Even Counterstrike Players Get it.....

[Colovion]

So last night I was fiddling around with some new maps that were released for Counterstrike: Source and I heard an interesting comment. Some people were commenting on CS:S as a game and the changes since 1.6 and someone says:

"Game companies care more about graphics than gameplay"

And everyone on the server agreed with him and bemoaned the fact.

This is not a good way for game companies to go, and it seems as if even the FPS people understand how things are going in the game industry and want a change.

[jerby]

its true and it sucks.
but graphics get new buyers. if you go for gameplay the game will not get much more new buyers. personally I never heard of MTW, but when I saw the great stuff CA did, me beiing used to age of empires. I saw grand armies and beautiffull stuf. so I bought it. but now, I just want gameplay.

[FURRY_BOOTS]

amen to that!!!
you know, i was thinking, if it wasnt for RTR(various versions), i just wouldnt be interested in rome, yeah, played vanilla once, got bored, played some mods. wait a minute, WTF!!!, i always thought mods were there for when youve totaly exhausted a game, when theres no other avenue left in a game, then you mod it, right? i played umpteen campaigns in mtw before i used a mod, yet with rome, i played 1 campaign as juili, then had to play with rtr
if that doesnt say something about the gameplay of rome, then i dont know what does. since 1.2, ive played half a campaign & then gave up, yet i know that rtr 6 will get me right back into it, strange, you fork out 30 quid for a game, & its some guys in a bedroom at their pc somewhere that make the game playable(for me)

[screwtype]

since 1.2, ive played half a campaign & then gave up, yet i know that rtr 6 will get me right back into it, strange, you fork out 30 quid for a game, & its some guys in a bedroom at their pc somewhere that make the game playable(for me)

You know, I often think just the same thing myself. I find it incredible that guys working in their bedroom with very limited tools at their disposal for altering a game can create a product in a matter of weeks that the game company seems totally incapable of producing in months or even years.

I look at RTW and I'm truly staggered, not only by the many blatant bugs and glitches which have been so well documented, but by the astonishing lack of depth in areas that should not be too hard at all to make shine, like the diplomacy for example. I mean, sheesh, how hard can it be to put together a model for sensible diplomacy? Or to fix the problem of small AI armies roaming around on the campaign map? Or the lack of AI aggression? Or for the AI building the wrong types of units? And so on.

Is that the programmers and developers just get so fed up with the product after a while that they lose all interest? If so, then at least they could give the amateurs a decent set of tools for modding as much of the game as possible.

Personally though, I sometimes think the best thing a company like CA could do would be to turn over design entirely to the community of enthusiastics on boards like this, and then just implement what WE decide is right for the game

[drone]

Wasn't this pretty much the same response to Doom3? Granted, that game was just a showcase for the engine, I'm sure there will be better games based on it later.

You can only "oh and ah" over the pretty pictures for so long. The amount of money being spent to push the graphics envelope probably dwarfs the amount spent on the gameplay feel. There has to be a tipping point where it's just not worth it to blow the budget for a unplayable game.

They have been saying that game industry is challenging the movie industry. Apparently in more ways than one! Lots of eye-candy, no real content.

It takes a lot to overcome the "entertainment/advertising" complex, and separate the crap from the good before purchase. What is really necessary is truly independent reviewers. You never know who is working for whom and who can be trusted to give an honest review of a game/show/movie/album. It's one big conglomeration/cartel whose sole mission is to rake in as much of your money as possible, and it can only be stopped when the masses decide to start thinking for themselves. It all started with the JFK assa(*$#@^#!*+"?~

Whoa. Sorry about that, I think I started channeling Bill Hicks. Must remember to keep the tinfoil hat on at all times...

[NicSO]

Years ago I knew every single game for PC, N64, PSX, Saturn that is coming out and Its rating. Back then I played games alot. I still have over 20 games for my N64. I payed 180 000 Italian liras for DooM64 (90Euros). But now, these days I dont buy games like before because most of them suck.
I have original Rome:TW and before I bought Morrowind, year earlier.
I have Doom 3 but not original because Im not stupid to throw money on those retarded LOW QUALITY games. I have many originals but only superb games like UFO 1, 2, 3 and 4, Masters of orion 2 (3 sucks), Fallout 1 and 2, Morrowind, TW series etc.

Im really sick and tired of graphic, engines...I wanna gameplay, good gameplay. Gameplay is on the first place for me!!!

[Come Together]

I personally like doom 3 (growing up on doom 2 helps though ;]) , but i obviously agree. RTW is painful to play without SOME kind of mods or alterations. I mean, it's quite rediculous that they can't fix bugs, or if they do, they replace it with more bugs. Mabey it's some sort of plot to get mod makers to start going to improve on their low quality work. Currently I'm waiting for the 5.2 RTR patch.

[mxlm]

I've been hearing the argument that companies care more about graphics than gameplay, and that most new games suck for, let's see....

hmm. Ever since 3D accelerators were introduced. Maybe even earlier. And you know what? It's no more true now than it was then. I can name offhand a dozen quality games released within the last year or so.

