GAMEPROs prediction about the interest in classic gaming

[lendelin]

In the recent GamePro (vol.189. June 2004, p.14) there is an interesting short editorial about present successful sequels of old classic games and their effect on interest in the old classics.

Basically, the GAMEPROS say that expanding new generations of gamers are experiencing better games of old franchises on new consoles which results in a fading memory of old systems and games.

GamePro:
"Sayonara, NES...With the population of game players expanding in every demographic direction possible, the memory of Ryu Hyabusa, for example, fighting the forces of 8-bit evil are getting dimmer and dimmer.Now, entire generations of game players are about to grow up experiencing only Ninja Gaiden in its soon-to-be-classic Xbox version.

Prince of Persia, Mega man, Metroid, Castlevania and a host of great game characters that trace their origins back to the NES are already staples on current consoles. They are all arriving in new, bigger, better, faster forms again this year...Time marches on and so do games."

At least the last stereotypical sentence is right, but they got everything else wrong. Progress in gaming goes hand-in-hand with interest of past gaming, they are not exclusionary, they re-enforce each other. Successful sequels of old franchises do not decrease interest in old franchises, on the contrary, they increase the interest in the origins of franchises and systems.

GamePros prediction doesn't make sense at all for continuing old franchises which saw sequels on every generation of consoles. Every sequel on a newer console would dig the grave deeper for the old game, which doesn't explain the increasing demand for the prequel and it's price as soon as a new successful sequel is published.

The prediction is even more off track for franchises which haven't seen a sequel for ages. The new Rygar sparked new interest of the old NES game, and the prices for the NES game reflect it. The interest of gamers in the origin of a game character increases with the surprise that there was long ago actually a game on the NES.

The crux of the prediction is the assumption that mere new game experiences for a new generation of players produce fading memories for old games.
1) The demographic of game players broadened indeed, and that means that more and more people discover games today who didn't experience older games at all. The players with a stronger interest in new games realize that they missed a lot of game eras, and we all know that this is the first step of buying older games and for some even the first step of serious collecting.

2) Even todays 12 year-old game players get older, and with age comes a stronger interest in the origins of their hobby for the ones who stick with it. A broadened demographic means more aging game players, more gamers who stick with games, and therfore more interst in the origins of gaming in the future.

The opposite of GamePros short-sighted prediction is true. As long as we have successful sequels we have interest in classic gaming. As long as we have an interest in present games, the interest in past games lives on.

[Ed Oscuro]

Time does march on, and people are becoming familiar once again with the classics through remakes...shame they mentioned Ninja Gaiden without acknowledging the SNES trillogy is in there, and even more shameful that they forgot Zero Mission.

Classic gaming fading away? I don't know. I certainly believe that classic styles of gameplay are here for the long haul, and whether or not companies will decide to bring back the classics is a choice to be made by each and every copyright holder according to their belief in the ability of their classics to be accepted and bought by gamers today.

If what you say is indeed what the article intended to convey (I guess I'll have to believe it o_O) then this is indeed very poor of them, you're right.

However, it's not GamePro, but us, gamers with roots in the past and present, along with those who'll join our ranks in the near future, who will decide if classic gaming stays relevant.

[NintendoMan]

Great post! I read the article 2 days ago when I got my new gamepro in the mail. I really wasn't exactly seeing what gaempro was saying, other than the NES was dead.

And I don't think that could be anymore about about the post put up on as long as their is hardcore gamers out there, not just the casual idiots that only play sports games, (nothing against sports games, I like some of them, just the people that won't give any other game a chance other than sports) there will always be interest in "classic games" or older games.

Having grown up in the 8-Bit Nes era, I know that I will never give up my classic gaming habbits and games. I love my old stuff do death, but I still get 2 or so gamecubes games a week.

[Bratwurst]

I threw a subtle insult in GamePro's direction in my earlier thread, not that anyone cares, it's just to establish I'm biased. My point is it's an idiot rag full of pretty pictures. Just skim over the letters they choose to publish and answer to. Hard hitting stuff there, I tell ya.

Hard to add to this thread without touching on anything lendelin has already eloquently covered, but it's a given that if some ten year old starts off on Mega Man X7 he'll eventually get curious and want to see what X1 was all about. And such venturing would possibly even lead him to the very first NES title. Though I figure it'll be more in the form of emulation than the kid bothering to pick up a copy through ebay.

