Slowtrain

There are still plenty of other hobby magazines on the newsstand though. Ham Radio, model rocketry, sewing, body building, all sorts of esoteric hobbies still have magazines. If computer gaming was stil an esoteric hobby, it woudl probably still have magazines. It had a lot more magazines when there was a lot less money in the business. Newspapers are a different kettle of fish from hobby magazines. Bad example.

I would tend to agree with you, DR, but sometimes, sometimes, against all odds, long shots do come in. And usually when you least expect it. So there is always hope that FO3 might be good. Or at least not bad. Or not ghastly. However, I'm going to let Mikey try it first.

Remember when flight sims were so popular all the gaming magazines had entire colums devoted to them? Longbow, A10, F22, Eurofighter, F15, F16, B17, P51. Remember game manuals so thick you could use them to hold open a heavy door? Remember fold out keyboard command sheets? Remember flight models and location specific damage? Remember dynamic campaigns? Remember Red Baron and Falcon? Dead as the dodo now. Boo.

All hope is lost. Come now. There is always hope. I mean if 10,000 monkeys jumping on 10,000 typewriters for 10,000 years can eventually produce the works of Shakespeare, then surely Todd Howard and team can eventually fling enough poo against the wall to make something moderately interesting.

lol. Remember those Oblivion previews: The best crpg EVAR! Lifecycle of a major computer game release (Now known as the Oblivion Cycle): Previews: All press gushes and praises upcoming release as the best game ever. Reviews: Press gives super top of the line scores to said game, notes a few minor faults in game. Post-release: 6 months later press recants super great scores and notes that game had a lot of serious flaws that they failed for some mysterious reason to notice during the review. Pre-release for next game from same major publisher: Press relases numerous articles detailing faults of previous major game and goes into great detail how those faults wil not be repeated by this next game which promises to be, wait for it now, the BEST GAME EVAR! wash rinse repeat. ad nauseum. etc, and so on.

I'd have difficulty filling out 10. XCOM Jagged Alliance 2 System Shock System Shock 2 Fallout STALKER Thief The Dark Project Those are the standouts for me over the last 10 years or so for me. There are a lot of other good games like Deus Ex and Master of Orion and Arcanum and Daggerfall just to name a few, but none of those can compare to these seven games.

Ah memories of a time when the entire playing a computer game was actually fun. It is really depressing what has happened to computer gaming as a hobby over the last 10 years. I'm just glad that at this point in my life I don't really have much time to play computer games anyway, so I don't have to think about how bad things are now very often. I used to have hundreds of gaming magazines in my closet. They were awesome.

As a Fallout fan since the day it was released away back when, I would like to point out that I have no particular desire for FO3 to be like FO1 and FO2. If such is OK, but if not then that is fine too. However, I DO have a very strong desire for Fallout 3 to be NOT AT ALL like Morrowind and Oblivion, because for me neither one was a very interesting crpg. I only bring this up to illustrate that not all Fallout fans who are concerned about Bethsoft's development of FO 3 are concerned because they want FO3 to be just like the Fallout crpgs of yore, but rather that some of us are concerned that Bethsoft is going to repeat some of the brutal mistakes and bad design decsions that have plauged their two most recent crpgs.

Given Bethesda's recent history I'm sure the graphics wil be fine. Whether they can conjure up atmosphere like STALKER is a question mark, but not a super critical one. Both MW and Ob were OK atmospheric games. I don't think too many people are worried about the graphics for this game. Gameplay footage and NPC dialogue options will be much more interesting when/if they are are ever released..

Of course not. But if the gameplay for said IP is the exact same 4 games in a row, I personally don't see the point. You could make the argument that if a great story is attached to said repetitive gameplay then the game would still be worth playing. Computer games are not known for their riveting stories however. I'm glad you enjoyed DX:IW. I did, too. FInished it twice. We are among the minority however. And I can't blame anyone for disliking it. It was a pretty poorly designed game.

