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Classic Games (Games)

The Fundamentals of Gaming 81

Posted by Zonk from the vampire-killer dept.
IGN has two great features up this week, looking back at two amazing gaming franchises. Their piece on the evolution of Final Fantasy takes in the changes and twists the iconic JRPG series has had over the years, while Castlevania: The Retrospective looks back on the last 20 years of vampire-hunting goodness. From the Castlevania piece: "Though Castlevania wasn't one of the original 18 launch titles for the NES, it was part of the unofficial second wave of games, and an integral part of the Nintendo Entertainment System's premiere years. From that point on, each Castlevania title (though still primarily a stand-alone adventure) was subsequently added into the overarching timeline, and while not every piece of the puzzle clicks from game to game, it remains to be one of the most prominent classic franchises still recognized today for its outstanding gameplay. "
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The Fundamentals of Gaming More

The Fundamentals of Gaming

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  • Castlevania was great..... (Score:4, Funny)

    by ganjadude ( 952775 ) on Monday January 22, 2007 @02:03AM (#17708080) Homepage
    but does anybody remember this

    A controversy ensued upon publication of the second issue of the magazine. Parents called in to complain to the magazine's office that the cover, featuring Castlevania II: Simon's Quest with an image of Simon holding the severed head of Dracula, frightened their children and had resulted in many of them having nightmares. For a long time following, Nintendo Power steered clear of cover artwork that features such graphic imagery and instead now place it inside the magazine. This trend may be ending, however, as on the milestone issue No. 200, a picture of a gruesome zombie from Resident Evil: Deadly Silence was shown on the cover.wiki

    That won it worst cover of nintendo power ever.
    • I remember being completely disturbed and frighted by that cover, as it was (if I remember correctly) a human actor holding a model of a sever head, which was dripping blood.

      Oddly enough, it made me really want to play the game.
      And made me really disappointed when I couldn't hold Dracula's head aloft at the end.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by ctstone ( 699147 )
      Some cover scans of Nintendo Power:

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Abattoir ( 16282 )
      And I actually still have that copy of Nintendo Power in my basement... Wonder what I can get for it on eBay...

  • any castlevania retrospective... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    ...that fails to mention its origin on the MSX (as vampire killer) is not worth reading.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Jarnis ( 266190 )
      Amen. Both Castlevania (aka Vampire Killer) and Metal Gear series started on MSX2 way back... before NES was even launched.

      NES versions of those first titles were (poorly done) ports, but apparently they sold a truckload because the fundamentals of gameplay were good enough even if the graphics and content was gutted due to NES limitations.

      • Re:any castlevania retrospective... (Score:5, Informative)

        by Wildfire Darkstar ( 208356 ) on Monday January 22, 2007 @04:54AM (#17708674)
        That's not true. The original Castlevania was released for the Famicom Disk System (FDS), the Japan-only floppy disk add-on for the NES, in September 1986. The MSX2 version was released one month later. While the MSX version was released in Europe significantly before the NES/FDS version, the latter was developed first.

        Konami had to port the FDS version to cartridge for the North American and European release, but it was for all intents and purposes a direct port: the only benefit the FDS had over the normal NES deck was an improved sound chip, and I'm not even sure that the original Castlevania made use of it. There were a lot of FDS-to-NES ports made in order to facilitate international release: Metroid, Doki Doki Panic (a.k.a. Super Mario Bros. 2), Kid Icarus, and The Legend of Zelda are probably the most notable. All were subsequently rereleased in Japan as cartridges, although often not for many years (Castlevania wasn't released as a cartridge in Japan until 1993 or so).

        There's more information at Wikipedia's Castlevania article [wikipedia.org].

      • It's not fair to say that the NES games Castlevania and Metal Gear were poorly done ports of their MSX2 counterparts, nor to say that they were "ports" at all. While some of the gameplay basics were the same, the content was different enough for the titles to count as separate games.

        Nor was the NES hardware particularly weak in comparison to the MSX2's; the design of Nintendo's graphics chip meant that color palettes were more limited, but that was made up for by other features--like smooth horizontal scr

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Jarnis ( 266190 )
          Except that in my books, original Vampire Killer vas *not* a side scroller.

          Anyway, I had assumed MSX2 versions were released prior to NES versions. It now appears that they were developed more or less in paraller, but by different development teams - hence, the games were not quite the same. MSX2 versions, however, are in my opinion superior versions, and it's a shame most gamers think these games originate from NES alone.

