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The Games we play...

I found the NFS: Shift games almost nailed it, particularly the first one.

It encouraged you to buy a car and to learn to drive it, and slowly upgrade to suit your driving style. It was all championship events, so the reward was points towards completion.

The racing was good - it was slightly more on simulator than arcade, but it was still fun. The competition would run you ragged and you had to fight to gain the lead and keep fighting to keep it.

You'd also upgrade the same car through disciplines, so the BMW 3 series you bought, you would take with you right through to the touring cars from D-Class saloons. The was flexibility too if you wanted to do the grind and get lots of cars. Also different events like drift and stuff to mix it up, but it wasn't compulsory to move on.

So it was great, but... The game was flawed still. Odd bugs would suddenly throw you off the track. There was one track with a hairpin bend that you couldn't physically get a number of cars around without doing a three point turn - the CPU cars would wander around it without any problems.

Just odd things like that. When you got to the higher levels too, the handling became too unpredictable. This is where Forza and Gran Turismo get it spot on. The cars are always great to drive no matter what the level. Shift struggled to keep framerate up and handling working.

It was a great effort though and I can STILL recommend either Shift or Shift2 for PS3 or 360 if you haven't played them and you'll pick them up for nothing these days. The low cost makes them a now brainer :)

In other news - the PS4 is just full of remakes and shooters. We've been told by everyone who knows these things...
So this isn't happening ;)
dokidoki-shot1.jpg

http://www.joystiq.com/2013/12/10/doki- ... e-machine/

I hate the fact there's nothing original ever coming out on consoles :p
 
Tbh the best car games were out in the 90's before they went for nice graphics.

Gp1 and 2 are the best f1 games ever.

To original BTCC games were fantastic as was Colin McCray rally.
 
There was a "fake" F1 game on the ST and Amiga called Vrooom. In terms of excitement AND skill, it was superb:
watch


It wasn't as realistic as the F1 games, but it had the speed of the later (Sony) F1 titles and you really did need to learn braking points and track position to get around it. Kind of the perfect blend or arcade and sim.

Again Marc, I think it's that concentration on actually racing - which is what you want to do - over flash, bang and instant gratification.

I used to love the WRC games on the PS2 by Evolution Studios (who got bought by Sony to make the Motorstorm series). With the feedback wheel, they were stunning. The tracks were challenging and gorgeous and the handling incredible.

Then Colin McRae rally four came out and blew me away. It was the first (I believe) game to model car physics based on the four wheels rather than a central pivot point (like you find in an aircraft). It was revolutionary in a rally game, and worked superbly. Both 4 and 5 were stunning games because of it. And all proper time trials and seasons...
 
Have tbh for me the ps3 etc actually made game worse.

Yes you get the wow it looks great factor but you lose the story and game play.

Finial fantasy on the ps1 blew me away as did the Star Wars game on the pc. Gt1 blew me away as well.

All games do now days is look better.

But yes FIFA got me hooked in Game but not played one in years lol.
 
I see 4chan have struck with a prank on Xbox One users :lol:

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2 ... soles-hack

Edit : Is there really a big demand for backwards compatibility? I'm not sure on sales figures but I bet Sony sold more PS1 classics than PS2 on the store last-gen. Is there going to be such a demand to play PS3 'classics' on PS4 (and Xbox360 on XboxOne).

It all stems down to Nostalgia for me - and I just don't get that feeling when playing PS2/PS3 games - maybe I'm just getting old and the younger people would feel nostalgiac playing PS3 games but that seems like all kinds of wrong :lol:

The PS1 was such a massive step from any previous console whereas the PS2/PS3 have been a slow evolution of that step - you know that phrase "they don't make them like they used to" - well for me, they do in this case :lol: - This is why I still find myself downloading the Snes9x on occasion and playing some classic Snes games because in that case they definitely don't make them like they used to!

Was never one for backwards compatibility to be honest.
 
