Games Industry Things We Should Leave Behind in '07

MTV's Multiplayer blog has a list of nine videogame concepts we should be 'leaving behind', left to rot in the now-passed year of 2007. From the countdown clocks to Halo 3, their snarky list leaves no stone unturned: "The Phrase 'Next-Gen' - Ladies and gentlemen, 'next-gen' is now. Everyone from PR firms to development studios are still using this phrase. Please, I beg of you, stop using "next-gen" until the PS4, Xbox 4000, and the Nintendo Super Wii are slated for release. Those consoles will officially be 'next-gen.' The PS3, Wii, and 360 are the current generation of games. Now is the time to accept it."

Can we leave "Top # $THINGS" lists?

[fotbr]

Please?

How about poor supply chain management?

[compumike]

Nintendo couldn't keep up with demand for the Wii... and it was like that for more than 9 months! Take a look at this article from Wired [wired.com], but still there are few answers as to why it was so bad for so long. I'd like to vote for better supply chain management in 2008.

--
Educational microcontroller kits for the digital generation. [nerdkits.com]

Top Two List of Things to Leave Behind.

[Chyeld]

Top two on my list: MTV (and SpikeTV, and VH1, and every other "entertainment only" network), and the idea that they have intelligible to say about the gaming industry.

Re:The Much Needed 2007 Gaming Trash Heap

[Sciros]

You forgot to put "kidnaps babies" and "slashes your tires while you sleep" under the bullshit you listed for Xbox 360.

That's asinine

[hudsonhawk]

If you'd take your fanboy goggles off for even a minute you'd see that all 3 consoles bring something new to the table. Massive disc storage, downloadable games / content, note-perfect online capabilities, achievements, motion sensing controls, wireless everything, user chosen music, and hardware so advanced that it enables gameplay in ways that were previously limited by technology (i.e. massive streaming worlds, online coop throughout the entire game, complex physics).

Being pedantic about next-gen versus current-gen is indeed ridiculous. Assigning the title arbitrarily is even worse.

Misogyny

[crosson]

I think one of the major barriers to the video-game industries quest for mass media acceptance is the stuck-in-the-1980s tendency to portray women as sexual objects with boys-club-only lack of shame.

Things I would love to see gone...

[Hamster Lover]

Recent game developments I would love to see dismissed forever:

• Non-interactive, long, drawn out, cinematic cut scenes. Just let me play the fucking game.
• Downloadable content that isn't downloaded but only unlocked on the game disc.
• Unrealistic release schedules.
• Timed exclusives.
• Rabid fanboi 360 versus PS3 frame by frame game comparisons. I love great games on any system.
• Shitty, utterly tacked-on Wii games.
• The yearly $60 sports games that feature incremental improvements and roster changes. We should be able to download roster changes by now; keep major changes to the game engine to a release every couple of years.

Arg, no

[Rix]

Please stop putting cheap ass wifi chips (which only support WEP) in consumer electronics. I really shouldn't have to leave my network open to all comers to use your shit.

Re:The 9 things

[Anonymous Coward]

Japan-Only Releases. (If the game is done, why not also release it in the US? Maybe it will do well, maybe not. Give it a try.)

1. Region Issues

The US is - uh, a bit puritan. Any and all references to sex must be excised, since what's a kid's game in everywhere that's not the US becomes porno in the US.

Then there's the whole "not English" thing, where the game must be translated into elementary-level English to allow the majority of US readers to understand what's going on.

2. It Costs A Lot More Than You Think

Placing boxes in stores costs a lot. Producing the box and doing marketing (even if it is only to the store) is required if you plan on having the boxes in stores.

Online-only releases can help with this, though, so hopefully we'll see more of that.

What you're really asking is for consoles to get over region-coding, and I'm all for that. But don't expect to see weird and quirky games in stores, it's just not cost-effective.

Why not 7-11?

[log1385]

I don't see what's wrong with buying video games at 7-11. It's just a vendor providing merchandise in a new context.

