I've seen people say that they'd rather have no morality system than a morality system.
I want to know why.
Because quantified morality systems lack the nuance of actual morality
Plus especially with light/dark systems it frequently leads to unfortunate situations, like in Fable where taking a quest to lead a man to his execution is treated as a good action, or in KOTOR where the player can manipulate people with the force and come out morally unscathed, or how Oblivion's fame/infamy system judges the player more negatively for the Thieves' Guild quest line than the Dark Brotherhood (plus it more or less equates fame with goodness and infamy with evil)
Man is a most complex simple creature: see what he weaves, and how base his reasons for doing so.
That, and like, the Renegade/Paragon meters in Mass Effect. Undertale, Shadow the Hedgehog, Fallout 4's Karma, Shin Megami Tensei, approval ratings on Dragon Age, etc.
Basically, a mechanical system that puts specific values on your choices within the game.
In any case, if only I'd known you were having a problem, then I'd have told you to post about it on the game's forum, since the dev is (from my observations) really good at responding to and addressing technical issues.
Doom II is basically just a continuation of the first, but with 32 new levels, some new enemies and a new weapon (double barrel shotgun). I'd say try it sometime
I think you kind of take "pretentious" with the territory when you're playing a John Blow game. At least Witness is like, not awful, contrast Braid which I still don't understand what anyone sees anything in.
Braid is one of maybe 3 or 4 video games I actually cannot stand, and the only one among those that isn't actually offensive in some way.
It's just so utterly devoid of any kind of charm to me at all. I found the puzzles alternately frustrating or boring, the graphics are kinda fugly, I don't even remember the music, and the story is infamous for a reason.
Like if we're talking good puzzle games made by unpleasant people, Fez kills it in every regard. IMO it even compares unfavorably to a lot of the forgotten puzzle platformers of the mid-2000s Newgrounds scene.
I am evidently in an extreme minority here since everyone else I've ever spoken to that's played it loves the thing to death, but I have never understood why and I don't think I ever will.
I remembered the music. And I thought the puzzles were kinda interesting, though me being me I didn't have the patience to figure out all of them.
I think the game is meh.
Also you're not alone in disliking the game; I've heard it semi-frequently used as an example of a "pretentious" game or at least one whose story lacks a point. I dunno if it does since I haven't completed it.
Let's just say a twist happens during the very last level that casts all the pretentious narration text, presumably written by the player character, into something of a doubtful light. And that he's so fucked up in the head that the time travel business is probably his own skewed perceptions while he waxes poetic about being a much better person than he really is.
Also some allegory about the atomic bomb? Maybe? I dunno. Once it became clear Tim was an exceedingly disturbed person, I'm not sure the details really matter.
I don't really mind that as long as it doesn't actively detract from the gameplay. Obviously if the story is one of the main draws like a JRPG or something, it shouldn't be so orthogonal. But it was unintrusive enough that you could outright ignore it and just fuck around with time for shiggles.
...Fez's narrative was also completely orthogonal to its gameplay. The only time it even became necessary to decode the language was postgame, and most of the dialogue in said language was just flavor text.
Those tend to be the ones that either use the mechanic to some end (I am not sure I'd ever argue that Blinx is actually a "good" video game, but it sure is fun) or are utterly complicated and are more puzzle games than anything.
I'm trying to remember what that one is called, it's still in development and has been referred to as a "nonlinear platformer"
...Fez's narrative was also completely orthogonal to its gameplay. The only time it even became necessary to decode the language was postgame, and most of the dialogue in said language was just flavor text.
I dunno, I felt it worked with the mechanics pretty well in that they at least sort of attempted to instill the same atmosphere.
Mind you I'm coming off as a huge Fez fan I'm sure, when I'm really not. That game is way over my head.
Antichamber proved a lot of things and was just really good in general but I felt it went underrated because people expected it to be some sort of paradigm shift and instead it was just a really good puzzle game.
I expect The Witness would've been received similarly actually were it not for John Blow's indie celebrity status.
Those tend to be the ones that either use the mechanic to some end (I am not sure I'd ever argue that Blinx is actually a "good" video game, but it sure is fun) or are utterly complicated and are more puzzle games than anything.
I'm trying to remember what that one is called, it's still in development and has been referred to as a "nonlinear platformer"
Of course there are good time platformers. There are good platformers that are basically super mario bros. There are good games with dual world mechanics and bog standard racing mechanics and sandbox formats.
If you're diving into a genre that's already overstuffed like crazy, you have a responsibility to make yourself stand out from the crowd. That means you have to either do the central thing really, really well (i.e. Dungeoncrawl Stone Soup for Roguelikes, Half-Life for shooters, Gunpoint, etc.) or you have to have something else that sets you apart from the crowd (Undertale having metastory, Shadow of Mordor being Batman, but with fantasy elements, etc.)