Pierre said:
I see 4chan have struck with a prank on Xbox One users :lol:

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2 ... soles-hack

I don't know if this is fabber than the iOS7 water proof thing or not :lol:

It kind of is, because it requires such huge steps to go through so it's a much cleverer "prank", but people believing a software upgrade will waterproof a phone? How gullible must you be :lol:

Pierre said:
Edit : Is there really a big demand for backwards compatibility? I'm not sure on sales figures but I bet Sony sold more PS1 classics than PS2 on the store last-gen. Is there going to be such a demand to play PS3 'classics' on PS4 (and Xbox360 on XboxOne).

It all stems down to Nostalgia for me - and I just don't get that feeling when playing PS2/PS3 games - maybe I'm just getting old and the younger people would feel nostalgiac playing PS3 games but that seems like all kinds of wrong :lol:

When I picked up my PS2, I also picked up a couple of good looking PS1 games (I'd not had a PS1 for many years). So it's a way of padding out your game collection on your new console while you wait for any other game to show up.

I hardly played them to be honest. They were just turds (even what are classed as great games) compared to the shiny new PS2 games I'd picked up. Over the years I'd go back and pick up a cheap game, like Tomb Raider or Wipeout and realise after 20 minutes, they may have been classics for the time, but so many years down the line they've aged really badly. Things like control methods have actually evolved massively over the years. Triangle for back through a menu? What devilry is that?

Likewise, I still played a few PS2 games on the PS3 when I first got it (I already had a large catalogue of games) and again, it just didn't really work. I'd played the games and moved on.

I did like the remakes of the PS2 games here and there. Ico and Shadow of the Colossus are hundreds of times better than the originals - which are simply unplayable when you go back to the originals. Things really have moved on that much in terms of control, etc.

Pierre said:
The PS1 was such a massive step from any previous console whereas the PS2/PS3 have been a slow evolution of that step - you know that phrase "they don't make them like they used to" - well for me, they do in this case :lol: - This is why I still find myself downloading the Snes9x on occasion and playing some classic Snes games because in that case they definitely don't make them like they used to!

Was never one for backwards compatibility to be honest.

I think for the old 2D systems, they were the kind of end of an era, top of the range evolution of that range. People had been making similar games with essentially similar hardware capabilities (maybe more colours, more sprites per screen, better sound etc, but still within the base limits) for 10-15 years so they were top of the game.

Look at the difference between Manic Miner and Super Mario World on the SNES, or Sonic on the Mega Drive. That evolution and talent had reached a pinnacle at that point. Essentially, the games for those systems couldn't be bettered - fortunately, the 3D based systems were appearing and a new way of producing and playing games was arriving - but it also needed time to evolve and settle, just as the old games did.

However, it was a new and exciting time, so a lot of those early games are well remembered because they simply broke new ground, rather than being actually any good by today's standards (where other late period 2D based games do still stand the test as good games).

But, they DO still make 'em like they used to. Nintendo never stopped at any point. They may have put Mario in a 3D world, but it's still exactly the same mechanic. I mentioned it in my "review" of 3D world on the last page. They've always continued with the same basic game mechanics just tightened.

The problem is that people look and go "it's just the same thing again" and at the same time go "I used to love it back then" :p

Look at the latest Rayman game. It's stunning. It's what every 2D coder in the 90's would have killed to produce. True film animation quality graphics and animation in a tight, exciting and fun game. They don't make them like they used to, they just make the same things only better! People just don't realise.

This kind of leads in to what Marc is saying...

marc said:
Have tbh for me the ps3 etc actually made game worse.

Yes you get the wow it looks great factor but you lose the story and game play.

I disagree. I think that the games are much better. They're much more polished, much tighter, much more playable and there's much more to them. The games are better, the problem is that they have to constantly evolve - sometimes because people are saying "we don't like it that way any more, we want fresh and new", sometimes because they're simply mining a rich vein of gamers who are willnig to hand over cash for the same thing as last year, every year (like Uncharted, where I'm with you and think the sequels offer much less than the original).

marc said:
Finial fantasy on the ps1 blew me away as did the Star Wars game on the pc. Gt1 blew me away as well.

Yet I'll bet if you played them now, you'd really struggle. I've tried, and there are very few games which amazed me on release which have ever stood the test of time. They're ugly, clunky, immature, uncontrollable lumps of pixelated mess.

marc said:
All games do now days is look better.