Re:Next-gen

[Cornflake917]

PS3 and XBox 360 do "add something new to the board." They add some really spectacular graphics for one thing. Now don't get me wrong. I'm not saying better graphics is revolutionary or ground breaking but it does add something do the previous generation of consoles. The increased processing power also adds the ability to create larger worlds, more interesting AI, and more accurate physics. I can't speak for PS3's online capabilities, but the way XBox live is integrated with the 360 is actually pretty damn cool and definately has a "next-gen" feeling to it. Example: I can be playing Eternal Sonata (single player) on my 360 and I can see if my friend from Houston starts playing Halo3 with my other friend in NY. I didn't have to do anything besides signing in to my xbl account. Being able to download High-Def TV shows and movies to watch on the XBox 360 is a new and sweet thing too. I don't recall having these capabilities with any previous-gen systems.

While I think the Wii is probably great fun for everyone, what has it added that the PS3, 360 haven't? A new controller scheme (that's not actually that new)?

Don't be an ass. All the new consoles add something new to the table that previous iterations didn't. If you one like one console over the other, good for you, that doesn't mean that the others "don't add anything to the table."

Game Delays are some times better then pushed out.

[Joe The Dragon]

Game Delays are some times better then pushed out carp that is not ready and feels like it is still in Beta.

If it means pushing people to work 80+ hours a week that just leads to buggy code then delay it so the game works and let QA / beta have time and alot of differnt systems to test on.

From the Wishful-Thinking department

[FlyByPC]

Things in the gaming world I'd like to see a lot less of in 2008:

• If-it-moves-shoot-it games. Portal was really cool. How about more innovative games like that?
• Emphasis on online games. (Aren't geeks supposed to be antisocial?)
• Handwriting-based mind games (this means you, Brain Age!)
• Sports games.
• Internet-required-to-play or disc-required-to-play security. Including Steam -- although the ability to download a game across the 'Net is very cool. What, are you trying to make us download a cracked copy??
• Console-only games. I'd bet PCs are more popular than any one console...

Re:Why not 7-11?

[cowscows]

Just another gamer nerd trying to pretend that his ultra cool and elitist hobby hasn't become a mainstream activity for bazillions of ordinary people.

Truly it's the most brain dead list in years

[Moraelin]

Ya know, I'm already fairly tired of "Top X Worst Y" types of list, that seem to serve the only purpose of showing that the author can talk smack. Generally. But this one is the most brain-dead and clueless I've seen in years. And yes, I did RTFA, but I'll use you summary just because I'm too lazy to write my own.

1. The Phrase "Next-Gen". (It's not "next gen" until the PS4.)

This is the only one which actually has a point, so I thought I'd give it a nod before moving on to the real offenders. Though even here, good luck getting marketers to quit using meaningless buzzwords.

2. "Halo 3". (Similar to the above, Halo is done, the fight is finished, no need to refer to the version anymore.)

Actually, IMHO your summary here is slightly inexact. What he demands is that they stop hyping and advertising Halo 3, and start hyping again when they release Halo 4. He has nothing against the version number, and his expecting a Halo 4 kinda doesn't imply that he sees the fight as finished. He's just tired of hearing about Halo 3.

Well, sadly

A) that's just capitalism in action. If MS thinks they can still sell Halo 3, how's that different from still advertising last year's model of car, or last year's CD of some band?

B) that advertising pays for some other things he's getting cheaper or for free. E.g., since the site name seems to imply having something to do with MTV, I'd like to see how MTV would survive without massive advertising. All those music videos are, effectively, advertising for whichever band the recording companies manufactured this year.

3. Bad Virtual Console Releases. (Referring to Nintendo.)

WTF? It's not like it even costs much to release a ROM for an emulator. But more importantly, what's _his_ problem there? It's not like anyone forces him to play or buy those anyway. Plus, being that they're ancient games, he should be able to find tons of reviews and whatnot.

Plus, here's the fun part: not everyone has the same tastes. What's crap for him and he doesn't want re-released, could be someone else's nostalgia moment. Even something like "Donkey Kong Jr. Math," well, why not? Some mom or dad might think that that's useful for their 6 year old.

