What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

Strongly agree with bolded.^ But I'm pretty much on the same boat with all of those.

I think you forgot the most important aspect of all. A good theme. This prevents the game from being a drag and allows long gameplay to be a positive instead of a negative. A properly developed theme allows for all of the listed above and much more.

Also an important trait in a good game is something that distinguishes it from any other game that is similar on the market. What makes a game special is what makes a game good.

About the graphics, I would rather have medium grade or low grade/retro graphics than super high detail. Frankly, showing every single blood spill, gunshot wound, and every form of destruction with full-on graphical intensity just creeps me out. While some people would prefer that games have real world physics, I would much rather play the game as a game, not some piece of crap war scene.

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

pretty much the same for me though id add penumbra and golden sun to that list.

oh, a great story helps

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

I've dubbed Zelda:OOT my all time favorite game for basically most of the reasons you listed. It was a well made game, especially considering the time period it was released. Just the overwhelming sense of adventure it produced was enough for me to fall in love with it immediately. I'm a huge fan of games that invoke thought; that's something I think you're missing from the list. The soundtrack also makes me nostalgia up to this day. It was just a very entertaining game in general. When I played it, I had a VERY difficult time putting the controller down while playing it, that's how I know it's a good game. They just don't make games like that anymore.

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

To me, good video games should tell really good stories. Good games tend to have great stories and memorable "characters" (characters can be used loosely) as well as a great atmosphere (mostly music). Graphics is not a factor to me. Good video games can be short.

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

I take it we're talking exclusively about RPG type console games. There's plenty of different things that make a good flash game.

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

I was kinda talking about consoles games. There are games that offer less than 10 hours of gameplay that can be good. The same kinda goes for RPGs,well maybe not less than 10 hours but something short for RPGs can be good too. Length doesn't really matter to me, unless it's really really short.

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

I'm not too sure about this. I've enjoyed several <20 hour games over the 60-80 Japanese RPG grindfests, so I'm in the same boat as Rushy. Persona 3 and Persona 4 were critically acclaimed with good reviews, but I couldn't find the appeal especially when it came to the 100+ hour journey of diving the same dungeon over and over.

The only really long game I've enjoyed to date is Oblivion.

I bunch these two together because they are relevant. Diversity in environments is great, but only if it works to serve a purpose and has good art direction behind it. I don't necessarily mean to say the game has to be SUPER REALISTIC 50000000000 POLYCOUNT GRAPHICS, but the art style must definitely stand out to me. I am a generally visual person.

Yes, yes. I feel these are both an absolute must.

Always a bonus, but I don't find it makes a game more fun all the time. It can just add tedium, so I'm a bit reserved on these.

If it's filled to the brim with content, yes. (See: The Elder Scrolls 3 & 4.) Otherwise, no.

This one, I don't agree with. Ninja Gaiden is considered ball-bustingly hard and Shadow of the Collossus is pretty damn confusing for someone who doesn't play games often (making the whole experience harder than it should be). Yet these games are both considered really fun and in SotC's case, epic. Sometimes the challenge adds to the enjoyment factor.
Kirby's Epic Yarn was a damn cakewalk but it had a killer soundtrack, lots of great environments, gameplay gimmicks that kept it interesting and superb art direction.

I don't think difficulty is necessarily relevant to a game's "epic/fun" factor, but I suppose that boils down to the individual.

I do generally agree with your points and I myself can't break it down into highlights any more concise than that.

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

Not too easy, not too hard.

A challenging game is challenging, not too hard.

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

The threshold for "too easy" or "too hard" varies from player to player. A challenging game may well be "too hard" for a vast majority of players. Not everybody likes to be frustrated while playing.

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

I think the point rubix was trying to make was a subjective view of too easy and too hard.

Not too easy for you, not too hard for you.

