How Not To Buy Crap Games This Season

The Guardian Gamesblog has a short guide on avoiding bad games and helping the games industry. From the article: "Say no to film and TV tie-ins - These are generally belted out in nine months by newcomers treated little better than sweatshop workers. If you're fed the line, 'the director was fully involved in the making of this game', beware. This means, roughly, 'The director sent his lawyers to the studio with a 300-page guide, warning that if it were breached, the team would be shot.'"

Comments

Film and Movie Tie-ins

[csbrooks]

Even though Spiderman 2 and The Incredible Hulk were both really awesome games? This sounds like crummy advice.

Here's what I do: never buy a game until you're read some good reviews. NOT previews, which are always suspiciously glowing. After getting burned buying a few $50 games the first day they came out, I stick hard and fast to this rule.

Even then sometimes I wait a year or so until they're $20 at Wal-mart.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[DJNephilim]

As a general rule the avoiding movie/tv/comic book tie-ins is good advice. Sure, there are exceptions (as there are to any rule), but keeping it in mind as a guideline can save you a lot of pain and suffering (Aquaman anyone?).

The best advice you could ever get for purchasing games is (assuming you know what kind of games you like to play):

- Read reviews. Not just one review from Gamespot or IGN (I find their reviews to be garbage more often than not), but from other places as well. Try a site you may not frequent very often and get their take on it. The more opinions you have of a game, the better you will know what you are getting into with your hard earned cash.

- Rent it first! If you like it and think you will play it longer than one rental period, buy it. Otherwise, play it and enjoy (or hate) it during the rental period, then return it and save your money.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[pnice]

What do you think about http://www.gamerankings.com/? It seems to work pretty good if you are looking for multiple review scores for one game and it puts them all together in a handy location. Then you can just follow the link to read the actual review. I use it when I am really serious about wanting a game but I want to check with multiple review sites to see if they all gave it the same general rating.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[DJNephilim]

Hey, any site that aggregates reviews like that gets a plus in my book.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[numbski]

Laugh if you want, but I've found that the quality of X-Play's reviews has been pretty solid. They're tied to a lousy TV network, but they post all of their reviews at the website. Good stuff.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[Kazzahdrane]

Personally I always check Gamespy.com first. Seen the reviews for the Shadow the Hedgehog game? Checked a few sites and many are suspiciously glowing, whereas Gamespy and Eurogamer seem willing to be honest and say it's a terrible game. Dunno which is right but Gamespy seem to be a lot more critical of games.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[Have Blue]

The best movie->game in recent memory is Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[hal2814]

"Rent it first!" - Once upona time I'd wholeheartedly agree with you. Nowadays, I don't think that's such good advice. Where I live, it costs $7 - $10 to rent. Granted, that's for a whole week, but my rental store options don't offer weekend rentals anymore. That's about 1/5 the cost fo a game. When games were $4 rentals and $40 purchases rent-before-you-buy made a whole lot more sense. Now when I look at a title, I rent the ones that I'll only play for a week or two at most. For example, X-Men Legends 2 is an incredible game, but after two weeks I was ok with taking it back. I'll play Madden 06 weekly until 07 comes out so that's a good purchase for me. Some games like Zelda: Windwalker and Metroid Prime are cheap enough now that I don't see why the rental stores still bother to stock the game.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[csbrooks]

The game was more popular than the movie; you don't see that very often.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[bradbeattie]

'Course, you could always wait a year until after the release date. By then the marketing department is done flooding the market with biased previews and reviews, the price has dropped from ~$60 to ~$30 and the biggest patches the game will receive have been released. With that in mind, is there any reason to buy a game on its release date?

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[NateE]

I looked at your link. However compare that site to GameTab's Reviews area. http://www.gametab.com/reviews/ Also be sure to check out GameTab's customizable news area. I only found this site recently and already am liking it.

Personally, I hardly ever need to check reviews by the time a PC game has hit stores. I'll know way before that point if I'm interested in buying or not. Everything gets preview'd beforehand. If somehow a stinker slips by me and onto my PC, I'll return it if possible and get my money back.

Only review I remember being super helpful was this one for Space Rangers 2. Never heard of it before finding the review but it been quite a time soak. :)

Eurogamer Review

Company site

GoGamer is one of the few places that has it

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[Prophet of Nixon]

Haven't played the game, but the movie is the worst sci-fi movie I've ever seen... I think it was worse than ST:Nemesis. Space goths?

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[DJNephilim]

Sounds like you need to find a new place to rent games. Perhaps Gamefly would be a more viable choice for you?

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[hal2814]

I certainly don't rent often enough to justify a montly fee. The service sounds nice but until there's a one-game $10/month deal, I'm not interested.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[badasscat]

What do you think about http://www.gamerankings.com/?

Everybody knows about gamerankings.com and I think a lot of people put too much stock in them.

The problem is review scores - even aggregated ones - tell you nothing. Reviewers often get so caught up in hype themselves that they can't (or won't) see a game's faults, and of course there's the issue of paid advertising at almost every publication. That's not to say reviews themselves are useless, but just looking at a score - even an average of the scores from a bunch of publications - is not going to tell you anything.

But for some of the same reasons, simply reading one or two reviews is not going to help you either. What you need to do is read between the lines when you read these reviews. Ask yourself "what is this reviewer not telling me about this game?"

For example, before I bought NFL 2K5, I read a bunch of reviews about it. None of them spent more than a couple sentences talking about the franchise mode, which is the main mode I play in every sports game I buy. If they said anything, it was just about it being more "fleshed out" than the year before. Still, they all said the core gameplay was great, so I bought the game. Sure enough, franchise mode was so buggy that it was literally impossible to play more than a couple seasons of it (destroying the whole point of that mode). The developer forums were flush with complaints about numerous game-stopping bugs, several of which I personally encountered pretty quickly, but none of which were mentioned in any review I read.

