J.E. Sawyer

At best, Kansas has marginal claims to being part of the Midwest. As I only grudgingly allow Missouri to claim membership, Kansas sure isn't getting in on my watch. A tiny number of Jews of any age resisted, even though many of them knew exactly what was happening. Expecting a 16-year old living in a fascist totalitarian nation to clearly comprehend the morality of what was going on around him is asking a bit much.

Why are these subjects still being debated? Ease of use and power are pretty clearly divided in this case. The PS3 possesses more potential power for those who have the time and inclination to conform to its particular standards, but the 360 ultimately presents a friendlier (easier) environment. You know how the PS2 actually possessed superior fill rate potential compared to the Xbox? Big deal. It didn't really matter because the PS2 had infuriating memory standards. 32 megs, 4 megs for textures, guys. How many PS2 games did we see that actually looked as good as Xbox games despite having a superior fill rate? If you think that devs aren't going to use all of those 256 megs of video memory on the PS3 in the next gen, remember that one of the major hits on new titles is in textures. Normal maps, specular maps, not to mention the size of the diffuse textures themselves. By the way, regardless of platform and memory availability, devs who don't want to walk a trail of tears create memory maps and program memory managers if they are serious about planning ahead.

All of the people in that picture are too thin and stylish to be me. http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0079766/

Unlike the legendary baby Jesus, this doll of black baby Jesus wouldn't balance on my shoulder, so I had to settle for having him pinned near my shoulder.

Actually they are Birkenstocks. ^_____________________________^

Gordon Freeman = Terrence Keller St. Christopher = Me Anakin Skywalker = David Espinoza Zombie Pirate = Jesse Reynolds ANBU Ninja = Joe Bulock Duct Tape Man = Tony Evans Sticky Note Man = Constant Gaw Post-MorTIM = Tim Cox Space Ghost = Tramell "T-Ray" Isaac The Jester = Tim Donley Ronin Samurai = Nicholas Pakidko Totally 80s H.R. = Tina Parker

Ones that are fun.

The X-TREEEEEME marketing of Warrior Within biased me against it. The first boss fight in the demo was such a joke that it completely turned me off.

Prince of Persia: Warrior Within's demo disappointed me so much that I never picked it up. Hopefully I won't have the same reaction to this one.

When I look at EA internal development, I see a bunch of titles I don't like. When I look at EA external development, I see some games I definitely like (Battlefield 2, for instance). When I look at UbiSoft, I see the opposite: internal games I like, external games I'm not a fan of. I would be concerned about what would happen to my favorite UbiSoft franchises underwent the EA process. Then again, I was pretty annoyed with how Prince of Persia 2 turned out. Thanks for the scoop, well-informed corporate insider!

Where's the Longshot love in this thread? What's not to like? * Mullet * Weird anatomy * Superpower: lucky

I think even if someone doesn't like team-based FPSs, failing to recognize that Battlefield: 1942 and Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory are two standard-bearers for quality in that genre is pretty obstinate.

It's pretty pointless, considering you can just disregard any title by fiat. I think the Battlefield games (excluding Vietnam) were great games, as was Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory. I also think RalliSport Challenge 2 was a lot of fun.

Not quite infinite replayability, but the original Way of the Samurai has an awful lot and is very short.

I'm just curious which console will have spotty online support. Sony has said they've considered something similiar to Live for the PS3 but free. The PS3 is slated to have... Ethernet (10BASE-T, 100BASE-TX, 1000BASE-T) x 3 (input x 1 + output x 2) Wi-Fi IEEE 802.11 b/g Bluetooth 2.0 (EDR) ...out of the box, though they may cut down to one gigabit output. Gigabit networking for free out of the box? The 360 will have networking out of the box, and free Live service. The Revolution will have wireless networking out of the box and they are launching a (supposedly) free service for DS and the Revolution. I'm confused which console will have spotty online support. The 360 looks like it will have solid online support out of the box, but hard drives are optional hardware. If Sony has something similar to Live but free, that's terrific. If it's exactly like Live is now, pay-as-you-go isn't something developers would want to rely on for distribution. Live requires people to buy physical cards at stores to enable it at home. Also, no hard drive comes standard with the PS3. If as many people buy HDDs for the PS3 as they did for the PS2, they can essentially be discounted. The built-in flash memory of the Revolution isn't big enough for most contemporary games. Also, the Revolution does support wireless, but not ethernet. If people buy a wireless router, that's great, but if people don't have them in their home by default, it again has to be considered optional equipment. Even if Sony and Nintendo come zooming into the game with a great online service, the fact that none of the "big three" have a combination of standard hard drives and rock-solid online storefront capabilities means that distributing console games online for them as a primary method of sales isn't sound.