A naming convention that I feel is sort of sneaky is that Capcom has branched off with these different series like Battle Network or Mega Man Zero just to start off with a new sequence of numbers. It almost dismisses the fact that there were titles before these games came around.

[StrychNiNE]

I threw a subtle insult in GamePro's direction in my earlier thread, not that anyone cares, it's just to establish I'm biased. My point is it's an idiot rag full of pretty pictures. Just skim over the letters they choose to publish and answer to. Hard hitting stuff there, I tell ya.

I don't have anything particularily interesting to add...but any thread with something to do with gamepro...I have to add my hatred to. Any "prediction" from gamepro is as good as saying "drunken hobo says that in 2005 videogames will". It's a worthless magazine written by idiots, for idiots. Kind of like what Interplay has become.

[Epicenter]

Newer is not always BETTER, but GamePro of course begs to differ. Most games nowadays are terrible! 1% of them are good, probably less! Whereas back in the 'day' (1983-1996 approx.) it was at LEAST 40% by the count of most gamers. Publishers are 'drunk on technology'. They think it's all about pretty, bump mapped graphics and gameplay doesn't matter.

Nintendo's present CEO even made a blind statement about gaming's future .. and with no words can I apprehend what led up to this nonsense:

[ PARAPHRASED ]
"Gamers don't care about state of the art technology and processors. They don't care about great graphics, epic storylines, high quality sound or fantastic gameplay. They want 2 screens."

Yeeeeeeah.
Is it just me, or are these the end-times? Maybe a meteor hits the earth and we all start gaming on the scavenged 8/16/32 bit system fragments we are able to piece together from the remains of our crater-pocked planet. It seems biblical enough to happen. ;D But odds are nothing stops the way the industry is going right now and we keep seeing trash like MARIO PARTY 43 and SONIC GOLF 9, FINAL FANTASY 904682 (part 9) a decade from now.

[chrisbid]

as long as modern mainstream gaming continues to grow and get away from classic style gameplay, then the classic gaming community will also continue to grow. However, they wont grow at the same rate, and the percentage of classic gamers within the video game market will shrink. The evidence is shown in the number of mainstream chains that carry classic systems. EB no longer carries old systems and games, and neither does gamestop. Gamecrazy is a new chain, and they carry old stuff, but for how long is anyones guess, as their shelf space is generally the smallest of the three chains.

of course the reasons why gamestop and EB (and Gamecrazy will soon learn) that they dont earn a lot of money on classic games is because they overcharge, and they dont preserve boxes and instructions when given the chance. I wouldnt mind paying the higher prices gamestop had on their NES, SNES, and Genesis games, if they had bothered to make an effort to keep the packaging.

but gamepro sucks anyway, they are only trying to reassure themselves and their readers that us old timers are just sentimental coots that arent in touch with reality. That may be partially true, but fun is universal and is something that really cant be improved or diminished.

[charitycasegreg]

I just read that article in my issue. That is so dumb. gamepro used to be ok back in the early 90's. I say you should email gamepro abot the stuff you said about that article.

[Milk]

Right now, it's becoming faddish to be a classic gamer. They sell NES T-shirts in Hot Topic, for goodness sake! If Gamepro and Gamestop think it's going to fade soon, they're foolish. The kids who were born in the '80's and reared on gaming are coming of age and buying their old toys back. As that generation gets older and earns more money, it's just going to build. Did you see the plug-in controllers that have collections of old games out 5 years ago? What about the NES-style Playstation pad? Did you hear anyone saying "Know your roots" in reference to gaming? On top of that, Sony has made it cool and mainstream to play games, so some of the people who threw out their old systems after they reached puberty are being lured back in.

[Aussie2B]

They are all arriving in new, bigger, better, faster forms again this year...Time marches on and so do games."

Anyone who would say such a moronic thing should be stripped of their job as a game reviewer. I guess by their logic the games they love today and give perfect or near perfect scores to are actually crappy games because in 20 years the games will be so much better in comparison. And I guess Castlevania: Lament of Innosence is SO MUCH BETTER than Castlevania 3, Castlevania 4, Rondo of Blood, *insert nearly any other Castlevania game here*, right? *rolls eyes* I can't believe people get paid to spout such garbage...

Calming down now...