Obviously, these reviewers simply hadn't played that mode. They looked at the options and assumed they knew how it worked and that was enough for them. I should have known better, because not a single one of these reviews mentioned anything about playing more than a couple games in franchise mode.

It's not just about bugs, though. Reviewers are paid to review what's there, not what's not there. Ask yourself what you're expecting out of a game and whether the reviews you're reading are speaking directly to those wants or not. If you're looking for an adventure game and you find a game you think you might be interested in but the reviewers just talk about how much fun it is to shoot zombies, then even if the game gets a high score, it's probably not for you.

Beyond that, though, there is definitely real corruption in game journalism, whether intentional or not. I think a lot of it is actually not intentional; reviewers get wooed and wowed by big publishers with trips and gifts and whatnot, and all the while the publisher hammers into their heads how big a particular game is going to be, how awesome it is, how everybody's looking forward to it. Eventually it becomes a self-fulfilling thing, and you see more preview coverage and more hype. The press themselves buy into it. The game comes out and in order to justify themselves, all of the press gives it a ridiculously high score. Look at a game like The Legend of Zelda: the Wind Waker, which even Shigeru Miyamoto now calls "boring" and basically unfinished. But it has a score of 94.9% on GameRankings, because the press bought the hype that they themselves helped create.

So my point is you cannot rely on scores (even aggregate ones) and you cannot rely solely on "sound bites" culled from reviews. You need to read reviews carefully and think about why reviewers say certain things and why they are not saying other things. Basically, just use some critical thinking skills - skills that a lot of game reviewers lack.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[joystickgenie]

Rent it first is only a good idea half of the time. Living purely by this rule means you will never get independent or games that have little advertising budgets.

More often then not places that you can rent games from will not have a lot of the games that you want to try out. For example, Katamari Damacy was not available to be rented until the industry was already screaming rave reviews. Or a different example, Guitar Hero, the game is getting nothing but great reviews but no one carries it for rental.

Generally renters won't get the title in unless it already has a following. They don't want to get burned by a bad title either.

If you live by this rule there are going to be a lot of great games that you miss.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[Chosen Reject]

Sure, there are exceptions (as there are to any rule)

That is a logical fallacy. If a rule 'A' exists that states "there exist no rules that do not have an exception", then an exception exists to 'A' which means, there exists another rule 'B' which has no exceptions. But 'A' stated that every rule has an exception. Therfore 'B' cannot exist. But if 'B' does not exist then there is no exception to 'A', therefore 'A' cannot exist.

Therefore, by contradiction, we cannot say that there are exceptions to every rule.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[KDR_11k]

It often helps to seek out the review with the lowest rating and look at the complaints, perhaps contrast it with on with a very high rating.

Look at a game like The Legend of Zelda: the Wind Waker, which even Shigeru Miyamoto now calls "boring" and basically unfinished. But it has a score of 94.9% on GameRankings, because the press bought the hype that they themselves helped create.

Miyamoto said it "wasn't all that it could have been", boring is something completely different. It could have used more dungeons and done away with the stupid triforce hunt but other than that it was a very good game. Certainly more fun to me than Ocarina of Time which Miyamoto didn't apologize for.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[snuf23]

"The problem is review scores - even aggregated ones - tell you nothing. Reviewers often get so caught up in hype themselves that they can't (or won't) see a game's faults, and of course there's the issue of paid advertising at almost every publication."

It should be noted that gamerankings.com and sites like gamespot.com have user ratings in addition to the media outlet ones. As in any open forum some user reviews are written by blithering idiots, but others are very insightful and make note of points the reviewers may have missed.
Everyone is different and some things even tiny things may ruin for you what is considered a 5 star gaming experience for others. I had a hard time enjoying Guild Wars because my character couldn't jump over a 6 inch tall obstacle or jump down a slight incline. I felt railroaded in the environments which looked open but were much more restrictive in actuality. Nit picking? I'm sure plenty of people would think I am, but I can't deny that it diminished my enjoyment of the game.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[Bongo Bill]

Two reasons: impatience and trust in the game's developers.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[cyberbob2010]

yea, great
buy them at walmart. walmart who starves the developers of money by demanding that they drop the price to an unbearable low so that they make no money off of it.
That will really help us get some new and good games out there from a developer who is broke.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[edwdig]

Look at a game like The Legend of Zelda: the Wind Waker, which even Shigeru Miyamoto now calls "boring" and basically unfinished. But it has a score of 94.9% on GameRankings, because the press bought the hype that they themselves helped create.

Miyamoto did not say Wind Waker is boring. He said the triforce hunt section of the game was boring. He did have a list of things he would do differently if he had more time to work on the game, but every game designer has a list like that for every game they have ever worked on.

The triforce hunt does get boring, but it's not that big a section of the game. The only other significant flaw in the game is that you have to get pretty far into the game before the enemies do a significant amount of damage to you, which means that once you get a couple hearts you pretty much can't die unless you're trying to. Despite the claims of the people who only played Ocarina of Time, the graphics fit in with the style of the rest of the series perfectly and are very well done. Quite honestly, if the development team had another 3 months or so to work on the game, it probably would have easily topped Ocarina of Time. In the end, it definitely is one of the better games in the series.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[illuvata]

Sure enough, franchise mode was so buggy that it was literally impossible to play more than a couple seasons of it (destroying the whole point of that mode). The developer forums were flush with complaints about numerous game-stopping bugs, several of which I personally encountered pretty quickly, but none of which were mentioned in any review I read.

To be fair to the reviewers, this is usually not because they can't be bothered to test the game properly, but because they test preview version, to make sure they have review ready by the time the game is in stores.
They could of course still write about bugs, but usually most will get fixed for the final version, and the publishers might stop giving them advanced copies if they feel it leads to bad press.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[Dodgycrap]

The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction (I assume thats what you were referring to) was not a Movie Tie-In, it was based on the Comics. There was a Hulk movie video game tie-in that was abysmal, really abysmal, so that kind of supports the article...

