the exact opposite, it makes sense as to why they went with it.

Personally, I had my doubts when XIII-2 was announced as "XIII, but better," but it was okay, for the most part. I thought the DLC and the silliness were the best parts of the game.

XIII-3? I just hope they use a different battle system. PLEASE. The direction might seem iffy, but if it works, I'll be fine.

[Mike Weedmark]

The thing about MP is that although it's attracting a lot of new players, the way most games go about creating their online experience (faking competitiveness by revolving around grinding or introducing elements of luck, or handicaps like in Mario Kart) will never be as satisfying to "Gamers" with a capital G, as a really hard single player game.

I don't feel like MP is succeeding at the expense of SP at this point. I feel like it's recruiting new casual former-non-players, not stealing veteran ones. At worst, in my opinion, SP is stagnating but not shrinking, while MP is expanding as videogames in general expand. Proportionally, MP might be overtaking SP, but in absolute terms, I doubt there's much of a problem.

[Emanresu13]

Originally Posted by Mike Weedmark

(faking competitiveness by revolving around grinding or introducing elements of luck, or handicaps like in Mario Kart)

this a million billion times


oh on topic

i luv ff8, ff7, ff6, ff4, and that's it pretty much xD

[StoneMcKnuckle]

Originally Posted by nunocart

The ffxiii versus was canceles and it turned out to be ffxiii , which is going to be an MMO for the pc.

Where did you read this? I did some brief reading only to find out that the news that it had been cancelled was a false rumor kotaku wrote an article about.

Also, it's going to be an MMO? After FF14 I highly doubt they'd want to try something so risky again.

[Reach]

Uh yeah I'm pretty sure FF13 versus is still a go.

Whether it will be any good or not though is still up in the air.


To join in the FF8 discussion; easiest low level game ever. I like the fact you never have to level up. Actually, as it turns out the game is even easier than it is normally at the lowest possible levels.

Aside from maybe Omega weapon, but I'm also a fan of stat maxing, and getting 255 in pretty much every stat is surprisingly simple in this game if you run a low level game, which also makes Omega pretty easy.


I find it surprising when people complain that 13 was linear, but not 10. 10 was incredibly linear. Actually, in 10-2 they removed a lot of the linearity and the game wasn't nearly as good imo lol. IMO linear isn't necessarily bad. I think the fact that most of the life was sucked out of 13 by removing towns and things like that hurt the game a lot, though I still really liked it.

[Mike Weedmark]

FFR tells you exactly which keys to press and exactly when. Aside from choosing songs, it's the most linear game of all time, and we all like it decently enough.

[Reincarnate]

Originally Posted by Reach

I find it surprising when people complain that 13 was linear, but not 10. 10 was incredibly linear. Actually, in 10-2 they removed a lot of the linearity and the game wasn't nearly as good imo lol. IMO linear isn't necessarily bad. I think the fact that most of the life was sucked out of 13 by removing towns and things like that hurt the game a lot, though I still really liked it.

This is a good point. However, I don't think FFX suffered all that much from its linearity. FFX and FFX13 are both linear compared to other FF games, but I'd say FFX13 is far more restrictive/clingy in what you can do.

At least in FFX I could move around from place to place, whereas in FF13 I felt like I was just moving from one scene to the next as if I were in an interactive movie surging forward. Both games had side-elements to them, but FF13 just bored me to tears. I felt like there was largely only one way to really play the game, and it didn't require much effort at all.

Part of is likely psychological due to lack of towns (as you mentioned). Towns (tend to) have this inherently large, exploratory feel, and so when you nix them, the entire game feels like I'm just walking a preset path -- and it removes some of the magical feel that the other FF games possess.

Then again, even FFX is fairly low on my totem pole, so I can only defend it so much. FFX-2 was horse shit so I will gladly piss on it with whomever else hates it with equal fervor.

I agree that linearity isn't *necessarily* bad, but I think it depends on how the linearity is implemented, since it can manifest itself in different ways based on which mechanic you apply it to.

[Reach]

Originally Posted by Reincarnate

This is a good point. However, I don't think FFX suffered all that much from its linearity. FFX and FFX13 are both linear compared to other FF games, but I'd say FFX13 is far more restrictive/clingy in what you can do.

At least in FFX I could move around from place to place, whereas in FF13 I felt like I was just moving from one scene to the next as if I were in an interactive movie surging forward. Both games had side-elements to them, but FF13 just bored me to tears. I felt like there was largely only one way to really play the game, and it didn't require much effort at all.

Part of is likely psychological due to lack of towns (as you mentioned). Towns (tend to) have this inherently large, exploratory feel, and so when you nix them, the entire game feels like I'm just walking a preset path -- and it removes some of the magical feel that the other FF games possess.

Then again, even FFX is fairly low on my totem pole, so I can only defend it so much. FFX-2 was horse shit so I will gladly piss on it with whomever else hates it with equal fervor.

I agree that linearity isn't *necessarily* bad, but I think it depends on how the linearity is implemented, since it can manifest itself in different ways based on which mechanic you apply it to.

I definitely agree.

I'm not really sure what their excuse is; they need to move back to world maps and exploration based gameplay. A game like Dragon Quest 8 makes me realize how good an expansive RPG could be on a new gen console but for whatever reason, despite the obvious power to the PS3 they've been rather restrictive with their worlds.

Even in 13-2, it's mostly a bunch of smaller maps with the linearity removed so that you can freely explore them. Where my cohesive world, damnit? In fact, I think the sequel suffered somewhat for being overly non-linear with too many hidden secrets, to the point that playing through the game without a guide led me to miss nearly half of the stuff in it, despite exploring most areas thoroughly.

It was still a great game. If it didn't have a final fantasy label on it, I think people would rather it higher than they do currently. But, we expect a standard from the series and hopefully they can bring it back.