I think I found the Video Game equivalent of the Animation Age Ghetto.

I say, stop trying to preemptively categorize. Its *all* art. 90% of it is just crap, like with any other artform. How do you tell the great art? Same way as with any other medium: the test of time.

^ He said exactly what I meant to say. Thank you.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if we lived in a world where we wouldn't have to live in fear of being horrifically misjudged by our likes and not be yelled at for them being someones elses dislikes?

... Haha! Like that's gonna happen!

Get this, Team Fortress 2, a 17+ rated game (or 15+ rated if you bought it in the Ornage Box, lolwut?) has had newbies flood in and whine how it has cartoony graphics, and acting as if that's enough basis to call the game shitty.

Because, CLEARLY a game that looks like a Bloody Hilarious gore fest made by Pixar is bound to be "kiddy shit."

Also, this effect of having less colorful and more Grim and Gritty Darker and Edgier and about 70% of (notable) games aiming for "realism" has caused in the following becoming rarer:

• Sugar Bowl
• Related to above, Crapsaccharine World
• Funny Animal characters, or generally any animals with character other than "try to eat player" or "be visible in cutscene."
• Colorful and vibrant areas. Even forest areas tend to get the sun completely blocked out and a dirty green filter over everything.
• Platformer and Collectathon type games. Admit it, those were pretty fun if the level design was clever or awesome enough.
• Puzzle Games tend to be on mobile phones or facebook mostly now. Though theres the occasinoal critically acclaimed exceptions like Professor Layton.
• Theres a slight over saturation of FPS games on the market currently.

For soem reason, this seems to affect the west more than the east. Though that probobly shouldn't be a surprise, seeing how CGI obsessed the western industry is, but how theres still a strong love for traditinoal animation in the east.

edited 5th Jul '11 3:30:17 PM by KuroFox

Here's the thing; you can't "play" a painting, movie, or book. Some of my favorite games not only let you play through the experience but also leave your own marks on it through Multiple Endings and paths. That's a whole different ball game from most other media, even if Video Games aren't "art" (and boy, do I no care if someone like Roger Ebert thinks these are or not), they still have a unique advantage.

...I think this thread has drifted and I didn't help. >.>

I think the issue isn't about getting people to regard games as 'art', but to get them to respect things that aren't 'art'.

Video games are art. There. The fact that anyone would argue against this baffles me. Personally, though, i don't really care.

You're kidding. Please, say it ain't so. I know the COD-Kiddies and fratbros have become a malicious tumor that is leeching life away from real hardcore gamers in an excrutiatingly painful manner (Do i sound bitter?) but disparaging Team Fortress 2 for "Kiddy graphix" is a level of sacrilege i just can't tolerate.

I got extremely bored of the Real Is Brown aesthetic years ago. I'm turning into one of those hideous abominations that cling to anything that offers them "Nostalgia" and it frightens me.

edited 5th Jul '11 5:50:43 PM by ShirowShirow

As a former Darker and Edgier and Grim and Gritty enthusiast, I am so happy to have the fun games still kicking around. Although, I am most happy when they secretly turn out to be Darker and Edgier. *coughEversioncough*

edited 5th Jul '11 6:37:23 PM by EviIPaladin

For me it's not really nostalgia so much as flavor. A lot of games I see nowadays don't offer much in the way of personal flavor, but I find those occasional gens that do.

Earlier today I bought the entire STALKER franchise set on Steam. True, this is because it was on sale, but it's also because I've been meaning to try that group of games out for ages. It's different. Yes, it's dark and gritty, but it's also an unusual way of doing a semi-realistic FPS that I haven't really seen elsewhere (except Metro2033, but that was done by a group including some of the level designers for STALKER, so that's cheating innit?).

Later, I might pick up Frozen Synapse, which is a considerably weirder game. If chess were to be redesigned so you directed your entire army's plan of action in one-move increments, and all of them acted at once and reacted to one another on their own whims (dependent on die roll or otherwise), it might come close... but it wouldn't be as fast or interesting in the final phase. FS is a strategy game done in a way only a computer game can handle gracefully. The only thing keeping me from buying it is that I'm not sure I'd have anyone I know to play it with.

Bioshock is something a bit more common that I'd love to have picked up, but it's pretty well past its prime at this point. Maybe I'll borrow it at some point, and play it through, but I've seen a lot of it already from shoulder-sitting. It's definitely got a nice storytelling method, and even if System Shock did it long before, Bioshock still handles it gracefully.

These are the kinds of games that interest me. Samey junk food games do not, whether they're Dragon Quest clones or Call Of Duty clones or any other Follow the Leader type game experience. I want something that shows the developers cared a lot about what they were doing, something that carries its own flavor, like I said before. We seem to be getting a lot more of these kinds of games in the spotlight lately, and I'd love to see the trend continue.