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[geminidomino]

Yeah but you save money! Games that go for 49.99 at Best Buy go for 49.88 at Walmart!!!

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[DJNephilim]

That's nice. Get out much?

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[bradbeattie]

Well, I can't help you with the first one, but I thought that after so many bad releases trust in game developers would be dried up.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[MarauderIIC]

With that in mind, is there any reason to buy a game on its release date?

The only thing I can come up with is size of player base for multiplayer games. Player base will probably be bigger closer to release than a year or more later. Of course, this is because most people buy games on release date... If everyone followed your advice, then no, there wouldn't be any point. Sort of like voting, I guess. It has to be a group thing.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[Bongo Bill]

I mean trust in the specific developer who's making a game, not developers in general.

If you trust the developer who is making a specific upcoming game then you will probably be justified in buying it on the launch date.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[xx404]

Sites like Metacritic and Gamerankings are still a very good place to start. If a game gets less than 85% on these sites then it is pretty much going to be crap. So while you can't necessarily trust that a game deserves to be rated highly you can put a lot of trust into the fact that a game sucks. Not to say that if you are a fan of a particular license or game style you won't enjoy the game but if you are looking for an exceptional gaming experience you aren't going to get it from the lower ranked games. Your advice is good but I just want to add that Gamerankings et al are good "shit filters" - they just don't filter all the shit.

Re:Film and Movie Tie-ins

[bradbeattie]

Agreed. Multiplayer games are a different breed in this regard. Furthermore, some companies price fix their games (Blizzard, for one) and that negates the benefit of this strategy.

How to avoid bad games?

[LehiNephi]

Wait for the review at least.

Seriously, I've found that waiting on both hardware and software purchases saves loads of money. Wait a few months until after the game has been out. Then go ahead and buy it if it turns out to be good/popular.

I see no validity in the implication that just because it's released right before Christmas, you must buy it for Christmas. There are plenty of other games that have been out for a while and proven their value. Don't be a lemming.

Re:How to avoid bad games?

[iainl]

"I see no validity in the implication that just because it's released right before Christmas, you must buy it for Christmas."

I'd love to agree with you, but my local games stores don't see the point in stocking anything over about two months old, which makes things somewhat difficult on that front at times.

Re:How to avoid bad games?

[BrainInAJar]

Don't be a lemming.

Or do, because that game was awesome.

director involvement

[Tom7]

Even sweatshop workers can work miracles under the threat of being shot.

Easiest way

[grub]

Download the game first. If you like it and play past an hour or so: buy it. Otherwise trash it.

Re:Easiest way

[sc0ttyb]

Yeah, I've heard this logic used before. Some people I know use this same argument. They download a game, find that they enjoy it for several hours past the one you suggest, and then don't buy it, even though they said they would if they enjoyed it. Instead, they just sit there with this "I'll buy it later" or "I have other things to spend my money on" mentality while the game never actually gets purchased but continues to get played.

This is obviously not a problem with people who honestly purchase games they like after they try them (as you seem to do), but figured I'd mention this side.

Counter examples

[2008]

Say no to film and TV tie-ins:
Tie Fighter, Chronicles of Riddick

Avoid gangster adventures:
GTA (OK, maybe they meant to exclude that themselves)

The second world war is over:
Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory - maybe not an incredible game but it's great value.

Try an original title:
Many of these suck too...

Download an independent game:
Most people seem to think Darwinia isn't much fun to play. Certainly there are plenty of awful flash games.

terrible games based on cartoons:
Astro Boy (GBA). It's by Treasure!

Re:Counter examples

[DingerX]

Yeah, but say no to film and TV tie-ins this christmas season. Tie Fighter's a ghost of xmas past dude.

Same for GTA. Don't avoid GTA -- avoid GTA ripoffs.

And WWII. WW2 games got a kick in popularity from Band of Brothers, and we saw a bunch of ripoffs of that series. Now we're seeing the ripoff of the ripoffs.

Original and indie titles do often suck -- hell, they're often much worse than the McSoftware that EA vends. But you *might* find something good; and if you don't, well, at least you can be smug and self-righteous on Slashdot. Hell, you could even make a blog entry about ahow indie games suck, get some AdSense or Google Ads or whatever links, get your ass slashdotted and recoup the cost of the games. See? Indie games pay for themselves, whether you like them or not!

Re:Counter examples

[Jonny_eh]

Movie game THIS season: King Kong. This looks quite good, especially since the developers behind this game made the awesome Beyond Good and Evil! The rule should be: Avoid movie/tv games made by EA.

WWII: Call of Duty 2 is quite an awesome looking and playing game. It, and its' original are a blast.

Re:Counter examples

[Edgewize]

The rule should be: Avoid movie/tv games made by EA.

I dunno, their Lord of the Rings games are really good (except for that Third Age RPG), and some of their Bond games aren't bad either (Everything or Nothing was excellent, although not strictly a movie tie-in).

I think you mean: Avoid movie/tv games made by THQ or Activision. ;)

Re:Counter examples

[Phyvo]

Meh, the lord of the rings hack and slash'ems reaked of shortcuts. I mean, all the hobbits were exactly the same. Though the action was ok, they weren't games that I'd play even after the technology moves on, like Escape Velocity, Super Smash Bros: Melee, or "Zap!" (which I'd play more if there were more players). EA may be capable of making ok games, but there's no way they're going to make a game which will stand the test of time. A series such as Maddon, perhaps. A game, no.

Re:Counter examples

[Delphiki]

Yeah, nobody kept playing The Sims for very long, did they?

