Videogame Criticism

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Todinho

Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Todinho »

KSubzero1000 wrote: January 14th, 2018, 2:24 pm Okay I've watched the video, and while I think that some of the criticism in regards to it being more of an endurance fight holds merit, I do have to address the elephant in the room. Is the footage in the background of him beating the boss? Because if so:

- Coop increases the boss's health.
- Midir is resistant to magical attacks.
- Midir takes twice as much damage from attacks directed at his head.

In other words, slashing away at his talons with the Greatsword of Judgment while your cooperators fumble around in the background is probably the most tedious and drawn-out way to fight the boss. I seem to recall that the way you finally beat him, Todinho, was to play defensively and focus almost exclusively on head attacks, which is a much more effective and time-efficient strategy.

I get where he's coming from, but he's really not helping his case with that footage.

And another thing: He mentioned NG2, and while I generally prefer that type of short and intense boss fight myself, the two games have very different design philosophies when it comes to combat. Dark Souls is a much more slow-paced and methodical type of action game, so I don't think that substituting their bosses would make sense.

On the other hand, the lore criticism is fair.
Yeah the footage that he chose to ilustrate his point wasnt very good but in a comment below he cleared that up, his point is focusing on a 1v1 fight on NG he just used that co-op footage because it was the one he had but he probably shouldnt have.

I really think the whole problem I and others have with the fight really comes down to the huge health bar, it's a fight that you really have to pay attention and play defensivelly making precise hits on his head(the only part that takes real damage) now Im someone that really doesnt like to play that defensivelly which is why I died so much until I decided to change strategy, now Im not saying that all fights should be the same and I should be able to use the same tatic to beat all of them but given his huge health pool it means I have to play the game In a way a dont like for that much longer.
I've seen people defend this by saying that this makes you "learn the fight" dodging his attacks and knowing where to attack but you can do all that without prologing the fight and funnilly enough Cuphead really hammered this home for me, you have to learn each boss there but the game doesnt strech the fight , even in expert the patterns get harder but the bosses dont get much more health, Now obviouslly they are different games and fights in Cuphead have to be faster but you can apply the the principle.
Which leads to the second half of the problem with the health bar which is repetition because you're essentially doing the same during the entire duration and like he says on the video Midir moveset doesnt change all that much so you're fighting the same way the entire time: backing off, running and attacking him while he's recovering and then backing off again rinse and repea. Compare that to the Friede and Gael fight that probably(I didnt get the numbers to see) have comparable health bars but it doesnt feel that way because the fights change considerably from one phase to the next.
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Michiel K
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Michiel K »

Dark Souls is the Cuphead of dungeon crawlers.

Sorry.

Please carry on.

;)
Todinho

Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Todinho »

Michiel K wrote: January 14th, 2018, 8:20 pm Dark Souls is the Cuphead of dungeon crawlers.

Sorry.

Please carry on.

;)
Indeed it is XD

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Alex79
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Alex79 »

That video is amazing, I'd love to play that!
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Michiel K
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Michiel K »

Yeah, I love it.
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stvnorman
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by stvnorman »

Wasn’t sure where to post this, but there’s a guy called Felipe Pepe who’s spent four years getting 115 volunteers to write about computer RPG’s. Which is kind of video game criticism!

The result is called the CRPG Book Project: Sharing the History of Computer Role-Playing Games. It’s over 500 pages long and he’s sharing it completely free. Thought some of you guys might dig it...
https://crpgbook.files.wordpress.com/20 ... _1-0-1.pdf
Todinho

Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Todinho »

stvnorman wrote: February 7th, 2018, 9:05 pm Wasn’t sure where to post this, but there’s a guy called Felipe Pepe who’s spent four years getting 115 volunteers to write about computer RPG’s. Which is kind of video game criticism!

The result is called the CRPG Book Project: Sharing the History of Computer Role-Playing Games. It’s over 500 pages long and he’s sharing it completely free. Thought some of you guys might dig it...
https://crpgbook.files.wordpress.com/20 ... _1-0-1.pdf
Great share! :D

Also I dont usually share zero punctuation videos as great examples of criticism because they are exagerated and more for comedy but I really liked Yatzhee's take on Doki Doki Literature Club, it kinda taps into alot of what I think about it and why I was more lukewarm to it then others:
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KSubzero1000
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by KSubzero1000 »



Not exactly my favorite design philosophy, but a very interesting explanation nevertheless!
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KSubzero1000
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by KSubzero1000 »



Not so much "videogame criticism" as "metaphysical theory-crafting related to an unreleased product", but god damn this is so intriguing and thought-provoking. And I only understands about half of this stuff to begin with.
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KSubzero1000
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by KSubzero1000 »

Finally, some common sense!
A man after my own heart, this one.
Joshihatsumitsu

Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Joshihatsumitsu »

KSubzero1000 wrote: February 20th, 2018, 6:30 pm Finally, some common sense!
A man after my own heart, this one.
Again. Nail right on the head. ;)
kintaris

Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by kintaris »

KSubzero1000 wrote: February 20th, 2018, 6:30 pm Finally, some common sense!
A man after my own heart, this one.
As much as I tend to keep falling for modern open worlds, nothing is more offputting in the marketing build up than someone saying "it's X square miles!" or "it's three times as big as the last one!"