I'm the last person on earth to defend GameStop, but they don't all actually throw away boxes and manuals, chrisbid. The one near me here in NYC does, but this semi-cool one I went to in Washington didn't. I guess they didn't have the funds to be all fancy by having games sealed in used packaging hanging on racks, so wherever they had the space, they'd shove the used games they had. I'd take a guess that they had more N64 games with manuals and/or boxes than loose N64 carts. They kept the NES, Genesis, and SNES games all together, and a few had boxes/cases and/or manuals (mostly just the Genesis games for obvious reasons). I'm gonna check out the store again this summer, so hopefully they haven't changed anything (besides no longer taking in DC, Genesis, NES, and SNES games).

[christianscott27]

god, i hope they're right!

i'm sick of the competition, every kid getting into classic gaming is another punk getting in the way of my greedy need to get all the games for myself! i long for the day when kids will walk past a pile of carts in the goodwill without even knowing what they are! mine, all mine!

[Kid Ice]

I predict Gamepro will continue to be unreadable.

[Epicenter]

When I pick up GamePro, I feel like I am touching death. The death of my youth, my interests, a huge facet of my world. Then I put it back on the rack, make sure no one's looking and give it the finger. Or both fingers. And pick up Retro Gamer or a magazine about PC gaming which hasn't been destroyed as badly as Console gaming has been.

As for GameStop .. all the ones near me (3 or 4) take their classic games and throw them in a rack. There will be 1 crumpled, near unreadable manual shoved in between every 40 or 50 games. Most games will be highly damaged. Packaging was most likely discarded. An in-box copy of SMB3 (but by no means new) copy seems to warrant $60 there. (WTF?)

And the FunCo land that had NES titles as far as the eye could see and MD titles nearly that far, was just converted to an EB Games. Something is very wrong with the world. Or just the industry. :P

[portnoyd]

I predict Gamepro will continue to be unreadable.

Amen brother homie. I also predict that Gamepro's rating scale of Needs Ritalin, Mildly Excited, Half Asleep, and In a Coma will be a major contributor to why no one really takes gaming seriously.

Yes, I know they finally changed it, but I wanted to make a gag, eat a dick.

Gamepro shouldn't be allowed to say anything where they have to make an assertion on anything. Prozines are bad enough these days, but Gamepro is the same magazine they were 10 years ago, just with more ads.

Let them pass it off as a fad. Won't bother my ass none.

dave

[Ed Oscuro]

To venture in the other direction, though, I take comments such as "only 1% of current titles are good" to be far from the truth. I manage to enjoy most every game title I come across, and if there was a meter for determining how much tolerance of games a person can have, I'd expect "Played the CD-i Zeldas" and "Has good things to say about arcade ports on the Spectrum" to qualify me as some sort of gaming maschiochist. Regardless, I look at games today and most of them are just as well done as classic, say, Konami titles (with their excessive borrowing from 80s movies).

Game developers have much more to think about (and worry about - try to convince Hideo Kojima that he can use the likenesses of a dozen real life actors and other famous personalities today, whereas his early classic Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake does just that). Many games are overcomplex today, but there are many that manage to deliver pure, simple gaming bliss despite the hardware.

We have a ton of FPS titles today because that method of displaying a world view is intuitive. In the 2D days we saw all manner of creatures walk from the left to the right. Yesterday's cast of characters was easily as diverse as the characters we control today, including Dragons in a certain Intellivision game, robots that take over other robots in a classic Commodore title, and lots of ninjas and warriors. Today we have Spyro the Dragon in a certain PlaySated title, characters that hack and take over devices, and lots of the same ninjas and warriors that we saw back in the 1980s.

It's alright if one refuses to accept the new way of presenting the world and giving the player control, but I don't think all that amounts to games being much worse than they used to be. The problem lies with companies that suck at updating their classics and break the system. I'm going to guess one of the reasons Epicenter wrote that would be his experiences with the 3D Sonic titles. They're nothing much at all like the classic Sonic titles, but classic updates are (thankfully) only a small portion of the market.

Some deride Ninja Gaiden, saying it's just a DMC clone...but back in the late 1980s, it was stated that original titles like Tetris and Quarth (from Konami) appeared "much less than we'd like to see." Castlevania was just a polished version of Ghosts 'n Goblins, and how many Street Fighter 2 (or, for that matter, Yie-Ar-Kung-Fu and Fighting Street) clones did we praise back in the day? The quality is still there, and so is a lot of unwanted hype. There's much to like in gaming today, and lots that didn't work out well.