Re:Counter examples

[Edgewize]

Yeah, I guess I'd agree with that. Pretty good entertainment at the time, but not much for long-term replay value. Then again, that charge could be leveled at about 98% of all the games out there. (Doom 3, anyone?)

Your last statement is right on the money, though: EA will never come up an instant classic. I don't think that they're set up in a way that's capable of producing one. I guess the right analogy is that they have a solid batting average but never swing for the fences.

Re:Counter examples

[CsiDano]

I don't think this guy knows what he is talking about, you made some good points, and I'd like to add Call of Duty 2 is excellent and I bought Brothers in Arms Road to somthingorother it sucked so bad I forget the rest of the name, anyway the first brothers in arms was the worst WW2 shooter and he bought the second one, so we are supposed to trust this guys opinion. And as for sweatshop games, well my fiancee would be pretty unhappy if I didn't get her the lastest expansion to the Sims 2, which is also against his counting rule.

Re:Counter examples

[Delphiki]

Neither were the games which the person I was replying to cited as classics. If he was just talking about EA being unable to make great games based on a license from another medium why did he bring up the games he did?

Re:Counter examples

[Phyvo]

I brought up the games I did because they were good, and LOTR was not like them. To be truthful I never knew that Will Wright was in EA. But Will Wright is an exception to the rule (because he's just that good), and so I think it still stands unless you come up with another example of a classic made by EA... Which perhaps you'll do. I'm not that much of an experianced gamer.

Re:Here goes the learnding

[iainl]

You be Merkin, yes?

Here in the UK, it's Crap Games, not Crappy Games. Two countries, seperated once again by a common language.

Re:A Bit Racist Are We?

[cornface]

Unclench your anus for a few seconds, chief. There's a whole world of things out there to be legitimately angry about.

A Bit Sexist Are We?

[Xarius]

Now, I understand what they are saying here, but why the inclusion specifically of the black young man holding a shotgun? I suppose if the same game featured a young white inner-city youth roaming the mean streets, or a latino kid, the game would be ok to pick up and enjoy?

I like the way that you use selective political-correctness to try and accuse them of being racist, yet you completely disregard the fact that they also said man.

I suppose if the same game featured a woman, the game would be ok to pick up and enjoy?

The specific inclusion of a specific gender into their "bad games" definition is a bit much, IMO.

(Please note the use of sarcasm here, just to point out the article was no more racist than it was sexist)

Re:A Bit Sexist Are We?

[snuf23]

"I suppose if the same game featured a woman, the game would be ok to pick up and enjoy?"

Hot damn! Why aren't there any games with a shotgun wielding african american protagonist?
Like Charleton Heston's partner in Omega Man, she was one cool cat and kicked ass.

Re:A Bit Sexist Are We?

[Prophet of Nixon]

There is, in the Hunter: The Reckoning games... she carries a katana and a revolver by default, and of course there's shotguns, machine guns, flareguns, chainsaws, etc... they're fun gauntlet-style games, but with undead and monsters, and they're great with 2-3 people (like gauntlet, they can get a bit too hectic with 4).

Re:A Bit Sexist Are We?

[patternjuggler]

> Now, I understand what they are saying here, but why the inclusion specifically of the black young man holding a shotgun? I suppose if the same game featured a young white inner-city youth roaming the mean streets, or a latino kid, the game would be ok to pick up and enjoy?

I like the way that you use selective political-correctness to try and accuse them of being racist, yet you completely disregard the fact that they also said man.

I suppose if the same game featured a woman, the game would be ok to pick up and enjoy?

Both of you are wrong, there's no racism or sexism, the original story was simply following a generalization with an example, not adding qualifications to the generalization. They said not to buy games overly inspired by the setting of GTA rather than the components that make it truly extraordinary (great car driving physics + incredibly detailed seamless world, IMHO). There are a large number of games coming out that involve black gang culture, in part inspired by GTA:SA and also motivated by rap star interest in games, and no doubt a lot of them are critically flawed and not worth playing.

I get annoyed by people using the term 'political correctness' as if we were still living in the 1990s- the term first saw widespread use back then, but if you think about it it is a thing that exists wherever there is politics- there is no specific viewpoint or ideology that defines political correctness, it is decided mostly by the people who wield the most political power at the given moment, or at least the most vocal of them. These days, being politically correct means you have to equate opposing certain policies of a country with opposing the country, its people, institutions, traditions, religions etc. to the point of wanting them destroyed.

Re:Here goes the learnding

[general_re]

It's early, but I've had my coffee and I'm feeling pedantic enough for /. ;)

Anyway, this is from the Guardian (UK), and while it's not exactly the Queen's English, "crap" as an adjective seems to be a reasonably common Britishism. "Shit" works the same way on the other side of the pond - you'd know exactly what I meant if I told you that I have a shit car. ;)

What about...

[Snamh Da Ean]

...Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay? the movie sucked ass, but the game was absolutely fantastic (on my Xbox at least) One way to avoid rubbish games is to avoid smart ass general conclusions like the ones touted in TFA

Re:Here goes the learnding

[BushCheney08]

It's amazing what a difference a single article can make. Examples:
"Your car is shit." vs "Your car is the shit." or
"You are shit." vs "You are a shit." vs "You are the shit."

Yes, there are exceptions. So?

[iainl]

This article isn't about saying ALL military FPS games, licensed stuff or whatever are rubbish. It's a call to buy something a bit different for a change, and save us from the monotony of being faced with a Christmas lineup in 5 years that just reads:

Tony Hawk's Extreme Wheelchair, Brothers Of Duty: It'll Be Over By Christmas 2100, GTA: Homicide Village, Every Sport 2011, Big Film 3 or Ricer Racer: Street Edition.

Buy something a bit different, and see what happens. It might suck after all, but at least it won't be what you bought last year but with slightly shinier graphics, some new maps and a roster update.

Re:Yes, there are exceptions. So?

