I'm done! Nintendo has fucked me on^h^h^h 3 times too many!

[schild]

What?

[StGabe]

...

Wow.  Very amusing rewriting of what I said.

I wasn't talking about BSG in the context of blowing up robots/aliens.  That was a different conversation.  Yes, BSG has that.  Hmm, wonder why.  Maybe because it is a revisit of a 30 year old TV series?  And actually, while I applaud its characterization I don't like the tired rehash of blowing up robots.

The statement about elves and dwarves was intentional hyperbole but of course you are really only interested in how many nits you can pick so you wouldn't get that.  That most old fantasy (which I did quanlify as 30+ years old) has flat characters is a statement that I stand by.  That Steven Erikson and George RR Martin are doing things with the genre that have not been done before by anyone is another thing I stand by.

I never said anything at all about rock music and music scoring.  Other people talked about that.  I said that generally I find the average quality of scoring to be much higher these days than in the past and that a few exceptions to that overall rule do not disprove that generally this is true.

You give a list of games you like and that is valid evidence but my list is cherry-picking. Very convenient.

I didn't pick one game from this year and one game from that year.  I picked the entire list of games that I have purchased in the last 3-4 months (actually I left out Bookworm Adventures but I was thinking of just console titles).  Of those I listed, all but 1 are new releases.  And all of them include gameplay that wasn't available/possible 20 years ago.  All of them are fantastic games.  And all of them are games I'd rather play than well, any SNES game.  Which isn't, of course, to say that there aren't good SNES games.  It is to say that there are better games now -- for me.

I have no idea, whatsoever, how anyone who isn't in denial, can look at a game list like that, of games all released in the same 3-4 month period, and think that we haven't moved forward from SMB3.

[schild]

I dunno. Platformers havne't moved very much in the fun factor from Mario 3. And trust me when I say nostalgia isn't my strong suit.

In fact, platformers are probably the poorest evolving genre. You're bad at this.

let's do Metroidvanias next.

[StGabe]

I dunno. Platformers havne't moved very much in the fun factor from Mario 3. And trust me when I say nostalgia isn't my strong suit.

Uhh, I agree.  I said as much like 3 pages back.

Overall, however, I feel it is very shortsighted (or nostalgic if you will) not to think that we've come quite a ways since the time when SMB3 was the highpoint of gaming.

The whole conversation started in response to you talking about whether we'd gotten anywhere between the SNES and the Wii and my point is that we have.  In such a manner that we often lose sight of all the improvements we've had.  Because our standards are just a lot higher these days.  And we've forgotten the many, many crap games from back then and just remember the few good ones.

[stray]

George RR Martin are doing things with the genre that have not been done before by anyone is another thing I stand by.

Martin is considered "low fantasy". It's an entire subgenre that's existed at least as far back as Conan (the 30's). There are all kinds of people who have been writing character/personal struggle based stories within fantasy settings for years. It's not an innovative thing.

I never said anything at all about rock music and music scoring.  Other people talked about that.  I said that generally I find the average quality of scoring to be much higher these days than in the past and that a few exceptions to that overall rule do not disprove that generally this is true.

As far as this subject goes, you're woefully wrong. It's not a "few exceptions". It's you not knowing shit, and talking out of your ass. I hate to go all Margalis on you here, since it's not my style, but I just have to. I've wasted a good deal of my life studying the subject of music, and it's history, including film scores. Wasted. What have you done? Buy a Freddy Got Fingered DVD?

You're either deaf, or just some guy who doesn't expose himself enough to film and music history. Or just the history of art in general.

Back to knitting with you!

[Strazos]

What have you done? Buy a Freddy Got Fingered DVD?

lolz. Also, RR Martin isn't doing anything new per se; he's just doing his thing very very well. Same as Paolini.

I also call bullshit on your notion that the only reason I can go back and play games that are not new is because of nostalgia. Link to the Past isn't really that good? Tons of RPGs have heavily surpassed the Baldur's Gate saga? Um, Deus Ex?

And you're supposedly a game developer? What have you developed, another Bejeweled clone?

[Margalis]

Actually he listed Baldurs Gate as one of the examples of RPGs that are much better than the nostalgic old RPGs...yeah it doesn't make any sense to me either...

I hate to go all Margalis on you here, since it's not my style...

But it's so fun! 

Everyone pile on Gabe! The idea that character driven fiction is new...is just absurd. As far as things like Lost go, it's a phase. Right now TV is in a serial-story phase. Lost, The Nine, Heroes, BSG, Jericho, etc etc. In a couple of years we'll be on some new phase. That's all it is. Now if this phase appeals to you more than others that's fine, but I wouldn't go off and say it represents some awesome new direction in storytelling. More like trying to duplicate the success of 24.

I do think this is a very good time for the TV drama, but IMO a lot of that has to do with cable. Nearly all the dramas people here (on F13) like are on cable. The Wire, The Shield, Rome, The Sopranos, Deadwood, BSG, Rescue Me. I don't think it is a revolution in storytelling and craft as much as the emergence of something other than the big 3 or 4 networks and their play-it-safe, family-friendly approach.

