In the Shadow of Greatness 53
1up.com has a piece on the making of Shadow of the Colossus, the sequel to Ico (arguably one of the first innovative titles for the PS2). From the article: "In the works for nearly four years now, Shadow of the Colossus is clearly the result of different thinking. While Western development teams try to one-up each other in terms of how big their guns are, how interactive their environments can be, how urban their attitude is, and how much their X-treme soundtracks rock, Ueda's studio is cutting its game from an entirely different cloth. One look at Shadow and you'll realize that this game carries the DNA of Ico, from its sun-soaked environments to its minimal cast of characters to its austere "level" design. But while the majority of Ico's discovery and puzzle-solving elements were confined within the walls of a finite space (in this instance, a castle), Shadow of the Colossus, shall we say, branches out."
Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:1, Insightful)
While Western development teams try to one-up each other in terms of how big their guns are, how interactive their environments can be, how urban their attitude is, and how much their X-treme soundtracks rock, Ueda's studio is cutting its game from an entirely different cloth.
Um, first of all, there are many western companies making interesting and innovative games. Secondly, there are also Japanese companies that are churning out crap(as wel
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:2, Insightful)
Who?
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:2, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:2)
Introversion (Darwinia)
Maxis (Spore, despite the best efforts of EA)
Quantic Dream (Fahrenheit)
Funcom (Dreamfall)
Rockstar North (Bully)
Neversoft (Gun)
Innovative games by western developers are out there, as are plenty of unoriginal games by Japanese developers. Neither nationality has an advantage. Perhaps the only reason some people adore Japanese games is because a great deal of the crap (like dating games, text adventure
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:1)
Maxis (Spore, despite the best efforts of EA) - not out
Quantic Dream (Fahrenheit)
Funcom (Dreamfall) - not out
Rockstar North (Bully) - not out
Neversoft (Gun) - not out
your example of innovated western design is 2 games and then 4 that the general public has not playen? Developers can say a lot about how innovative something is but in actual gameplay and execution it might be a baby step and hardly of merit.
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:1)
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:1)
I actually have a hard time coming up with anything innovative. Right now at 2am all I can think of is parappa the rapper(american I believe) and katamari damacy(japan)
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:1)
It's not clear from your punctuation whether that comma is supposed to be marking a subordinate clause or separating items in a list. If the former, then you reveal a level of ignorance on a par with describing Grand Theft Auto as an FPS. If the latter, then you merely fall into one of two common traps - asserting that anything you don't like is crap, or assuming that something you h
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:1)
I dislike the vast majority of dating sims because they tend to boil down to trial-and-error. You select a conversation option and see the character's reaction. Repeat until you find the appropriate ones to achieve your goal. I realize this description can be applied to adven
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:2)
Step 2: Go to Akihabara (call it "Akiba" if you want to be one of the cool kids)
Step 3: Go to the first game store you see
Step 4: Note the number of amazing, innovative titles (note: these are the same titles that are localized into English)
Step 5: Look at how many titles in the store are unamazing, derivitive, poorly programmed crap. Compare this to the number of awesome, innovative games.
Step 6: Return to the US
Step 7: Laugh at fanboys who think Japanese games are intrinsicly bet
Ubisoft, Valve, Lionhead, Rockstar (Score:2)
And if you didn't play those games, then you've no right
Re:Ubisoft, Valve, Lionhead, Rockstar (Score:2)
Half Life 2 I have refused to purchase due to steam, so I can't speak to that. (My computer is used for both gaming and my daily development: anything that looks and smells like spyware can bugger off.)
Rockstar has one meme: push the limits of what is socially acceptable. I will grant the GTA series is good, but they haven't moved *since* that idea.
And what is the jingoism/STFU comment all about? Did I deserve that swip
Re:Ubisoft, Valve, Lionhead, Rockstar (Score:1)
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:2)
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:1)
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:1)
Re:Someone here is a Japanophile (Score:1)
Some good PS2 games:
Rez
R-Type Final
Gradius V
Silpheed
Neo Contra
Front Mission 4
Gungrave: Overdose
Zone of the Enders: The Second Runner
Someone THERE is a Japanophile (Score:1)
Japanese Developer likes American Games (Score:1)
Most anticipated game this fall by me (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Most anticipated game this fall by me (Score:1)
Why not make it a first-person perspective! And replace his sword with a gun! And replace the plot and gameplay with graphics and thousands of ignorant bastards from all over the Internet who call you a "n00b"!
Honestly, I am anticipating this game very much, and it's good to see people trying to make games enjoyable again, and not a matter of "my e-wang is bigger than yours" or "j00 not hardcore RPG players lol CS r00lz rofl!!!1!"2111"
Very nicely written article (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:They may be great games... (Score:1)
Re:They may be great games... (Score:1)
Buy a PS2 if you want to play it so badly.
Broaden your gaming horizons beyond PC (Score:1, Insightful)
For the majority of one-PC people whose machine sits nearby and is connected to an "OK" PC sound system, a "good" gaming experience is actually pretty poor (I'm talking about the A/V quality not the gameplay), although most people happily live with it, until they experience better. Disks and PC fans are intrusive, even when l
NOT A SEQUEL (Score:4, Informative)
How is Ico Innovative? (Score:3, Insightful)
The only innovation I can think of is the invented gibberish language spoken by the characters. But that wasn't really part of the gameplay and the effect of this invented language is no different in effect than using an actual language not spoken by the game player. Other games might have used invented language too. I know FF X did. Ico's contribution to gaming - beyond fun - was in its total, unmatched, artistic beauty. The graphics were solid, but the use of composition, color, tonal depth, contrast, scale, lighting, atmospherics, and such were unique within in-game play.
-- and I'll say Rez was the first innovative game for the Playstation.
Re:How is Ico Innovative? (Score:3, Insightful)
Rob
Re:How is Ico Innovative? (Score:2)
Comparing it to Lemmings is a bit of a stretch, but yes, it has been done before, namely in PrinceOfPersia and AnotherWorld/OutOfThisWorld, Ico just put a pretty similar gameplay into 3D. So Ico didn't actually invent anything totally new, but on the other side I have a very hard time finding a game beside AnotherWorld/OutofThisWorld that gets close to Ico, the complete lack of HUD, a story told without the use normal language, the extremly dense athmosphere, etc. It has been
Re:How is Ico Innovative? (Score:1)
Lemmings is a mouse-based game. The C-64 was a pre-Macintosh computer, meaning it had no mouse.
C-64: 1982
Lemmings: 1991