Slashdot Mirror
Best Original Games of 2003?
PapaZit writes "It seems like most of the games that I purchase these days are sequels: GTA3 and Vice City , Zelda: Wind Waker, even Knights of the Old Republic and Galaxies built on the Star Wars franchise. What are the best original (not a sequel or franchise) games that you've played this year?"
I haven't played a game more original (or bizarre) in a very long time.
STOP ROCK VIDEO
I know the poster goes on to say that he excludes franchises as well as sequels but GTA3 was a ground-breaking and original game - it seems a bit harsh to exclude it on the basis that it shares its name with a top-down 2d crime game....
;-)
But don't even get me started on Vice City
Happy New Year,
Stem
I am not sure there *is* an original game : there are strategy games, like Civ, Warcraft, there are Doom like (once again obviously unoriginal), there are multiplayer games...
Well, the last time I saw a NEW game and said "WOW" was when I saw people playing Dance Dance revolution...
Trolling using another account since 2005.
Xenogears is episode 5, Xenosaga is episode one (And soon two) of the tale, which literally spans thousands of years.
It's supposed to be close, but not the same, when they get to Xenosaga Episode 5.
"You've got an invalid haircut" -Warren Zevon - Life'll Kill Ya
It's not brand new, but it's the most original game I've ever seen -- you move in a 3D world bouncing off platforms chasing a "spinner".
:)
What's really appealing is that the game is definitely a great stress reliever, very relaxed, with outstanding music (AI generated, which means it rarely repeats itself) based on your moves, and a highly, highly trigonometrical figures assembled on some of the most interesting mathematical curves you can think of...
Reminds me of the 3D Simpsons epizode, where Homer falls into a black hole into the real world
See it at tqworld.com.
NB: I'm not affiliated with the developers in any way, I don't make money off the game and in fact I've never purchased an account on their servers (though I did offer help with their Linux port at one point, but never did anything about it)...
There are no original games any more, any originality of powerful 3D engines has been used up a few years back already...
The next opportunity at originality might come in the real time online world department, but I think all attempts at that in the year 2003 fell flat...?
PC online games just have too much cheating, and consoles just aren't powerful enough yet (even XBox has way too little memory), and there aren't enough people with fast enough access who want to play them to bring out their true potential anyway...
One thing that I'd like to know is why does nobody create any 2D games anymore? 2D is a great format for many types of games - scrolling shooters, platform games, shoot 'em-ups. Why does nobody make these any more?
3D is fine for many types of games, but personally I'm a bit bored of 1000 variations of the DOOM format, and long for some 2D games. It's a good format for the screen, and it's a good format for games - afterall, most of the classic games of all time (Go, Chess, playing cards) are essentially 2D games in a 3D environment, which suggests to me that there is something intrinsically right about 2D for game formats.
With the capabilities of modern consoles some fantastic 2D games should be possible, but I've looked everywhere for good 2D games for the Playstation 2 and can't find any. Very frustrating.
Just squeaking in under the wire, the recent Star Chamber, a 4X/board/card game for the PC, is one of the more unique releases this year. Furthermore, it's a free, and has free online play with ladder rankings. (The card booster packs are what costs you).
So go to their web site and check it out. There is no excuse not to. Or at least read this glowing review from Gamespot.
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
Believe it or not, one of the most original/unique games I've played this year is on the Apple Mac platform!
It's called "Enigmo", and it's sort of a "real-time puzzle game", in the tradition of something like Lemmings. You have falling drops of water, oil and lava which must be captured in the proper containers at the bottom of the screen. You're given a set of objects you can place anyplace on the screen to attempt to achieve this goal. (Of course, there are lots of interesting little catches. If a stream of drops of lava intersect a stream of water drops, the water drops evaporate, for example.) As you complete levels, you get more interesting challenges and new tools in your arsenal of objects to direct the flow of the droplets.
It's a very well done little game, and can be quite addictive.
Guess you don't own a cube.
See, here's the thing. I don't think that just because a game is built around a franchise necessarily makes it "unoriginal". I think that the gameplay and concept behind the game are really what give it originality. For instance, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic really tries to do new things in RPGs, like allowing the player to choose which side of the force he'll align himself with. If the game didn't have the Star Wars license, that sort of "choose your destiny" idea might not have been respected at all. Was NBA Street an unoriginal game? Of course not, but it did use the NBA license to help sell itself.
Later,
Patrick
Disgaea is the best game I've played on the PS2 this year, it's not a sequel AND a 2003 release to boot, so it fills all the requirements
It has a wildly hyperactive, original storyline, hundreds of classes, incredible levelling, and lots of elements I've never seen in any other game (such as the Item World, Dark Assembly and the Geo Panels) - as far as small-scale strategy games go, it's quite possibly the best title I've played since X-Com.
Karma: Could be worse (could be raining)
Can I just say that I'm sick and tired of people equating sequels with a lack of creativity in games? No? I'll go ahead and do it anyway.
I'm sick and tired of people equating a sequels with a lack of creativity in games.
We need to get over the mistaken notion that sequel == uncreative or even easy. It may be true (but not 100% true) that sequels are indicative of recycled creative ideas in the world of film and books (though note that we have no problem with good dramatic television shows that run for many episodes). But games are different from these things. One of the important ways that games are different from movies is that games are software. I don't think that any of us would complain that Adobe keeps releasing sequel after sequel to Photoshop. Photoshop 7.0 is a dramatically better product than Photoshop 1.0. Linux kernel current.number is a more robust OS kernel than Linux kernel 1.0. Likewise, it is reasonable to expect that (game title) 2.0 could be a better title than (game title) 1.0.