It took the game industry a decade longer than Namco to run into the problems Namco did with Pac-Man 2, that's all.

[SoulBlazer]

Great post, Ed, my thoughts exactly. :)

[Daria]

The only real difference is back then we didn't have the internet to gather in large groups on and bitch about the state of gaming today. :P

And on a side note I liked Zelda's Adventure... >.> The other two CD-i titles were complete crap though.
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[lendelin]

I don't like the posts of GamePro bashing too much. :) GamePro isn't so bad, the reviews are pretty accurate, and GamePro was the only magazine I read which actually called 'Enter the Matrix' a below average game and gave it a mediocre review grade, whereas GI explicitly recommended buying a premature released game, and so did NP.

Ed Oscuro, overall I agree with you. I agree even with the provocative statement in the GamePro editorial that game quality overall improved in the last 30 years. Like you I recognize more copycat games and games with bad control during the NES times than today. I also think that games have to develop, have to go in different directions, after all, who wants to enjoy for fifteen years the same 8-bit gameplay over and over again? Game development can't stand still, and game developers aren't masochistic to produce the same stuff ad infinitum. We just overlook today that gamede velopment was and always is slow and gradual, and we are today as impatient with the lack of innovation as gameplayers were 15 years ago.

The revival of classic gaming today and overall game quality today is besides the point of the editorial, however. It simply says that the interest in older systems and games gradually vanishes because new generations of players and more players experience successful sequels of older franchises.

Without hard data about gaming habits of different age groups and their first gaming experiences I'm speculating like the guys from GamePro; but I think the better arguments of speculative reasoning looking at reality is on my side.

If GamePros evaluation were true
- the interest in Atari 2600 would almost equal zero.
- there would be no expanding collecting scene for older games.
- there would be no Videogame Museum at the upcoming E3.
- there would be no younger gamers who enjoy Joust and the first Castlevania because of their refreshing linear simplicity in contrast to the games today.
- there would be no increasing number of publications about videogame history.
- there would be no Hall of Fame for videogame developers.
- there wouldn't be compilation discs of older games and franchises like the upcoming Mega Man compilation release.

While all of these phenomena could be tweaked and forced into GamePros evaluation with a lot of twists and turns, the editors opinions aren't convincing. If you have a lot of phenomena who are so obviously in conflict with the editorials assertion, the core of the assertion is probably wrong.

Basic interests in games isn't a generational problem. Basic gameplay and the motivation to play didn't change dramatically in the last 20 years, which means that the potential interest in older games are always there. Successful franchises, their sequels, and the broadening demographic of players is almost a guarantee that interests in older systems and games increases as well. More CASUAL gamers mean more hardcore gamers becasue some of them will mysteriously transform into hardcorers (who are just players who play more often than others and are interested in game history). Embrace more financial success of the industry, embrace casual gamers because that's the recruitment field for the hardcore crowd. If the ratio between casual and hardcore gamers tilts a bit to one side or another isn't so relevant for the topic, I assume it was and will be the same ratio.

The more successful the game industry overall becomes, the more successful sequels we have, the more gameplayers there are, the more interest in older systems, franchises and game history will develop. Not only newer games become increasingly an established and recognized form of entertainment; with the increasing success of videogames their past becomes established and recognized as well.

If we didn't have successful sequels, no interest in newer games, no succesful game industry, THEN we'd have a problem, then the interst in older games would vanish as well and the editors were right. Then the Atari 2600 crowd were just a bunch of old farts no-one take s seriously. Fortunately, that's not the case. :)

If Gampros generational argument were right, that would also mean that UNsuccessful sequels of old franchises would spark interest of younger players in better older franchises. I don't think that's true either. :)

[Ed Oscuro]

The top-down one? It does fetch insane amounts of money...which you must've paid to play it unless you got it back in the day...

It's the one CD-i Zelda title I don't own.

[Push Upstairs]

The only reason Gamepro is saying this crap is so its readers will continue to buy NEW games and continue buying their magazine to read reviews on them.

Gamepro doesnt sell magazines if everyone is buying games they do not cover anymore.

[YoshiM]

Ed Oscuro, overall I agree with you. I agree even with the provocative statement in the GamePro editorial that game quality overall improved in the last 30 years. Like you I recognize more copycat games and games with bad control during the NES times than today. I also think that games have to develop, have to go in different directions, after all, who wants to enjoy for fifteen years the same 8-bit gameplay over and over again? Game development can't stand still, and game developers aren't masochistic to produce the same stuff ad infinitum. We just overlook today that gamede velopment was and always is slow and gradual, and we are today as impatient with the lack of innovation as gameplayers were 15 years ago.

