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Post by llj on Jul 19, 2011 15:12:20 GMT -5
I like Capcom's talent pool and they still make good games. I just hate the suits there with their "wacky" 1 save ideas and cheap money grabs.
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Post by acidonia on Jul 19, 2011 16:58:20 GMT -5
I love how Japanese games desing their creatures there milles ahead in this to western companys. I look at games like Metroid that are full of creative Alien Life Forms then you look at games like Mass Effect and Halo and nearly every alien Race in those you can interact with just look like humans with Alien Heads stuck on.
As for Child of Eden iI was expecting it to fail. They only promoted that it plays on Kinect even though it is fully playable without kinect and it is ment to be a rather short game. It would of been more suited to a Xbla or PSN title really.
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Post by muteKi on Jul 19, 2011 19:29:45 GMT -5
You do realize that Shadows of the Damned was directed by a guy who has a feverish obsession with western culture and that the game contains constant references to western culture? I mean, it's an excellent game made by an excellent group of people and I loved the dickens out of it, but it's one of the very few awesome games out of Japan the last few years, and it's by someone with a fetish for Western tastes and culture. This isn't really anything new, though. After Burner (Top Gun!) and Snatcher (Body Snatchers! Blade Runner! Terminator!) both really stand out to me in this regard. I suppose anything medieval fantasy would have to count as well. For that matter, Sonic is pretty much Pepsi's mid-1975 ad campaign given legs and arms (at least relative how he was promoted here in the US). Mario's Italian, etc. etc. And of course we can't forget all the games that are pretty much an interactive HR Giger painting (some Contra, a decent amount of Rie Kodama's stuff, Metroids, etc.). |
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Post by kyouki on Jul 19, 2011 19:52:37 GMT -5
I enjoy plenty of games on my PS3 (Dead Space is awesome, even Biohazard 5 is a lot of fun, Demon's Souls is great, great baseball games this gen out of Konami, current gen Armored Core games are fantastic, etc etc) but I understand that's not the point of this thread, so here are my gripes about this generation:
JAPANESE GAMES
-zero creativity
-near 100% focus on "characters." It's like they think all they need to do is design a "cool" character and the rest of the game writes itself
-not pushing graphical boundaries anymore. The difference between a Japanese game and an American game on during the 8/16 bit generations was like night and day. Clever use of sprites and dithering pushed the systems to their max. Now they just buy an Unreal license (that's what westerners like, right!!!), throw a fancy coat on a kid and call it a day. Playing Dead Space for the first time (a year ago!) blew my mind it looked so good. Then I played Biohazard 5 with its overuse of filters and lighting and it just looks awful
-drastic case of EITHER/OR. EITHER design a game based on what they think westerners want based on that one time they saw an American movie once, OR pandering to their niche audience. Arcana Heart 3 is an awesome fighter. Awesome sprites. Too bad the characters are all from a pedophile's fantasy land. Not all Japanese people love little anime girls! CAVE shooters are some of the best STGs ever made, but they are inexplicably filled with little anime girls.
-quick time events ruining perfectly decent games. Bayonetta isn't bad, why pollute a game that should be 100% skill based with button press minigames?
WESTERN GAMES
-overemphasis on open world exploration in massive worlds that are so boring they might as well have been randomly generated. Ironically, the most interesting "open world" game I've played this gen has been Nier, which has a small but interesting and instantly memorable world. Two Worlds (yeah, the first one) was also really great about this.
-Everything has to be epic constantly. When everything is turned up to 11 all the time, nothing is interesting anymore.
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Post by kitten on Jul 19, 2011 19:55:35 GMT -5
This isn't really anything new, though. The idea is nothing new, certainly, and I find it pretty ridiculous you would think it necessary to point this out to me with my favorite game series being fucking Contra. It's tremendous dominance is something new, though, and "distinctly Japanese" games are on a very serious decline. I think this might be the first time since they started development on the original Mega Man that there's not been a Mega Man game in development. I mean I could bring up a staggering list of really damning examples about Japan's decline, lately :/ |
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Post by beach1 on Jul 19, 2011 19:56:10 GMT -5
You do realize that Shadows of the Damned was directed by a guy who has a feverish obsession with western culture and that the game contains constant references to western culture? I mean, it's an excellent game made by an excellent group of people and I loved the dickens out of it, but it's one of the very few awesome games out of Japan the last few years, and it's by someone with a fetish for Western tastes and culture. Having a bunch of references in your game out of love for western culture isn't the same though as trying to make your game more "westernized." |
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Post by Snarboo on Jul 19, 2011 20:07:04 GMT -5
-Everything has to be epic constantly. When everything is turned up to 11 all the time, nothing is interesting anymore. This is my biggest problem with modern gaming. There's no subtlety, no chance to catch your breath, just a constant crescendo until the whole game leaves you feeling numb. |
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Post by kitten on Jul 19, 2011 20:18:40 GMT -5
You do realize that Shadows of the Damned was directed by a guy who has a feverish obsession with western culture and that the game contains constant references to western culture? I mean, it's an excellent game made by an excellent group of people and I loved the dickens out of it, but it's one of the very few awesome games out of Japan the last few years, and it's by someone with a fetish for Western tastes and culture. Having a bunch of references in your game out of love for western culture isn't the same though as trying to make your game more "westernized." It's more than just references, though. The game has a very western sense of humor, and one of the two main characters was strongly based off of a character from a British comedy. It's not a derivative game, though, and definitely more homages these things - but it's clearly designed to appeal more toward Western tastes (less intentionally and more just to be congruent with Suda51's personal interests, as far as I can tell, but still). |