To pick a recent example - by all accounts, Project Gotham Racing 2 is a dramatically better product than Project Gotham Racing 1. They tweaked the interface, they made it prettier, they added new gameplay functionality and they generally made it a BETTER GAME. It is uncreative? I would argue that the cool new things that they added were very creative indeed.
I have a lot of opinions about Cyborgs and Architects
GTA 3 is such a huge departure from GTA 2, I happen to think it's much more original than most non-franchise games. Yes, its the same gangland/pedestrian-killing/jacking game, but vastly further developed.
Compare to Call of Duty which is just more WWII-themed-FPS. Very fun, not original.
At a certain point, who cares about originality? I'd rather go see Return of the King than some other lame movie.
I found the new Prince of Persia to be amazing. It isn't the same as any game before. It's the first true advance in its genre since Tomb Raider. I vote for it for game of the year.
Another game I've been impressed with this year is Final Fantasy Tactics Advance. It takes the normal RPG system and removes some of the drudgery and in the process creates a game you can play nearly forever, without some final boss. It also fits the GBA perfectly, because since it isn't a twitch game you can play when mildly distracted (not driving) and pause it at any time.
Also on the Game Boy is Advance Wars 2. A return to the turn-based strategy game. And a good one a lot of fun. This game deviates least from it's predecessors in its franchise, but it is still a great game.
Finally, Project Gotham Racing 2 for the Xbox. This is the single finest arcade racer I have ever played. Many problems from the first are corrected and the physics are fantastic. The selection of cars is great. It does have a few minor flaws still (including the lack of a reverse lockout in manual shifting mode) but all in all it is fantastic.
It's a bit sad that all these games are sequels of a sort. But most of them add significantly enough to the games they are built on to be considered in their own right.
Ikaruga was great also, possibly the best technical shooter I've ever played, and also produced by Treasure. ( Who I remember more for Bangai-O ).
To be frank, pretty much everything they touch turns to gold. I'd love to see some releases from them in 2004.
YLFIP.S. This thing about 'non sequel games' is total bunk. Most original games are only 'original' in the sense that they're the first step in a franchise, not that they innovate in any way shape or form. My two favourite games at the moment ( Crimson Skies and MarioKart Doubledash ) both have ancedents on other systems, but they're still fantastic games.
One god, one market, one truth, one consumer.
uh, yeah, a three word blanket dismissal of one of the best rated games of the year gets modded "insightful."
Viewtiful Joe is among the best games I've played this year, for any system, from any year. And just for perspective, I also beat games like Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy VII, and Gunstar Heroes this year.
The controls are tight and intuitive, the challenge is incredible, the story is entertaining and very amusing. The graphic design is consistent and unique. There are great extras that extend the replay value.
It also manages to bridge the gap between classic old school gaming and the tricks availible to current developers.
Overall, it's a very solid game worthy of your time.
Now, was that insightful?
.
You say that there are tons of quake-like games, as if it's a bad thing. Yeah, terrible. So there's choice. They aren't all game-of-the-year, but I don't have to buy all of them so it's not really a problem. There are derivative clones out for all platforms. And hey, if you really love Quake type games, it's a good thing.
The problem with consoles isn't that many games are similar, it's that even though modern consoles don't have the same restrictions as older ones, the designers are still stuck in the 80s. It wouldn't kill them to provide decent save games, yet how many do? In GTA it wouldn't take a ton of ram to keep track of the cars that are behind you, but every time you turn around it places new ones.
And at least the PC has a decent set of controller options. There are a ton of joysticks available for the PC and yet very few people buy them - because for all but a few uses, gamepads are the worst controller. You don't get much choice with a console though. Whatever hand-cramping design was cheapest to make.
Everyone agrees that directors are assholes when they don't provide chapters in a DVD because they want everyone to watch it the way they intended - as if phones don't ring and real life doesn't intrude - so why is it a *feature* when console games enforce a bunch of stupid rules? At least PC games let me do what I want, when I want. If I want to save because I can't play now, I can. If I want to save because I suck at this area and don't want to redo it, I can.
PCs do cost more, but not as much as you make it seem - you don't need the latest GeForce card to play the latest games, unless you insist on 1024x768x32 with anti-aliasing. My GeForce 4 and AMD 2500+ have yet to meet their match, despite being almost the cheapest parts I could find. They also do a lot more. My computer burns and plays CDs and DVDs, holds thousands of MP3s, lets me use the net, displays high-resolution pictures from my digital camera. I can use community-created mods for games, use editors and design my own (something I used to do for Quake 1) and create my own programs, instead of simply being a consumer.
It's not like I pay $800 every few years just to play games. It costs my less than that to stay current and I get a ton more for it.
But that's beside the point. The point is that consoles are all about B&D, you play the game the way it was made, damnit. You don't get to choose the level you want to play, or how you want to play it. You can customize your controls all you want, maybe, as long as you don't want to change controllers. Why do people put up with that kind of crap? I returned Sixth Sense (the movie) because it made me watch trailers every time I started it. Does nobody else care about being forced to use things in the way the manufacturer wants?
OLD pc game, same concept.
I found it to be designed to make me walk over the same area twenty or more times. Each time I got given a quest it was on the other side of the main map area. When I travelled in time I got to walk over the same area again, but with a slightly different grass texture and different monsters. I know it was the premise of the game, but it was so abused. Once over each area in each time, sure, but to cross back and forth...
Then there's the issue of needing gold for everything, gold that was best collected by entering and exiting certain areas over and over again while breaking pots, or pulling up flowers. Ugh.
It claimed a hundred hours of gameplay or something, but it was all repeats. Compare to Call of Duty (PC World War 2 game) which I played recently and it's completely different. They only once reused a single map. Much shorter game, but all of it was exploring new things. I'd much rather twelve hours of real gameplay than a hundred of boredom.