I have to disagree a bit with the view of modern gaming. Games take much longer to crank out than in the past (at least on the console side of things) so it's easy to say that we don't see a lot of average or copycat games. However I think the ratio of copycats is probably about equal with the past, with their sloppy control and annoying camera. As for experiencing the same gameplay for years and companies producing the same stuff, isn't that happening anyway? Sports games aside we still get the same basic platformers we played on the Playstation or N64, just with graphical tweaks and a few new options. FPS games are another genre that seems to not want to change too much. When a company praises their game with the "innovative" ability to "shoot around or over obstacles the hero is under cover by", you know not much is happening with that genre. And if you're a PC gamer the RTS and RPG category is still pretty much the same since Warcraft and Diablo set the scene ablaze years back.

To me things haven't overly changed except for better graphics and replacement problems like, for example, camera issues in place of crappy scrolling. You still have to sift through the titles to find that diamond and there are always the games that are great renters but probably not something you'd pony up full price for.

As for impatience for games these days, I feel that is an Internet-born problem thanks to up to the minute gaming news and the constant flood of screen shots and movies on high profile games. I can't remember being overly impatient as I got my news about once or maybe three times a month depending on how many mags I got. When a game came out, it came out.

[lendelin]

Games take much longer to crank out than in the past (at least on the console side of things) so it's easy to say that we don't see a lot of average or copycat games.

I agree, however, we see MORE games than 10 years ago. If you had a Genesis and SNES ten years ago, and now you have the three major consoles, you get more games today in one month .


However I think the ratio of copycats is probably about equal with the past, with their sloppy control and annoying camera. As for experiencing the same gameplay for years and companies producing the same stuff, isn't that happening anyway? Sports games aside we still get the same basic platformers we played on the Playstation or N64, just with graphical tweaks and a few new options.

True innovative ideas are few and far in between, back then and today. It's a SLOW, sluggish, and gradual change in gameplay for certain genres. The action platformer changed, look at Jak 2, influenced by GTA. If you strip it down to the basics of the basics, then indeed there is no dramatic change, not from the first Zelda or FF to the most recent sequels of both franchises. Paradigm shifts don't occur in a revolutionary way, they are always well prepared. Don't expect something new from 6 months to 6 months, that never happened; but I think that a FFX plays smoother with a more involving storyline than the first installment, the control is better, the handling of the menu easier, the game just flows better with the player more in mind than the first FF. Game developers learn. We have improvement in this aspects even from FF1 to FF2.


To me things haven't overly changed except for better graphics and replacement problems like, for example, camera issues in place of crappy scrolling. You still have to sift through the titles to find that diamond and there are always the games that are great renters but probably not something you'd pony up full price for.


There are always the average games which are by definition the majority. I guess maybe 10% of games released for a major system are worthwhile playing considering the indivial preferences of a gamer. (probably the Dreamcast library is an exception)

If we stay WITHIN a gaming era, the ratio of true marvels, good games, the average ones and real stinkers are for each era probably the same. However, if we compare ACROSS gaming eras, I think that the truly bad games are reduced simply because game development improved dramatically compared to 20 years ago, and the business expanded. The business professionalized, and that means overall better control, better graphics (considering the technological limits of each era) , better plots and stories, better feedback from gamers and marketing research, and overall game quality improved; additionally, we have nowadays a much more varied game library than we ever had because more game eras with uniqe features means that characterisics of past eras make some appearances in present games, and sometimes mix nicely. (like in a Metroid Prime, Ninja Gaiden or Shinobi)

A selective look back focuses on the true classics and serves as an unfair measurement tab of the present which breeds impatience. We always get used to a certain quality and are dissatisfied with the vast number of average games coming out, even if the quality improves over time. That's good for us gamers, because it keeps developers on their heels.

...additionally games are cheaper than they ever were, and they drop faster than they ever did. Big business means more companies which want a piece of the pie, that means more competition, and competition breeds in the end creativity.

[Daria]

The top-down one? It does fetch insane amounts of money...which you must've paid to play it unless you got it back in the day...

It's the one CD-i Zelda title I don't own.

