The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

[Malacite]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

Ygg, give it up - that stick isn't coming out of his arse no matter how hard you pull on it XD

[Yygdrasil]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

Yeah, you're probably right Mal. Defending games that pushed the limits of their genre and failed is just his thing and we'll all have to get used to it. What say we forget about him and go play M.A.G. for a while. Man... isn't that game just the best?

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

Again, you're missing the point. I'm not in an example war with you. I'm just openly mocking you in the most direct way possible for defending terrible games by praising the unique mediocrity of OTHER TERRIBLE GAMES.

You're going to have to do better than non-examples to explain how these games are terrible. I never said DoC was awesome I said "I liked it alright" which is to say I found it to be average, neither good or bad. I even cited some of its faults rather than just saying it was "bad." You have a difference of opinion you do not bother to explain.

And again, I enjoyed FFX-2 for the same reasons pretty much as FFVIII - gameplay, not story. If it all rode on the story, I would have quit both and never finished either over them, but the gameplay and the metagames in particular were something I could really sink my teeth into and at that point I don't care what the game looks like or what the story is. Squall is surrounded by idiots, Ok, got it.

There are just games where the grind interests me more than the window dressing.

That's at least half of what a JRPG is. Just saying.

Your assertion is that story and gameplay are inseparable is flawed and outdated if FF is going to be your gold standard here. In Final Fantasy, gameplay is the slave and story is the master. That is true, but they're still alien to each other and don't transition seamlessly. Games like Persona, Mass Effect, Monster Hunter or Skyrim emphasize choice , character socialization initiated by the player and exploration.

You'd never assert that story makes Pokemon, its always been freedom, exploration, collection and choice - same as MH or Skyrim. But if story does make the game, they I submit you try Persona or Mass Effect ot see how the player initiates socialization with characters to affect gameplay.

If you took the gameplay out of Persona, all I'd be left with was a visual novel and while it would be a well-written and mature one, I'd probably still pan it on that basis. The fact that is integrated and I can persue the parts of that novel that are interesting to me to power up a certain family of Personas, however, gives me incentive to explore relationships with the characters I like and ignore the others if I don't. Same thing with Mass Effect 2 - who lives and who dies pretty much rides on how much time I spent with characters and how I spoke to them. I don't have to like Zaeed if I don't want to and can send him out to die or risk someone I like who may succeed.

Gameplay does not have to be a slave to story. The fact that people are so down on Final Fantasy and JRPGs in general today is the belief JRPGs can be more than that.

[Yygdrasil]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

Weather must be nice in Ian World.

[Icemage]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

Ok then, show me a game from SE Japan that's tested the limits of what an RPG can be.

Or is that why we all play Namco, Nintendo, Atlus, Bioware and Bethesda RPGs now?

I'd replay both of those games in a heartbeat rather than FFX-2.


Icemage

[Yygdrasil]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

But I'll humor you. Here are just a few reasons why DoC and FFX-2 sucked.

DoC:
- Auto-Aim
- Limited Equipment upgrades
- Forgettable Characters
- Too easy
- Every level felt the same
- Limited control over limit breaks

X-2:
- Sailor Moon-type costume changes that took forever
- Yuna became a singer? Where the fuck did that come from?
- Limit breaks were a waste of time 99% of the time
- Shu-Puffs
- x3 Gunners = Easy Mode
- 100% completion reward wasn't worth the effort
- Pain (or however you spell her name)
- Combat was overly repetative
- Not enough sidequests
- Copy-paste landscape with hardly any original maps
- No playable male characters
- Pandered too much to a femal-centric crowd
- Shu-Puffs

- - - Updated - - -

Either way, I dont think I'm speaking out of turn way when generalize DoC and X-2 as "games that sucked because they sucked". Just reading that resonates memories with everyone who has had the misfortune of playing them.

Now that I've given you my examples, I implore you... find me someone who defends X-2 because they thought it was good game. Find me 1 person.

[Armando]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

Your assertion is that story and gameplay are inseparable, but in Final Fantasy, gameplay is the slave and story is the master. This is why the world as moved on.

I don't buy it.

People didn't move on from Sonic the Hedgehog because the Sonic formula didn't work. They moved on because starting with Shadow the Hedgehog, Sega started to make really fucking bad Sonic games. Meanwhile, Mario games are still Mario games and people still play them.

If the world "moved on" (Square is still in business...) it's because Square stopped writing stories people want to experience. Saying that the world moved on implies that people don't love the classics any more. The opposite is true: every new game is (often unfairly) compared to its predecessors.