To be perfectly honest, it's extraordinarily difficult to get publishers to consider a lot of stuff -- at least, it has been in my experience. I reached the point a while ago where I don't seriously respond when I'm asked for submissions/proposals. Costykian's ideas are reasonably sound, but they won't be feasible for console developers within the upcoming generation due to spotty hard-drive and online support.

Well, that and the fact that most people don't finish even short games. How many people wrote/said, "Oh it's so awesome that BG II is over 200 hours long!" and either didn't play much of that side content or never finished the game? EDIT: Better example: would you rather have had Icewind Dale II as it shipped or Icewind Dale II with 75% the length and a proportional bump in quality?

Jade Empire runs at 30 fps, isn't very responsive, uses vague collision, and has a pretty shallow input and attack priority system. Battle Raper II probably will be a better fighting game than Jade Empire was. JE's fighting system doesn't detract from its qualities as an RPG, but comparing it to what I would consider action games (God of War, Ninja Gaiden, Devil May Cry) is slightly questionable and comparing it to fighting games (Soul Calibur II, Tekken 5, Dead or Alive) is very questionable.

Goodnight, Ender.

Suppose you took a bunch of coins and handed them out to people across the world. You establish their values clearly and make bold, obvious engravings on both sides. Some coins have smooth edges, some have ridges. Everything works well early on. Over many years, people hand these coins back and forth to each other. The faces wear off of the coins and the ridges wear down. What's more, sometimes people get confused about what the initial value of the coins were, or worse yet -- they disregard what was established and they start trading according to their own, local values. Sometimes people hand off a Gold Eagle to someone and the person accepts it as a Gold Hawk. One day in the 21st century, someone says, "Hey, hold on, what is this worth, anyway?" Some old geezer looks in the ancient log book and says, "Well, if that's a Gold Eagle, it's worth ten oxen. But if it's a Gold Hawk, it's worth one virgin -- but, only a black-haired virgin!" "Ten male oxen or ten female oxen?" "Is a blond-haired virgin more or less valuable than black-haired virgin? And what about whores?!" It doesn't really matter what was intended long ago because the values that were held when the currency was established were held by people. They had agency, mainfested in individuals. Those values didn't exist outside of those people. A value written down is still a value expressed through a medium by a person Some held different beliefs than others -- or they changed their minds. And those who had the will, influence, and tenacity to do so passed on what they believed. So the coins lost their faces and the old owners, the minters, they lost their coins to youngin's with heads full of opinions. It didn't stop the descendants from trading them according to their own understanding of worth. Right and wrong only existed in the minds of the owners, challenged only when making transactions. I don't believe in misuse. Grammarians will tell you that Jesus does good and you do well. The linguist will shoot back that they're ain't nothin' wrong with that, everbody's doin' good, u should 2! Between the ends of the spectrum, both sides make some reasonable points. It's frustrating for me, because I live in a world where 95% of the people with whom I converse have no idea how to use the subjunctive mood. From my perspective, they mangle grammar. From their perspective, so I have been told, I sound odd. I think the definition you gave for "RPG" is a broken descriptor that has not kept pace with changes in game development. For that reason, I use the word less and less and try to qualify my usage of it more and more. If people don't accept the value I give to it, that's fine. I can't force them to accept it. But similarly, any time others use "RPG" with me, my mind shatters the definition of what they could mean into a dozen possibilities, rendering the word useless.