Not exactly... the guy I bought the other two Zeldas from sent me a burn of Adventure. Philips CDi, like a lot of older cd based systems has absolutely no copyright potection.

Some day I'll shell out some money for it though. Can't imagine finding it in the wild but eh, you never know.
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[Ed Oscuro]

I have to disagree a bit with the view of modern gaming. Games take much longer to crank out than in the past (at least on the console side of things) so it's easy to say that we don't see a lot of average or copycat games. However I think the ratio of copycats is probably about equal with the past, with their sloppy control and annoying camera.
I agree with that completely. The article somebody posted a few months ago about how everything in the 1990s seemed to be ripping off something else and that "new" game concepts like Tetris and Quarth (!) didn't appear often enough - that really made me understand what's been going on here.


FPS games are another genre that seems to not want to change too much. When a company praises their game with the "innovative" ability to "shoot around or over obstacles the hero is under cover by", you know not much is happening with that genre.
Heh! I think that there's still a good amount of ground the FPS genre needs to cover in the graphics department. The stuff Epic's working out on with the newest Unreal Engine is amazing and will make skinning characters and creating detailed surfaces much easier (like you use normals to make a wall look bumpy, not just bump-mapped but actually contort in a 3D sense, wow). It's rather funny, Unreal Tournament 2K4 is an awesome game but you still have the funky old S&M looking characters that've been standard in the deathmatch type FPSes since Quake 3. What's most interesting is that they've added dodge keys and "special combos," feels like we've returned to the days of Apogee and their 3D games LOL


As for impatience for games these days, I feel that is an Internet-born problem thanks to up to the minute gaming news and the constant flood of screen shots and movies on high profile games. I can't remember being overly impatient as I got my news about once or maybe three times a month depending on how many mags I got. When a game came out, it came out.
Yes, and while I don't ever feel annoyed that a game takes forever to take out ("when it's done" means I'll keep living contentedly until Duke Nukem Forever is out, and I also have a lot of patience waiting for stuff I buy as much is out of Japan), I know that a lot of people don't have that patience.

When you look at old comic books you see that there's so-called Gold and Silver "Ages." When a comic book was printed, bam, that's it and you wouldn't likely ever see a reprint. I had a reprint of the first Green Lantern in the early 1990s, but overall when an era passes everything that set it apart is GONE.

In gaming we don't have that. Art styles come and go but there's enough folks out there who realize that we still want to play classic types of games now and again. Midway keeps the classic gamers happy releasing and updating their Treasures disc on whatever platform is around, Nintendo rereleased the classic Metroid knows how many times recently (at least twice, maybe more? That's just in the US), and Taito just recently created (2002, now to see more attention) a sequel to Space Invaders. The internet's helped expand and reinvigorate the comic scene in the west (heck, even I've tried my hand at a strip or two, though I won't push that here...heh heh) but the effects of the 'net on gaming have been even more dramatic. MAME, MUGEN, VirtualBoy Advance and ZSNES, oh my. Tons of homebrew projects and remakes.

If I had one last thing to say on the subject, it would be this: We never really will see a "bad" year in gaming; every year adds to the glorious pile of games that will always be fun to play.

[YoshiM]

However I think the ratio of copycats is probably about equal with the past, with their sloppy control and annoying camera. As for experiencing the same gameplay for years and companies producing the same stuff, isn't that happening anyway? Sports games aside we still get the same basic platformers we played on the Playstation or N64, just with graphical tweaks and a few new options.

True innovative ideas are few and far in between, back then and today. It's a SLOW, sluggish, and gradual change in gameplay for certain genres. The action platformer changed, look at Jak 2, influenced by GTA. If you strip it down to the basics of the basics, then indeed there is no dramatic change, not from the first Zelda or FF to the most recent sequels of both franchises. Paradigm shifts don't occur in a revolutionary way, they are always well prepared. Don't expect something new from 6 months to 6 months, that never happened; but I think that a FFX plays smoother with a more involving storyline than the first installment, the control is better, the handling of the menu easier, the game just flows better with the player more in mind than the first FF. Game developers learn. We have improvement in this aspects even from FF1 to FF2.