If you can't find good games, you're simply not looking. Either that or you have stratospheric expectactions and demands.

The good ole days are a myth. If I had the patience, I could flip through my very old gaming mags and list quite a few trashy games from back in da day. Leather Goddesses of Phobos, anyone?

[Kraxis]

Aw come on... Can you honestly tell games that has the sophisticated humour of Space Quest, the deep mystery of Police Quest or even the thorough yet diverse balance of StarCraft (it might be RTS but it is the pinnacle of it).

In FPS it has also gone downwards. Since I haven't got all that much experience in Half Life I won't comment on it, but my all time fav. AvP got butchered in AvP 2. The feel was all but gone. It had plenty of new cool features and it shows that the developers at least had intended it to be as novel as AvP, but it simply wasn't. And that was shame, for it really had potential.

But unlike many people I'm not as negative about the future. There will always be new players on the market, and thus we can be certain that there will also be games where feel or inovation is above looks.

[NicSO]

I play games since 80`s. I started with Atary 2600, ZX Spectrum, Amiga 500, XT PCs, Nintendo, Sega Master System, Sega Mega Drive, SNES...etc...

I have huge expirience with games and I can say one thing...games quality is decreasing just like movies quality.

[screwtype]

They have been saying that the game industry is challenging the movie industry. Apparently in more ways than one! Lots of eye-candy, no real content.

I don't even go to watch Hollywood movies anymore. They are so formulaic they are an insult to intelligence. That's when they have a formula at all. Some of them just seem to have lots of big explosions instead of a plot.

What is really necessary is truly independent reviewers. You never know who is working for whom and who can be trusted to give an honest review of a game/show/movie/album.

Very few of the game reviewers are independent IMO. They are part of the industry and they serve the industry. If they really gave frank reviews of the games they saw, pretty soon they wouldn't be sent games to review anymore.

For years my rule of thumb has been to take a game review score out of 100 and knock off 20 points or so to get an idea of what the game is really like.

[HarunTaiwan]

VIC 20.

Now that was a machine!

[Mikeus Caesar]

Obviously if one of the lowest breeds of gamers realise that games are getting worse in exchange for graphics, then something is up that is quite serious. Heck, the only reason i play most of my old games isn't because of the graphics, it's because of the gameplay. Take Tribes 2 for example. The graphics aren't too brilliant, after all, it was released in 2000/2001, but the gameplay rocks!!! Now look at it's sequel, Tribes: Vengeance. Sure, everyone agrees, it sure looks pretty, but the gameplay just isn't what it should be. Most of the veteran players are now using their T:V discs as coasters, or just letting them gather dust on the back of a shelf.

[BDC]

I don't think it's too bad. Seeing the past through rose-tinted glasses and stuff. Better graphics also mean you expect a better game, but if everything looks ugly you will give it more doubt.

Anyway, in the past it was bad at times. I remember trying to play some flight sim on a new computer about 3 years after it came out, and it still didn't work because it was too demanding. Ah, those were the days. Pre-shaders. *sniffle*

[Khorak]

Over a hilariously short period of time computers have suddenly become so ridiculously powerful it's not even funny, and it's still going on. As a result games companies and it has to be said, the very creators of all that computer technology, are still developing new ways of utilising this inhuman amount of technology to chase a 'holy grail' of virtual environment creation, with photorealistic graphics and fully realistic physics out the wazoo. There's no point whining about the almost singleminded rush to fill out this sudden void of untapped capability.

Meanwhile AI technology, for example, is still professors making little robots that astonishingly manage to negotiate the peculiarities of moving about a room without bumping into things.

So of course graphics are a main concern. Why? Because it's the most advanced part of the whole shebang. Great graphics can help immerse a player in the game, and you can try to tell me otherwise but people do prefer to be looking at something pretty. There's billions in various aesthetically driven industries that call you a filthy liar on that count.

And frankly....I'd like to know when this supposed golden age of fantastic gameplay was. Because I've been here since my Amstrad CPC 464 and I can't pin down the exact date for the life of me. For the past fifteen God damn years I've been able to pick up a completely random game and been able to guarantee that it's one of the vast herd of total dross that gets spewed out for every single gaming platform in history. There wasn't ever some gameplay golden age, it was exactly the same as today, a massive outpouring of utter crap and bad cash-in sequals interspersed with a few real shiners and middling hit-and-missers.

But in the very least I get to look at pretty crap now, as opposed to crap dressed up like crap.

[screwtype]

"Game companies care more about graphics than gameplay"

I was just saying the same thing myself on another thread the other day. Goodness only knows how many man-years of development go into these 3D worlds, but gameplay is too often the poor cousin.

Unfortunately the reality is that glitz sells. Most of the money that a game makes is probably made in the first few weeks of its release, pretty soon it will be a budget priced game, so longevity doesn't matter so much to the industry. A few cheap thrills up front are all that's required, by the time gamers get deeper in and find the gameplay is shallow, the game has already made most of its profits. And now the dissatisfied gamer is looking for his next quick fix.