I've had some incredible "OMFG WOW" moments over the last few years. They surpass the feeling of being chased by a dragon in Dungeon Master, or the delicious parallax scrolling of Shadow of the Beast, or getting smacked into Thargoid space in Elite, or the joy of taking part of the cinema experience in The Untouchables or even the unadulterated joy of finally managing to get to grips with the control mechanism on Kick Off 2 and being able to play real football for the first time - even Sensible Soccer never matched the skill required in the Kick Off series.

Getting swept up by the flying colossus on Shadow of the Colossus - OMFG WOW!
Having to chose between cutting off my virtual finger or not in Heavy Rain - OMFG WOW!
Losing Kai in Heavenly Sword - OMFG WOW!
Seeing a car flip over and over down the start/finish straight in Grid as I pass under it - OMFG WOW!
Most of Alan Wake - OMFG WOW!
All fo Telltale Games' Walking Dead series - OMFG WOW!
The first level of Puppeteer - OMFG WOW!

If you play the same games, then yes. However, outside the AAA aisle, there's a wealth of superb titles that are really doing things very differently, or telling great stories. It's just that people pass them over.

Look at the first new Batman game. Superb. Brilliant new combo mechanism with a brilliant story, massive replay value and complex, deep extras that could keep you going for ages. Second one, more of the same only bigger play area. Third - we're hitting yawn territory now. Yet there is a AAA game which does something significant - it sold well so now that rich vein is being mined.

If people stop buying (GT6 has sold less than a fifth the number of copies on release as GT5 did) - then publishers need to start taking note and making changes. Gran Turismo is the same game now as it's always been (cosmetics and a few modes aside). People don't want that any more. So they need to change it, but not the core mechanic, the way the game is presented though.

Codemasters must have hit something similar with the McRae games and TOCA. They moved from serious representations of the racing world to flashy, in your face "you're the star!" titles. Toca Race Driver was already heading there with tighter limits on how you could progress through the game based on swapping and changing between cars/classes. By the time you hit Grid and "Dirt", they've cemented this horrid attention deficit issue where you constantly need to switch between cars, classes and disciplines to advance.

Every time the game is released and makes money though, that's the way they head assuming - and they could be correct - that's what people want. So the games get farther from their roots and closer towards an arcade experience as we see with Grid 2, or the depressing Dirt Showdown.

Ironically, Forza and Gran Turismo, with their "gotta get 'em all" mantra mean that you'll be spending hours in the same car and same class in the same races grinding to earn in game cash. Why not offer that as a championship as the TOCA series used to? If you're forcing people to grind, make the grind worthwhile beyond simply gaining money.

But yeah, the games are worse because they either haven't evolved, or they've evolved in a way that isn't maybe the best (evolved through sales feedback rather than internal critical review). However, there are still superb new games out there being released. Games that are as "made like they used to be". Games that captivate and wow. Games with fantastic stories. You just need to look and find them though, because they're not going to be anywhere on a shelf in a top ten being pushed in your face.

Pick up Ni No Kuni or Beyond: Two Souls cheap Marc. I think you'll be surprised what "nothing but better graphics" can have to offer :)

marc said:
But yes FIFA got me hooked in Game but not played one in years lol.

And that is the result of many years of evolution to perfection ;)
Mario 3D World is in exactly the same position.


I have a feeling I should have done the history and future of computer games for me degree thesis :)
 
furie said:
Ironically, Forza and Gran Turismo, with their "gotta get 'em all" mantra mean that you'll be spending hours in the same car and same class in the same races grinding to earn in game cash. Why not offer that as a championship as the TOCA series used to? If you're forcing people to grind, make the grind worthwhile beyond simply gaining money.

This is ridiculously rude, but are you sure you're not just really crap at Gran Turismo? Because I'm not brilliant and have never, ever, had to grind (with the exception of when you've done the game and you want the Ferrari F1 car or the Audi Le Mans cars that cost several million - but by that stage it only takes 10 or so re-races :p ).