[Shad_the_protector]

Best way to try something new, is to rent it. It usually give you a good opportunity to play the game for a fair price. After you just choose to buy it or not. Like this you not only know if you like the game, but also if it is worth to spend more than a week on it. Certain game have a short gameplay and are only good to rent. You can also make your own idea other than the one from th review already out. Sometime a popular and well rated game isn't always something you'll like. For myself GTA wasn't really entertaining for myself altough it was popular and very well rated.

Re:Yes, there are exceptions. So?

[MeanderingMind]

I dunno, Tony Hawk's Extreme Wheelchair sounds like one heck of a game!

Re:A Bit Racist Are We?

[iainl]

I can't think of any other ethnic minorities on the front cover of UK game boxes holding guns that say "3rd-rate GTA ripoff", so it seems a reasonable generalisation to me.

Story icon coincidence?

[Jeff DeMaagd]

It looks as if there is a Christmas tree perched on an Atari joystick.

Metacritic.com is where I shop first

[toddlg]

Metacritic games is where I visit first.

Prettymuch if a game has an 85+ rating on here it's not going to be a total lemon.

Just last week I was talking with our facilities manager who was lamenting he hadn't played any games on the Xbox lately, but was wanting to get some more FPS and didn't know which games were any good.

We went to metacritic, used the advanced search, and printed off a list of the top 25 FPS for Xbox, stopped by Gamestop at lunch and he picked up 3 highly rated games.

Re:Metacritic.com is where I shop first

[patternjuggler]

We went to metacritic, used the advanced search, and printed off a list of the top 25 FPS for Xbox, stopped by Gamestop at lunch and he picked up 3 highly rated games.

Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion to this post, where we learn whether a guy just wasted $150 on a load of crap games, or that a particular website is decent for this reviewing and recommending sort of thing.

Re:Metacritic.com is where I shop first

[CandyMan]

I just met a top honcho at EA Europe who said in a casual conversation about developers: "this is how you hire people that give you titles with an 85+ score at Metacritic". Basically, they know that you know.

Re:Avoid anything from EA

[iainl]

Really? I've found Battlefield 2 fairly stable since applying the patch (well, other than their servers being down for mainenance the other day).

My objection to the patch is that my whole reason for liking BF2 so much is the feeling of open spaces and a rural atmosphere. Special Forces seems to be an attempt to turn it back into precisely the close-combat corridor blastfest of Counterstrike and co. that I was so sick of before it came along.

Re:Here goes the learnding

[general_re]

Sure. Consider the difference between "da" and "a". Telling the airport screener that your traveling companion is da bomb may have different results than telling them your friend is a bomb...

Re:A Bit Racist Are We?

[Bastian]

Now, I understand what they are saying here, but why the inclusion specifically of the black young man holding a shotgun?

I wouldn't take that quote as a sign that the article's writer is racist. Rather, I'd take it as a sign that the author made a nod to the fact that there's racism in the video game industry.

Re:Here goes the learnding

[voice_of_all_reason]

Cool, I never knew that :) Always assumed it was just a grammatical goof

Still sounds more awkward than lift and lorry. And I love wanker.

Re:Here goes the learnding

[Otter]

Absolutely. Read this thread to see precisely your example in action.

That's why those of us with precise intellects prefer the word "shiznit" to minimize such ambiguizzlety.

Indie Games

[the phantom]

The article mentions indie games, but fails to mention one of the greatest draws -- they are also generally cheap (or at least cheaper than the standard $50 per game of most large releases).

Mutant Storm is a brilliant arcade style game that combines old school frenzy with purty graphics. It is nice to see that folk are still making games like this (now, if I could find a decent platformer -- the last good game in that genre was Castlevania: Symphony of the Night). Not only is Mutant Storm a great game, but it costs less $20.

Darwinia is another wonderful game. Sure, it is a bit short (10 levels, less than 10 hours if you go through it at a reasonable pace), but some of the best games ever were rather short (Sonic the Hedgehog is still one of my favorite games, and can be beaten less than an hour -- two hours if you take your time). Add to this that Darwinia has a very different set of aesthetics from most modern games (rather than realistic graphics, Darwinia seeks to produce a very clean, artificial look, something like the movie Tron), an interesting interface, and a compelling story. Price: $30.

I know that both of these were briefly mentioned in the article, but I thought that they both deserved a bit more praise.

Re:Indie Games

[Shad_the_protector]

Not to forget Armagetron and the famous Uplink that are really good and cheap. I even think Armagetron is free. If you search well you can surely find something good.

Reading those article remind me it's been a long time since my last uplink game.... Should play it again.

Re:Indie Games

[Soul-Burn666]

A decent platformer, free too! Oldschool style and translated to English.
And it's weird you mentioned SotN and forgot all about the latest game in the series, Dawn Of Sorrow.

About Darwinia, they said it'll be availabe for purchase/download at Valve's Steam. I wish them the best of luck, and hope this will open the flood gates for cheap downloadable indie games.

Re:Indie Games

[the phantom]

Ack! I forgot about Cave Story! Silly me. As to Dawn of Sorrow, I hadn't heard of it. Mayhaps I will buy a DS in a few years when I can get a used one for $50. Don't laugh... I tend to buy all of my games several years after they come out -- they are cheaper that way. I only got Symphony of the Night last year, and didn't get a PS2 until last month (for $70). That being said, I am still very interested in what is coming out now, as I will be playing it in a year or two :)

Re:Indie Games

[geminidomino]

Lucky you. If you tried to get a copy of SotN THIS year, you'd be paying out the ass... Just dropped $60 on a Greatest Hits copy since I wore out my original.

What about Shotgun Gaming?

[Demon-Xanth]

I've done this in the past:

Instead of buying one $50 game, buy 5-10 $5-10 games. You know, games that are a year old, on clearance, etc... Sometimes you find a good game that you otherwise would have overlooked.