Not sure if I see a contradiction here. Before you said "who wants to enjoy for fifteen years the same 8-bit gameplay over and over again?" and now it seems as though you're kinda saying the opposite in the quote above. The copycatting these days are doing all the same motions that we saw in the past: take a popular concept, maybe throw in some twists to make it seem unique or improved, give it a graphic/audio overhaul and yer done. Not that it's a bad thing as long as the game is fun but it's still a copycat and it's using the same 3D 32 bit gameplay over and over again that we've played for the past eight or nine years. That's what I was pointing out. Heh, as much as you used to tell me I looked at the 16bit era with rosy glasses I'm thinkin' you're doin' the same with the modern era :P

As for 8 bit game play, how can millions of Gameboy players be wrong? LOL



To me things haven't overly changed except for better graphics and replacement problems like, for example, camera issues in place of crappy scrolling. You still have to sift through the titles to find that diamond and there are always the games that are great renters but probably not something you'd pony up full price for.


There are always the average games which are by definition the majority. I guess maybe 10% of games released for a major system are worthwhile playing considering the indivial preferences of a gamer. (probably the Dreamcast library is an exception)

If we stay WITHIN a gaming era, the ratio of true marvels, good games, the average ones and real stinkers are for each era probably the same. However, if we compare ACROSS gaming eras, I think that the truly bad games are reduced simply because game development improved dramatically compared to 20 years ago, and the business expanded. The business professionalized, and that means overall better control, better graphics (considering the technological limits of each era) , better plots and stories, better feedback from gamers and marketing research, and overall game quality improved; additionally, we have nowadays a much more varied game library than we ever had because more game eras with uniqe features means that characterisics of past eras make some appearances in present games, and sometimes mix nicely. (like in a Metroid Prime, Ninja Gaiden or Shinobi)

A selective look back focuses on the true classics and serves as an unfair measurement tab of the present which breeds impatience. We always get used to a certain quality and are dissatisfied with the vast number of average games coming out, even if the quality improves over time. That's good for us gamers, because it keeps developers on their heels.

...additionally games are cheaper than they ever were, and they drop faster than they ever did. Big business means more companies which want a piece of the pie, that means more competition, and competition breeds in the end creativity.

As for the ratio of "bad" games: no, I don't think it really reduces when you span across gaming eras. I think it stays about the same. We still have companies that crank out some pretty weak titles to try and capitalize on the market itself or some genre that is "so hawt right now" with an inept development team and little funds or time to do it in.

As for development, has actual development truely improved since the past eras? Just because we've got powerful 3D hardware doesn't mean overall development is "better" than the past, it's just more complex. Besides we still see many of the same problems plagueing modern games like we did when the Playstation and N64 were duking it out.

[JaredCenter]

...Time marches on and so do games."[/b]


Probably the only thing sensible you'll read from Gamepro.

Gamepro always has its old gaming press attitude that all gamers are immature 7-8 year old boys who live on toilet jokes/fat people jokes, and that all games have to be advertised to that audience only. That is why I think that whatever Gamepro reports is a joke.

Lets say Midway did a makeover of Major Havok for Xbox or PS2. Gamepro would treat the original Major Havok as something that your father's friends once played, and to Gamepro, your father would be retarded because he viewed vector graphics instead of 3D graphics, he would look like Elvis (suit and all), and he would be rolling over dinosaurs because of the time he played the game -- 1983.

I wish NEXT Generation magazine was still around. They had some of the best articles on classic revisions (Battlezone from Activision) and the best stories on classic games (Owen Rubin's "Tunnel Hunt" at Atari). The best article, I thought, was the one they had on Atari Games after Atari's release of The Rock: Alcatraz Edition. NG had an interview with Dan Van Elderen and he told about his experience in working on "Tank" and "Sprint" back in the `70's, and how arcade games are made with the 90 or 120 second experence.

NEXT Generation was a proper gaming press, for people who cared about games and its developers from the past, present, and future. Gamepro is for gamers who are immature who only know stuff that's spoonfed to them. Gamepro needs to realize that immature gamers are becoming fewer and fewer as time passes, with more gamers puking out what is spoonfed to them.

[Ed Oscuro]

Gamepro needs to realize that immature gamers are becoming fewer and fewer as time passes, with more gamers puking out what is spoonfed to them.
Quite an insightful comment...I'm sure the folks at Gamepro understand that the makeup of the gaming public is going to change, perhaps they're banking on their current demographic/readership staying loyal. I bet their reputation makes it hard to try to change, too.