          Then again, most current kids think Metal Gear series started on the PS1 with Metal Ge

  • Bizzaro world (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22, 2007 @02:04AM (#17708088)
    Since when did Castlevania become the fundamentals of gaming? I know it is a good game and the sequels have been nice. But fundamental? Not really. Not any more than Ninja Gaiden or Metroid or Zelda or Super Mario or Kid Icarius. And that's just the Nintendo Universe. Gaming goes far beyond that (no matter how much I like the Wii and think it is the current best offering on the market).

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Overly Critical Guy ( 663429 )
      Are you actually trying to argue that games like Metroid, Zelda, and Super Mario aren't fundamental to gaming? God, Super Mario Bros. alone set so many precedents still followed today...I'm just going to pretend you didn't post that.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by miro f ( 944325 )
        that's what I first thought reading the comment. but after re-reading I realised that it clearly states that castlevania was definitely not more fundamental to gaming than mario, zelda, metroid, etc.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by KDR_11k ( 778916 )
          In that case it's funny he mentions Ninja Gaiden which is really just a Castlevania ripoff with ninjas.
          • Ninja Gaiden was probably the first console game (perhaps the first game, period) to attempt to tell a cohesive story with cinema-style cutscenes in between states.

            Even if it wasn't THE first, its method of doing so was clearly the template for pretty much every game to do so up through today.

            Hence, its importance.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Sciros ( 986030 )
            Well, since then Hayabusa has moved on to bigger and better things (no Castlevania IMO has approached Ninja Gaiden for Xbox in awesomeness... although SotN and Dawn of Sorrow are amazing games). Meanwhile Castlevania suffered such a failure in its move to 3D that it's still old-school 2D monster bashing. I still love it and get every Castlevania game that's released, but I can't even compare them to NG anymore.

      • At least conservatives explain why they think you're wrong. Liberals spit and call you a Nazi.
        And there was me thinking that calling you a liberal was a conservative's way of spitting at you and calling you a nazi. Silly me!
        • Liberal means Nazi?
          • No, Liberal means nothing...conservatives means nothing...Nazis? They mean less than nothing...
            Do the math...

            "I have seen the enemy, and..."

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Sique ( 173459 )
            No, both mean, if used by one side that considers itself definitely "not Nazi" or "not Liberal", the same: I don't bother with your arguments, I just label you as not confirming with me and thus being a moron.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Sique ( 173459 )
              Just to elaborate a little: In most parts of the world a liberal is considered someone who likes libertas, the latin word for freedom. The Liberal Democrats of Japan are pretty different from anything a U.S. conservative would label 'liberal'. The austrian Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs (Liberal Party of Austria) even is considered pretty close to being a Nazi party by some. The more nice description is 'rightwing conservative'.

              For some reason liberal in most parts of the world means, according to th

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by bumptehjambox ( 886036 )
      It's all about Mega Man, the greatest series to ever hit the NES.
  • My replay [retrogames.com](You need Mame/windows/Rom, so basically its unwatchable for most people) I was able to take down the Count without dying, but his second form got me. I haven't got back to play after some nice Slashdotter told me to use holy water on the second form. I give Castlevania 1 some serious props for quality gaming. The funny thing is, as hard as it is to beat the game on one life, there's a second stage after you beat the first game where things get harder. I haven't beat the game on one life yet,

  • Dissent (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mstromb ( 869949 ) on Monday January 22, 2007 @02:05AM (#17708096)
    There seems to be some... dissent [selectbutton.net] about the quality and veracity of that article. I mean, parts of that article are horribly wrong. Should IGN hold themselves to some shred of a standard for quality? Or do they get a free pass because they write about video games?
    • The people who care certainly already know, and the people who don't know almost definitely don't care. Do we need even three paragraphs devoted to a retrospective on the menus of Final Fantasy or the whip mechanics in Castlevania? I could've written these article by reading GameFAQs for fifteen minutes.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by 56ker ( 566853 )
      I run a gaming website and have to declare a conflict of interest as IGN is an advertiser. However IGN.com gets about a million visitors a day, so what they write tends to be believed and get a larger circulation than most sites.
    • What parts are wrong? For instance, the poster in the thread seems to refute the claim that the whip-and-hold move is in Castlevania games to this day, the most recent being Portrait of Ruin. Particularly, the downward whip move. I have the game, and it's in there. What's the problem exactly?