If you're diving into a genre that's already overstuffed like crazy, you have a responsibility to make yourself stand out from the crowd. That means you have to either do the central thing really, really well (i.e. Dungeoncrawl Stone Soup for Roguelikes, Half-Life for shooters, Gunpoint, etc.) or you have to have something else that sets you apart from the crowd (Undertale having metastory, Shadow of Mordor being Batman, but with fantasy elements, etc.)
Braid fails on both points, imo
I don't like the notion that a creator has a "responsibility" to do anything in particular.
If you're saying that making one's work stand out is highly advisable for commercial success, I certainly agree.
But a work should not be considered any lesser just because it's "generic". This is where I say things shouldn't be compared to each other like that. Because, y'know, if all those other works didn't exist, but this work stayed the same, would it have the same merits?
A work's merits should not depend on the existence or non-existence of other works. A work's merits should be the same regardless of time period or context of the creative field. (With some exceptions such as works of parody that inherently depend on other works.)
I think you kind of take "pretentious" with the territory when you're playing a John Blow game. At least Witness is like, not awful, contrast Braid which I still don't understand what anyone sees anything in.
I still remember having high hopes for Paranautical Activity which was sort of like that (only game I ever won a copy of, incidentally) but it was kinda bland.
then Mike Maulbeck threatened to kill Gabe Newell on twitter and well yeah.
I still remember having high hopes for Paranautical Activity which was sort of like that (only game I ever won a copy of, incidentally) but it was kinda bland.
then Mike Maulbeck threatened to kill Gabe Newell on twitter and well yeah.
It's back on Steam actually. Been back since a little while ago.
Fine. If the developer doesn't have the responsibility, then the judging public has it.
And yes, we can compare works to each other like that! And we should! Videogames are a medium that relies on innovation and mechanics more so than any other. So what comes first and what it effects matters.
hell, all media depends on what is around it. no book or movie or song is created without drawing on other sources. That's why outsider art is considered to be so rare and unusual.
Fine. If the developer doesn't have the responsibility, then the judging public has it.
And yes, we can compare works to each other like that! And we should! Videogames are a medium that relies on innovation and mechanics more so than any other. So what comes first and what it effects matters.
hell, all media depends on what is around it. no book or movie or song is created without drawing on other sources. That's why outsider art is considered to be so rare and unusual.
What comes before and what comes after may matter from a scholarly/historical sense, but I don't agree with judging a work based on its context.
Perhaps you play for innovation -- which could arguably be said to be just another word for novelty value -- but I don't. A game with smooth and intuitive gameplay that uses those mechanics to weave a convincing narrative experience is the same work whether it was created in 1995 or 2015, and I'd expect to get the same enjoyment out of it regardless of what year it was created in. If a bunch of similar works were created in 2005-2015, and thus this game is not "innovative", that should not penalize it, because I'm going to get the same enjoyment out of it.
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Plus especially with light/dark systems it frequently leads to unfortunate situations, like in Fable where taking a quest to lead a man to his execution is treated as a good action, or in KOTOR where the player can manipulate people with the force and come out morally unscathed, or how Oblivion's fame/infamy system judges the player more negatively for the Thieves' Guild quest line than the Dark Brotherhood (plus it more or less equates fame with goodness and infamy with evil)
Mystik Belle is 25% off during this Lunar New Year sale!
Far as I know it runs just fine on even a low-spec machine.
There are a zillion fanmade levels, of course, although I've played only a handful of them.
I can't really say much more since puzzle platformers are not really that much of my thing, and I got only part-way through Braid.
I think the game is meh.
Also you're not alone in disliking the game; I've heard it semi-frequently used as an example of a "pretentious" game or at least one whose story lacks a point. I dunno if it does since I haven't completed it.
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
If you're saying that making one's work stand out is highly advisable for commercial success, I certainly agree.
But a work should not be considered any lesser just because it's "generic". This is where I say things shouldn't be compared to each other like that. Because, y'know, if all those other works didn't exist, but this work stayed the same, would it have the same merits?
A work's merits should not depend on the existence or non-existence of other works. A work's merits should be the same regardless of time period or context of the creative field. (With some exceptions such as works of parody that inherently depend on other works.)
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Perhaps you play for innovation -- which could arguably be said to be just another word for novelty value -- but I don't. A game with smooth and intuitive gameplay that uses those mechanics to weave a convincing narrative experience is the same work whether it was created in 1995 or 2015, and I'd expect to get the same enjoyment out of it regardless of what year it was created in. If a bunch of similar works were created in 2005-2015, and thus this game is not "innovative", that should not penalize it, because I'm going to get the same enjoyment out of it.
Even if you're not judging mechanics, you're judging quality, playability, accessibility.
The reason you have standards at all is because you are judging something in distinction of others.