For whatever it's worth, it's not that gameplay and story are in separable, it's that gameplay and presentation are inseparable. Who wants to play Super Rectangle Bros? How many people judged Wind Waker purely on the basis of its art direction?

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

Awesome job on not reading, Ygg. Again, I didn't not assert DoC as the greatest thing ever.

For SE to push the limits, I think they have to so more than publish another developer's game. i was talking about SE internally, Cavia was not internal. SE did not step forward to rescue them when they went under, they got absorbed into IO Interactive, which I believe is now owned by Disney and so we'll never see they doing games like that again.

Getting Kingdom Hearts right on the fifth try pushed the limits of PSP, but that was about it, but KH3D has proven they can indeed take everyone they learned and throw it away. Bring back the terrible characters and force people to switch between them rather than play who they want when they want just to be "different." Herp de derp.

[Malacite]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

Yeah, you're probably right Mal. Defending games that pushed the limits of their genre and failed is just his thing and we'll all have to get used to it. What say we forget about him and go play M.A.G. for a while. Man... isn't that game just the best?

lol... I actually do miss that game.

Too bad it tanked and now Zipper is gone. Good concept, mediocre execution.

[Yygdrasil]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

Awesome job on not reading, Ygg.

Not reading what? One of your bibles you call a post? I'm sorry if I skimmed over the vast majority of one of them, suplimenting it with a whole lot of "bla bla I'm a pretencious jerkoff bla bla" and missed whatever gem it is you're talking about. Next time I'll promise to try harder if you promise to write less.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

If the world "moved on" (Square is still in business...) it's because Square stopped writing stories people want to experience. Saying that the world moved on implies that people don't love the classics any more. The opposite is true: every new game is (often unfairly) compared to its predecessors.

You can love the classics and still move on.

Also, I think that fact that FFXIII-2 sold less, that KH3D sold less is proof the fanbase is weary and want something fresh.

Obviously the answer to that was LRFFXIII and not stepping up production for FFvsXIII. When SE starts finishing console games they announced like six years ago, I'll start caring about their Japanese console releases again.

Not reading what?

The same thing I've said at the start of two other posts. I never said DoC was the best thing ever. I even initially pointed out its flaws in the post you mocked.

"I liked it OK" is pretty much saying something is average. I found it neither amazing or bad. I customized the controls to what I found manageable, played it and finished it. I appreciated the extra history on Vincent and Reese.

I don't know how much more simply I can put it for you. If I type out another sentence it might be like reading a novel for you.

[Icemage]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

If you think FFvs13 is in any way going to be the savior of the FF series, you've got a rude awakening coming.


Icemage

[Yygdrasil]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

I liked DoC all right, it did fall short of potential on the hole Berzerker transformation aspect of Vincent, He only ever zerked out into one form and the use of it wasn't as varied, though he did also transform into Chaos, but that was more of a story-driven element and not a form by choice.

The big downer was the inclusion of Yuffie, had they just kept it to Vincent and Reese/Cait Sith, that would have been a bit better. Yuffie added nothing to the plot.

This was your original post. Sounds to me like you're saying you enjoyed it... but that you have some suggestions on how it could have been better. That's a far cry from pointing out flaws in an inherently bad game.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

If you think FFvs13 is in any way going to be the savior of the FF series, you've got a rude awakening coming.


Icemage

I don't know what to think of that one at this point, but lots of people are hoping its something different. I was just pointing out SE is leaving people more disenfranchised with that game still being out there in limbo while SE shoves more FFXIII in their face.

Its not a good strategy. VsXIII could be Duke Nukem Forever for all we known. If the story's premise is still Baz Luhrman's Romeo and Juliet there may be no hope for it anyway.

[Raydeus]

Re: The best games you never played or the worst you forced yourself through...

I still say that Chains of Promathia was mediocre at best.

No, seriously no.

- - - Updated - - -

I don't know what to think of that one at this point, but lots of people are hoping its something different. I was just pointing out SE is leaving people more disenfranchised with that game still being out there in limbo while SE shoves more FFXIII in their face.

Its not a good strategy. VsXIII could be Duke Nukem Forever for all we known. If the story's premise is still Baz Luhrman's Romeo and Juliet there may be no hope for it anyway.

Considering even Metal Gear is going open world SE seriously needs Versus to prove they can actually do next gen. It may end up as vaporware, but there was just so much potential there it's as jarring as not being able to replay mission fights in XI.



AKA Self-destructive behavior "hopeless junkie" style.