The great thing is that the name "Wiimote" is not being used to denegrate the system, it's been given as sort of an endeering nickname. Nintendo's really going for the "endeering" qualities this time around, giving the system a cute name, pushing casual games that involve more social interaction. I think they might as well go all-out and name the remote, the Wiimote. I think calling the last controller (at least the wireless version, which became the dominant kind) the "Wavebird" was a great move, it gave the system just a little bit more character. "Wiimote" is self-conciously cutesy and self-depricating, in a very endeering way, I think they should officially name it what their fans have christined it.
It's an extension of the criterion that a video game system designed to output to the family TV set is a console. The Super NES with Super Game Boy is a console. The GameCube with Game Boy Player is a console. But no console available to the public as of August 2006 runs DS software.
I think what he means is, "what use is this as criteria?" Being able to be played on a TV or off a TV does not drastically change the marketting demographic or style of gameplay. Portability does, but it seems that this is not what we're talking about. There has to be a compelling reason to divide objects into different catagories. Defining a handheld as "something that can never be played on a TV" is meaningless catagorization. It may be true, but it has no real value as a catagorical feature. Defining a handheld in terms of how it is played, and where it can be played, are far more useful features in defining the catagory, as they have a noticable impact on the demographic, style of gameplay, marketting, etc.
There are subtle differences between consoles and handheld consoles, but probably the only large difference is that today's handhelds = yesterday's consoles, in terms of ability, and to a lesser extent, style of gameplay (GameGear is a Master System derivitive, GBA is an SNES derivitive, the DS is basically an N64 with a whole new interface system, the PSP is a PlayStation derivitive), there may be some differences in hardware and programming, but generally, their aim is to achieve the level of power and style of the last generation system.
The DS is the first major handheld (unless you count the Virtual Boy) to take the console genre in a drastically different direction from its TV-based counterpart. Nintendo finally used the fact that it is a self contained, portable, piece of hardware, as a way of prividing functionality that a TV-based console can't do. This is an exception... not the rule.
But for the most part, the only really notable differences between handhelds and TV-based consoles are:
They're portable
They're generally a generation behind, in terms of graphics, sound, and gameplay style
The games are weighted toward being able to quickly pick up/put down the system (though, often this is simply the addition of a "quick save" feature).
One can make a pretty good arguement that these differences are fairly irrelivant, in terms of gameplay experience, at least to their last-gen TV-based counterparts. So, yeah, I would consider handheld games to be a slight varrient on the TV-based console world. Although, since the DS and PSP are able to handle the same KINDS of graphics as their current TV-based counterparts (if not up to their quality, but at least their style), the generation gap is becoming less and less apparrent. Metroid Prime Hunters is solidly a current generation title, for instance (even if I thought it was terrible in comparison to its GameCube counterparts). GTA: Liberty City Stories is (supposedly) able to replicate the gameplay experience of GTAIII; in fact, it was popular enough to be the first game ever (I believe) to be ported from a handheld to a TV-based console.
Only mod to the engine I know of that made any difference to the gameplay was the addition of the poison mushroom... I don't really call that an update, it's probably one line of additional code, alone with one new sprite. Other than that, the graphics are all the same, and the physics are the same.
Oracle of Ages/Seasons (as well as Minish Cap) was outsourced to Capcom, not Nintendo, though they did a wonderful job with them.
But I'm not sure those are good examples, I'm a bit tired of the whole re-hash quest, myself. I thought a great example was reusing a varient of the Ocarina engine for Majora's Mask. It had a new story, completely new quests, new puzzles. I thought Master Quest was just a lame rehash, and not a very good one at that. Pokémon RBY is a perfectly good system to use, as long as everyone realizes that RBY are the same game, and that you just use them for trading, and having slight varients in collectables. I would never BUY and play through two different versions, though (btw, I'm currently playing through Fire Red right now, first time I've ever played a Pokémon game).
Seriously, the NES had no serious competition, Nintendo really created the niche we now know as the modern console gaming industry. Atari couldn't keep up, and Sega's first system was a viable failour. But, after that, other companies were able to learn from Nintendo's successes, it's no wonder that someone was able to catch up. Hell, Nintendo and Sega were practically neck & neck in Nintendo's second generation. The industry was so small, all these companies were almost unheard of. "Turbo Graphics"? the company sticks it's head out for about a year and a half, and then dives down again. Suddenly, Nintendo finds itself going up against two of the largest tech companies in the world: Sony and then Microsoft, with powerhouse budgets... and when they, somehow, are unable to maintain their lead, everyone talks of how they lost the hearts and minds of gamers?! It's amazing a company the size of Nintendo weren't completely burned to a crisp. It's because they had the hearts and minds of the gamers that they're still around, at any form at all, now. I seriously think that people are finally starting to realize that, and which is why the Wii will do so well.