  • Wow, they got it right (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Stormwatch ( 703920 ) <`moc.liamtoh' `ta' `oarigogirdor'> on Monday January 22, 2007 @02:21AM (#17708144) Homepage
    They acknowledge Castlevania: Bloodlines as the last TRUE Castlevania. I, for one, regard Symphony of the Night as the beginning of a different series that simply happens to have the same title. (the N64 games and the unfinished Dreamcast game, however, belong in the first series)
    • I agree that after Bloodlines, Everything Changed.

      However, in my view, that just means that SOTN was the first TRUE Castlevania game. The previous games were just attempts to get it right. They finally did.

      I've played the heck out of every Castlevania... but SOTN and after are the ones I'll go back to again, and again, and again.

  • The only game my dad ever played with me... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22, 2007 @02:28AM (#17708164)
    back in the day.

      He was so into Castlevania that he taped pieces of paper together, length-wise (because that's the way it scrolled) to map a significant portion of the game in pencil.

      Little did he know that I would grow up and whip naughty vampires for a living!
    • Little did he know that I would grow up and whip naughty vampires for a living!
      Wow, even Buffy posts on /. !

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Rei ( 128717 )
      Back in the day, I was so into FF2/FF4 that it was the first game I played in which I had to get a "perfect game" -- all of the items (all found on my own, since I didn't have net access), and maximum levels for everyone (I still remember that Rydia's level maxed out 93, unlike the higher levels of the rest of the party -- but at 93, her Nuke made her easily the strongest character). It wasn't until years later that I thought back about the game and realized that Rydia's name was a translation error. It's

  • Final Fantasy (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by 56ker ( 566853 )
    I first played Final Fantasy when it was up to version 7. Then it was a great game - although they'd already had 6 attempts at it. ;) I'm sure the later incarnations were even more polished. It was good in that it was a non-linear game (although some of the puzzles were so obscure you needed to read the walkthrough).

    As to Castlevania, I never had a NES so didn't get to play it - I hear it was a classic though.
    • I've played a good chunk of rpgs ranging from the dragon quest series to some of the more modern ones like mass effect. My all time favorite have been Final Fantasy 4 for the excellent story, Final Fantasy 12 for the great system (possibly the best system used in the series). Star Ocean for the PS2 was excellent but VERY long, and the Wild Arms series is also very cool.

      Of coarse, I am very retro and still play games like Breath of Fire 1 and 2. You couldn't pry my nes and snes from my cold dead fingers. Gam

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by simondm ( 901892 )
      Have you ever actually played FFVII? Whilst you are free to explore the world map (once you've opened it up that is) it is almost completely linear. There is the date you go on and a couple of other minor things you can change, and that is controlled only within the dialog options. There are a few minor subquests and sub-characters that changes nothing within the story. It is an extremely linear game with only 1 goal at any one time and only that will progress you to the next goal. It is still a great game

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Rei ( 128717 )
        Attention big, mean, hostile slashdotters hovering overhead in an obvious attack posture: My favorite "non-linear" plot-based game had to be Star Control II [sourceforge.net]. Since there was a pre-designed plot, it couldn't be truly nonlinear, but they left you with the illusion of non-linearity, with many dialog options, a huge world, many different ways you can advance the plot, and a flexible definition of "victory". That was a great game.

        But yes... FF* games generally are quite linear, except for the "optional" miniga

  • Until it gets "milked" (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Monday January 22, 2007 @02:34AM (#17708180)
    There have been other titles that were great. Starting with Zork and arching over Ultima to titles like Quake and the whole Mario franchise. Titles and games that sold just 'cause they had a certain name. It usually works until the developers start relying solely on the name and stop investing time to add new tricks, gadgets and twists to it.

    In every franchise, there comes a time when all that's added is new graphics and some eye candy while leaving the game essentially unchanged. And that's when the title becomes stale and starts to erode.

    And this puzzles me to no end. You have a title that you only have to ANNOUNCE to sell it. You don't even have to advertise. The game is already selling because people remember the other titles, and remember them fondly. Why do studios simply throw away great names just for a quick buck? Yes, you can sell that crappy game, but after that the name is destroyed, a name with a value that is usually by magnitudes greater than the meager reward you can reap.

    All for the allmighty quarter report.
    • There have been other titles that were great. Starting with Zork and arching over Ultima to titles like Quake and the whole Mario franchise. Titles and games that sold just 'cause they had a certain name. It usually works until the developers start relying solely on the name and stop investing time to add new tricks, gadgets and twists to it.