As it's fresh in my mind, take GT6. You get "given" (you have to spend 15/50k that you start with) a Honda Jazz to start the game, which easily creams the Novice level and then the National B stage you're passing the leader mostly on the last lap (but anyone would easily get the podiums they need). By which time you've earned about 80-100k and you've also received a couple of decent cars as prizes. Gran Turismo prizes have ALWAYS been there to progress the story without you having to spend money, leaving you to either save or spend on upgrades rather than new cars.

However, that's if you do the "story" only. There's a few events available very early on to give you a taster of quicker machinery - so I did some of them. Notable favourite was the KTM X-bow Goodwood Hill Climb <3

Anyway, after doing a couple of those (now have about 300k in the bank), decided to splash out on 1970s legendary Ferrari 512 (100k) which won races easily in National A and with relative ease on International B. It also payed itself back in 6 races, none of which I had to repeat and they were all 'new' races towards the completion of the game.

I'm now in International A and I'm thinking about buying an Audi R8 which is 200k (I have banked 700k). This is along the same lines (different cars and numbers obviously) as the previous titles, so I haven't the foggiest where you're coming from. Either you're rubbish (which I doubt in all honesty, but it could be the case) or you're constantly buying the 'wrong' cars and wasting your money, forcing yourself to grind. In this example, I'm almost onto the Super license, have only not won twice (one of which I span like a spastic at Indianapolis - Le Mans corner not the boring oval), only had 4/5 hours of play time, and I've only purchased 1 car (not counting the first one which you kinda have to get :lol: ); this is typical of my experience with Gran Turismo titles, so I genuinely don't know what you're doing wrong.

_________________

The game itself. No real advance on the last in terms of visuals, but car feel I find much more enjoyable. I much prefer F1 games or the latter stages of Gran Turismo when you get your hands on the racing cars and Kimi Raikkonen's 2007 Ferrari! <3

It also feels "larger" than the last one and all the Ayrton Senna McLaren stuff so far has been fab. Can't wait to unlock more stuff!
 
Gt5 was a pain due to bugs in the NASCAR section. You could not turn off abs and stability control so you could not win. It was a bug they put in with an update.

The endurance races had no mid race save so I just let the computer drive over night for 10 hours lol.

I enjoyed most of the game tbh but it was just so easy, apart from that Newey car which was so hard to control.

Gt5 online was fun though.

I will get gt6 for the senna stuff but I'm way off being able to play games at the moment, probably another 2 months.

It's a big kick in the balls for Codemasters the fact they could not get senna for f12013 but the makers of gt could. Codemasters kept saying senna could not be used in any game, how stupid do they look.
 
Sorry, by grind with Gran Turismo I mean "get a car that is massively more powerful than the competition in the given class ranges you race in so you just lap them 8 times in a 2 lap race, win your cash, unlock the next level (I can't remember if the levels unlock through car ownership or experience points?), repeat until you've got to a point where you actually do need to start racing - by which time you're bored stupid" :)

You unlock a huge garage, but never need to touch it to "complete the game". You need perhaps five or six cars for the majority of the game. I know I complained about "not getting to learn the car", but you don't need to in GT, because it's so much better than the other cars on track you can just hammer it around. Unlock, unlock, unlock, grind, grind, grind, yawn, yawn, yawn.

I found the best thing on GT5 was the challenges mode where you had to try and win a one lap race on a moped against a stream of Lambos :) I think there were about two dozen of them?
 
I see what you mean Furie and agree, once you get the bigger power cars that's it and the challenge has gone from the game.

I used to like the manufactor cups were you were all in the same car.
 
You jumped in Marc before I posted but I was in a rush so didn't quite reply properly and stuff.

Essentially Neal, the grind is exactly what you've described. Most of the way through the game in a single car, no challenge. What's that if it isn't grinding?

marc said:
I see what you mean Furie and agree, once you get the bigger power cars that's it and the challenge has gone from the game.

I used to like the manufactor cups were you were all in the same car.