FF7 is revolutionary. Technically because it's the 'first' 3D RPG in the same sense Mario is the first action platformer.
For one thing, that's flatout wrong. There were several 3D RPGs before FF7: Wild Arms 1, for starters. Now, I'm not going to compare these two, they're totally different, and I would agree that FF7 comes out on top, but saying that it's revolutionary is a bit of a stretch. If you step back from graphics, though, FF7 hardly does anything more than FF6 did, it just does it with a bit more flash and flare, and a bit more cliche. I would argue that FF6 has much better dialog (granted, some of that due to a bad translation on the part of Square's localizers, for FF7), and more flushed out character personalities. FF7 trades character personality for backstory, which I think is an inferior direction to take. FF7s characters are also much more archetypical. FF7s events are also less applicable than FF6s, they constantly relly on completely fantasy/sci-fi factors, where-as, more often then not, FF6s fantasy elements are far more applicable to day to day existance. In it's ability to create a compelling narrative, with flushed out characters you can actually empethize with, at a time in which even the most advanced RPGs were composed of completely archetypical personas, FF6 stands to be the far more revolutionary game. Sure, the sprite-based graphics may be deciving, but I think of FF6 as, quite possibly, the first moddern console RPG, the first truely great one.
Now, in terms of game design, and architecture, FF6 is a 3D game as well, it just was forced to use 2D graphics because of the technology at the time. You can totally feel the developers struggling to get every ounce of their vision out with the hardware they have... which is why, sometimes, you get god-aweful side-effects, like the mine cart ride. All the houses and buildings are laid out in very concise 3D models, with nooks and crannies you may find yourself walking behind, all the time... unfortunately, the SNES had only the most basic polygon rendering engine (who's extent can be seen in things like the spinning triforce in LttP). I've always hoped that they would redo FF6 in the 3D glory that its creators hoped to be able to give their vision. Partially for their own sake (and for ours), and partially so ignorant fools like you would open your eyes and realize that the holy church of FF7 is nothing but a minor tweak of FF6.
Now, that said, FF7 is a fine game that I hold very dear, but it is greatly overshadowed by the ingenuity and deapth of both games on either side of it.
Interesting, I found Kuja to be far and away the most interesting villian in the series... he actually has a believably human motiv, other than "I'M INSANE" or, "I'M EVIL". It's a complex combination of, pride, jellousy, and narsicism that lead him to where he is... he's a tragic character that actually mimics the behavior of the hero, had he been on the other side. Unfortunate that his creator's saught to dress him up in the most unappealing clothes ever, so noone would like to admit to finding him interesting, risk they be called "gay". He's one of the very few villians in RPGs that I could actually empathize with. I'm much more partial to empathetic characters/villians than charasmatic ones... which is why I can't stand Sephiroth.
My friend has an interesting theory as to why Kuja dresses in such androginus clothing: it is in deffiance of Garland, who is a hyper-patriarchal figure, with muscular armor and gettup that commands "manliness". Kuja's outfit is a deffiance of that which he hates, that being Garland's unwavering control over his existance. Who knows if this was what the creator's had in mind, but I think it's a very intereting theory, none-the-less.
One of the many reasons that it's actually my favorite game in the series, just ahead of FF9 and FF6. It's a love or hate game, I've found. I know MANY die-hard Final Fantasy fans (and I mean, people who have played over 50% of the series, including at least one pre-FF7 game), who think it's the finest game in the series... I also know many that think it's the worst thing ever made. I tend to find myself liking games/music/movies that are the biggest polarizers. While I was off at college, about 9 out of 10 die-hard FF fans I knew thought FF8 was the best in the series... but among more casual players, it seems to be a real point of contention. Interestingly, it often gets accused of being a game made for 13 year old boys, but from my experience, 13-year-old boys are the biggest critics of the game, since it revolves around a love story... "GAAAAYYYY!!!!" FF7 was pretty amazing, but I don't think it's anywhere near FF8, I just think it offered a lot of cliche's that were very popular at the time... the characters had a certain charisma (especially Sephiroth) that everyone loved, and I detested. I like FF8 because the characters are all fairly uncharasmatic, and they feel far more realistic that way.
No harm done... and it took a lot more courage then most to admit a mistake. But yeah, I agree with pretty much all the facts you stated. Any respect I used to have for the playstation brand, is gone. Unfortunately, I still don't have much more respect for the XBox brand, so currently there's a big gaping hole to be filled. I'll admit to becoming a bit of a Nintendo fanboi and Wiitard, but my love of epic RPGs is something that Nintendo can't currently be expected to fill in for. That was the one genre that was completely owned by the playstation, and I'll be interested to see what becomes of it.