Goggle Fox, you has it right. I don't want to act like a hipster, but i only buy stuff that does things differently nowadays.

Obligatory image.◊

I remember when buying a JRPG, any JRPG, guaranteed a good time. Whether it was a Final Fantasy game or Legend Of Legaia or Wild AR Ms or whatever it would be fun. Sometime amid the late PS 2 era we started to see a ton of Cliché Storm types and some of them just sucked for other reasons. And now the JRPG genre is considered stagnant and unprofitable, with only games that do stuff differently like Shin Megami Tensei making news. The same thing happened with Shoot 'Em Up games during the 16-bit timeframe.

So, is this going to happen to modern shooters? I hope so, we really need a shakeup. But the people that buy them tend to be less finicky then the people that buy JRPG and Shoot 'Em Up games, which are placed squarely in the "Hardcore" bracket...

Each series in the Mega Ten franchise (and Persona and Raidou by extension) tends to stick to its own formulas from game to game, so only the first game in each branch of the franchise is truly new. I think different is a better term for how those games compare to the average JRPG.

Final Fantasy may be a Cliché Storm, but they explicitly try to introduce new mechanics with each installment. In fact, every new JRPG I've seen tries to sell itself on something it does differently from previous games, usually in the combat mechanics. I don't think the field is becoming stale, but people pay less and less attention to the changes and focus on the similarities.

Speaking of similarities, what on Earth is up with Iron Sights aiming nowadays? Okay, have your Gun Porn, just let me see what I'm looking at. Make the gun half transparent or something so I can see through it. People have two eyes y'know.

That's why I play Counter Strike: Source. It's easy to install a custom skin for a weapon to make it look like another one. Want your AK-47 to look like an AK-74Su? Or your FAMAS to look like an IWI Tavor? Or your M249 to look like an M4A1 with a 100-round Beta C-Mag, a suppressor, a vertical grip and an EOTech sight? Or your Dual Beretta Elites to look like dual automatic shotguns? Simply go to Gamebanana and download skins to your delight!

edited 5th Jul '11 10:00:39 PM by RocketDude

People still play Counter Strike? Now that i think about it... THAT'S WHERE IT ALL BEGAN. Dun dun duuuuun.

Yeah, but with no health recovery at all, no ironsights, crazy recoil, armor and a strong modding community.

My brother showed me some interesting statistics on Steam last weekend.

Top 3 played games on Steam?

• #1: Team Fortress 2
• #2: Counter Strike
• #3: Counter Strike: Source

And I don't play FPS games, but I can already tell you, iron sighting and "strawberry jam vision" is getting old already.

And I was serois about the COD-kiddies and fratboys critizising Team Fortress 2's graphics. Though my sources are tales from Face Punch forums, but those people play a lot of TF 2.

Also another genre in heavy decline is the Beat 'em Up. No, not Fighting Game, Streets Of Rage kind of stuff.

... then again, I play an MMO that is pretty much that mixed with RPG flavor, so I guess I have my fix for it.

Oh well, as much as we rant about 70% of the notable games on the market being similar, every so often some gems pop up. And I don't mind looking through older games for "new" discoveries like Dark Chronicle. It's not nostalgia, since I never played it before, but simply that I don't judge a game by it's age.

edited 6th Jul '11 2:06:45 AM by KuroFox

How did CS:Source get to #3? It must have improved tremendously since launch for so many people to pick it up.

Beat 'em Up genre does need a bit of a boost, though I'm more a fan of the platformer beat-em-up style — which has a fair amount of use nowadays, through games like Muramasa. The hardest part of a game like that is keeping it from getting "repetitive" for people, which is probably best managed with novel enemy placement and grouping.

I miss the "RPG-beat em ups." Aside from Vanilla Ware, nobody makes them anymore.

You meean Action RPG's, or Beat 'em Up's with RPG Elements?

edited 6th Jul '11 9:58:18 AM by Demongodofchaos2

The second one. Look up Odin Sphere and Muramasa The Demon Blade. Particularly, look for gameplay footage of those, or dig 'em out of your collection and play them.

. . . What do you mean you don't own them? FIX THIS

Eh, I've wanted Muramasa The Demon Blade for whie now, but never got the chance to play it.

Action RPG. Beat 'em Up.

Dungeon Fighter Online. That is all.

Seconding Dungeon Fighter Online.

Thirding, Even though I haven't played in a while.

And that new Vanilla Ware game, of course.

I suspect that the new game will hew closer to D&D Arcade than to, say, Odin Sphere, meaning that the RPG elements won't be as extensive. I certainly don't see how they can put in the scale of plot that they're known for.