      In every franchise, there comes a time when all that's added is new graphics and some eye candy while leaving the game essentially unchanged. And that's when the title
      • Lament of Innnocence is it "innovative" or is it just trying to move Castlevania into the generic "3D Adventure" game that every franchise must go into according to certain companies (ahem... Sony). To me, there's a lot innovative about Portrait of Ruin mainly in the way it uses two characters at the same time. (This has been done before in other series, the first one I can remember is The Lost Vikings, but it's still innovative in a Castlevainia title.)

        One thing about me, is I'm always suspicious when

        • POR brought the whole dual character utility thing. Lament brought 3d and mind numbingly reptative combat. Neither really brought all that much that was new, they both brought somethign "new" to the series. I own all of them. I keep hoping for SOTN greatness and I almost get it in the GBA/DS titles but the "3d" ones have all been let downs.

          I agree, 2d has died prematurely. And I'm glad the GBA/DS keeps the 2d platformer alive. 3d has it's place buts sometimes it kills a good thing. Metriod on the DS is less
    • While some franchises were thrown away I'm sure, I think it's less a matter of 'hit that quarterly report', and more a matter of 'trying something new that didn't work out'.

      Final Fantasy had several iterations that were pretty crappy. Seriously... Magical Girl transformations in 10.5? 8 was also a no-fly for me, though I hear others liked it.

      Quake III was a multiplayer-only departure from the series... the single player was pretty crappy. Quake IV returned to the original series style, and improved it in ma

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Rei ( 128717 )
        I thought I was done with the series after 9. I loved 2/4. I loved 3/6. I loved 7. I adore Tactics and its convoluted plot. I thought the plot was reasonably good on 8, the world was pretty (by the standards of the time), the dialog was better than your typical FF fare, but the gameplay was pretty bad (too easy, and drawing was a pain). 9 hit a low for me: graphics no better than 8, god-awful dialog, poor plot, too easy, and in general like a cartoony little kids game. I put the series down.

        Until thi

  • *Video* gaming (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Kris_J ( 10111 )
    Can we please at least try to acknowledge there is gaming in the world other than video gaming?
    • What? Game & Watch aren't video games!?!

      • Re: (Score:1, Offtopic)

        by Turn-X Alphonse ( 789240 )
        Like the parent I've got to agree with this. This isn't the 80s any more, video games just doesn't sound right. COmputer games sounds better and less "lol I can play space invades with my VCR!!"

    • Can we please at least try to acknowledge there is gaming in the world other than video gaming?
      You must be new here!
      This is Slashdot. News for NERDS. The only games other than Video games are table-top ones.
      (Takes the karma hit :P)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Thraxen ( 455388 )
      Ummm... the article is on IGN, a VIDEO game centric site. So taken in context, the term "gaming" is understood to mean "video" gaming.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Kris_J ( 10111 )
        I'm not sure where you are, but this post is on Slashdot, a nerd site. I know the current trend is to basically duplicate the headline and first paragraph and call it a Slashdot article, but it would be nice if when the context changes the headline is revised.

  • Evolution of Final Fantasy? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by salle_from_sweden ( 896798 ) on Monday January 22, 2007 @03:46AM (#17708448)
    I'm just gonna complain a bit, but the Final Fantasy article doesn't delve into anything as deep as the evolution of Final Fantasy. That would have required them to atleast mention what changed over the course of the series. this is more a "what's final fantasy XII's heritige" sort of piece... and not really a good one at that.
    It's this sort articles that usualy makes me stay clear of IGN.
    The article isn't really clear as who it's aiming for, gamers who has played previous titles and knows what "the Sphere Grid system in Final Fantasy X" is or the gamer that is unfamiliar with the history of the series who needs to learn what a Chocobo - "a large, traditionally (but not necessarily) yellow, flightless, bipedal mode of transport" is.
  • The Final Fantasy article was just rubbish. It was not much more than a preview of FFXII for the Australian market with a few fairly vague puffs about how it sometimes had complex menus, character classes aren't clearly defined etc. Totally vague rubbish, and particularly disappointing to anyone who might consider themselves even a passing FF fan. There are better articles written by 13 year old bloggers.
    • Honestly, to me it read like an infomercial. I hope IGN was well compensated by Square-Enix for that piece.
  • Maybe I am a little too old, but Super Mario happened already *after* the fundamentals were defined, let alone Castelvania!
  • I remember reading the article and not being phased at all, this kind of thing is everywhere. It is beyond the point where I am only surprised when I can find articles of *good* quality about video games. A small portion of my faith in humanity was restored by reading these comments.