...is it's effect on game series, as a whole. Up until then, sequals were little more than altered level sets. In fact, this is all the Japanese sequal to Super Mario Bros. is... aside from the addition of one item, the poison mushroom, it is simply a different level set. But with the game switch debacle that was Mario 2, the whole idea of a "sequal" changed from: "same game with different levels", to "new game with similarities to original game, with new levels". Since then, few series have been able to get by with simply altering level sets. Imagine what would have happened if Mario 2 had been released the way it originally was, in the US, Mario 3 wouldn't have had to be so innovative just to follow a similar progression, it could have just been a THIRD level set of the original game... but thankfully, the creators were forced to come up with some entirely new design ideas, and created one of the greatest games of all time.
Ummm, dude, I probably agree with you on every single one of your individual points, but you still come across as an asshole. Actually, if you read his post, it doesn't come across as fanboyish in the slightest, he takes a good step back from everything and surveys it fairly well. If anything, YOUR post comes across as anti-Sony fanboyish. I may agree a little more with your actual conclusions, but you could learn some communication skills from this guy. Oh, and spelling a company you don't like with a "$" sign, that's so funny, I wish I'd thought of that!
Sure, I don't believe the PS3 will be a huge success, but I don't believe it will fail either... the PS2 did so well, the PS3 is guarenteed a good ride for a while on its success, even if it is little more than a toaster glued to a frying pan. Now, the PS4 may be a disaster because of it, but that's a different story.
That was sorta my thought, at first, but then I started thinking about it like this: Sony is making a profit on the PS2, or at least breaking even, at this point. The only reason to create a new console is to attempt to get more people to buy your consoles, when the older one starts flagging. The PS2 is doing quite well right now, though, so many Sony's plan for the PS3 is for it to be gradually adopted, thus furthering the life of the cheaper, but more profitable PS2. If PS2 sales start to drop, it's only because people are preparing to get a PS3, which is not a bad thing for Sony either.
The bottom line is, people aren't really "done" with this generation, yet. They're pretty happy with the quality of technology thus far, which is why the PS2 greatly outsold the far more powerful XBox and GameCube consoles. Hotcakes are going to be selling like Wiis, though, because it's not so much a new generation, but a new kind of console experience all together... not just an upgrade. I predict that PS2 sales will be strong for a good 6 months to a year into the PS3s life, with some great new games coming out. By then the PS3s price will drop enough that people will slowly start buying them.
I'm not being a Sony appologizer, however, I think the PS3s price is outragous, and I'm not buying one until it falls below $300, but it may not be a bad strategy for Sony to extend the launch period, and continue the PS2 legacy a little longer. After all, it's not about how many console one sells at launch, it's about how many consoles they sell over the console's lifespan.
Both Netflix and Blockbuster have major problems when working from a social gathering standpoing: with Netflix, if you have a party, and someone suggests a movie, you have to plan to get back together another day to watch it. With Blockbuster, you have to have someone leave the party, get in a car, drive to the movie place, and bring back a movie. This is why a service like this is going to be a complete boon for any party atmosphere, which makes up a large percentage of movie rentals. This will be especially the case for college students. Sure, it ties up your internet, but who cares? If you're in a social situation where you want to be watching a movie, chances are you're not going to be heavily surfing the web, unless you and your buddies are checking out the latest Strongbad emails, or having a LAN party. Netflix requires PLANNING, which is a huge deal killer... most people don't know what movie they want to watch until a few hours or minutes before hand. Most college students use their computers as their movie players anyway, unless they show stuff in the lounge, in which they, more often then not (from my experience), still use their laptops as the main DVD player. I wonder how many lives this will save, from drunk partiers driving to pick up "the movie".
The other demographic that will totally benefit from this are famillies with small children. "Mommy, I want to watch Spongebob, and I want to watch it NOW!", okay, Netflix is now completely out of the question, and getting the little ones all dressed to go out, hurding them into the car, having to keep them from running into people in Blockbuster, and other shinanigans, make renting out complicated and a pain for many parents. Simply sitting down for 5 minutes, starting the download, and then going out back to play catch with the kids for a half-an-hour seems like a much better option.
Of course, there's going to be a question of how to get the movie on the TV. It won't be long until various media-center PC options become available. Even if Apple doesn't get a Mac Mini media-center device out the door and in everyone's house, iTunes will work on any PC, so Apple will have a fairly seccure infrastructure, if the #1 media center is windows based.
Heh heh, I love the Final Fantasy series and the Metal Gear Solid games, but "good stories"? I dunno if I would go that far. I think they're TRYING, especially Kojima, which I give a lot of credit for, but they're far from being great narrative works. Kojima has made a series that has about the litterary quality of a decent James Bond movie, which is pretty good, considering that we're talking about a genre that's only about 15 years old (in terms of story telling), but it's no "Good Night & Good Luck". Also, Kojima's games are basically a hybrid of movies and games, the cinematic sections are only very slightly interactive (and only in MGS3), and the gameplay sections have no story. It's a game of switching back and forth. Now, I don't think there's anything wrong with that, but it should be understood that it's two separate medias within one larger work.