If 80% of those games aren't worth playing, you still end up with one that is.

Look used.
GT4: $50
GT3 (used): $6
Will you have 700% more fun w/ GT4 over GT3?

That's not to say don't buy the $50 game. After all, many are well worth it. (ie: Shadow of the Colossus)

Re:What about Shotgun Gaming?

[oliverthered]

I do something similar, my local games shop take 'trade in' games and then sell them for a fraction of the retail price, e.g. Hidden and dangerous cost me 50p less than $1, my girlfriend works for a sister company so I get a 30% discount on that. Battlefield 2 ended up costing £12.

Re:What about Shotgun Gaming?

[patternjuggler]

Instead of buying one $50 game, buy 5-10 $5-10 games. You know, games that are a year old, on clearance, etc... Sometimes you find a good game that you otherwise would have overlooked.


There are still a lot of games not even worth $5-$10, I've found many times I'll put down a game after only playing a few levels. It's odd, because if I had paid more money I probably would have felt more compelled to give the game a chance and would have put more effort into getting past a difficult section or more willing to put up with minor flaws- I want to get my money's worth.

What?

[sc0ttyb]

What on earth are you talking about? Just because there are some games with black men and guns you assume the industry is racist? These games just typically try and glorify the gang "culture", which is another issue altogether.

black man + gun != racist

Now, if the game was something like "Underground Railroad Tycoon", then yeah, I'd have to agree with you. But I don't even sense the most subtle hint of racism in games. At all.

Care to point some examples out to me?

Re:What?

[jackbird]

Almost every RPG ever made, where your character's 'race' and sometimes 'gender' affects their traits like 'strength' and 'intelligence'?

Re:What?

[sc0ttyb]

I'm not trying to be an ass, honest, but here we go.

You mean like "human", "dwarf", "elf", etc? Yeah, that's really racist all right. God forbid each of those races have different physiologies that enhance certain traits. Everyone should be human, I guess.

Can you name one game (outside an obvious white supremacist propaganda game) that bases stats on skin color?

Gender is an entirely different issue altogether. That's not what this was originally about. Some games choose not to place stat restrictions/limitations based on gender, and that's their choice. In actuality, both genders each have their limitations because they are both different. This isn't sexist, it's reality. So, is it considered sexist when a male character has +25 strength and a female has +20 strength? It shouldn't be, because each gender's natural build is different. The male form's possibility for maximum physical strength is always going to be greater than that of the female form unless evolution changes something very fundamental.

Re:What?

[Bastian]

First of all, let's get our language straight. "There's racism in the industry" does not mean the same thing as "the industry is racist." It's the difference between 'some' and 'all.'

And no, one black guy with a gun is not racist. But if you start looking at cheap knock-off games that are trying to capitalize on the success of GTA and/or "street culture," you'll probably notice that a disproportionate number of the gang-bangers in those games are black.

Re:What?

[(A)*(B)!0_-]

"But if you start looking at cheap knock-off games that are trying to capitalize on the success of GTA and/or "street culture," you'll probably notice that a disproportionate number of the gang-bangers in those games are black."

Oh my god! You're right! I just took a look at all the NBA games that I've bought over the years - the majority of the people in them are black! IT MUST BE RACISM! THEY'RE TRYING TO TELL ME THAT ALL BLACK PEOPLE PLAY BASKETBALL IN THE NBA!

People who cry racism at the first sign of race are intellectually crippled with fear of upsetting anyone. They are completely worthless in conversation.

Re:What?

[Shad_the_protector]

This is good as long as each gender have their pro & con. If you have a game where all stat of a female char are lower than the male one, first that is pointless to have a female char, second I could BEGIN to consider it a little sexist.


And can someone tell me why is it cheaper to buy a female soilder than a male soldier in FFT. I'm still woundering why.

Re:What?

[sc0ttyb]

First of all, let's get our language straight. "There's racism in the industry" does not mean the same thing as "the industry is racist." It's the difference between 'some' and 'all.'

You're right. I mistook your statement. My apologies.

"But if you start looking at cheap knock-off games that are trying to capitalize on the success of GTA and/or 'street culture,' you'll probably notice that a disproportionate number of the gang-bangers in those games are black."

Maybe that's because San Andreas featured a lot of black gang members and the knock-offs are simply applying the age-old "me too" aspect to their game design? Of course they're gonna have predominantly black characters because they're copying everything to make it appealing to people who enjoyed San Andreas.

Re:What?

[KDR_11k]

GURPS makes you more resistent towards the tiring effects of wandering around in a desert if your skin color is black but I wouldn't call that racism.

Re:What?

[Bastian]

Maybe that's because San Andreas featured a lot of black gang members and the knock-offs are simply applying the age-old "me too" aspect to their game design? Of course they're gonna have predominantly black characters because they're copying everything to make it appealing to people who enjoyed San Andreas.

True. But I wasn't trying to insinuate that games that feature black guys with guns are all racist. I was pointing out a good reason not to assume that the author of an article that mentions video games featuring black guys with guns is racist by providing an alternative guess as to what his thought process was.

Re:What?

[jackbird]

Obviously it's not racist in a real-world sense, but the worldview the game mechanics endorse is.

Re:What?

[geminidomino]

And can someone tell me why is it cheaper to buy a female soilder than a male soldier in FFT. I'm still woundering why.

It's been a long time since I played FFT, but if I remember correctly, female chars had better DEX (or was it called Agility?) scores and worse defense and total HP, so they died more often?

how to not buy crap games

[davez0r]

two options:

1. don't buy games
2. go to http://www.gamerankings.com/ and don't buy anything that gets lower than 90%.

this isn't rocket science, come on.

Re:how to not buy crap games

[bergeron76]

Or simply avoid the 360.

Re:A Bit Racist Are We?