This is where Forza has it right. You are not only limited by stuff like manufacturer, type, country or whatever - but they all have an upper class limit. You can take an F Class Fiesta into an R1 race if you like, but you can't take a modified to class A Fiesta into a Fiesta class race - you have to downgrade it.

Obviously there's a degree of where you derive your fun from. For me, it's not about sitting in the same car just racing and racing and racing with only myself as any challenge. I want the AI to challenge me, or the game to challenge me in some way. Yes, you don't have to play GT that way, you could play the fair game and only drive within class and power bands or whatever - but then you always start off half a lap behind everyone because of the stupid procession starts - so you're at a massive disadvantage. It's not racing, it's just driving around a track.

One thing I really hate which you touched on Marc, is the race lengths. Forza is bad at this particularly.

Your first "season" will be in slow cars, doing maybe two laps of a short circuit and a few races per "class type" (maybe 2 or 3). So you're looking at about five minutes per race - for about a dozen race sessions in total.

Each season, the number of laps increases as well as the number of races you need to run. I think in Forza 4, I'm looking at a 26 "race" season, with races coming in at around 10-15 minutes each, often with two sessions per race. So to reach the end of the season, I've got hours upon hours of racing ahead of me.

This is how they "increase the difficulty". It's harder to beat the game because a war of attrition between the game and your life. My life wins every time. GT cheated by just letting you put a driver in your seat instead to win the races for you - Forza has kind of followed this.

I'd rather have AI that makes the race a fight for two or three frantic laps in a slowly opening array of better cars. If you want the longer races, then you pick 10% length, 25% length, 50%, 100% or whatever. I don't want to feel like playing the game is a chore though, eating away at my life a mile at a time. That's exactly what GT and Forza feel like.

It's why I'm just playing Forza through the individual races, step by step. It's making my own game up though, which seems to defeat the point somewhat.

Oh, and increasing difficulty through turning off assists can **** off as well. Forza I've got set to the hardest AI and it's no challenge. I only have ABS turned on, all the other assists are off. I simply can't play console racers without ABS as you just constantly lock up - I find it frustrating. However, I should still find a real challenge anyway, but don't, because the AI is easy and the only way to stop that is by turning the car into a lump of grease. Once I've mastered the no ABS (which I disagree with, so wont :p ) - they'll still be a doddle to beat.

marc said:
Gt5 online was fun though.

This is the only way I can play the games to be honest. It's the only way to find a real challenge. At least when you're being beaten massively, you know it's down to your lack of skill and nothing else. I remember the Go Karts on the Alps track on GT5 Marc, that was epic and you were **** awesome!
 
furie said:
Essentially Neal, the grind is exactly what you've described. Most of the way through the game in a single car, no challenge. What's that if it isn't grinding?

You and I clearly have VERY different definitions of grinding.

If you're continuing on with the plot/story of a game, that's not grinding. If you have to keep repeating yourself in order to get to a point where you can successfully move on to the next stage, that's grinding.

Think of it like Pokemon. Having to endlessly go round and round in circles fighting wild monsters in the same patch of grass in order to sufficiently level up your own to beat the next gym leader is grinding. But if your Pokemon were strong enough for you to keep progressing forward (which is how I described my cars in Gran Turismo) then you're not grinding, you're just playing the game.
 
The thing is, you're not really continuing with the game in this case. In as much as you're not hitting a bar in terms of challenge. The game is there ready for you to have, you just need to put in some time to get it.

What you're doing is lapping the same tracks, time and time again in the same cars, with no challenge to unlock either the best cars, or the events that require you to actually have to change the car and be challenged by the game.

If it takes no skill to continue further, then it's a grind.

In the Pokemon example, it's like starting with a shiny Dialga you can control perfectly, and just walknig into each battle, each gym leader contest and trouncing them. You're advancing through the story, but the entire game is the grind. You're doing it because finally, in the last two major battles, you'll win a wonderful new Pokemon and the battle will be even so you'll have to work at it.

It's a looser definition of the term, but it's still a grind. It simply doesn't matter what track you're on or what cars you're against, you will win and unlock something. Grinding is all about putting in time, but as little effort as possible - and that's exactly what GT5 was; all time and no effort.
 