IIRC neither Thief3 nor DX:IW sold well. IW was generally not very well regarded of course, by anybody, so its low sales are pretty much expected. Thief 3 was generally applauded by most but also did not sell very well. Both games were pc/console releases. I'm not opposed to another Thief game per se but: 1) If you are going to make a sequel to a poorly performing game, pick one that hasn't already been done three times. Brand recognition obviously ain't helping here if none of the three have sold very well. 2) By the fourth iteration gameplay starts to get tired. Next gen graphics alone aren't going to be a compelling enough reason for me to pick up a fourth thief game. Maybe if the things that were cut in Thief 3, namely water, mantling, and rope arrows were put back in, I would be more interested. And climbing would be nice. I don't know why climbing is so rarely included in games these days. It must be hard to implement or something. I remember back in Daggerfall scaling massive dungeon vaults and climbing over city walls in the dead of night. If you're playign a Thief, clmibing is almost a neccessity from a gameplay point of view.

How many copies did Thief 3 sell anyway? I bought a copy, Hell Kitty bought a copy so that's 2 at least. Add in a couple others aroudn the world and Thief 3 sold what 5 or 6 copies? If publishers are so inetrested in releasing sequels to poor selling games why not do XCOM or Wasteland or Terra Nova or Anachronox or some other title that has gameplay that we don't see every day. Take a stand! Blaze a trail! Be bold! DOn't get e wrong Thief 1 and Thief 2 were 2 of my most favorite games. Thief 3 was OK, but the lack of joy in that game offered no compelling reason why we need a number 4. Of course we can get cool next gen graphics that consume 4/5s of the development budget and offer 0 to the gameplay. I mean that is what developers do now right?

We need Thief 4 why exactly? Oh wait, I know because we need more of the exact same gameplay all over again! Whee. If they put in climbing and or implement rope arrows again, then OK, otherwise, poop. A thief game without climbing is like a day withut sunshine. ALso, more undead and fire arrows. And level scaling. And maybe some miniguns. Arrow miniguns and probably ninjas.

Casual games are always simple, they lack plot, the don't NEED anything more than the simple game mechanics, which is what makes such games addictive. I wouldn't say they were pushing any bounderies, but they are making alot of money, from games which are simple. Are they dumb? Well that's a matter of debate for another time. I personally hate 90% of casual games and find them to be utter dross. My point was simple, casual games are for all intense and purposes incredibley simple, and simple is synonymous with stupid. Now the difference is that while they're dumb, they can infact be alot of fun for alot of people of varied skill levels. I think that is something that is important to remember, intelligent doesn't = fun nor does stupid = fun. Planescape : Torment is seen as a high point of story telling in games by many, but all's said I can assure you it wouldn't even be as fun to some people as others. IP == Sales. I make my opinion based on the product. I'll buy them both, if they both suck then more fool me, but frankly I imagine they will entertain me, and perhaps even make me think a lttle. If a product didn't appeal to me at all I would not buy it. Alpha Protocol is the first game of any type of RPG genre that is likely to appeal to my brother. It ticks all the boxes. It's certainly also a game AIMED very much at a male audience, much as such movies... That's not to say it's utterly sexist, just matter of fact. I'm interested in the Aliens games mostly because I'm curious about how they will deal with the combat, and how cross-product development will work out, hence I will also pick-up the gearbox alien game. I'm also hoping for some good gore in the Aliens game, I wanna see some really gut wrenching stuff... But I probably won't. What is bad, what is good? That's purely subjective... And in case of the gaming media, purely bias, but I vowed to stop picking on mkreku, it's not his fault. Every games developer I've spoken to, and there have been a few, big and small, they've all had different outlooks, and while that is so I don't think we'll ever get the whole Hollywood releasing the same crap over and over from development studios... Although any tendancy for remaking games is abhorant. The problem is also that some studios also get typecasted. I'm sure Alpha Protocol wil be a decent enough game. All the boxes ticked, as you say. I might even buy it. But probably not. The Alien IP has enough of the unknown in it to be potentially interesting. I'm not sure why you brought up the male audience thing. That sorta stuff doesn't really come into play for me one way or the other. On either side. I just like games. on a completely and totally unrelated note. Are you fan of Big Red? Or do you just have her in your avatar and sig for some non-fan reason?