Definitions exist in the heads of individuals, not outside of them. Any group, minority or majority, can exchange words according to their own currencies. Over time, the currencies of words can lose value and be replaced or fall into disuse. I don't see why RPG is different from any other term. I'd definitely say you're being too harsh since the thread author asked for individual opinions. I assume that RPG is a loaded term. I don't assume that what's being given to me had the same value to the giver as it does to me. I don't buy games or even look at games based on genre classifications for a few reasons 1) genre terms are loaded and highly disputed and 2) good games exist across many "genres". The term doesn't exist outside of individual usage. It doesn't "exist today". The beliefs of the people participating in this thread have no majority. I think it's pretty presumptuous for you to assume what "consumers" as a whole believe an RPG is or is not. In Forza, the speed with which your car reacts is controlled by the player's speed and also by the car's weight, suspension, engine configuration, and weight distribution. Is Forza Motorsport a racing RPG? The shape of an object does not preclude or restrict its ability to have any particular value of color. My metaphor confuses you because you seem determine to use my terms according to your own definitions as opposed to the definitions I have stated that I hold. You're putting an awful lot of restrictions and exceptions on something that is supposed be defined as "stat-based gameplay, period". So the only valid stat-based gameplay is gameplay that involves straight value comparisons? Does it have to be randomized, or can it be a static comparison? Aren't we slaves to the definition given by the Godfather of Sandbox games, Will Wright? http://pc.gamespy.com/pc/the-sims-2/591767p7.html Also, just because its a "sandbox" game doesn't mean it doesn't have goal structures. I think of a "sandbox" game as one where it's more the player imposing the goal structures on the experience than the game is imposing the goal structures. But still the game designer has to give them plenty of reward feedback and failure feedback around a larger landscape, a 'goal space.' So rather than having 'Here's the goal of the game,' you now have a space of possible goals that the player can choose and pick from. You certainly can wander around and do a lot of things at your own pace for a variety of rewards in Fable. It sounds kind of like a sandbox game according to Will Wright's definition. And strangely enough, I didn't even know about this next link before I asked you: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandbox_(videogames) Most simulation games are sandbox-style video games, however Role-playing games (and MMORPGs) and other type of games can be sandbox games as well. The best selling computer game of all time is a sandbox style game, The Sims. ... Common features of sandbox style video games ... * Freedom to experiment: The ability to make good or bad decisions. In sandbox games, users can often set their own tone for the game. For example, in Darklands and Fable a user can do good deeds and become famous, or perform evil acts and become infamous. Do a search for "fable" and "sandbox" to see how the internet population associates them.

That's great, but I don't view "RPG" as a genre, I view role-playing as a system of reactivity. It isn't exclusive to a type of story or setting, or even to other mechanics in the game. Doesn't the fact that this thread exists indicate that people aren't quite sure how to define RPGs? RPG is a word (well, an acronym), and as with all words, common usage determines effective currency. But that doesn't mean I have to accept it or adopt it. Personally, I'm getting to the point where I just want to avoid accepting and offering game "genre" classifications. They're about as worthless as the words "atheist", "agnostic", and "liberal". But since the thread author specifically asked for opinions, I felt obliged to offer my own instead of the opinion of what may be the majority -- the majority that may also spell "tonight" as "tonite" or "through" as "thru". Must all our definitions be cleared through marketing and retail? It should have been made for the pc to begin with. It is very much a console RPG. You consider Jade Empire to be "very much" a console RPG despite the fact that the core mechanics are clearly driven by twitch reflexes, augmented by statistics -- exactly the same way that Forza Motorsport works. I'm using the definitions I gave. I'm saying that something can be a circle and blue or a square and blue. In my mind, "RPG" isn't a radio button that un-clicks "action" or "sandbox". In your mind, is Fable an RPG or a sandbox game? Also, why is The Sims strictly a simulation when your character has stats that are constantly tracked and altered and constantly affect gameplay transactions?

No you don't. You call them something more appropriate: tactical combat games. Statistics and statistic advancement as a core mechanic of gameplay can be found in tons of games. If you could play a robot in Fallout 3 and it had stats that you could advance, would it be a role-playing game? If controlling machines with advancing statistics still allows the "RPG" classification, Forza Motorsport is an RPG. In my opinion, action games can be RPGs. Simulation/sandbox games can also be RPGs. If the core gameplay mechanics don't limit the ability of the player to establish and "play with" character personality, why can't it be an RPG? EDIT: By the way, The Sims would still be an RPG by your definition since your character has stats that you can play with and change.

Wizardy and Might and Magic are RPGs as much as Front Mission 4 is an RPG. That is to say that they are tactical combat games with stat progression systems that allow no way to significantly establish or express character personality and influence things in the game world (outside of killing/destroying things).