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Monday January 22, 2007 @04:44AM (#17708640)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Actually the funny thing is, that those articles usually start with Nintendo, while Nintendos influence is not denyable, nor is the importance of Castlevania, there are predecessors. In case of Castlevania, numerous sidescrolling games on the early homecomputers. In case of Zelda for instance games, like Ataris Raiders of the Lost ark on the VCS2600 or even more Rogue, or Temple of Asphai by Epyx (1982)

      The problem with most consolish articles is, that they have a narrow view of japanese consoles being th
  • I find it interesting that while it touches on Dracula X: Rondo of Blood, it largely fails to look at the Japanese existence of the rest of the series. The naming convention (Vampire Killer/Dracula vs. Castlevania) isn't really addressed, and the author seems largely ignorant of anything but the U.S. incarnations of the games.

    For instance, take Dracula X: Nocturne in the Moonlight, a.k.a. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. He talks about the comically bad voice acting... ...what he fails to note is that th

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Kupek ( 75469 )
      It's and English speaking site for English speaking readers. Is there something wrong with having a bias of covering the English version of a series?
  • At the time of its release, Castlevania looked and felt a lot like Ghosts and Goblins. (Jump, slash, occasionally throw, hit things and items pop out.)

    Final Fantasy was similar to games like Hylide and several games with "Dragon" in their name. (Wander around a big map, go into dungeon/town maps, fight turn based battles, etc.) I remember playing Final Fantasy on a Nintendo 8 for the first time after playing RPGs on my Apple II. At the time I thought gamers would never let RPG survive on consoles: I felt
    • At the time of its release, Castlevania looked and felt a lot like Ghosts and Goblins.

      Right, except Castlevania wasn't fucking impossible.
    • Yes, castlevania started as a ghost and ghoblins rehash in my opinion, I think both titles were by Konami? As for final fantasy, I do not get it until today why this series is so beloved by so many. It follows very conservative design principles which were in the pc side been thrown overboard as bad limiting designs at the time of Ultima 4 nor started they off being innovative at all, well at least newer games have the merits of having some of the best graphics at all. But the game design still sucks. What
  • In their article they say that Cid was in the Final Fantasy series since Final Fantasy 2. This is incorrect. He has actually been in every Final Fantasy. In Final Fantasy 1 he was the guy that used the TNT.
  • If you want a retrospective of Castlevania in your magazine, you're far better off just publishing a link to the Wikipedia article. This is crap. At least on Wikipedia, people who post opinions as "well known facts" get yelled at, and their articles marked up with "needs to be sourced" or just straight up removed.

    Really slow news day I reckon.

  • The piece on Final Fantasy was almost entirely fluff. There was hardly any mention of the early games in the series at all.

    Since deserting Nintendo and moving to the PlayStation, the Final Fantasy series has been largely a means of showing off the advanced rendering capabilities available on the hardware of the day. In earlier ages, we worried about how many angels might dance on the head of a pin. These days, we talk about how many individual hairs are rendered on head of the latest FF hero(ine)

    Two th

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by MemoryDragon ( 544441 )
      Nothing to flame here, except that I personally consider most console rpgs, badly designed and highly boring in their linearity. The sad thing is, that rpg gaming should have followed the ultima route to a bigger extent by tring to bring things into the openness of table top rpgin, american and european rpgs have successed in various degrees and some of them currently suffer from the automated generated content syndrome, which is equally bad as lock in. Japanese rpgs and final fantasy is the rule not the ex
    • I think that was the title that really made the whole series for me. It's not like I don't like the rest of them, but after SOTN I was just like "eeewwwww these are so blah compared to SOTN". I mean going back to using a whip just seemed so simple. I think if Konami chooses to try and resurrect the series it should be a sequel to SOTN. Alucard is way badder than any Belmont by far. Plus the soundtrack was killer. The paired the music so perfectly with the levels. That's just my nerdy two cents for what it's
      • Dawn of Sorrows for the DS is pratically a port of SOTN, right down to using the same sprites for many enemies and the like. And Soma plays more or less the same as Alucard.
  • I just wanted to say, bleh, that article could have used less box art and more screenshot.

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