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Post by Deleted on Oct 12, 2014 23:37:04 GMT -5
Wait, felixm is so bad at Mario that he's seen the white suit in multiple games? That burn was over 9000!
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Post by Deleted on Oct 13, 2014 11:56:39 GMT -5
Felixm, my whole problem with your argument is that you are holding people to a universal standard that simply won't apply to everyone. Yes, there are disabled people and young children who can master the most difficult of games, but there are also disabled people (and fully abled people, let's be fair!) along with children who will never be able to do that. There are people in this very thread that have admitted that they had to use the white tanooki suit in Super Mario 3D Land because they wanted to move on with the game. And you know what? That's fine! They have nothing to prove. They can master the game later. When did we decide that everyone, regardless of skill or inclination, HAS to be allowed to see the end of a game? Sure, tons of 8 and 16-bit games had easy modes, but they usually didn't gimp the challenge to anywhere near as great of an extent as in modern titles; you weren't allowed to be nothing more than a digital tourist. What ever happened to "practice makes perfect?" Games are not passive entertainment, and if players aren't interested in having their skills tested to at least some small degree, they should find a good movie or TV show instead. What are you insinuating with "times change?" That the children of today are somehow much less skilled at playing games than the kids of the 1980s and 90s? Blame the degenerate state of modern game design that panders to lowest common denominators and lazy tendencies, but never blame the kids. They can't help what they were raised on. And how was Mario 64 more accommodating than Mario World? You had to contend with a confounding (for 1996) control scheme and fully 3D environment, while mastering a huge repertoire of different jumps, flips, kicks, and slides. Even if your trajectory of the Mario series over time was accurate, it's never a good thing when a gaming franchise gets progressively dumbed down over time, and piles on more and more concessions to difficulty as if it was uncomfortable in its own skin. Bzzzt, wrong answer. It's an evolution (or regression) of the P-Wing from SMB3, which let you essentially bypass a level while still having to fly over its full expanse. The P-Wing was and still is a dumb novelty and concession, but an acceptable one, because they were non-replenishable and scarce. You had to carefully choose where you could make the best use of one, and the game didn't dish them out like candy pallatives when it determined you had encountered a tough spot. As for the warp zones and whistles, you were unlikely to ever find them unless you saw The Wizard, were told about them by a friend, or read Nintendo Power. They certainly weren't handed to you on a platter if you couldn't get past a world. I've always viewed them as more of a mechanism to allow players to resume from close to where they left off after turning off the power, in the absence of a password system or save battery. If I'd had my way, the Western versions of SMB3 would also have always reverted you to small Mario upon getting hit, even with a second-stage powerup. As far as I know, the Japanese kids were okay with it. The problem is that dumbing down a game in the name of "accessibility" inevitably results in a weaker core experience for players of all skill levels, even with the presence of high difficulty settings. Sure, Super Mario Galaxy's optional purple coin challenges may be tougher than anything in Mario 64, and Call of Duty campaigns on Veteran will give anyone a run for their money, but it won't change the fact that the controls and level designs of these games are heavily simplified and casualized. The result is inflated difficulty, where game mechanics that were designed with casual and unskilled players first and foremost in mind are clumsily stretched far beyond their intended limits to cynically fulfill a quota of catering to those who do not reject challenge in their games. No, but games that were designed to pander to the kind of person who would use the White Tanooki Suit are incapable of delivering the same enjoyment as games that weren't. I won't hesitate to say that 3D World, while good, is far inferior to the NES Mario Bros. games or Mario 64. And there is rather little of the modern glut of overblown, story-driven cinematic action games, such as Arkham Asylum, Bioshock Infinite and The Last of Us, that I would consider more than mediocre. I still believe that if all someone is looking for is a good story, they'd be better off picking up a good book or movie, which are capable of feeling just as or even more immersive. It's especially important whether a game has controls, mechanics and level/enemy designs strong enough to hold up under high difficulty settings, and the vast majority of these glorified interactive movies do not. (Also, whether the game merely adjusts HP and damage values between difficulties, or actually modifies things like enemy placement and behavior.) Mind explaining what these mysterious "recent events" are? I think Ikaruga is a great example of the right way to make a game more accommodating. Within the same difficulty setting, you can play it pretty much any way you want: as a simple, no-nonsense shoot-em-up; as a complex and precise puzzle game/memorizer, or as an exercise in pacifism and avoidance. Outside of the score counter, you're not penalized for choosing one method over the other, but all of them are challenging and fully accounted for by the mechanics and level designs (those crates in Chapter 2 look impossible to get through without shooting, but you can carefully slip between them). Allowing players to plow right through all the elaborately placed clockwork of a level without giving a fuck is NOT the right way to do it, and serves only to slight the work of the designer. Come to think of it, the position of level or map designer has become devalued more and more over the years, between the transformation of FPS campaign maps into shiny, linear cattle runs focused on showing off graphics and cinematics, and the fad for procedural generation...