SO is mine, but if I ignore it for a while it generally goes away. One thing I have noticed is that as I get older I become more accepting of mediocrity in all aspects of life. Not something I am particularly proud of really when I think about it, but maybe an inevitable side effect if the aging process? Computer games used to be fairly riveting experiences for me now they are mostly just time-killers. And since I don't feel I've gotten any smarter or sophisticated in the last ten years, I can't believe its because I've outgrown them. The design paradigms have changed.

Me, too. Usually, I don't even get worked up about it anymore. Apathy creeps deeper into my soul every day.

Well, I don't think that casual = dumb. Casual games can be fun, too. Tetris is fab. I enjoy most forms of solitaire. etc Incredibly complex games can be bad, too. Its just not much an issue these days, cause not too many incredibly complex games are made anymore. I dunno. Look at Obs 2 games in development here: One is based on an existing IP, developed under license. Bleah. Now, in point of fact, I have some hope for the Aliens game, simply because the aliens universe is a decent IP, discounting the mauling it has received at the hands of the AvP movies. There is potential to develop a game that has some interesting aspects to it. I'm not saying this game will, but I am hopeful The other appears to be a beyond generic computer game, utter formula, connect the dots, etc. Even the name Alpha Protocol. It sounds like a really bad DTV release, maybe one of Steven Seagal's recent films. The lead player character looks generic as crap. The screenies look generic. Heck, when I look at that batch of screenies I'm seeing screenies of games that were released three years ago, just updated with vanilla next gen graphics. When developers are looking no further than last years games as inspiration for this years games, how excited can I possibly get? I'm sure it will be a fine, vanilla game. But there are a lot of fine bland games on the market every day. If bad games is all people have to play then that is what they are going to play. Its the same with movies. If Hollywood just releases piece of crap after piece of crap film, people are stil going to go see them because people want to go to the movies on Friday night. If all people know is crap, then what else are they going to do. I think what is happening to gaming is that publishers (and probably some developers) think gamers are idiots and so they make games that are especially geared for idiots. That's why I was so blown away by that "quote" from Levine. I couldn't believe that some major developer would have the balls to come out of the closet and fess up to what he really believed. Guess that didn't happen after all, but I was so excited at the time.

I agree. I am certainly hoping that is not their goal. ALl these next gen shooter, sction, rpgs all look "good", but so what. Its all very vanilla these days. Even though I didn;t like the art style in Bioshock, I give the devs of that game credit for being a little risky with their art approach. And it wasn't even that risky, just a little different. Next gen games seem to be severly lacking in zing these days. And when it seems like new games are just copping the licks of a little older games from five years ago, I find it more and more difficult to get exhilarated about them. Did I spell that right? Probably not.

Why put a lot of effort into something only 5% of the players can see, when you can instead put that exact same effort into extra things for everyone to see? Wait, so you are saying that ideally games should be aimed at the lowest level of gamer? Those who find it impossible to take the time and effort to look into various corners of the gameworld and pursue obscure quests to see where they might go? I mean, the broad and well-marked path might be easy enough to travel, but it ain't very interesting. Or at least itr doesn't stay interesting for long? (Hello, my good friend Bioshock!) In my opinion game developers (or at least publishers) are seriously beginnig to paint all gamers with the stupid brush.

Yeah, I just thought of that.

I hope that wasn't a April Fools thing, I just realized. Not that it is April 1 anymore, but it might have been when it was posted. It does seem totally unlike Levine to say that.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=185894 So if I dye my hair some rich dark color, will I be entitled to complex computer games plots? Granted a lot of morons play computer games, but a lot of people who play computer games are really smart. Nothing like feeding the masses their daily doses of idiocy and pablum. I'm salivating already, damnit. More, plz, Ken. Thanks. How do I install this Bioshock thingie anyway? Or more to the point, why should I bother if it is so ****ing stupid (your words, by inference).

Is that the exact same apartment that Alex Denton had to break into in DX:IW? Sure looks like it. Lead Developers are going to have to start bring in some interior designers to help them remove the blah from their interiors.

I think they are pretty unremarkable. Sure they are generically "pretty", but what game isn't in this day and age. Did they steal the cryvision goggles from Farcry? That's the first thing I thought of there.