Imperfections In Rise of the Imperfects

Game Girl Advance has an intriguing screed from an EA designer who has a lot to say about what went wrong with the Marvel title "Rise of the Imperfects". From the article: "When you make games for a living, sometimes you play games for fun, and sometimes you play games for research. If you're not playing Marvel Nemesis for research, there really isn't much point to it, I'm afraid. This game shows a lot of signs of being forced out the door before it was ready, which is a fairly common trait of the first game in a new genre for a developer. I'm going to step through my impressions of the game: what didn't work, what did work, and what I'd like to see expanded upon and improved if EA or Nihilistic ever tries to do another fighter in a similar mold (which I wouldn't be opposed to, honestly)." Shocking to see such honest talk from a member of the developing company.

Comments

Of all the games ...

[Winterblink]

Of all the games out there that come out this week, why post a review of THIS ONE? It's probably more informative to tell everyone how Virtua Tennis is comming out and is getting ridiculously good reviews from almost everyone, rather than tell us how much a 3D fighting game based on Marvel characters sucks.

Re:Of all the games ...

[iocat]

In the gaming industry, this kind of honest self-evaluation is something that's sorely lacking.

I have to take issue with this. Just because you don't read about it, or it isn't done for public consumption, doesn't mean it doesn't happen. Most games I've seen worked on begin with a clear idea of what to do differently from before, what went wrong on past projects, etc. (Which isn't to say that mistakes aren't repeated, even by people who know what they're doing.)

Regarding this specific story, it might be kind of unusual if a member of the development team commented on the game, but in this case it was just someone who happens to work for the same publisher, who specifically disclaims any knowledge of the development of the game or of the development team. So it's basically a game review by someone in the game industry. Without commenting on the specifics of the review or the game, which I haven't played, all I can say is, the Slashdot story about someone reviewing a game doesn't seem as interesting as the headline blurb made it seem.

Does anyone even work in the EA marketing dept.?

[Puhase]

They obviously pushed development to hit the peak season. But in their rush they seemed to not notice another Marvel liscened game was being released on the same weekend, "X-Men Legends:II". I personally was looking forward to Marvel Nemisis until I read a couple reviews and then saw that the Legends sequel was coming out. How could they possibly feel that an underdeveloped piece of rental-bate could compete with one of the top selling games from last year? I guess I'll find out when I get off of work and get on a computer that doesn't have the "Websense" website filter.

Why is a candid report so newsbreaking?

[TossCobble]

Having freelanced on and off for a couple of gaming companies, I've honestly felt that the American gaming industry has been unhealthy for a while - young boys making prurient games for young boys, with only the occasional break-out title that's appealing to a more diverse audience. Not that I'm against a little prurient fun now and then, but any objective visitor to E3 will quickly realize the fanboy infatuation and shallow flashiness alongside very little constructive cultural presence (not to mention very few women outside of skin-tight clothing).

This is the problem with an industry that's engaging in design-by-comittee. Back when all it took was six or seven guys in a garage to create a video game, real innovation was easy. Now with games approaching or surpassing major motion picture budgets, you have tight-fisted executive boards that are terrified of anything outside of the mainstream, and rely heavily on tried-and-true rehashed sequels.

The well-known fanboy corruption of the video game media has contributed to this culture for a long time now, and only recently are we starting to see a little stabilization in both video game exposure and video game reporting. It's a little embarrasing that an article like this should be remarkable for it's candor, as opposed to being the norm.

Re:Does anyone even work in the EA marketing dept.

[gabebear]

I have both XL2 and Nemesis and must say I enjoy Nemesis MUCH more, although I haven't had much time to play either much yet. Nemesis is something different, where XL2 feels like just an expansion pack.

I don't see why reviewers are hating:

• similar character controls - yes certain characters control very similarly, but guess what.... THEY ARE SIMILAR!!! The important differences are deffinately here: the Hulk controls like a lumbering giant, Spiderman whizzes around like a freaking bug, and Storm flies around like a goddess. I think they nailed the control mechanics.
• Color/Lighting - I've never seen anything quite like what was done in this game. It's sort of a cross between cell shading and standard 3D, I think it looks similar to modern-day comic art. I like it, but everyone is entightled to their opinion.

Not to mention the wonderful character models(good bump mapping!!!!), perfect use of sounds/audio, and best character animations I've ever seen.

To each his own.

[Edgewize]

I disagree with some points, agree with others, but in general, I *like* the game. Sorry that the author doesn't, but hey, to each his own.

Maybe it's not what he was hoping for, but that's not the same thing as being a failure.

A little background.

[Anonymous Coward]

Meet the author, a recent M.S. grad from CMU who interned as a testing programmer on The Sims 2 and did a little work on Ultima X Online.

http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/bkj/

Bad reviews from normally bias reviewers.

[joystickgenie]

I was honestly watching this game with allot of interest. I really wanted to see how EA would turn out a fighting game. Although I am a huge fan of the fighting game genera, I think this is one of the easier generas to move into at the moment. There are allot of games that you can look at that did very well and at the moment there isn't much competition. Both of those factors in mind makes this game that much more of a disappointment.

The controls are more like a beat-em up action game (like streets of rage or double dragon) then like a fighting game. The things that allows fighting games to work is the fact that you can spend hours simply trying to learn everyone's moves. Practicing the motions so you can perform them at the exact moment you want to. This game is completely lacing in that. Once you know one characters move list you know all of them. So there is no enjoyment of learning the characters or being able to do things that no one else has seen before.

This thing that showed me just how bad this game was the IGN review of it, when IGN (normally very producer bias) gives an EA product a 4.8 out of 10 there is something terribly wrong with it.