I still completely disagree.

Sure, I'm using the same car, but as you advance the opponents get harder and new tracks appear. So when you're incapable of winning, you upgrade. Except, because you've been efficient/skilled/whatever, you have the money to immediately upgrade and carry on advancing. Simply playing the game is NEVER grinding. By purchasing it you've accepted that you will set aside time to complete it. Otherwise reading books would be considered grinding, except that's nonsense because (like with games) you buy them to finish them. Like a book, games have a story of sorts.

If, however, you can't win with the car you get to start with, then you grind away at the 4th/5th places. Repeating race and championship scenarios until you earn enough money to get a car that you're capable of winning in. The inadequacies of the player is creating the grind, it does not come automatically just by deciding to play a game.
 
The game simply offers itself on a platter.

For most games, I'd agree, but GT5 at no point in the first 30 races (or whatever) offered any kind of challenge. You won, got money, got car, upgraded, won, got money, upgraded, won, got money,got car, upgraded, won, got money...

Over and over and over and over. Dull as sitting hitting the left mouse button until "Fireball levelled up" appears and then doing it again until eventually I can defeat the great wizard Ferrari and get hi F1 car of magical speed!

A decent game forces the player to be challenged as much as possible. Gran Turismo isn't a game though, it's a driving simulator that has a game like element to make it seem like a game.

At least the PSP version didn't **** around. It's just went "let's face it, you're just playing this to drive cars, so bollocks to it - no seasons or organised races. Just drive the cars, enjoy!"

That wouldn't bother me at all; at least it's honest.

I don't mind advancing relatively unchallenged through a game if the game is all about story, character or there's something really fun in the challenge while you're actually playing. I don't play shooters on anything other than easy because I'm poor at them, but I still like the challenge of trying to hit barn doors at 2 paces - even though I often die a lot in the process still. If the story is good, the gameplay element is good and the whole way the game is presented is good, then I enjoy it.

GT's driving is fantastic, but the racing simply doesn't exist and the challenge of unlocking cars and progressing doesn't exist and there's nothing interesting about doing it. It's like a load of the world's prettiest four piece jigsaw puzzles. "I made another one Mum! And another! I'm really great at this game Mum, look another already!!!" You end up with a whole bunch of pretty wall hangings and braggings about how many you've finished and how fast, and then finally have three 10,000 piece puzzles at the bottom to complete. Rubbish; absolute crap. That's the grind, you're not actually making any difference anywhere, except to unlock new things which offer no real difference over the old things.

"Oh great, another 20 laps of Laguna Seca, only this time I'll only lap them 10 times instead of 15, because 'they're harder'."

I'll still be getting GT6 mind :p , because the driving is good, and there ARE challenges here and there (the seasonal challenges and stuff); but mostly, the game element is just crap. So it's a £15er to get my 10-20 hours of fun and then get rid.

Though I will wait until the GPS thing comes out, as I want to see how realistic it is driving my car on the route to work :)

See, I do actually like the game - kind of - it's just that the "career" mode is tosh. No challenge, no fun, no racing - unless you enforce it upon yourself, and that's a whole new game in itself :)
 
Perhaps.

One thing you will like about GT6 over the predecessors is that on ALL levels there is now a strict upper limit for the performance of your car. Which I think you might be getting at.
 
Yes. That's exactly it. Will make an enormous difference to how it plays. May be worth £25 then ;)

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk
 
Finally got round to purchasing a PS Vita.

Play.com did a good deal today where you got the 3G+Wifi version of the console, a 16GB memory card and 10 games for £139. :)

Means I can finally play all those free games I downloaded on PS+ ready for when I got it. :p
 
Hmmm...
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOq4IiuRMWk#aid=P60d8UfhEWA[/youtube]

I've never played any of the Dynasty Warrior games (and I'm not too familiar with them either), but this looks pretty cool!

In other news, Lego Hobbit looks beautiful. I want to see more of it though, specifically some gameplay. As of now I might actually want to get it.

I'll be going back home tonight, so I can finally try to finish Ocarina of Time and A Link to the Past. :lol:
 
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