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Post by The Great Klaid on Oct 13, 2014 12:13:19 GMT -5
You know I want you to tell me exactly how 3D Land is cheapened by the White Tanooki suit. The game feels challenging enough if you ignore it. It's easy enough to ignore even. I want to know how it is any worse. Rather then whinging about how it allows other people to beat the game.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 13, 2014 12:43:37 GMT -5
You know I want you to tell me exactly how 3D Land is cheapened by the White Tanooki suit. The game feels challenging enough if you ignore it. It's easy enough to ignore even. I want to know how it is any worse. Rather then whinging about how it allows other people to beat the game. The level design of the game is cheapened by the presence of a game breaking uber-powerup that is freely available in every stage upon dying a certain number of times in a row. If the developers themselves didn't care about keeping their carefully constructed house of cards intact under any circumstances, it becomes harder to care about the game in question. I miss when games had cheat codes and would sometimes insult you for using them, or wouldn't let you see the ending if you finished on Easy. At least that hammered home that the developers weren't endorsing the use of such concessions. If any action-platform game of the NES or SNES era had an equivalent of the White Tanooki Suit that was simply handed to you any time you wanted instead of being a hidden secret or cheat, it would have immediately gotten slammed by the magazine reviewers of the day for being too easy and short.
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Post by Weasel on Oct 13, 2014 12:48:42 GMT -5
You haven't explained why you can't just ignore the White Tanooki.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 13, 2014 13:01:30 GMT -5
It would certainly have been a much worse game if you COULDN'T refuse to pick it up, but it's still damaged by the presence of such a blatant "get out of jail free card." Why couldn't it have been a hidden cheat code? You could still use it if you suck that much, but at least it wouldn't be handed to you like candy to a squealing toddler.
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Post by The Great Klaid on Oct 13, 2014 13:09:48 GMT -5
Dying a gajillion times is in my mind pretty well hidden. Just as hidden as a cheat code. I came across it twice. And it was on those base jumping levels. So if you really want to use it you have to spend a lot of time dying. By the time it showed up, I was just like fine! Let's take it and move on. Actually, I came across it thrice. The last Bowser fight kept offering it to me, but I skipped it. I ignored it.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 13, 2014 13:20:37 GMT -5
There's a pretty wide gulf between "five times" and "a gajillion times."
Since you've resorted to giving personal anecdotes as evidence: When I was younger I would get stuck on challenges like stopping Link the Goron in OoT, or beating Ing Emperor in Metroid Prime 2, for MONTHS at a time. There were no cheats or special concessions for me to exploit in these games. I certainly got frustrated, but the eventual rush of accomplishment I felt when I finally pulled through was worth it.
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Post by Jungyin on Oct 13, 2014 14:33:46 GMT -5
Maybe I'm just having trouble recognizing it, but I still don't see where you say how the level design has been cheapened in 3D Land, rather, you seem to be repeating: "the existance of the White Tanooki Suit makes them worse". Have the platforms been made easier to jump on? Are there uninteresting sets of challenges presented during the levels? Could you maybe give an example?
This conversation reminds of that Etrian Odyssey thread around the time of Untold's announcement/release.
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Post by Snarboo on Oct 13, 2014 15:21:29 GMT -5
When did we decide that everyone, regardless of skill or inclination, HAS to be allowed to see the end of a game? Because no other medium denies people from seeing the ending of something in the same way games do? Paintings don't become blank canvases if you do not have the skill to reproduce them; books don't shut themselves if you don't understand every word; nor do movies turn themselves off if you don't understand the intricacies of the plot. If games are to be treated as art and as a vehicle for storytelling, they need to be held to the same standards as other mediums and allow people to evaluate the entire product regardless of skill. It's also just plain good game design! A game of average difficulty implies that most people can beat it, not an elite few. If normal is too hard, that's where easy modes and cheats come into play. I can appreciate a game that doesn't hold my hand or pull its punches, but times have changed. I stand by that statement! It has nothing to do with children specifically either, but rather making games more accessible to a broader audience. Why do you think games are as popular as they are today? Frankly, I don't miss a lot of the bullshit I was subjected to as a child. I don't miss having to restart an entire game if I can't get past a single level, nor do I miss limited lives, bottomless pits, or spikes. It doesn't make a game bad if it does those things, but I also don't have the same amount of time to memorize things as I used to. The fact that we are talking about Mario, of all series, instead of the bullshit, cookie cutter clones that nobody rightfully remembers, is a testament to how well designed those games are. And do you know why they are well designed? Because they are accessible. Even the harder entries in the series are accessible, and Mario is one of the few series to get easier with time, opening the series up to people of all skills levels and abilities. The white tanooki suit might not be the same as the warp zones, p-wings, or cape, but they're built on the same foundation: giving less skilled people an option for accessing more of the game. Of course, thanks to youtube and let's plays, now anyone can enjoy a game without even having to play it, and that's great! Given the way this conversation has gone, however, I'd bet you feel that people shouldn't even be allowed to see the ending of a game on youtube until they've signed a blood oath demanding their first born. :p I also find it strange that you don't complain about FAQs, hint guides, or Nintendo Power given they spoil the game for you in a way the white tanooki suit never could.