[(A)*(B)!0_-]

How is portraying a black male with a gun racist?

The character with the gun has to have some race. Is it racist to show a white guy with a gun? What about an Asian guy with a gun? Why do you think the example of a game with a black male wielding a gun proves that the game industry is racist?

Re:Here goes the learnding

[Gulthek]

Not really. Jokes like that (and in general) are not taken with a sense of humor by airport security.

Re:Here goes the learnding

[general_re]

And I love wanker.

There's a lot of those these days - which one did you mean?

Sorry, couldn't resist ;)

Re:Avoid anything from EA

[Threni]

> My objection to the patch is that my whole reason for liking BF2 so much is the feeling of
> open spaces and a rural atmosphere. Special Forces seems to be an attempt to turn it back into
> precisely the close-combat corridor blastfest of Counterstrike and co. that I was so sick of
> before it came along.

Each to their own. I only like the city maps (Karkand, Mashtuur, Sharqi) really, although I tolerate Dragon Valley and Fushe sometimes. I don't do planes/helis, so unless you are lucky enough to find a spare vehicle it's time to start trudging from flag to flag with utterly ineffective anti-air weapons (assuming you can get to one in time).

Re:A Bit Racist Are We?

[Gherikill]

Best retort ever!

Re:Avoid anything from EA

[BenjyD]

I'll second that: the "find server" page is truly awful, like it was written by some 13-year old VB kiddie and lag is a huge problem still. It took BF1942 something like four patches to become stable and playable for me, so BF2 has a way to go yet.

Re:suggestions

[Pxtl]

Nope. The UT2kX series is an extremely impressive exception to the rule.

Re:A Bit Racist Are We?

[Brando_Calrisean]

Could the author be referring to that "50-Cent" game that's coming out?

Re:A Bit Racist Are We?

[Pxtl]

The problem is that we're in the wake of GTA:San Andreas, and so every 2-bit knockoff company is making games about black kids shooting up their urban city.

When he means "black man with shotgun" he doesn't mean Malcolm from UT. He means "gang banging thug".

Now, personally, I'd extend that rule to apply to any game where the box art shows a protagonist wearing street-gang glothing with a shaved head wielding firearms, not just black ones... but by and large, right not the trend for street gangery is to have a black protagonist similar to San Andreas.

My advice: Buy last years games this year!

[techstar25]

Not only are they tried and true, tested and reviewed, but they can be had for $15 used at EBgames. Great games never get old.

Re:Avoid anything from EA

[iainl]

Each to their own, indeed. I don't begrudge others having fun on the city maps, I just realised fairly quickly that I wasn't enjoying myself when playing them. Probably because I'm rubbish at it, to be honest.

Re:suggestions

[Delphiki]

The other poster said that the UT series is an exception to this rule. I would just say this is an incredibly shitty rule, espoused by those who care more about sounding cool than playing good games.

Let's consider a few other 'exceptions', shall we? Civ VI, HL2, Halo 2, GTA3, FFX, GT4, MGS3, Elder Scrolls 3... I'd be willing to bet all of those are above 90% on gamerankings. But I guess you'd rather play crap, so long as it's not a sequel.

Re:A Bit Racist Are We?

[(A)*(B)!0_-]

But how does putting a black gang-banger on the cover show that there's racism in the industry?

movie games

[truffle]

Knights of the Old Republic
Chronicles of Riddick

Two great movie license games.

Savvy gamers will buy games based on quality of the game, unsavvy gamers won't be reading slashdot anyway so they'll keep buying movie license games.

Re:movie games

[jclast]

I'm not going to argue that KotOR isn't a great game, but how could it possibly be a _movie_ license? Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith is a movie license. If anything, KotOR is a franchise license.

It uses the Star Wars name and concepts, races, and other things established in the films.

There is no film on which KotOR is based, and there never will be (that I've hear about at least). The events of the game don't impact the events of the films, and George Lucas himself has said that it (and every other piece of non-movie Star Wars entertainment aside from The Clone Wars cartoon, I think) is Expanded Universe and non-canon.

Great game? Yes. Move license? No.

I'm doing my part...

[vga_init]

This holiday season I'm investing in a GP2X. This device has been reported on previously on Slashdot; basically, it's a handheld that's powered by open source software. If this doesn't help the "game industry," I don't know what will... :-)

I think the advice in the article is crap

[Jaeph]

Buy a game because it's good. You can find this out within days by reading through the reviews. That's not perfect - nothing in life is - but it's a very useful step.

Regarding the supposed "racism"; it wasn't racist, it was stereotyping. To be simplistic, the former is "evil" the latter may be "ignorant". However, in the real world advertising, marketing, and specifically entertainment are all targetted to stereotype groups. It's quite normal to speak of games, tv shows, or films appealing to certain ages, genders, racial groups, or some combination thereof.

I think the article writer showed poor discretion in writing what he did, but I don't think we can jump to racism either.

-Jeff

Terrible way to choose a game

[brkello]

This "article" reads like it was written by someone who reads the daily gripes about games on Slashdot. They really are guilty of generalizing specific game categories rather than helping anyone find good games. There are good games out there with movie tie-ins. There are great games that take place in WWII now matter how tired they are of it. Independant games are not magically good. Non-Sequels can be terrible. Now, if they said "A large number of games with movie tie-ins are very very bad. There are many exceptions though. Do some research on a title online first and see how people rate it. Check multiple sources." Actually, that's the advice I would give on any game. That article doesn't do much to actually help you. You'd get more out of going to gamefaqs.

Thank goodness for articles like these...

[bigbigbison]

If only there some reviews for videogames than these kinds of stupid articles would be pointless. ...oh wait...

Make sure you have a Nintendo DS

[richman555]

Make sure you have a Nintendo DS and a copy of Mario Kart DS and all will be fine. The game (and the DS platform) simply rocks.