[zmweasel]

NEXT Generation was a proper gaming press, for people who cared about games and its developers from the past, present, and future. Gamepro is for gamers who are immature who only know stuff that's spoonfed to them. Gamepro needs to realize that immature gamers are becoming fewer and fewer as time passes, with more gamers puking out what is spoonfed to them.

GamePro's formula, as much as you and I disapprove of it, has been succeeding for more than a decade. If the market of "immature gamers" was shrinking over time, GamePro would have adapted or died. Neither has happened.

Next Generation was a wonderful read, the smartest videogame magazine ever published in America, but it was simply TOO smart for the mainstream/casual gamer. (Admittedly, NG's editorial quality took a huge hit after it stopped reprinting editorial from Edge and its founding editors left.)

-- Z.

[Captain Wrong]

Uhh...why does ANYONE care what GamePro thinks about ANYTHING?

[portnoyd]

Uhh...why does ANYONE care what GamePro thinks about ANYTHING?

Because everything they say is most always so damn dumb, it makes us stop and say things like what's above.

dave

[SegaAges]

I threw a subtle insult in GamePro's direction in my earlier thread, not that anyone cares, it's just to establish I'm biased. My point is it's an idiot rag full of pretty pictures. Just skim over the letters they choose to publish and answer to. Hard hitting stuff there, I tell ya.

I don't have anything particularily interesting to add...but any thread with something to do with gamepro...I have to add my hatred to. Any "prediction" from gamepro is as good as saying "drunken hobo says that in 2005 videogames will". It's a worthless magazine written by idiots, for idiots. Kind of like what Interplay has become.

Whoa, dude, Interplay had/has the Clayfighter series. I love that game.

[Ed Oscuro]

GamePro's formula, as much as you and I disapprove of it, has been succeeding for more than a decade. If the market of "immature gamers" was shrinking over time, GamePro would have adapted or died. Neither has happened.
Well, that's the history but I wonder if that's about to change, if only slightly. I'd bet that you're absolutely right in saying there's nothing to suggest this approach is wrong, but I also see that lots of folks are trying to muscle in on games for the aforementioned different audiences - I don't imagine a lot of GamePro readers will be picking up gaming on cellphones, but I do think that the journalists in other magazines will pick up on the trend and start publishing material for other types of reader. So the question is: will GamePro feel threatened at all? Will they want to be a part of that market, or will they just shrug off and insult such games? Will they try to write something for those folks as well, creating a split in styles throughout the magazine? I think the answer is none, but what's the opinion? They are writing for their subscribers, but how much?

Or better yet, have game journalism's percieved track record and/or the availability of Internet sources combined to effectively devastate the market for mature (or adult-oriented, as I lack a better term) game magazines? I can only speak for myself, but I know that I'm not very interested in reading stuff I don't find online.

Those are some picky questions, hope nobody minds 'cuz I don't mean no harm ;)

[zmweasel]

So the question is: will GamePro feel threatened at all? Will they want to be a part of that market, or will they just shrug off and insult such games? Will they try to write something for those folks as well, creating a split in styles throughout the magazine? I think the answer is none, but what's the opinion? They are writing for their subscribers, but how much?

I don't think GamePro feels threatened about anything. It's a blue-chip videogame magazine with a rock-solid brand and a distributor (IDG) that gets the magazine into a LOT of readers' hands, through subscription-giveaway offers and other such circulation sleight-of-hand.

I can't imagine GamePro feeling the need to alter its present editorial course until it's been proven that it's not working. Other magazines might be writing about cellphone games, but so what? That's not what GamePro does. Magazines that stick around as long as GamePro don't follow trends and shift editorial gears every three months.


Or better yet, have game journalism's percieved track record and/or the availability of Internet sources combined to effectively devastate the market for mature (or adult-oriented, as I lack a better term) game magazines? I can only speak for myself, but I know that I'm not very interested in reading stuff I don't find online.

It's a much simpler explanation: the majority of American videogame-magazine readers are teenagers and preteens. The reader surveys conducted by publishers bear this out, as does my own flimsy-ass anecdotal evidence.

However, I wouldn't say that other magazines are skewing quite as young as GamePro, other than the forever-kiddie Nintendo Power. For example, I perceive OPM's editorial voice as aimed at the twentysomething casual gamer.

What you seem to be asking for is a magazine for adult hardcore gamers, and the closest things to that are Play and PSE2.

-- Z.

[SoulBlazer]

That would explain why I don't read ANY magazines, then. :roll: