I'll start this off with Tex Murphy: Mean Streets. Thankfully I haven't played a lot of games that were truly "bad," but Mean Streets is about as close as it gets.
Hmmm... off the top of my head?
SimCity DS. Horrible remake of a classic game (SimCity 3000 Unlimited) from my childhood! I read about it, got so pumped because it gets harder and harder to play the game when I get a new computer, and bought it with my own money at Best Buy's bargain bin.
According to my friend Albert, the bargain bin is where you either find crappy games or just really cheap games. The receptionist thought I was mistaken when I asked if they had it, and was genuinely surprised when I managed to find it.
It was so bad that I actually wrote an essay on it for my college writing class, and got an A on it! (*sigh* One more point on my score, and it would have been a perfect A+)
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Tarnished Nostalgia
You have to wonder sometimes, why people seem to think you need to remake everything into something 'cool' or 'edgy' or 'hardcore' or, in the case of Electronic Arts' "remake" of Simcity 3000 for the Nintendo DS- completely botched and ruining childhoods. As someone who grew up with the original company for Simcity 3000 Unlimited (the only one aside from the DS version I'd ever played) of Maxis, this remake was completely cut down from the original in every way possible.
First of all, the gameplay itself. The game is lot harder to get into in the remake than it is in the original. Why? Partially because of the interface, and also because there is a lot more you can do with your city in the original. The interface in the original was very simple: you have your tabs for all your city building stuff like Landscape, Roads and Buildings (and all their little submenus depending on what you click) on the right side of the screen, alongside your options and different save files. The bottom right corner of the screen has your map, and down along the bottom of the screen is your City Ticker (where news is) and where you can see how your zones are doing and adjust your speed. The remake makes this a lot more awkward. It took me forever to figure out how to access things, because I couldn't find them as easily in there. I eventually figured out that you have to click on your Finances tab in order to reach the other stuff. What a hassle, huh? I mean, couldn't you just organize them like they were in the original, like say, putting them all on the touch screen?
The other thing I didn't like was the fact that, unlike the original, you have no control over how you design your city. In the original, you could choose what your terrain could be (green grass, dull grass, snow, sand, or clay), and where the rivers and mountains were. In the original, you could choose how big or small it was, what your buildings would look like (low class, middle class, high class), and even your difficulty settings and how much money you have at the beginning.
The remake takes all that away from you! You always only have the city on dull grass terrain, you can't add anything there, and the difficulty setting is determined by where you start on the map. C'mon game, just because I want to start with the maximum amount of money so I don't go bankrupt within the first few hours of playing, doesn't mean I want a tutorial level! Just let me play my own way!
Second of all, there is the music. Oh dear Lord, the music. What I loved most about the original game, aside from the gameplay was the catchy music. They had a composer named Jerry Martin on board, with actual musicians playing toe-tapping jazz songs with actual instruments like real saxophones, trumpets and pianos. There were several lovely tunes that made feel good and mellow, like "Central Park Sunday", 'South Bridge" and "Updown Town" and a few others that sounded a bit more ominous and quiet like "Desert Sand" and "Sixth Floor". All of them fitted the mood most of the time, with the more mellow songs playing when things were good, and the more somber songs when things weren't. Of course, sometimes it was the opposite, but that's usually what I thought of it.
The remake... completely ruined the music. Even if they'd fixed things like the interface and such, I still wouldn't have given them a free pass on that if they hadn't fixed the music as well. Gone are the saxophones and pianos, now replaced with MIDI music that just sounds awful and doesn't hold a candle to Jerry Martin' work. They cut nearly all the songs, and decided to have ONE song per activity: one song for the main game (which escapes my mind, but I remember not even liking it in the original all that much) which just drones on and on. One song for the museum, one for the options, and one song for the "Save the City!" scenarios menu... which was an absolutely BUTCHERED version of "Central Park Sunday", which was my favorite song in the original game! Forget the rest of the tracks- if you screw up my favorite song in the game, you get a low score from me!
Lastly, of course, is the creators themselves. As I mentioned before, I grew up with Maxis and loved all their "Sim" games- SimPark, SimAnt, SimSafari, SimTunes, SimTown and SimCity. I wasn't allowed to play The Sims back then unfortunately, although I still hear good things about it even after EA took over Maxis, which makes me interested. All of these games were educational in some way, and always entertaining. SimPark taught me about nature, SimSafari taught me about Africa, SimAnt taught me about ant colonies, SimTunes taught me about music, SimTown taught me about managing a small town, and SimCity taught me about broadening my horizons to a city. Maxis was a great little company, and I'm so happy to see it in the front list of companies for the new SimCity game coming out in 2013, classic eclipse logo and all!
Electronic Arts however, I've not heard good things about. It's not just SimCity they've ruined either. They've also done horrible things to series' like Ultima (especially the last game which ret-cons nearly everything in the series, including the ending to the game before it, and makes the main character seem like an idiot), Command & Conquer, Dragon Age and Mass Effect according to most people. SimCity seems like small potatoes to something like the Ultima series. Of course, they've done their share of a few good games such as The Sims, but that still doesn't cut it with all the bad ones they have.
In conclusion, I wouldn't recommend the DS version of SimCity at all. It just isn't as good as the original, the only good thing being that it's portable. But, just because it's portable, doesn't mean you need to ring out all fun and decency out of it with bad music and gameplay made by a non-respectable company that was voted one of the worst places to work. I don't want to leave on a negative note with this paper, so I'll give you two options if you want to try SimCity out yourselves: 1. If you can find them, buy the original games (SimCity, SimCity 2000, SimCity 3000/Unlimited and SimCity 4/Rush Hour) and get them working somehow. Or 2. Wait until the 2013 game, which is being made by Maxis thankfully, and play that on your modern computers.
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On a technical level? New World Order, it was a Counter-strike wanna be, came free with a magazine (though it was sold in stores as well), threw it in the trash the next day, it wasn't even worth the disc space it took
Games that disappointed me the most? mmm... Good question, Maybe Gothic 3 it was barely playable when it came out, though I hear it's a little better now
Dear goodness how would I even quantify "worst"?
For example I thought Simon the Sorcerer was a very funny game and I liked the characters and humor but I thought the technical gameplay of it was absolutely dreadful and nearly the worst I ever played!
Yet not only would that just be the worst point and click I ever played, but it would be so just for the actual gameplay aspects AND if I don't use a guide.
Mind you the worst point and click I played would probably AS OF THIS MOMENT! be... Monkey Island 4
Worst game I've ever played: Command and Conquer 4. Gah. Just look it up on Amazon and you'll see that I am not alone in thinking that this game is garbage.
Worst game I've seen but not played: The Town with No Name, which is riffed over at this Blip TV link:
http://blip.tv/slowbeef/true-s***-5475579 (http://blip.tv/slowbeef/true-s***-5475579)
Holy hell. The Town with No Name is like the holy grail of bad games. Glad I didn't waste my time playing it. A runner-up in this category would be F**k Quest.
Worst game I've heard of, but not bothered to look further into: Probably the E.T. game. It's kind of famous for its badness at this point.
I'm thinking Final Fantasy XIII is gonna have to win this for me. The plot was obscure; the gameplay was both boring and tedious (being both too easy and too hard at the same time); and by the end, I didn't even know why I was playing. I genuinely have no idea what the final boss had to do with that game, and was paying attention and reading datalogs.
I remember there was this game that was made based on Michael Crichton's Timeline. It was terrible. It handled badly, it had basically no puzzles in it, and it didn't follow the book at all. I think it came bundled with the book. Or the book came bundled with it. I think of it as the former because I fully enjoyed the book more. Man, that was a terrible game.
Outside of that, I'm not really a gamer, so I haven't much experience. It might be cheating to include a fan game because there is just a ton of amateur crap out there. But I do feel the need to once again point out, just because it's so well known and is one of the originals, that Space Quest: The Lost Chapter is an unplayable mess. Not just because of the bugs, not just because of the tentacle maze, not just because of the tentacle obsession in general. Also because the story, narrative, and puzzles made no logical sense whatsoever. It's just a profoundly broken, unplayable game at every level.
Quote from: Damar on June 15, 2013, 02:40:54 PM
It might be cheating to include a fan game...
Not really. I'm sure Lamb will pop in and talk about how much he hates TSL any minute now.
Did he ever fully explain why that is?
A few times, actually. Valanice acting out of character, melodrama, dialogue trees that go on for way too long, and awkwardly written scenes (Graham and Edgar's heart-to-heart is probably the most glaring). No matter how much you like TSL, it's safe to say that POStudios has come a long way from the first couple episodes.
*nods* They can only get better and better as time goes on. Actually, I don't really mind those lengthy conversations really. In fact, Tower Sequence aside, that conversation between Graham and Cassie was one of the defining favorite moments of episode three for me.
Melodrama? Well the saying goes "The night is darkest before the dawn" I'm used to dark things by now. And besides, at least this game had quite a few humorous/awesome moments to lighten the mood.
Valanice? *shrug* Could have been much worse.
Much of Lamb's experience with TSL is playing the first two episodes, and those are the ones he rips on the most. The whole melodrama thing mostly has to do with the voice acting, and two particular examples stand out to me.
Edgar: It was evil...it was pure evil.
Alexander: CASSIMA!!! *then, later* Don't you DARE call me that! You MURDERER!
As for Valanice:
[spoiler]The ending of episode 2 really left Lamb pissed off from what I can remember. Valanice attempting to kill herself because things were looking a little grim was severely out of character. It wasn't until a while later when Cesar explained that Valanice was possessed at the time that the scene started to make any sense.[/spoiler]
As much as I love the acting in TSL, I can say that they're not perfect performers. Although, I am wondering now, since according to the special feature video from a few years ago that Jason Michael Victor has been in theater before and proven (at least to me) that he's really good with Graham and Robert.
I wonder if he can sing? I'm assuming that's him doing Graham's whistling anyway.
QuoteValanice acting out of character
I thought that was specifically a plot point.
"Valanice is not going mad! There must be an explanation for this!"- Graham, episode 3 to Captain Saladin iirc.
Lamb is gonna lap it up over how much you guys are talking about him! tee hee!
Bt
Quote from: Blackthorne on June 15, 2013, 09:18:15 PM
Lamb is gonna lap it up over how much you guys are talking about him! tee hee!
Bt
!!! !!! !!! !!! !!! !!! !!! !!!
Also, it's not the voice acting, it's the writing itself. Though certain voice actors WERE terrible.
I might ask 929572 to pen my biography!
Quote from: Neonivek on June 15, 2013, 07:58:05 PM
QuoteValanice acting out of character
I thought that was specifically a plot point.
It may have been a plot point but it was never particularly clear. I know I didn't get it until Cesar pointed it out (and seemed pretty annoyed that people didn't get it.) It could have been made
a lot clearer. And that's coming from the guy who thought it was pretty clear that she must have been under a curse in the first place. But linking it to what was going on in the Pandora's Box scene? The to events just did not tie together for me at all. In fact it seemed much more likely that...sigh...spoiler tag[spoiler]Valanice was distraught not because her kids were in comas, but rather that they were in comas and she opened Pandora's Box and unleashed an evil. Still think it would have been out of character for her to try to kill herself, but that added thing makes it more understandable. And when you add in the fact that the jumping wasn't at all related to what was going on with her confrontation with Shadrack, it seemed the more likely theory. I mean, at least have the scene end with her trying to escape Shadrack by jumping out a window or something. Then it ties in and shows that this was enchantment, not suicide. Whatever, it's their fan game, they can do what they want.[/spoiler]
Quote from: Lambonius on June 15, 2013, 11:45:53 PM
I might ask 929572 to pen my biography!
I was reading the forum long before I actually participated in any discussions, so I'm familiar with people's stances on certain things. For instance, Baggins' stance on TSL is that it is stupid and anybody who likes it is stupid.
Wow, Baggins would hate me then! :o
I mean, even Lamb who also hates TSL doesn't call people stupid for liking it!
Then again, you are talking to the girl who:
Has no hatred for Cedric the Owl.
Does not go into a rage whenever ME3's endings are mentioned (probably because aside from the GameStop commercial, that was actually the first footage she ever actually saw of the game.)
Gets most of her knowledge of certain videogames from Retrospectives, Let's Plays, and Reviews (for which I apologize to Numbers for.)
Actually likes KQ5 and KQ7.
QuoteIt could have been made a lot clearer
They are allowed to have SOME subtly.
Quote from: GrahamRocks! on June 16, 2013, 06:03:41 PM
Actually likes KQ5 and KQ7.
You're not the only one who likes KQ5 and KQ7. 5 was the first King's Quest game I played, and at the time I did not hate Cedric because I only had the floppy disc version and never heard his voice until years later when I got a computer with a CD-rom drive.
I agree with the amount of wordiness in TSL's episodes 1 and 2, but wordiness is frequently common early in many games when all players have to be acquainted with the world of the game, whether they have played any of the KQ games or not.
Bringing this back on topic, the worst game I ever played was Sentinel -- Descendents in Time. That game was another of the many Myst clones that were made, but the puzzles were tedious at best and too easy at the worst. The "plot" of the game felt like it was hastily cobbled together at the last minute.
The worst game disappointments I had were King's Quest 7 and 8. Both seemed so far from the perfected format of King's Quest 6 that they failed to meet my expectations. While I still enjoy playing KQ7 at those times when I get the feeling to watch a Disney movie, I cannot bring myself to finish KQ8 because I am lousy at combat and I really hated that game for it. It was especially jarring after playing games in the series like KQ2 that reward you for taking the most non-violent approach, like feeding the lion instead of killing it.
Another disappointment was Myst 5: End of Ages, which should have been called the prequel to Uru since it only seemed to have a tenuous link to the first four Myst games, all of which I really enjoyed for their lonely, scenic atmospheres. Myst 5's characters were laughable at best, though the plot was not intentionally humorous, a certain over-the-top Escher comes to mind, and calling a character in the Myst series over-the-top is significant since Brad Douriff ate all of the green screen around him in Myst 3: Exile. (NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!)
Wait, Myst 5 is the prequel to Uru? I thought Uru came before it in the timeline?
I never said I hated TSL. :)
... What?
QuoteI cannot bring myself to finish KQ8 because I am lousy at combat and I really hated that game for it
Ohh trust me you were spared. KQ8 becomes utterly incompetent once you get to the swamp.
Quote from: GrahamRocks! on June 16, 2013, 08:19:34 PM
Wait, Myst 5 is the prequel to Uru? I thought Uru came before it in the timeline?
You're correct. Sorry for the error. I played Myst 5 before I played Uru, so I think of it (incorrectly) as being before Uru.
Butbutbut...! you clearly didn't like it enough to even give episodes 3 and 4 a chance?! What gives, Lambchop? Is it just tolerable then?!
Quote from: GrahamRocks! on June 17, 2013, 04:10:57 PM
Butbutbut...! you clearly didn't like it enough to even give episodes 3 and 4 a chance?! What gives, Lambchop? Is it just tolerable then?!
Hate is such a strong word. Its existence doesn't keep me up nights or anything.
Eh. Fair enough.
New goal: make changes to Episode 5 enough that it'll keep Lamb up at night. :P
Quote from: Cathenah19 on June 16, 2013, 08:16:43 PM
Myst 5's characters were laughable at best, though the plot was not intentionally humorous, a certain over-the-top Escher comes to mind, and calling a character in the Myst series over-the-top is significant since Brad Douriff ate all of the green screen around him in Myst 3: Exile. (NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!)
There are characters in Myst? :o *only played the first one*
Yep! There's Atrus, Catherine, Sirrus, Achenar, Yeesha, Saaveedro...
Quote from: KatieHal on June 18, 2013, 07:53:47 AM
New goal: make changes to Episode 5 enough that it'll keep Lamb up at night. :P
Just randomly change characters' faces to this during conversations, and BINGO!
(http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t97/Lambonius/peekaboo_avatar.png)
*Has a sudden image of Cedric's head morphing into the Forever Alone face*
Quote from: Neonivek on June 16, 2013, 07:22:10 PM
QuoteIt could have been made a lot clearer
They are allowed to have SOME subtly.
Absolutely, subtlety is fine. Of course this wasn't subtle. It was straight up obscure and unclear. And in a situation that the writers knew was going to be controversial to people who liked King's Quest and had strong feelings about Valanice's abilities, that's really a problem. And don't get me wrong, I don't have a problem with controversy either. The stuff about Mannannan and Valanice and Alexander that I'm too lazy to type into a spoiler tag right now was certainly controversial and I could practically hear the screams of die hard Questers. But I thought it was an interesting take, and I honestly like stirring the pot a little. Is it where I'd go with it? That doesn't really matter because it's not my fan game.
But the issue with Valanice wasn't subtle; it was just unclear. And I think that's borne out by the fact that in the feedback threads, really no one seemed to get it until it was actually explicitly explained by the head guy. I mean, if it was just subtle, I'd have expected some know-it-all to put all us clueless morons in our place pretty early on. It's a major plot point and no one really got it. It kind of seemed like a writer who knew exactly what he wanted to do, but didn't recognize that it wasn't coming across clearly because it was already obvious to him. I mean, not to sound arrogant, but I'm really pretty good at picking up subtext, subtlety, symbolism, and formulating theories. It's quite literally my job, actually. I'm not exactly a dunce who doesn't get subtlety. But, whatever. It's their game.
Well I will admit Alexander is probably the character the least in character... but I do accept at least a passible excuse that he is "under duress".
As for what happened to Valenice.
QuoteI mean, if it was just subtle, I'd have expected some know-it-all to put all us clueless morons in our place pretty early on.
No, I think it was specifically set up as a mystery for later and to put pressure on Graham to finish his mission. I in no way think it was meant to be solvable as soon as it occurred.
The Subtly comes from the fact that they just didn't tell you and didn't connect the dots when they did the reveal.
As well the assumption that she was under a spell was also a valid one.
QuoteI mean, if it was just subtle, I'd have expected some know-it-all to put all us clueless morons in our place pretty early on.
Well there are two clues early on.
If you click on Valanece with Graham he will talk about how strong she is, as well he has dialog with Cassima about the fact that she could usually equal him when it came to dealing with hardship. As well the words of her actions describe a delirious state.
It was very clear early on that what was happening to Valanece was clearly abnormal. Yet until you knew further you could just assume she was written out of character.
QuoteI mean, not to sound arrogant, but I'm really pretty good at picking up subtext, subtlety, symbolism, and formulating theories.
Maybe books... but I am pretty good at picking up subtext, subtlety, symbolism, and formulating theories too. It isn't my job but it should be.
Mind you I did something you didn't. I played all four chapters back to back, and when you have a eagle eye view of the story as a while the Valanice Arc is pretty much whole... and ultimately that is what the chapters are, sections of a single game split up.
Worst game I ever played: Final Fantasy 8. I tend to go heavy on spellcasters in most of the RPGs I play, and that game was definitely not for magic. The story was also confusing, the characters were irritating at the least, and I'm still baffled that Laguna managed to become el Presidente in any sense.
I know that Final Fantasy 13 is worse, but I'm avoiding that one like the Plague.
QuoteI'm still baffled that Laguna managed to become el Presidente in any sense
Given how much of a loser he is in his own plotline... Yeah...
He went from someone who was barely able to stand on his own two feet when he gets a little bit stressed. To being someone confident and charismatic enough to become president.
I mean Squall was a loser too but for him it was actually part of the plot and character. It was actually want made the dance scene so endearing and was something he actually had to overcome.
Oh man, I FFVIII could not have been made more for the way I play games. I can see how it would've been a miserable experience for you but I stockpile everything like crazy and I loved that game so much. XD
I could never get that far in FF8 because of the damn summons. I do not want to watch your 1-minute long animation, I'm in a timed sequence here, you jerks!
FFXII is the best post-16-bit Final Fantasy game. There--I said it.
*shrug* If you say so, Lamb.
I loved FFXII so much.
Quote from: GrahamRocks! on June 20, 2013, 09:41:04 PM
*shrug* If you say so, Lamb.