How Not To Read Crap Articles This Season

[lightspawn]

What terrible generalizations.

It's a shame the author of the article isn't aware of The Guardian Gamesblog that had an entry several weeks ago titled Peter Jackson - game developer. It seems the director was unhappy with EA's treatment of the LotR games, so for the game based on King Kong he contacted the developer of Beyond Good and Evil, a great but overlooked title, and even shipped members of the design team to New Zealand, gave them information about the movie and discussed the game with them.

Yes, games based on movies used to be bad (E.T. anyone) but now that games are big business things are changing.

Re:How Not To Read Crap Articles This Season

[Turn-X Alphonse]

This is bullshit. Theres 1-2 decent movie games a year at most. More often than not EA get the licence and just make some crappy generic game.

Re:A Bit Racist Are We?

[ConceptJunkie]

Calling this racist is just trying to start a conflict where one doesn't exist.

That's what 95% of use of the word 'racism' is, But don't tell anyone... it's a secret.

Re:Here goes the learnding

[KDR_11k]

Bob. Everyone's favourite wanker.

Re:A Bit Racist Are We?

[tepp]

Generally, avoid any game featuring a young black man wielding a shotgun on the cover

Bad advice. Ignoring the obvious biases against black men with guns, there are several good games out there that feature a cover with a black man with a gun.

For example, Suffering: The Ties that Bind is a great fps horror game, where you play a convicted murderer who is escaping from a tormented version of hell on earth, set in Baltimore. (One might add that Baltimore looks just like normal! :) But that would be flattering Baltimore just a bit...)

The Suffering: Ties that Bind features on the cover a black man with two guns.... because the main character is black, and he's shooting the hell-demons with guns. Big surprise there, the cover is depicting the actual contents of the game.

Basically what this fellow is saying is, if Torque - the main character of The Suffering - was white, or female, it would be a good game, or if he was wielding a sword it would be OK...but because Torque is black, and is fighting in modern day Baltimore using a gun... it's crap. Which isn't true.

Re:A Bit Racist Are We?

[KDR_11k]

Well, there is this game called "Total Overdose" which seems to involve mexicans.

zerg

[Lord Omlette]

Pick up a DS and Mario Kart. Done.

Look for the bad

[Lord_Dweomer]

The good reviews are easy to find, and can definitely highlight some good perks of a game. However when I make my purchase decisions I want to find ALL of the negative reviews and problems I can before I make my purchasing decision. That way I can find out what key compatability issues might be, or if things aren't working out like the developers intended (as happens TOO frequently in MMORPGs).

Say it again for those who missed it....

[Targon]

The point is that the whole industry has gone into this mode of being afraid to try something new. Because the budget to make a game from scratch is going up and up and up, it's not a big surprise, but there are very few companies out there willing to take a chance.

Some sequels that were good include The Sims 2, and Civilization 4(the game has changed a LOT from previous titles for the better).

Bioware has been working on some new stuff, such as Dragon Age which is a while away still, but will be an original game world and rule system.

Oblivion(which has been delayed), may or may not be a great game that breaks away from previous Elder Scrolls titles, so while it may be in the series, the game itself should be more than just Morrowind with a new area to explore and adventure in.

If you look at what I and the original article was saying, a sequel in general isn't a bad thing, but if it's just the same junk as the previous game in the series with some differences, it's not worth spending money on. If a game is based on a movie that is just comming out, chances are it's being sold just to try to make more money for the movie, not because the game itself will be good. It's like "Buy Star Wars Episode 3 toilet paper", not because it's good, but because you like the movie. Crap like that needs to go away in this industry.

Sports games are one of the worst offenders out there because by their nature, each new version tends to be the same game with a different set of players. Do you need to spend $40 to buy a game that isn't different from the last year's version? If there is a new game engine and the game is really different, then sure, buy it. If it's the same crap, then skip it.

Another thing to be careful of is when the next game in a series is made by a different company. In many cases, the feel of the original game in the series may have been great, but if the license gets transfered to a new developer, the feel may get lost. So, beware...

To be fair...

[MMaestro]

There have been a LOT more poor movie/franchise licensed games in comparison. There was at LEAST 3 different Star Wars games on the SNES alone (episode 4, 5 and 6 games), somewhere around 20~30 games on the PC (not counting expansions) and way too many to count on the Xbox and PS2 (anywhere from Star Wars Pod Racing (or whatever it was called) to Star Wars Battlefront 2).

Then theres the imfamous E.T. game, the incredibly bad Matrix games and the Batman/Superman/Spiderman comic book games which almost always seem destined to fail.

all generalizations are false!

[Scudsucker]

You can make generalizations that are true 95% of the time - that's why they are generalizations. There's a 95% chance that a Spielberg movie will be good, and a 95% chance that a Pauly Shore movie is going to be absolute dreck.

Are there good game with movie tie ins? Sure. But 99 out of a 100 will be shit.

most reviews are crap though

[Scudsucker]

On most review sites a really horrible game will still score 70%. Even Diakatana managed to score 25%, despite getting the microwave award. There are several reasons for this:

1) 85% is considered an "average" game rather than 50%
2) Reviewers are dependent on free copies of games from publishers
3) Reviewers get much better support from developers if problems arise.

Contrast that with Slashdot's review of Myst III: Exile, which earned a score of 0 because the game wouldn't install or play. Highlights include the game not running if you didn't have a 32 bit card, despite the supposed support for 16 bit, not installing if your CDROM drive had a letter higher than H (wtf?) and people not getting the game to run despite having the exact system specs as what was listed on the box.

So, what to do? I start by subtracting 20% off the typical review score. Then I try to "read between the lines" to see if the reviewer is is trying to nonchalantly slip some grips past his corporate "benefactors". Then I read user reviews, and start with the mixed to hostile reviews first and the fawning ones last.