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Post by beach1 on Jul 19, 2011 20:22:28 GMT -5
Having a bunch of references in your game out of love for western culture isn't the same though as trying to make your game more "westernized." It's more than just references, though. The game has a very western sense of humor, and one of the two main characters was strongly based off of a character from a British comedy. It's not a derivative game, though, and definitely more homages these things - but it's clearly designed to appeal more toward Western tastes (less intentionally and more just to be congruent with Suda51's personal interests, as far as I can tell, but still). Oh, never mind then. I hope the trend in modern gaming changes soon. While it's great that we still have plenty of Japanese games coming out on the handhelds, I miss being able to play lots of Japanese games on home consoles on a tv with a controller. |
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Post by muteKi on Jul 19, 2011 20:33:37 GMT -5
less intentionally and more just to be congruent with Suda51's personal interests, as far as I can tell, but still But doesn't that just take us back to the other main issue here, that everyone's making games they think will sell rather than what they themselves actually want to play, due to how big the industry is? |
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Post by Super Orbus on Jul 19, 2011 21:03:02 GMT -5
I still see plenty of good stuff coming out. I'm buying just as many games now as I ever have. Possibly more. The only real difference I've seen the last few years is that the big Japanese houses (Capcom, Konami, Sega particularly, Square-Enix and Namco to an extent), seem to have gone completely off the rails. The middle-sized and small guys still seem to be doing just fine.
I'm not sure if their recent obsession with trying to appeal to the west is really the problem, or if it's more of a symptom of the real problem. The real problem presumably being they've gotten too big for their own good. As giant evil megacorporations, they are beholden to their shareholders to constantly make more money. The easiest way to do that would appear to be trying to grow sales in the West. Except the masses here aren't biting, and in their headlong rush to try to appeal to them, they've alienated their previous fans. Leaving them in an even worse position than they were in before.
But that's a problem for those particular companies. The industry as a whole seems to be getting along alright. This includes Japan.
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Post by Catalyst on Jul 19, 2011 21:26:50 GMT -5
I still see plenty of good stuff coming out. I'm buying just as many games now as I ever have. Possibly more. The only real difference I've seen the last few years is that the big Japanese houses (Capcom, Konami, Sega particularly, Square-Enix and Namco to an extent), seem to have gone completely off the rails. The middle-sized and small guys still seem to be doing just fine. I'm not sure if their recent obsession with trying to appeal to the west is really the problem, or if it's more of a symptom of the real problem. The real problem presumably being they've gotten too big for their own good. As giant evil megacorporations, they are beholden to their shareholders to constantly make more money. The easiest way to do that would appear to be trying to grow sales in the West. Except the masses here aren't biting, and in their headlong rush to try to appeal to them, they've alienated their previous fans. Leaving them in an even worse position than they were in before. But that's a problem for those particular companies. The industry as a whole seems to be getting along alright. This includes Japan. I definitly agree with this recent observation. It seems as if money is in charge in the East, amongst those older big name companies. Which leads more often than not for decisions which aren't viewed well amongst their fans stateside or even in their home of Japan. The little guys though are still pumping out good products just like some of these game companies were in their smaller and more youthful days. You just gotta know were to look. That's not to say I'm not enjoying anything from these big name companies like Sega, Capcom, or Konami. |
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Post by Super Orbus on Jul 19, 2011 22:15:53 GMT -5
Konami's output in particular seems to have dropped way off in recent years. Last year they put out Lords of Shadow and Peace Walker? Was that it?
EDIT: Okay, they put out some music games too. And soccer.
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Post by Feynman on Jul 19, 2011 22:16:23 GMT -5
A large part of the problem is, indeed, the size that some of these companies have reached. The larger a company gets, the more beholden to it's shareholders it becomes, making it increasingly difficult to take risks, and increasingly important to make company growth the #1 driving force behind the decision making process... remember, investors and shareholders don't care if you're merely profitable, all they care about is whether or not your company is growing. If it isn't your stock plummets. In fact, your stock can drop if are growing but investors don't think you're growing enough.
I actually feel that Sega has been doing a pretty decent job of keeping their fans in mind given the company's size. I mean yeah, they pump out some cash-in shovelware like the Mario & Sonic Olympics crap, and the Sonic franchise is being milked like hell, but they've also been doing a lot of good lately. They brought us Valkyria Chronicles and even took a chance with the sequel when the original gained a cult following. They listened to complaints about Yakuza 3 and really did a wonderful job on Yakuza 4. They helped Platinum games bring us Bayonetta, Infinite Space and Vanquish. They helped Tri-Ace bring us Resonance of Fate! And while the games are neither new nor emulated perfectly, Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection is still one of the best retro compilations out there, offering tons of value.
Most of these risks didn't really pay off for Sega, but they took them anyway, even after several failures. I feel that Sega has done a pretty good job pulling their weight this console generation.
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Post by Super Orbus on Jul 19, 2011 22:19:48 GMT -5
Okay, I'll give you that one Feynman. I was mostly thinking of Sonic Team. I forgot about all the other good stuff they have been doing. Even if they aren't sharing Valkyria 3 with us.  |
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