Heh...I was just making light of the fact that FFXII was very divisive back when it came out--it was the first major Final Fantasy game to break some of the traditional formulas for Final Fantasy gameplay (like random battles, for example), and for that it got a lot of flack. However, I would argue that pretty much every change it made was for the better. Not to mention the fact that the story kicked f***ing ass, and the main characters were all much more memorable (and MUCH less annoying) than those in the previous big FF game on PS2, the much lauded FFX (which I couldn't stand.) And last but not least, FFXII was probably the single best looking game on the PS2. Just a stunningly beautiful, deep, secret-filled game. Glorious. But, it still gets crap for changing up the formula, and it never quite makes the Final Fantasy "best" lists, for some strange reason. It's got to be one of the most underrated games of the PS2 generation.
Quote from: Neonivek on June 20, 2013, 04:45:43 PM
As for what happened to Valenice.
QuoteI mean, if it was just subtle, I'd have expected some know-it-all to put all us clueless morons in our place pretty early on.
No, I think it was specifically set up as a mystery for later and to put pressure on Graham to finish his mission. I in no way think it was meant to be solvable as soon as it occurred.
The Subtly comes from the fact that they just didn't tell you and didn't connect the dots when they did the reveal.
As well the assumption that she was under a spell was also a valid one.
QuoteI mean, if it was just subtle, I'd have expected some know-it-all to put all us clueless morons in our place pretty early on.
Well there are two clues early on.
If you click on Valanece with Graham he will talk about how strong she is, as well he has dialog with Cassima about the fact that she could usually equal him when it came to dealing with hardship. As well the words of her actions describe a delirious state.
It was very clear early on that what was happening to Valanece was clearly abnormal. Yet until you knew further you could just assume she was written out of character.
Mind you I did something you didn't. I played all four chapters back to back, and when you have a eagle eye view of the story as a while the Valanice Arc is pretty much whole... and ultimately that is what the chapters are, sections of a single game split up.
And I still maintain that episodic releases are terrible and break up the flow of the game, destroy tension, and invite people to make cynical assumptions that it's all about trying to squeeze out as much money as possible (and yeah, I know obviously that's not the case with TSL since it's free. But the episodic release is still modeled on games you have to pay for.) I honestly do believe, apart from any complaining about characters being out of character, overwrought dialogue, melodrama, plot twists, the narrator, apart from any of those complaints whether they're justified or not, I would put the episodic release as possibly the biggest problem with this particular fan game (apart from maybe that ridiculous RPG fight, but not getting into that again). I really think it hurts the game that much.
Regarding Valanice, I actually pulled up Cesar's explanation. Here it is:
Quote from: Cez on November 09, 2011, 03:33:26 AM
Ok, I'll come out and blatantly say what happened during that Episode 2 section.
[spoiler]Yes, she is, she's going through some serious stuff, remembering her origins, having opened Pandora's Box, etc. However, she wasn't trying to jump in Episode 2, she was being screwed over by Shadrack in the dreamworld, and that was reflected upon the real world. If you remember the conversation with Saladin in episode 3, he mentions how Valanice was "talking to someone who wasn't there, pleading to be left in peace" In the real world, she was on the balcony of the Green Isles, but in the dreamworld, what she was really seeing, she was just leaning on the balcony of the tower, the same way that she leaned over at the beginning of Episode 3 when she was a young girl. She didn't know this was actually happening to her as well in the real world as she was sleep-walking-- Notice how she doesn't notice Graham until he grabs her and brings her out of the trance/dream? Shadrack was showing to her all that Graham later saw in Episode 3, in the tower section. That's why she crumbled in Graham's arms and couldn't really say a word once she woke up. She was really disturbed as her memories were triggering. Later in the Episode 4 scene with Graham, she's shown at a loss, BUT this scene is crucial because within it, because of Graham's words, she makes the decision that marks the beginning of her journey. [/spoiler]
See, I'd always assumed it was a spell for all the reasons you listed, but then with the Pandora's Box scene, there didn't seem to be an actual spell, making me second guess all that because now they seemed to be saying that she really was in despair because she realized what she did. But that explanation above apparently puts the whole thing on her just not realizing that she wasn't in the dream world back in Episode 3. It's convoluted and unclear. That's all I'm saying. But this has really gone off topic from the main post and TSL is most certainly not the worst game I've ever played. Really, I do enjoy it. I just think it's flawed. Anyway, if you want, we can take this to the Episode 4 feedback topic so that the mods don't get a headache here with off topic debate (and that was certainly not intended to sound like a "let's take this outside and settle it" challenge.)