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Post by The Great Klaid on Oct 13, 2014 16:40:19 GMT -5
There's a pretty wide gulf between "five times" and "a gajillion times." Since you've resorted to giving personal anecdotes as evidence: When I was younger I would get stuck on challenges like stopping Link the Goron in OoT, or beating Ing Emperor in Metroid Prime 2, for MONTHS at a time. There were no cheats or special concessions for me to exploit in these games. I certainly got frustrated, but the eventual rush of accomplishment I felt when I finally pulled through was worth it. One, 5 times is a lot for most of those levels I found. Really twice meant it was kind of a tough level. And I didnt really use it immediately Two, I like how you make anecdotes sound like a logical fallacy. Three, I've never had that feeling. A lot times I shout finally! Considering if it takes me that long, usually I found it was a problem in design. Usually a boss just spamming some BS attack more then what's fair. Or having to stand in a spot that is far from intuitive. Or something just not plain working. To illustrate my point, Megaman X. That part at the start of Sigma I, where you have to jump from platform to platform while getting assaulted by respawning enemies. That part took me weeks. The respawning made it borderline unfair. I'm still positive it wasn't designed with that in mind. In fact it may be the only bit that can't be beaten by just your buster. Well designed that way. I did it, because never occurred to me until after to use the Chameleon shot. I was just happy I could move on, I wasn't satisfied or felt accomplished. Sigma on the other hand, had a clear pattern, that was telegraphed enough to be fair, but you had to learn the signs. And you still had to know how to avoid it. It took time, but really only a couple of hours. It was fair. I bring that up because I can't comprehend depth. Everything is like Mode 7 to me. Its all just growing and shrinking. 3D games are a dick to me. I was thankful as balls for that white tanooki suit and unlimited flying. Otherwise, I wasn't beating it.
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Post by nightdreamer on Oct 13, 2014 19:07:46 GMT -5
Somehow I think that felixm is starting these arguments as a weird condescending kind of humblebrag so that we could all recognise his 'vidyagaem skizll!'
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Post by cambertian on Oct 14, 2014 13:39:59 GMT -5
Since you've resorted to giving personal anecdotes as evidence: When I was younger I would get stuck on challenges like stopping Link the Goron in OoT, or beating Ing Emperor in Metroid Prime 2, for MONTHS at a time. There were no cheats or special concessions for me to exploit in these games. I certainly got frustrated, but the eventual rush of accomplishment I felt when I finally pulled through was worth it. I suffer from a special kind of depression/anxiety where I've never felt accomplishment after completing something big. In its place is usually anger or resentment towards whatever put me through it in the first place. (In the case of video games, the developer.) They always make it possible to beat, but did it have to rub my face into shit-covered pavement? It's just not worth it at that point. Am I not allowed to play video games because I don't feel the same "rush" or "exhilaration" that other people feel?
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Post by The Great Klaid on Oct 14, 2014 18:31:38 GMT -5
I'm kind of crap at Mario. Beat Mega Man 7, but I can't even finish SMB3.
So, the argument as we left off was if accessibility was detrimental to difficulty. And honestly, it's not. Look at Fire Emblem, and then even compare it to other games in the SRPG genre. As far as rules go, Fire Emblem is a hell of a gateway drug. It's easy to pick up and play. But it's a fairly tough game. The rules are simple, you just have to figure out how to make them work for you. Now take the opposite, Final Fantasy Tactics. It's kind of a dense game and took me three tries to really figure out how to work it. After that, however the game's rather easy. Give or take 2-3 battles.
But, those were games that were designed that way. Fire Emblem's been around for decades now. So, the question becomes is it possible to add accessibility into a series that didn't have it before, without necessarily changing the difficulty. Looking back at Fire Emblem the answer would be no. Using Casual mode just kind of breaks the game hard. Of course it's optional, and it's still kind of a tough without it.
So really, I don't have an answer. What do you guys think?
EDIT: Changed the opening, because I like to go through archives and keeping them oddly meticulous and I'm sure I'm not the only one. And that opening made no sense being on page 3. So future readers there you go.
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Post by Allie on Oct 14, 2014 18:35:20 GMT -5
Shining Force is the Gateway Drug, because it allows you to grind as much as you want, and pay to bring your dead characters back.
Hell, the second game gives you two characters (Karna and Sheela) specifically built to pump their own levels up at ludicrous speed.
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