Final Fantasy IX comes about as close to being a "great story" as I've ever played, the characters are far more real than almost all other games (FF8 has it's moments too), and some very thoughtful dialog, but it, too, is fairly basic. Now, I think there is potential in games for great stories, and I think there's potential for games with great narrative that is completely intertwined with great gameplay. I don't think we're there yet, though.
But what I really don't understand is this hatred of linearity. Just because we have the means, within a medium, to be completely non-linear, doesn't mean we should be restricted to that. Non-linearity, is very restrictive, in itself. A game can simply be a film with an interactive camera... there is no such thing out there, afterall, and it might be a very interesting medium for artists to use. I particularly like this concept of having a story going on around you, where the character is only slightly in control of (because that's what our lives are, after all), and the player has the options of choosing what parts of it to see, at what pace to see them, in atempts to figure out what it all really means.
The basis of narrative is that it MEANS something, there is a creator behind it trying desperately to get their ideas across. This is what interests me the most about various art and entertainment works. I do not feel threatened by the artist's ideas, in fact, I enjoy exploring that. I think at lot of this anti-narrative sentiment comes from people feeling threatened by others' creative endevours, and would like games to be a safe-haven for their own ideas, only. And it is a great safe-haven for that, after all, games (unlike novels or films) don't have to have narrative at all. But you also have to understand, that there are some of us who enjoy working through other people's creative ideas... and there is room for all kinds. Games don't HAVE TO be anything, they shouldn't be limited to certain areas, just because they tend to approach similarity to other mediums. The reality is, Final Fantasy, as cinematic as the series has become, is NOT a movie, and it does offer things that movies can not, which in-itself, makes it a viable and unique form of entertainment. I, personally, enjoy both games with narrative and games without, and would feel extremely threatened if one side were to take over the industry completely. There is room for both... no, there is a NEED for both.
LOL, that was my first thought when comparing Doom 2 and Marathon 2 back in the day, as well! But similarly, I believe Marathon to be a MUCH better series. Eventually, when the ideas behind it were allowed to reach a larger audience in it's extension, as the Halo series, it seems that it finally won out. But the main difference between Doom and Marathon, besides luminosity, is that it has a story, and a fairly ingenious way of developing it (a device later used by the Metroid Prime series).
Even if you're a pure gameplay freak, remember that narrative gives a good escuse for varience in gameplay. After all, Tetris, as great as it is, is only fun for 15minutes here and 15minutes there, because there's no change in gameplay, where-as a story can spark drastic, and interesting changes in gameplay.
Oh, misscomunication, man. I was replying to his post, not to the article, which speculates that maybe the 6k is used to simply to hold the key (username and password) to an online account. I was simply replying to why I thought that would be a bad idea. Go back and read it if you want, but it's pretty irrelivant, anyway.
I agree. I was very worried when the DS came out, that the current trend in handheld gaming, basically the reniasance of the SNES, would dissappear, but I'm happy to say that it really hasn't. One of the biggest selling games on the DS was Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, which was a 2D game. Same with New Super Mario Bros. which has already outsold Super Mario DS (Mario 64), if I remember correctly, Super Princess Peach, and many other titles. The only one I've been dissapointed with was Metroid. I love both the original series and the Prime series, and I think there's room in this world for both 2D and 3D Metroid games, and think consoles are a great place for the 3D Prime series, where as handhelds are a wonderful place for their 2D brethren. I was very sorry to see an attempt at a Prime game on a handheld, and think it failed quite misserably. I was also even more upset to hear that there was a 2D Metroid game in the works, that we didn't even know about, that got cut. Zero Mission was an excellent game, and as much as I love my DS, I have yet to play a game of it's calliber. It will come though, I hope. But there is hope, look at Zelda. Around the same time, they're releasing the big 3D release, Twilight Princess on the Wii, and a top-view, psuedo 2D (made with 3D graphics, which is just fine with me... this is how New Super Mario was done, anyway) on the DS.
Remember that the best selling game on the Gamecube was a 2D game, Smash Bros. Melee. Sure, its visuals were produced by 3D graphics, but the gameplay was completely 2D, and that's what really matters.
That's basically a maximum. Most CDs cost between $12-$17, only at very expensive places do CDs cost $20... that's usually around the price for a double album. Similarly, the only games that cost $60 are XBox360 titles... and seeing that there's a HUGE market for those these days I'm not sure I can see that as any kind of standard. All DS games cost $25-$35, all PS2 & Gamecube games are $20 if over a year old, and $40-$50 for new releases.