Quote from: LadyTerra on June 20, 2013, 08:12:38 PM
Worst game I ever played: Final Fantasy 8. I tend to go heavy on spellcasters in most of the RPGs I play, and that game was definitely not for magic. The story was also confusing, the characters were irritating at the least, and I'm still baffled that Laguna managed to become el Presidente in any sense.
I know that Final Fantasy 13 is worse, but I'm avoiding that one like the Plague.
Believe it or not that was actually my first Final Fantasy, so I hold a bit of a soft spot for it.
With that said, yeah the magic system was sooooo tedious. But I've seen worse (Ultima IV anyone?)
For the life of me I could not get into Bioshock, I liked the first two minutes and then it just started going downhill.
QuoteI still maintain that episodic releases are terrible and break up the flow of the game, destroy tension, and invite people to make cynical assumptions that it's all about trying to squeeze out as much money as possible
Ohh no, I dislike episodic games. Everytime I finally get into one... BOOM it is over and the next one cannot start where the last one left off and thus has its own arc.
The major limitation of episodes is that they cannot maintain a single arc.
Add in that the largest provider of episodic games, Telltalegames, are made to be as easy as possible... And you get a problem.
---
As for another worst game I ever played... Roguelike time!
Nethack
I know what some of you may be thinking: "But Neonivek, Nethack is GOOD"
Yet my experience with it is as such: Eventually I get to a point where a secret wall won't open and I starve to death.
As well Nethack suffers from what I call "Wikipedia Roguelike" in that you are outright expected to look up info you could not have possibly have found out in game to finish it.
I actually never played Nethack, but I do usually like roguelike games, though I never liked Dwarf's Fortress
Quote from: stika on July 05, 2013, 05:41:01 PM
I actually never played Nethack, but I do usually like roguelike games, though I never liked Dwarf's Fortress
You will probably like Nethack. I hate it, it is the worst roguelike I ever played but that is just because from my perspective it is terrible.
As for Dwarf Fortress, give it time... It has a LOOOOONG way to go.
Quote from: Neonivek on July 05, 2013, 03:14:34 PM
Ohh no, I dislike episodic games. Everytime I finally get into one... BOOM it is over and the next one cannot start where the last one left off and thus has its own arc.
The major limitation of episodes is that they cannot maintain a single arc.
I don't know... If it's done properly, each episode has its own arc that contributes to the overall story arc - just like a TV season or a series of books.
I think the Cognition episodes do a pretty good job of sticking to one story arc that contributes to the overall plot.
The TSL episodes, of course, are all about one single story arc, so you only get the story in chunks.
QuoteI don't know... If it's done properly, each episode has its own arc that contributes to the overall story arc - just like a TV season or a series of books.
Well "Back to the Future" wasn't a bad game but it suffered this the worst.
Each game had to have its own "Smashing ending" and "Smashing start" to the point where the main arc is just not all that interesting because each "episode" has to maintain it.
Now let me go into a TV show that actually had Arcs.
Now this anime I like had a three episode arc (actually longer, but these are the three I am handling).
The first was somber and was setting up the emotional tone of the next three episodes but wasn't too exciting, the second ends with the big reveal, and the third is the consequences.
Even television shows can fudge the "excitement" of episodes to go to the next ones and can hold things back for others.
But the issue with the "episodic game" formula is that because each episode is sold individually each episode has to be THE GREATEST EPISODE EVER! and be a game onto themselves.
Thus a single arc cannot be maintained.
As for Cognition, I cannot comment on it. I mostly have my dislike of episodic games from TellTale...
Wallace and Grommit though held up but that was because it was an episodic game that didn't have a main arc. Sure there were developments that progressed game to game, but there was no grand unifying storyline.
Silver Lining also escapes this by having each game occur one after the other without feeling like each one is competing with the other (because the game isn't being sold individually) thus when I play them back to back I don't get whip lash because each one moves smoothly into the next. Each game is about what it means for the main arc and not "what each game means for its individual story".