I don't care! What's in it??
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KSubzero1000
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by KSubzero1000 »

Joshihatsumitsu wrote: February 20th, 2018, 9:45 pm Again. Nail right on the head. ;)
Is the author famous or something? First time I've heard of him.

kintaris wrote: February 21st, 2018, 6:42 am As much as I tend to keep falling for modern open worlds, nothing is more offputting in the marketing build up than someone saying "it's X square miles!" or "it's three times as big as the last one!"

I don't care! What's in it??
Exactly. I'm not saying that no game can make good use of the open world formula, but I strongly object to it being elevated to the status of the "ultimate" design philosophy that every game should aspire to. It's Quantity over Quality, and a lot of games would be better without. The resources that have been spent making a virtual world bigger and bigger are also the resources that haven't been spent making it tighter and better structured. That's a pretty universal law of game design.

Just in the past few days, I've been playing NieR: Automata and was left wondering why on earth the developers had chosen to create such a barren and empty overworld instead of focusing their efforts on crafting the handful of actual levels interspersed throughout. And yersterday I read the news about the upcoming Burnout Paradise port - a game that, for all intents and purposes, has one of if not the best mechanical engine in its genre, but utterly atrocious track- and race design as a direct result of its hare-brained implementation of the open world formula.

This notion that every other game has to try to be either the next GTA or Elders Scrolls is one of the worst developments to come out of the 7th gen, for me.


...Oh, look. Yelling at clouds again.
Joshihatsumitsu

Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Joshihatsumitsu »

KSubzero1000 wrote: February 21st, 2018, 9:49 am
Joshihatsumitsu wrote: February 20th, 2018, 9:45 pm Again. Nail right on the head. ;)
Is the author famous or something? First time I've heard of him.

...

...Oh, look. Yelling at clouds again.
No idea who the author is... so I guess by my own personal measure, not really?

To be fair, the clouds only have themselves to blame! ;)
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KSubzero1000
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by KSubzero1000 »

Joshihatsumitsu wrote: February 21st, 2018, 9:39 pm To be fair, the clouds only have themselves to blame! ;)
Ah, but they sure know how to act all cute and innocent when under scrutiny in order to deflect suspicion, though!

Image

It's all a trick, I tell you! Do not allow yourselves to be fooled!
Joshihatsumitsu

Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Joshihatsumitsu »

KSubzero1000 wrote: February 21st, 2018, 9:59 pm
Joshihatsumitsu wrote: February 21st, 2018, 9:39 pm To be fair, the clouds only have themselves to blame! ;)
Ah, but they sure know how to act all cute and innocent when under scrutiny in order to deflect suspicion, though!

Image

It's all a trick, I tell you! Do not allow yourselves to be fooled!
:o
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Chopper
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Chopper »

I don't like that article much; we all know the weakness of open world games is the often-terrible repeatable activities, but I think he's cherry picking his examples and engaging in lots of hand waving.

Thank heavens we have heavily curated experiences like the Yakuza games, where there are no horrible minigames, endless encounters with street thugs, several thousand lockers to be opened etc etc ;)
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KSubzero1000
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by KSubzero1000 »

Oh snap, Chopper wasting no time whatsoever and going straight for the jugular with the Yakuza hate! :lol:

I think the issues with the open-world design aren't limited to repetitiveness, like for example the sheer amount of uneventful downtime / empty space and lack of environmental structure, all of which Yakuza tries its best to circumvent in comparison with other open-world titles. With that being said, the repetitiveness of the Yakuza core gameplay loop is indeed one of the series' biggest flaws, so I can't really rebut this too vehemently!


In other news, I've been on a bit of a YouTube recommendations-induced trip these past few days, which has led me to discover various gems such as this one:



Genuinely one of the most entertaining video game critiques I've ever seen. Hilarious writing and an obvious passion for the source material.
Todinho

Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Todinho »

Ok Im really stretching the definition of Videogame Criticism but I stumbled upon this video again today and I just love it so much, it's Kojima, Mikami and Suda51 having a talk about games, its a really interesting watch and pretty funny too :D
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Chopper
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Re: Videogame Criticism

Post by Chopper »

KSubzero1000 wrote: February 22nd, 2018, 6:23 pm Oh snap, Chopper wasting no time whatsoever and going straight for the jugular with the Yakuza hate! :lol:
:lol:

Open worlders in general are getting harder to defend for sure, as they seem to be running out of ideas, especially in the single player campaigns. It's notable that GTAV and Ghost Recon Wildlands seemed to be most appreciated in multiplayer/co op modes, and Fallout 4 which didn't have those was widely derided for it's gameplay.

For me, they work best when there's something that reinforces the link between player and world, such as the use of the map in Far Cry 2, or having to actually map the world yourself in Miasmata, or having to engage with the world to locate quests rather than having a million markers polluting the map. The Witcher 3 probably succeeded on the strength of its quests, I'm not sure (and its repeatable activity, Gwent, was a hit). I haven't played Breath of the Wild.

But yes, too often the big open spaces (which are the main draw for me) are wasted, but there are some great open worlders that succeed.

I tried hard with the Yakuza games but I just couldn't get there. :cry:
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