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The great thing is that the name "Wiimote" is not being used to denegrate the system, it's been given as sort of an endeering nickname. Nintendo's really going for the "endeering" qualities this time around, giving the system a cute name, pushing casual games that involve more social interaction. I think they might as well go all-out and name the remote, the Wiimote. I think calling the last controller (at least the wireless version, which became the dominant kind) the "Wavebird" was a great move, it gave the system just a little bit more character. "Wiimote" is self-conciously cutesy and self-depricating, in a very endeering way, I think they should officially name it what their fans have christined it.
lol, was I the only one who got this?
http://www.cafepress.com/leftward.66531036I think what he means is, "what use is this as criteria?" Being able to be played on a TV or off a TV does not drastically change the marketting demographic or style of gameplay. Portability does, but it seems that this is not what we're talking about. There has to be a compelling reason to divide objects into different catagories. Defining a handheld as "something that can never be played on a TV" is meaningless catagorization. It may be true, but it has no real value as a catagorical feature. Defining a handheld in terms of how it is played, and where it can be played, are far more useful features in defining the catagory, as they have a noticable impact on the demographic, style of gameplay, marketting, etc.
There are subtle differences between consoles and handheld consoles, but probably the only large difference is that today's handhelds = yesterday's consoles, in terms of ability, and to a lesser extent, style of gameplay (GameGear is a Master System derivitive, GBA is an SNES derivitive, the DS is basically an N64 with a whole new interface system, the PSP is a PlayStation derivitive), there may be some differences in hardware and programming, but generally, their aim is to achieve the level of power and style of the last generation system.
The DS is the first major handheld (unless you count the Virtual Boy) to take the console genre in a drastically different direction from its TV-based counterpart. Nintendo finally used the fact that it is a self contained, portable, piece of hardware, as a way of prividing functionality that a TV-based console can't do. This is an exception... not the rule.
But for the most part, the only really notable differences between handhelds and TV-based consoles are:
One can make a pretty good arguement that these differences are fairly irrelivant, in terms of gameplay experience, at least to their last-gen TV-based counterparts. So, yeah, I would consider handheld games to be a slight varrient on the TV-based console world. Although, since the DS and PSP are able to handle the same KINDS of graphics as their current TV-based counterparts (if not up to their quality, but at least their style), the generation gap is becoming less and less apparrent. Metroid Prime Hunters is solidly a current generation title, for instance (even if I thought it was terrible in comparison to its GameCube counterparts). GTA: Liberty City Stories is (supposedly) able to replicate the gameplay experience of GTAIII; in fact, it was popular enough to be the first game ever (I believe) to be ported from a handheld to a TV-based console.
Very Sad... everyone should know the lyrics to AT MINIMUM: Tom Sawyer, Freewill, and Spirit of Radio.
BTW: I always get a kick out of it when radio stations play "Spirit of Radio" as if it's their anthem.
Only mod to the engine I know of that made any difference to the gameplay was the addition of the poison mushroom... I don't really call that an update, it's probably one line of additional code, alone with one new sprite. Other than that, the graphics are all the same, and the physics are the same.
Oracle of Ages/Seasons (as well as Minish Cap) was outsourced to Capcom, not Nintendo, though they did a wonderful job with them.
But I'm not sure those are good examples, I'm a bit tired of the whole re-hash quest, myself. I thought a great example was reusing a varient of the Ocarina engine for Majora's Mask. It had a new story, completely new quests, new puzzles. I thought Master Quest was just a lame rehash, and not a very good one at that. Pokémon RBY is a perfectly good system to use, as long as everyone realizes that RBY are the same game, and that you just use them for trading, and having slight varients in collectables. I would never BUY and play through two different versions, though (btw, I'm currently playing through Fire Red right now, first time I've ever played a Pokémon game).
But going from #1 out of what? 1?
Seriously, the NES had no serious competition, Nintendo really created the niche we now know as the modern console gaming industry. Atari couldn't keep up, and Sega's first system was a viable failour. But, after that, other companies were able to learn from Nintendo's successes, it's no wonder that someone was able to catch up. Hell, Nintendo and Sega were practically neck & neck in Nintendo's second generation. The industry was so small, all these companies were almost unheard of. "Turbo Graphics"? the company sticks it's head out for about a year and a half, and then dives down again. Suddenly, Nintendo finds itself going up against two of the largest tech companies in the world: Sony and then Microsoft, with powerhouse budgets... and when they, somehow, are unable to maintain their lead, everyone talks of how they lost the hearts and minds of gamers?! It's amazing a company the size of Nintendo weren't completely burned to a crisp. It's because they had the hearts and minds of the gamers that they're still around, at any form at all, now. I seriously think that people are finally starting to realize that, and which is why the Wii will do so well.
Wow, you really schooled me! Feel proud buddy, that was definitely a very thoughtful and elegently executed, diss. Have fun with that!
Seriously, try being a bit more of an asshole next time you post, people will like you even more.