I think Gabe seriously underestimates things like that - environmental issues that have nothing to do with art *or* craft.

But I will agree that this is a great time for TV drama. But by the same token a terrible time for TV sit-coms.

Edit: I'm still waiting for Gabe to articulate how film scoring today is different and better than it was in the past.

[CmdrSlack]

Whatever, you nostalgia-driven hacks!  You couldn't pick up a hooker, get full health, then kill the hooker and get your cash back in the SNES days!  Hurrah for innovation!

 

[McCow]

Whatever, you nostalgia-driven hacks!  You couldn't pick up a hooker, get full health, then kill the hooker and get your cash back in the SNES days!  Hurrah for innovation!

 

The princess was a hooker.  What do you think she was doing in the other castle?

[geldonyetich]

Mario was a "plumber".

[StGabe]

Whatever.  You see the thing is, I learned a long time ago that I don't need to be right about everything I say on the internet.  Batting .900 is just fine by me.  You can each take pot shots at the one idea I've mentioned that you disagree with.  You still aren't really responding to most of what I'm saying.  Games, generally, have gotten significantly better in the past 20 years.  A random sampling of the new releases currently available demonstrates an amazing breadth of gameplay not available 20 years ago and in fact, quite a bit more fun that which was available 20 years ago.

None of that says that you can't still have fun playing an SNES games these days.  As I pointed out, I admitted in my very first post that yes there are SNES games that I can play for a long time.  It says that overall, the quality has increased tremendously.

The point is not that you can't play SNES games anymore.  The point is that, in discussions like these, they are given a lot of extra credit just because of they impression they made at the time.  We tend to discount all the great stuff going on right because our standards have increased in the meanwhile.

...

And about Martin:
The notion that Conan is doing the same stuff as Martin.....it boggles the mind.  Yes, I know what low fantasy is and no that isn't what I was talking about.  Conan, now there was a flat character.  I have no idea how the notion of a general improvement in character-driven sci-fi over idea-driven sci-fi has escaped you.  It is exactly the point that Martin is doing what he is doing incredibly well.  That is exactly what hadn't been done before.  Conan existed, low fantasy existed, stories did have characters of some sort or another but the quality fo character development wasn't there.  Fantasy/Sci-Fi was stuck in a cycle of rehashes and flat characters (with some exceptions, but not exceptions that match today's standards) and it finally got out of that, with authors like Martin and Erikson offering up not only fantastic ideas but real, deep characters go with them.  The overall increase in quality is exactly the point.

I do think this is a very good time for the TV drama, but IMO a lot of that has to do with cable.

I agree.  I mentioned quite a ways back that a lot of the improvement in narratives comes from an improvement in the overall maturity of the audience.  This has helped to create new markets that can support greater creativity.

[Strazos]

Perhaps you haven't read enough "older" fantasy/sci-fi.

You're simply wrong.

[stray]

Conan, now there was a flat character.

He went from an insecure teenager, to a skull splitting barbarian, to a wandering thief, to a silk adorned patron of the fine arts. One could say that Howard changed him TOO MUCH over time.


You should stop lying. You haven't read any of it.

[Strazos]

Gabe, before you reply to Stray....let me just warn you.


Don't fuck with him when it comes to Conan; it'd be like me messing with someone like Abagadro on an issue of law.


In both cases, it would just be fucking stupid.

[stray]

Pretty soon he'll argue that the Vagina Monologues is a better play than Hamlet.

[schild]

I'm ready to argue that vagina is better than Hamlet.

[Velorath]

The notion that Conan is doing the same stuff as Martin.....it boggles the mind.  Yes, I know what low fantasy is and no that isn't what I was talking about.  Conan, now there was a flat character.  I have no idea how the notion of a general improvement in character-driven sci-fi over idea-driven sci-fi has escaped you.  It is exactly the point that Martin is doing what he is doing incredibly well.  That is exactly what hadn't been done before.  Conan existed, low fantasy existed, stories did have characters of some sort or another but the quality fo character development wasn't there.

Please just stop... fucking... writing.  If your ultimate goal here is to keep being so fucking wrong that the laws of the universe will bend and somehow make you right, I'll let you know in advance that it doesn't work that way.  The only thing you're batting .900 in right now is bullshit.  Please stop embracing ignorance.

[stray]

Now Velorath is pissed. That's saying something. 

[geldonyetich]

I'm batting a 0.473 in noticing that one man's toilet reading is another man's bible.

[stray]

He didn't read anything.

[Ironwood]

Games, generally, have gotten significantly better in the past 20 years.  A random sampling of the new releases currently available demonstrates an amazing breadth of gameplay not available 20 years ago and in fact, quite a bit more fun that which was available 20 years ago.

If that's what you're saying you're right about :  You're Not Right.

Just so you know.

[Big Gulp]

Everyone pile on Gabe! The idea that character driven fiction is new...is just absurd. As far as things like Lost go, it's a phase. Right now TV is in a serial-story phase. Lost, The Nine, Heroes, BSG, Jericho, etc etc. In a couple of years we'll be on some new phase. That's all it is. Now if this phase appeals to you more than others that's fine, but I wouldn't go off and say it represents some awesome new direction in storytelling. More like trying to duplicate the success of 24.

I think it's more than that.  We've been headed in this direction for a long, long time now and with the advent of the DVD and the soon to come permanent On Demand back catalog you're going to be seeing this push towards continuity and directors working on a bigger canvas a lot more.

The whole point of self-contained, wrap everything up in a pretty bow at the end of the hour episodic content was due to the fact that you needed people to be able to get into your show even if they hadn't been following it from the beginning.  Releasing every show in creation on DVD has altered that structure.  And when we have set top boxes where you can pull up whatever episode of whatever show you want at will (Just you wait, it's coming.  Either in the form of an ad-free pay service or an impossible to skip the ads, but free service, it'll get here.) you'll definitely see the landscape change completely.

[Margalis]

You are probably right to some degree, but I expect an eventual backlash as people find it too difficult to follow the continuous storylines of a half-dozen+ shows. As comics have found out, continuity isn't always a good thing, for the consumer or the producer.

Games, generally, have gotten significantly better in the past 20 years.  A random sampling of the new releases currently available demonstrates an amazing breadth of gameplay not available 20 years ago and in fact, quite a bit more fun that which was available 20 years ago.

Did anyone actually perform this random sampling? Of course not.

I suspect a random sampling would find a lot more sequels and licensed games than it would have found during the SNES days. Prove us wrong. But don't claim that a random sample proves X or Y when you haven't actually done the sampling.

Also why is now 20 years ago? 1986? I'm not sure how much argument you are going to get there.

[Aranel]

Whenever I feel disgusted with nintendo, I bring out the N64 and play Ocarina of time.  Good old days...

anyways, I thought gamecube controllers wrked for the Wii?

[Strazos]

Um, they do. But not for all games.

[Aranel]

Hmm... I see....

Then I thought the Wii would support some 3rd party controllers?

[Margalis]

Cube controllers work for some games but not for games that actually require a pointer. You can't play Wii Sports on a cube controller.

[Yegolev]

Platformers, 2D... there's lots of room for opinion there.  Pinnacle could very well be Symphony of the Night, if you ask anyone that's played it.  Best thing that has come out since then are games that try really, really hard to be a reskinned SotN.

Platformers in 3D, I think, have come along rather well lately.  I consider God of War a platformer, so there's where my brain is coming from.  God of War is almost as good as the Ratchet & Clank series, and if there's another 3D platformer in the running, I don't know that I played it.

[stray]

Psychonauts is another great (and recent) 3D platformer.

[Yegolev]

It is, I just wish I had read to find it was a platformer before I bought it.  That aside, it is not quite as good as a R&C or God of War.

[stray]

I would agree. It's not better.

Though I wouldn't call GoW a platformer really. Just "Action Adventure" or somesuch. Would you call Ninja Gaiden, Prince of Persia, or Tomb Raider platformers? If so, then I guess GoW is one too.

[Yegolev]

It is a grey area, I admit.  What dooms GoW to being a platformer is the Hades area; without that I would be less sure about it and might not consider it so.  Might be more fair to say it has platformer elements.

I have never played a Tomb Raider game, but it looks platformy from a distance.  Prince of Persia, I would consider it a platformer.  Not Ninja Gaiden, however, due mostly to some sort of unidentified personal bias.

So, here's a nice academic question.  What would be the differences between Ratchet & Clank and Ninja Gaiden that would cause the first to be a platformer and the second to be merely action-adventure?

[stray]

So, here's a nice academic question.  What would be the differences between Ratchet & Clank and Ninja Gaiden that would cause the first to be a platformer and the second to be merely action-adventure?

Umm.....R&C has actual platform levels maybe?  :-D

I can't recall any of those traditional elements in Ninja Gaiden. It's mostly beating ass on the way to a boss, unlocking traps and such, with a few "ninja" like physical challenges (like wall crawling) tossed about in between (but nothing really platform-y).

[Strazos]

Tomb Raider could definitely be a Platformer/Adventure game.

[Dren]

Wow, go away for the holidays, get my copy of Twilight Princess for the GC, come back and this thing is on page 7.

I really like the game.  The controls are very nice.  It is rare that I can come up with a move in my head and actually accomplish it over 90% of the time.  This game does that.  Even long shots with the bow are easy enough.  Yeah, you don't have a cross hairs, but you have the tip of the arrow to use.  Line that up with your target and you hit it.  They didn't put anything in for physics, so your shot doesn't drop over a distance.  It loses some realism, but it is fun never-the-less.

I'm taking a break from it for now as I was getting into that dangerous obessed mode of my younger years.  Solid game and worth the cost. (Even though it was a present.)