4. Game Delays. (I'm with him in hating delays, but good luck on that one.)

Now this is truly brain dead. Those delays don't happen as some premeditated marketing ploy, they happen because people are bad at guessing the future. The fact is, even if you could know exactly how much code you'll need to write (you don't), and exactly how long it would take to _write_ it, you can't guess what bugs you'll have to fix. Therefore, nor how much time you'll spend fixing those.

Then there are the inevitable design changes. Some things it's easier to just see how it looks in the game, before you decide how you'll do it. Some things sound good in theory, but you'll find out that they suck when you sic the playtesters on it. Etc.

Sure, there are ways to make things more maintainable and reduce the surprises, but even that isn't 100% bullet proof. And good luck with getting the game industry to follow best practices anyway. Especially when:

A) you have the publisher telling you that it _has_ to be ready within X months and Y dollars, you just don't have the time or budget for UML diagrams and funky frameworks, and

B) you have to push the edge in terms of graphics and whatnot (because screenshots sell), but still have a finite budget of CPU cycles and GPU gigatexels/second, and you know everyone will moan if the frame rate is even 1 less FPS than in another similar game. So, you know, you end up doing evil hacks just to meet those constraints.

Seriously, short of hideously overestimating (which the publisher will reject from the start) or being able to see in the future, it just won't happen.

5. Countdown Clocks. (I guess I never notice

Re:Get rid of the PS2?

[himurabattousai]

Agreed. It's been said before, and probably will be said again, but the PS2 did well because it played all those PSX games. That capability gave it an instant, humongous, game library. The same is true with Wii and GameCube, which is part of why Wii is selling so well. Since PS3 really has no backwards compatibility, I won't even consider purchasing it.

Some of the latest stuff for PS2 is quite impressive--not because of of the raw power of the system, but because developers got so good at wringing every last bit of performance out of the platform. Okami as we know it would have never been written for PS3, but the limitations of the PS2 hardware forced Capcom/Clover to do something different, and I, for one, am glad they chose to be different. A PS3-centric version probably wouldn't have been nearly as distinctive.

Horsepower leads to laziness, not just with games, but with software in general. Any time that industry experts proclaim that "it is time to move on" like the author of this article suggests, I get a bit queasy. A jump in raw computing ability though it may be, it's also usually a setback in game playability and quality. "It's time to move on" to me says "It's too hard to work within these old constraints."

Where are big monitors for 4 players on one PC?

[tepples]

[I'd like to see a lot less of] Emphasis on online games [and] Console-only games.

On a PC, how do you do multiplayer without an Internet connection and without requiring the host of a party to buy multiple PCs? If you want to plug four gamepads into a machine to play a Bomberman or Smash Bros. style game, you need a monitor that's big enough to seat four people around, and in my experience, that means 25 inches diagonal or larger. But most PC owners, even owners of a PC whose video card has a TV output, do not connect their PCs to a television. This is why almost any party-style game from a publisher that has a license on one of the consoles won't see a Windows or Mac release.

Battery life; streaming vs. installing

[tepples]

Yeah, requiring the disk has completely killed the portable and console markets, both of which require the player to insert the game disk/cartridge.

What kind of battery life do you get out of a PSP playing games from UMD? What kind of battery life do you get out of a notebook computer playing games from an optical disc vs. playing games from the hard disk?

That's like complaining about be required to insert the DVD to watch videos.

Not it's not. DVDs stream completely from the optical disc. Games for the Windows OS, on the other hand, often need to be installed, and they still need the optical disc.

Retrospective on the Super Nintendo

[Wilson_6500]

Back in the day, you didn't feel too stupid saying "Super Nintendo" or "Super NES" or "ess-ness" because, well, you were probably about 10 and everyone else (all the kids) had to say it in some silly-sounding way, too. You'd have the occasional eye-rolling when someone said their shibboleth differently (for instance, I grew up around Super NES kids, and the ess-ness and--god forbid!--ess-en-ee-ess kids were laughed at), but that was how things went. "Super Nintendo" was long and dorky-sounding, and so were most of the alternatives, but I'll be damned if people didn't stick by THIER saying as the coolest of them all.