For one thing, that's flatout wrong. There were several 3D RPGs before FF7: Wild Arms 1, for starters. Now, I'm not going to compare these two, they're totally different, and I would agree that FF7 comes out on top, but saying that it's revolutionary is a bit of a stretch. If you step back from graphics, though, FF7 hardly does anything more than FF6 did, it just does it with a bit more flash and flare, and a bit more cliche. I would argue that FF6 has much better dialog (granted, some of that due to a bad translation on the part of Square's localizers, for FF7), and more flushed out character personalities. FF7 trades character personality for backstory, which I think is an inferior direction to take. FF7s characters are also much more archetypical. FF7s events are also less applicable than FF6s, they constantly relly on completely fantasy/sci-fi factors, where-as, more often then not, FF6s fantasy elements are far more applicable to day to day existance. In it's ability to create a compelling narrative, with flushed out characters you can actually empethize with, at a time in which even the most advanced RPGs were composed of completely archetypical personas, FF6 stands to be the far more revolutionary game. Sure, the sprite-based graphics may be deciving, but I think of FF6 as, quite possibly, the first moddern console RPG, the first truely great one.
Now, in terms of game design, and architecture, FF6 is a 3D game as well, it just was forced to use 2D graphics because of the technology at the time. You can totally feel the developers struggling to get every ounce of their vision out with the hardware they have... which is why, sometimes, you get god-aweful side-effects, like the mine cart ride. All the houses and buildings are laid out in very concise 3D models, with nooks and crannies you may find yourself walking behind, all the time... unfortunately, the SNES had only the most basic polygon rendering engine (who's extent can be seen in things like the spinning triforce in LttP). I've always hoped that they would redo FF6 in the 3D glory that its creators hoped to be able to give their vision. Partially for their own sake (and for ours), and partially so ignorant fools like you would open your eyes and realize that the holy church of FF7 is nothing but a minor tweak of FF6.
Now, that said, FF7 is a fine game that I hold very dear, but it is greatly overshadowed by the ingenuity and deapth of both games on either side of it.
Interesting, I found Kuja to be far and away the most interesting villian in the series... he actually has a believably human motiv, other than "I'M INSANE" or, "I'M EVIL". It's a complex combination of, pride, jellousy, and narsicism that lead him to where he is... he's a tragic character that actually mimics the behavior of the hero, had he been on the other side. Unfortunate that his creator's saught to dress him up in the most unappealing clothes ever, so noone would like to admit to finding him interesting, risk they be called "gay". He's one of the very few villians in RPGs that I could actually empathize with. I'm much more partial to empathetic characters/villians than charasmatic ones... which is why I can't stand Sephiroth.
My friend has an interesting theory as to why Kuja dresses in such androginus clothing: it is in deffiance of Garland, who is a hyper-patriarchal figure, with muscular armor and gettup that commands "manliness". Kuja's outfit is a deffiance of that which he hates, that being Garland's unwavering control over his existance. Who knows if this was what the creator's had in mind, but I think it's a very intereting theory, none-the-less.
One of the many reasons that it's actually my favorite game in the series, just ahead of FF9 and FF6. It's a love or hate game, I've found. I know MANY die-hard Final Fantasy fans (and I mean, people who have played over 50% of the series, including at least one pre-FF7 game), who think it's the finest game in the series... I also know many that think it's the worst thing ever made. I tend to find myself liking games/music/movies that are the biggest polarizers. While I was off at college, about 9 out of 10 die-hard FF fans I knew thought FF8 was the best in the series... but among more casual players, it seems to be a real point of contention. Interestingly, it often gets accused of being a game made for 13 year old boys, but from my experience, 13-year-old boys are the biggest critics of the game, since it revolves around a love story... "GAAAAYYYY!!!!" FF7 was pretty amazing, but I don't think it's anywhere near FF8, I just think it offered a lot of cliche's that were very popular at the time... the characters had a certain charisma (especially Sephiroth) that everyone loved, and I detested. I like FF8 because the characters are all fairly uncharasmatic, and they feel far more realistic that way.
No harm done... and it took a lot more courage then most to admit a mistake. But yeah, I agree with pretty much all the facts you stated. Any respect I used to have for the playstation brand, is gone. Unfortunately, I still don't have much more respect for the XBox brand, so currently there's a big gaping hole to be filled. I'll admit to becoming a bit of a Nintendo fanboi and Wiitard, but my love of epic RPGs is something that Nintendo can't currently be expected to fill in for. That was the one genre that was completely owned by the playstation, and I'll be interested to see what becomes of it.
