sexta-feira, 14 de junho de 2013

Next Gen is here! Why Im not impressed?

In anticipation to E3 I decided to state my discontempt. Don’t get me wrong I do love videogames but I kinda lost hope to see it truthly evolving. Every time a new generation of gaming hardware comes out we keep thinking “where it will further grow? How will games evolve this time? what things will become bigger? better? what will be the new things to come?” And with every step I can’t help to feel a bit disappointed. Again we are at the very door to a new beginning. Next gen is camming again.
 
But I won’t talk about my expectations, because I simply don’t have much. I came to learn with past generations that the main difference in games from generation to generation is graphics. And I so don’t give a crap about graphics. And this time I’m not even seeing a big graphic leap. Instead of that what I would like to do is to point out what could have been some real improvement in my opinion. What should have been the steps taken in the game development entertainment.

First let’s start with the things that are holding back gameplay development.

1. No more QTE! (Quick Time Event)

QTEs are the dumbest thing ever! So they make a game, and there are some segments wich they couldn’t manage to develop a decent gameplay. Normally that would result in a cutscene. But instead of letting people enjoy the cutscene someone came up with the brilliant idea to obligate players to stay alert for RANDOM prompts to press a button! That is not gameplay! So you are not playing AND not enjoying a cutscene! So WTF are you doing? a Freaking QTE! That’s what it is. A limbo place full of shit.
If every time a monster jumps on you, you have to press RANDOM buttons to escape that’s just silly! But if every time a monster jumps on you you have to press the dodge button and the hit button, that’s a concept, that’s a gameplay, even if in those moments the camera shifts to a more cinematic view. And then you don’t have to prompt buttons on screen all the time, because I learned what needs to be done and it makes SENSE.

 

So yes games like God of War would be much more enjoyable without QTE. If every time you had to kill a certain monster you had to press just the same sequence and that it made sense. Like pressing the grab button to grab the enemy and twisting the analog to break a neck. Not having to wait the game says which button to press to grab the enemy (wich is stupid because you have a grab button but for this finisher move that’s not the button you use to grab you have to wait a RANDOM prompt!)and which way you have to twist it. Not to mention the QTEs on cutscenes. Just silly... they will never even begin to try to make an awesome gameplay sequence that looks like those cutscene moments, and they trick the weak minded into thinking they are playing it with a QTE? Just sad... that’s not gameplay! Just let me watch the AWESOME cutscene without having to worry about random SHIT! Or make the HOLE game AWESOMELY PLAYABLE!

     2.   Enough with the graphics enhancements!

Ok I get it, some games are beautiful to the eyes. But what good is all this polishment, all those poligon, all these textures, if the character doesn’t move fluidly? Or what good is a beautiful scene, if you can’t interact properly with the things in place? Or what good is a beautiful city, if it doesn’t feel alive? I can’t help to think what if they were to make a PS2 game for the PS3. How bigger and better a game with PS2 graphics could be in the PS3 if all the horsepower were to focus on other areas, like gameplay and animation? how much more fluid the game would look like? how much more complex and deep a gameplay could be?


would we perhaps have a open world spider-man game where we could have 100+ spidey’s iconic combat moves for we to choose, upgrade and combine our combos the way we wanted? would these game perhaps have ALL the spidey’s outfits and skins possibles? Would it be able to run a bigger, deeper and more alive city? where perhaps you could be swinging by and Green Goblin just came out of nowhere and bust you into some building. And there is actually a building interior an office perhaps with people working, and they would run away scared while you begin to fight the goblin inside the building!? A complex enough city where the goblin’s bombs would brake walls and cause debris to fall on the crowd bellow and you would have to try and zip those debris or save those peoples somehow?

 

That’s what I was expecting for this gen after playing Spider-man 2 on the PS2. But instead we got a bunch of non open world games and a movie tie-in that had a ridiculously tiny NY! (I’m leaving Web of Shadows out of this pack because I think it’s actually a pretty good game, the best of the bunch). I see no sign of any open world game reaching that far.

3. Open world games are fun, but now give me an all-open game

Many games have options and consequences for the options you make but it never was deep enough. Nowadays we are a bunch of grown ups and we need that deepness. Don’t try to give me a movie, try to give me a life! Don’t tell me what to do, just let me do anything I want! How many times you were playing GTA and found a character that you just thought “damn this guy is gonna fuck me up! I know he will double cross me!” But you can’t do shit about it. What if you could? what if a game gave you the REAL power to decide. To choose whether or not to trust the guy. Or even better a game that could give you the option to listen to the guy... but if you don’t like his tone or something, you could hit him during a dialog! And even kill him! like shoot someone before he kidnaps your daughter. Or also try to calm down a violent character that you think it’s too dangerous to deal with at that time.

See? This are the things I want in games. This is the kind of interaction and deepness that I expect from gaming. This is the evolution to me was the obvious way. Not just dumb better graphics or a cliché movie script. I want freedom!  

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