The Wii, though, can't really be abbreviated. There's little ambiguity about it being just "Wii", so everyone who wants to go buy one will probably be calling it the "Super Wii" no matter how silly they think it sounds. There's probably something to be said about the unambiguous, unifying name of the Wii standing in stark contrast to the pride-wars waged over the Super NES, and about how it reflects the gregarious character of the console.

Ah, of course, there's always the age-old "mom exception": people out of the loop did and probably will forever call the newest Nintendo console "that new Nintendo."

It's pronounced:

[Anonymous Coward]

Sness.

Re:How about poor supply chain management?

[servognome]

The only lost sales are those people who want one immediately and will not for whatever reason eventually buy one when it becomes finally available for them.

Which can be a large number given the time period. Once the Christmas season was over, the money for the Wii was likely spent on other gifts and the immediate demand to satisfy the kids is over.

Everything else is not lost revenue, just deferred.

Deferred revenue has a cost, the same amount of money you get later is not worth as much as money you get now

I would be so bold to say that the buzz which I (incorrectly or otherwise) attribute in large part to perceived "exclusivity" of the device easily offsets those actually lost sales by generating revenue in new markets previously untouched by console gaming.

From my limited experience word of mouth is a huge driver for sales of the Wii. For many non tech-savy people it's just another new video game console, until they try it themselves. So limiting the supply and chances would in fact negatively impact sales.

Re:It's pronounced:

[Anonymous Coward]

snez

Re:Agreed

[king-manic]

Damn near every female game character is some archetypal short, buxom, hyper-sexualized character to fulfill the designer, artist and players sexual fantasies. Why isn't Alyx Vance a little husky? Why is Lara Croft a sex bomb with huge breasts when her figures and career tells me should would probably be closer to flat chested and sinewy.

Conversely why isn't kratos a bit tubby with glasses? How come Solid snake isn't 5'0? Why isn't Link obese? It's because they're selling fantasy. Lara croft i agree is just lame. But Alyx Vance at least looks like a girl i might meet outside of a strip club. I think Alyx vance highlights how far they've come from the Tomb raider days. Frankly I'd have some more problem buying into a game if we have a 5'0 350 lb man or woman hoofing it across a broken cityscape at full sprint for a 15 min session.

Re:Truly it's the most brain dead list in years

[Moonpie Madness]

I don't get it. Scrap PS2 for PS3 sales?

The PS3 would do better with the PS2 gone, but the PS2 makes more money than the PS3 would even if the PS2 were gone. Sony is diversifying to maximize profits.

PS2 owners are late adopters, and a very low percentage of them have moved to the 360, so though Sony has not done a very good job so far with PS3, their market position is much better than internet forums seem to realize.

They sold twice as many consoles worldwide as Microsoft last month. Only because they are diversified.

And also, I would never buy another Sony console if they did as MS did and completely stopped supporting my system before it was the right time. XBOX 1.0 users got screwed. 360 owners are probably going to get screwed as well. PS3 owners have confidence that, even if the PS3 doesn't dominate, Sony will support them for ten years. Abandoning the PS2 now would ruin a major distinction Sony enjoys. For what? The PS2 owners who aren't able to get a wii?

Sounds stupid. Sony makes royalties from every PS2 console out there that buys software. They don't have to subsidize the box. It's free money at this point. This is what all the loss leader stuff was building up for. This is what MS is dreaming will happen to them. people say Nintendo is the only console maker that sells for profit, but Sony does it too with PS2.

Re:Can we leave "Top # $THINGS" lists?

[mqduck]

You know, if you think my opinion that articles like this are worthwhile because they spark conversation is wrong, you could just ignore me - or, better yet, the whole article - instead of modding me "overrated". For that matter, why are you even reading the discussion if you don't think it's worthwhile?

I really wish people who don't like certain parts of Slashdot would stop showing up at those parts and bitching instead of just staying away and letting the rest of us enjoy ourselves.