...is it's effect on game series, as a whole. Up until then, sequals were little more than altered level sets. In fact, this is all the Japanese sequal to Super Mario Bros. is... aside from the addition of one item, the poison mushroom, it is simply a different level set. But with the game switch debacle that was Mario 2, the whole idea of a "sequal" changed from: "same game with different levels", to "new game with similarities to original game, with new levels". Since then, few series have been able to get by with simply altering level sets. Imagine what would have happened if Mario 2 had been released the way it originally was, in the US, Mario 3 wouldn't have had to be so innovative just to follow a similar progression, it could have just been a THIRD level set of the original game... but thankfully, the creators were forced to come up with some entirely new design ideas, and created one of the greatest games of all time.
Don't mention it, Wiitard! ;)
j/k
Ummm, dude, I probably agree with you on every single one of your individual points, but you still come across as an asshole. Actually, if you read his post, it doesn't come across as fanboyish in the slightest, he takes a good step back from everything and surveys it fairly well. If anything, YOUR post comes across as anti-Sony fanboyish. I may agree a little more with your actual conclusions, but you could learn some communication skills from this guy. Oh, and spelling a company you don't like with a "$" sign, that's so funny, I wish I'd thought of that!
Sure, I don't believe the PS3 will be a huge success, but I don't believe it will fail either... the PS2 did so well, the PS3 is guarenteed a good ride for a while on its success, even if it is little more than a toaster glued to a frying pan. Now, the PS4 may be a disaster because of it, but that's a different story.
That was sorta my thought, at first, but then I started thinking about it like this: Sony is making a profit on the PS2, or at least breaking even, at this point. The only reason to create a new console is to attempt to get more people to buy your consoles, when the older one starts flagging. The PS2 is doing quite well right now, though, so many Sony's plan for the PS3 is for it to be gradually adopted, thus furthering the life of the cheaper, but more profitable PS2. If PS2 sales start to drop, it's only because people are preparing to get a PS3, which is not a bad thing for Sony either.
The bottom line is, people aren't really "done" with this generation, yet. They're pretty happy with the quality of technology thus far, which is why the PS2 greatly outsold the far more powerful XBox and GameCube consoles. Hotcakes are going to be selling like Wiis, though, because it's not so much a new generation, but a new kind of console experience all together... not just an upgrade. I predict that PS2 sales will be strong for a good 6 months to a year into the PS3s life, with some great new games coming out. By then the PS3s price will drop enough that people will slowly start buying them.
I'm not being a Sony appologizer, however, I think the PS3s price is outragous, and I'm not buying one until it falls below $300, but it may not be a bad strategy for Sony to extend the launch period, and continue the PS2 legacy a little longer. After all, it's not about how many console one sells at launch, it's about how many consoles they sell over the console's lifespan.
Yeah, but, who hates the C stick?
I'm just waiting for them to releas the WiiBird (Wii-only Wavebird with no nubs to stick in the ports, and possibly rumble feature)
Both Netflix and Blockbuster have major problems when working from a social gathering standpoing: with Netflix, if you have a party, and someone suggests a movie, you have to plan to get back together another day to watch it. With Blockbuster, you have to have someone leave the party, get in a car, drive to the movie place, and bring back a movie. This is why a service like this is going to be a complete boon for any party atmosphere, which makes up a large percentage of movie rentals. This will be especially the case for college students. Sure, it ties up your internet, but who cares? If you're in a social situation where you want to be watching a movie, chances are you're not going to be heavily surfing the web, unless you and your buddies are checking out the latest Strongbad emails, or having a LAN party. Netflix requires PLANNING, which is a huge deal killer... most people don't know what movie they want to watch until a few hours or minutes before hand. Most college students use their computers as their movie players anyway, unless they show stuff in the lounge, in which they, more often then not (from my experience), still use their laptops as the main DVD player. I wonder how many lives this will save, from drunk partiers driving to pick up "the movie".
The other demographic that will totally benefit from this are famillies with small children. "Mommy, I want to watch Spongebob, and I want to watch it NOW!", okay, Netflix is now completely out of the question, and getting the little ones all dressed to go out, hurding them into the car, having to keep them from running into people in Blockbuster, and other shinanigans, make renting out complicated and a pain for many parents. Simply sitting down for 5 minutes, starting the download, and then going out back to play catch with the kids for a half-an-hour seems like a much better option.
Of course, there's going to be a question of how to get the movie on the TV. It won't be long until various media-center PC options become available. Even if Apple doesn't get a Mac Mini media-center device out the door and in everyone's house, iTunes will work on any PC, so Apple will have a fairly seccure infrastructure, if the #1 media center is windows based.
This is, after all, emulating a culture that coined the term "hopster" to mean anyone who's trying to be like them, they might actually take to it.
Heh heh, I love the Final Fantasy series and the Metal Gear Solid games, but "good stories"? I dunno if I would go that far. I think they're TRYING, especially Kojima, which I give a lot of credit for, but they're far from being great narrative works. Kojima has made a series that has about the litterary quality of a decent James Bond movie, which is pretty good, considering that we're talking about a genre that's only about 15 years old (in terms of story telling), but it's no "Good Night & Good Luck". Also, Kojima's games are basically a hybrid of movies and games, the cinematic sections are only very slightly interactive (and only in MGS3), and the gameplay sections have no story. It's a game of switching back and forth. Now, I don't think there's anything wrong with that, but it should be understood that it's two separate medias within one larger work.
