DoA Creator Says Online Is New Arcade

Thanks to an anonymous reader for pointing to this interview with Dead Or Alive creator Tomonobu Itagaki at Gamespy. The discussion covers the forthcoming Ninja Gaiden, as well as the new Dead Or Alive Online title we've previously mentioned, but the most interesting part of the interview may be Itagaki's assertion that "When you look at arcade culture, it's pretty much dying. I feel that it needs to be replaced with something else, and that is online gaming. Online connects the homes around the nation to create an arcade-like experience without going to an arcade."

Comments

The New Arcade With More CHOICE

[Babbster]

The biggest problem with arcades, IMO, is the annoying people who inevitably show up ("I was waiting for that game," "Yes, those are my 15 quarters on the machine," etc.). Add into that the fact that arcade goers are always going to skew young, and we "old folks" (I'm 31) just aren't going to feel as comfortable in an arcade anymore.

While it's true that you can find as many kids and other annoying people online, you get to choose. You don't have to play against someone just because they happen to be there and you don't have to listen to someone's inane prattle if you don't want to (yummy Xbox Live mute button). Plus, you don't have to be stuck waiting in line for a machine to open up since every machine - or every two machines for online - is it's own arcade box.

Re:No 'watching' though

[bigman2003]

I was talking to a friend about games yesterday, and he was asking me if a certain game was 'good'. I told him "yes, it is good- but ask me if it is FUN".

As I talked to him, I realized that a lot of games are good, solid games. Very few flaws in the gameplay. They are getting more complex, and more challenging.

But when I thought of FUN, I realized that a lot of them are not fun. To me, having fun while playing a game, is 4 people sitting around playing against each other. Yelling, screaming, hitting each other when we win or lose (console style). The arcade was fun, because you had a few buddies behind you, hoping that you didn't beat their high score- hoping you lose, so they get a turn.

When you watch someone else play, you learn their techniques. You get to repeatedly say "you're gonna die, you're gonna die, you're gonna die" during the boss levels. Sometimes its even okay to poke them when things get really tense, just to add a little more drama to the situation. And hell, they have money riding on it, so the excitement is enhanced by that.

Usually in an on-line situation, you are sitting by yourself, typically silent, but with Xbox live you can talk (never used it). Playing games by yourself is a lot like playing golf. Nice challenge, pretty things to look at, but not FUN. Basketball is fun...because of the interaction. (Yes, you can interact in golf...but its more like masturbating in the same room, than having a big orgy together..)

So- are arcades dying? Yes, obviously- visit any arcade around and you can see that. My system at home has better games, better graphics, etc. etc. But, video games will be losing a valuable element- social interaction- when they are gone.

Arcade is coming back

[Apreche]

I agree that the internet is the new place for games. It will remain so until something else comes around and completely revolutionizes our world again. However, the arcade is making a comeback. If the popularity of DDR isn't enough for you just check out Time Crisis 3 and the new F-ZeroAC. Time Crisis 3 is perhaps the best gun game ever. F-Zero will provide connectivity between the soon to be release GameCube F-Zero game and the arcade one. The arcade still has a use. It is the place to play games with peripherals that you can't have at home. If companies started making more really great games with interesting peripherals, the arcades would be packed. If more people opened up arcades...

Arcade culture as a byproduct of distribution

[cgenman]

Arcades have traditionally been a distribution medium for new software, not a cultural medium facilitating communication. While there were cultures of PacMan, Super Mario Brothers, and Q-bert players, the games were very solitary in nature. The lone guy with a row of quarters playing space invaders is a perfect example of this. Games in those days were single-player affairs on jamma-compatible boards, utilizing a 4 position joystick and two or (gasp) three buttons. Because such hardware was so expensive to own personally, people needed to go to the arcades to have the best play experience, and to play a wider variety of games.

That is no longer the case.

During the NES / SNES period, arcade conversions were getting to be "good enough" that one didn't really need to go to the arcade to play excellent games. While the 2600 may have choked on Pac Man (and don't even bring up Q-bert), the Genesis could reasonably approximate NARC, and the SNES did a great job with Teenage Muntant Ninja Turtles. It was during this time that arcades transitioned from distribution centers to competition centers, thanks in no small part to the phenomenon of fighting games. The 4-player TMNT: Turtles in Time and the 6-player X-Men were all hits in the arcade, as were a plethora of multiplayer shooting games, fighting games, and car racing games (polygons were an arcade-exclusive back then).

But that changed with the Voodoo 3dfx and the rise of the computer as a competitor to the console, as well as the coming of networked gaming. Not only were computers capable of delivering compelling realtime 3D to rival (though not, at the time, beat) arcade gaming, but it also could connect separate players to people across physical boundaries. At first this led to neighborhood games of Bolo, later to direct dial-up competitions, and finally to the remote multiplayer frag-fests and Massively Multiplayer Role Playing worlds we see today. The anonymous instant competition with strangers of similar skill levels previously provided by arcades is now available right at your desk. Likewise, the graphical advantage once held by arcade machines has eroded to nothingness... To reduce overhead the machines are based heavily on existing console and computer equipment, which in turn leads to low acquisition costs and very low porting expenses, but leaves little to differentiate the two platforms. Add in direct competition with rental industries, and you have very little reason to go to the arcade.

The arcade does remain, however, and with one last, best reason. Hardware. Light-gun games, dance mats, digital batting cages, etc are prohibitively expensive for the average person to afford, yet can provide fun and unique experiences. Likewise, they are intuitive enough to be picked up and used without instruction by the casual or incidental gamer, the kind that is not likely to have access to many other distribution options at home (consoles or up-to-date graphics cards).

Sadly, as a distribution medium the arcade is faltering badly, in no small part due to the inefficient economic model behind it. 'Core gamers often go to the arcade looking for the "latest and greatest" in entertainment, but find perhaps one or two first run games, with a smattering of older games they don't wish to play. This would be like a movie-goer wanting to see Die Another Day, but only being able to watch Tomorrow Never Dies because the movie house couldn't afford to buy a new reel of tape from the studios. Game distributers still sell boards to the arcade owners, who in turn try to recoup their investment from the gaming public. This is a very inefficient way of going about making the highest profit, as the distributers feed from the arcade owners, who (in their financially weakened state) attempt to feed upon the customers. But it is the customers who bring money into the system as a whole, and it is they whom both the producers and the providers should be focusing upon.

For example, a Capcom vs. SNK machine may lay dormant in an

Re:Retro Arcades & VR

[Mostly Monkey]

Funny. Your first paragraph pretty much sums up our local arcade. There's a couple of semi-new games there, but most of them are old battered machines running the classics. There's no hotdog stand, but the '80 music is the style there. Every time I go past it I only see one or two people inside. Your idea might work in a big town, but with ours having less then 20k it is a worthless cause.