Fun is subjective after all

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

By "not too easy and not too hard" I mean that the difficulty was appropriate for most people. It wasn't so hard that people were unable to progress in the game, but it wasn't so easy that you could just coast through without any effort, either. Most people who wanted to beat, say, Ocarina of Time, were actually able to despite getting stuck here and there. The same can't be said for other games where people get stuck and then stop playing the game out of frustration -- or games where it's so easy to win that you toss it away and forget about it after a few hours of gameplay.



Another question: What kind of stories do you think work the best? What do you consider a fun/good game storyline and why? Examples?

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

I like a longer game myself, but it has to hold interest for me. RPG games are great, but they have too low of a replay value for me -- I'll end up being on my first save file only to be overly fatigued because of all of the running around I have to do for something specific.

Environment diversity is a HUGE thing for me. If I'm able to roam freely in a game's world, it better be big enough for me to have some fun while I'm off of my main storyline (one of the huge reasons why I fell in love with Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, despite the horrible dialogues and somewhat annoying missions).

Soundtracks are another great thing to have, but not a lot of a games have fairly appealing soundtracks, probably because the composer is probably trying harder to convey a mood in a non-distracting (or intentionally distracting, see: Resident Evil games) manner to the player, causing them to be particularly limited.

Memorable characters doesn't make a game epic and fun to me. However, it's something that adds replay value to a game if I just want to see that character again. Krauser from Resident Evil 4 comes to mind here - the scene before the boss battle involves you pressing buttons with decently fast reflexes to emulate Leon dodging what would be fatal hits to you. It's fast, it's intense, and it's something I would go back to just to reabsorb that part of the game again.

Side-quests. Absolutely. Any fan of Crash Bandicoot will tell you that it is the best game to acquaint yourself to handling side-quests, because if you want 100% completion, you're going to have to replay levels at LEAST twice (3+ times if you're playing the newer games) to achieve everything. The reason why it's a side-quest to me is because even if you acquire only what you're supposed to, you can face the last boss, win, and see the credits screen (this would technically leave you at 35-40% completion rate, but it's still technically beating the storyline).

Hidden goodies are neat too. I remember playing Fantavision for PS2, and once you completed the game on Hard Mode, you would unlock an almost "screen-saver" like mode, where you can press buttons on your controller to trigger very realistic looking fireworks, as fast as you wanted, whenever you wanted. The game itself was very short, but it was pretty interesting.

Large worlds are great to me, but only if I can roam within them. If I'm constrained to a storyline and I can't do anything else, then the large world is absolutely useless and the game gets incredibly boring, very quickly. There should always be a lot to explore in a good game, and there should always be something else for you to do (obviously excluding most platform games).

Finally, the ideal game to me is one that picks up in difficulty fairly early, and turns incredibly hard at the end of the game. This particular thought reminded me of the game Black (PS2), where the AI difficulty level would automatically adjust based off of how well you were completing the early levels. The game has 8 levels, with a bit of length in each of them, but not overbearing. I happened to breeze through the first 4 or 5 levels, but the difficulty gradually got harder and harder. The very last level, the Spetriniv Gulag, has a hectic shootout at the end of the game, where it's you against a ridiculous amount of people (an army of baddies, woo!), machine-gun nests, and RPG men firing rockets, and man -- I've got to say, it was probably one of the most well-earned game beats I had. Came into the last area with very little life (want to say 30%), and came out with a gray screen, a single sliver of life, and entering the door to the final cut scene.

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

I grew up on Japanese RPGs, so anything that isn't heavy-handed "save the world because you are the one" works just fine for me. Political scuffles (Final Fantasy 12 had a good plot, as far as Final Fantasy goes) and things that a regular player can relate to are generally interesting.

Or maybe that's just comparative contrast working on me after living through a lot of shitty plots.

Re: What, to you, makes a game epic/fun?

Halogen: I've never been much of a replay-value guy unless it's concerning a multiplayer game (Super Smash Brothers: Melee is my favorite multiplayer game and I will *NEVER* get sick of playing that with others whenever the opportunity presents itself). I judge a game based on how I feel as I play through it the first time. I think it's hard for a game to captivate you one way on the first pass but then offer something different via a second pass. I mean, do most people *really* play NG+ modes?