Final Fantasy IX comes about as close to being a "great story" as I've ever played, the characters are far more real than almost all other games (FF8 has it's moments too), and some very thoughtful dialog, but it, too, is fairly basic. Now, I think there is potential in games for great stories, and I think there's potential for games with great narrative that is completely intertwined with great gameplay. I don't think we're there yet, though.
But what I really don't understand is this hatred of linearity. Just because we have the means, within a medium, to be completely non-linear, doesn't mean we should be restricted to that. Non-linearity, is very restrictive, in itself. A game can simply be a film with an interactive camera... there is no such thing out there, afterall, and it might be a very interesting medium for artists to use. I particularly like this concept of having a story going on around you, where the character is only slightly in control of (because that's what our lives are, after all), and the player has the options of choosing what parts of it to see, at what pace to see them, in atempts to figure out what it all really means.
The basis of narrative is that it MEANS something, there is a creator behind it trying desperately to get their ideas across. This is what interests me the most about various art and entertainment works. I do not feel threatened by the artist's ideas, in fact, I enjoy exploring that. I think at lot of this anti-narrative sentiment comes from people feeling threatened by others' creative endevours, and would like games to be a safe-haven for their own ideas, only. And it is a great safe-haven for that, after all, games (unlike novels or films) don't have to have narrative at all. But you also have to understand, that there are some of us who enjoy working through other people's creative ideas... and there is room for all kinds. Games don't HAVE TO be anything, they shouldn't be limited to certain areas, just because they tend to approach similarity to other mediums. The reality is, Final Fantasy, as cinematic as the series has become, is NOT a movie, and it does offer things that movies can not, which in-itself, makes it a viable and unique form of entertainment. I, personally, enjoy both games with narrative and games without, and would feel extremely threatened if one side were to take over the industry completely. There is room for both... no, there is a NEED for both.
LOL, that was my first thought when comparing Doom 2 and Marathon 2 back in the day, as well! But similarly, I believe Marathon to be a MUCH better series. Eventually, when the ideas behind it were allowed to reach a larger audience in it's extension, as the Halo series, it seems that it finally won out. But the main difference between Doom and Marathon, besides luminosity, is that it has a story, and a fairly ingenious way of developing it (a device later used by the Metroid Prime series).
Even if you're a pure gameplay freak, remember that narrative gives a good escuse for varience in gameplay. After all, Tetris, as great as it is, is only fun for 15minutes here and 15minutes there, because there's no change in gameplay, where-as a story can spark drastic, and interesting changes in gameplay.
Oh, misscomunication, man. I was replying to his post, not to the article, which speculates that maybe the 6k is used to simply to hold the key (username and password) to an online account. I was simply replying to why I thought that would be a bad idea. Go back and read it if you want, but it's pretty irrelivant, anyway.
I agree. I was very worried when the DS came out, that the current trend in handheld gaming, basically the reniasance of the SNES, would dissappear, but I'm happy to say that it really hasn't. One of the biggest selling games on the DS was Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, which was a 2D game. Same with New Super Mario Bros. which has already outsold Super Mario DS (Mario 64), if I remember correctly, Super Princess Peach, and many other titles. The only one I've been dissapointed with was Metroid. I love both the original series and the Prime series, and I think there's room in this world for both 2D and 3D Metroid games, and think consoles are a great place for the 3D Prime series, where as handhelds are a wonderful place for their 2D brethren. I was very sorry to see an attempt at a Prime game on a handheld, and think it failed quite misserably. I was also even more upset to hear that there was a 2D Metroid game in the works, that we didn't even know about, that got cut. Zero Mission was an excellent game, and as much as I love my DS, I have yet to play a game of it's calliber. It will come though, I hope. But there is hope, look at Zelda. Around the same time, they're releasing the big 3D release, Twilight Princess on the Wii, and a top-view, psuedo 2D (made with 3D graphics, which is just fine with me... this is how New Super Mario was done, anyway) on the DS.
Remember that the best selling game on the Gamecube was a 2D game, Smash Bros. Melee. Sure, its visuals were produced by 3D graphics, but the gameplay was completely 2D, and that's what really matters.
That's basically a maximum. Most CDs cost between $12-$17, only at very expensive places do CDs cost $20... that's usually around the price for a double album. Similarly, the only games that cost $60 are XBox360 titles... and seeing that there's a HUGE market for those these days I'm not sure I can see that as any kind of standard. All DS games cost $25-$35, all PS2 & Gamecube games are $20 if over a year old, and $40-$50 for new releases.