Stop me if I’ve gone on about this before, but I’ve been wondering if user created content (specifically on consoles) is something that we really want to be courting as an industry, or even as gamers.
On the surface, yeah, this sounds like a very good thing. I think mainly because we’re all operating from the assumption that it will all be good, or at the very least, most of it will be good. Hell, I’d even take some of it being good.
Unfortunately for everyone involved, my very unscientific and anecdotal statistics show that typically almost none of it is any good. I avoid user created TF2 levels like the plague. Sure, out of the 100s that have been created, Valve has managed to sift through the detritus to find us a couple that are worth sharing every so often (and they just so happen to be ones I’ve already downloaded. Hooray I get to download them again!). But good lord, there is no greater displeasure in my gaming than waiting to download a map (a very long time over my wireless DSL) only to have it be some untextured nightmare that looks and flows like it was made by an eight year old. Easily 99 times out of 100 I get something that doesn’t even remotely resemble a finished or balanced level.
And these are still “gated” by the fact that we’re dealing with PCs.
The PC has a natural buffer to it that keeps most people from attempting user created content. There’s usually some installation that needs to happen, then some unpacking (meaning you need to get an unpacker). Then there’s a lot of forum trolling about how to use the SDK for the game you’re trying to mod, and if you even manage to figure out how to get the ball rolling, then there’s the actual work to be had. Most people give up. Many just phone it in (as evidenced by over ten years of grabbing mods with only a handful of successes).
Now, imagine the “gate” of the PC being eliminated. Imagine everyone and their moms generating user created content, because it’s coming to a console near you. Prepare to smile through clenched teeth and nod politely while your friend subjects you to all ten of his incredibly uninspired Little Big Planet levels he made as a shrine to his favorite animes. Maybe your other friend wants you to check out his awesome Guitar Hero IV riff he made for the new Steve Vai song. You don’t even like Steve Vai. He knows this. He doesn’t care. And he has more.
The point here is that professionals make professional grade content. Amateurs make amateur grade content. Am I saying one is better than the other? Oh yes. Yes I am. Consoles are wonderful to me because in the past, there’s been two guarantees which up until this console cycle were intact in one form or another:
The game will work straight out of the box and not require a patch.
Only devs working on a dev kit can make content.
People, these are good things, and they were why consoles were wonderful. Now with the inclusion of hard drives and games including author kits for content creation, we’re right back in amateurville again.
Does anyone remember Napster? Even that was ruined by people submitting sub-par quality files claiming they were sampled at 128k, if you even got the file as labeled. Half the time you got static or Barney’s “I Love You” or some other ancient form of “Rick Rolling.” I can’t wait to grab a version of a challenging song for Guitar Hero IV only to find that the person gave up authoring note patterns halfway through and just repeated the green note a thousand times. That’s IF the song quality is even worth listening to in the first place.
Sure, there will be an occasional diamond in the ruff, but I’m not really willing to do the sifting to find it. I already have diamonds. I bought them at a store and they came packaged in shrinkwrap with little reflective shiny stickers on them that guaranteed me that every single level I downloaded for Little Big Planet was not going to have nothing but hairy penises in them.
Yes, it’s true, in my day, we walked to school through five feet of snow up hill, both ways.
I just read that the Still Alive map pack (which evidently has been available free this whole time for PC) that is due to be released for Portal on the consoles is going to be missing the voice of GLaDOS. I recall when I learned a map pack was coming being super excited for a “sequel” of sorts to the main game, but now that I’ve heard GLaDOS won’t be voicing the levels, I feel it’s a big let-down.
Portal isn’t just about puzzles, as I’ve already discussedatrediculouslengths. Easily half (if not more than half) of the charm of the game comes from the mental puzzle of “what’s going on here?”
And with that missing from the map-pack addition, I just really don’t have any desire to pick it up and play it. Would it be too difficult to record some new VO for them? Even if there wasn’t any story? Heck, rewind things and make it a prequel to Portal, what with you running a different course while there’s still plenty of ASL staff around. We could see them getting in the way, and contradicting GLaDOS. We could see just how inefficient they are compared to her. Maybe we could live through the part where GLaDOS loses it and gasses the complex or something.
For me, playing Portal without GLaDOS is like peanut butter without the jelly. I just won’t be participating in this one. Sorry guys.
Maybe it’s the old coot in me, but this preview comment by Richard Mitchell from Xbox360fanboy regarding his hands on playthrough of the Fallout3 presser just made the hair on my neck stand up and immediately put me off:
Some things must be made clear. One, I played Bethesda’s Fallout 3 today. Two, I have never played a Fallout title before, so I can’t judge it based on the merits of the series.
Points in advance for Richard’s honesty here, but come on. While I can appreciate getting an impartial review from someone who isn’t familiar with the series, how can someone have a career in games journalism and not have played “one of the classics” like Fallout? Don’t get me wrong, there are obviously so many classics that it’s unlikely that any one person could have played all of them, but I’ve been noticing that as our industry rapidly expands, there’s quite a few people who are entering the ranks who simply lack the bona fides to be in the trenches. Much like an experienced vet, I don’t want to share my fox hole with the noob, and it irks me (possibly unfairly) that there’s young’ins being brought into the fold who haven’t been given a proper primer.
When I was at the GDC Games Design Workshop, during the “make a card game out of a classic video game” exercise, we were instructed to pick games that were so popular “everyone at the table should have played them or be familiar with them.” As I recall, Street Fighter was on the table as an option, and of the ten people at the table who were there to take a grueling two day boot camp on game design, only two of us (myself included) had played at least one version of Street Fighter. Take a look at this list. Pardon my French, but there are forty three fucking versions of Street Fighter there. If you haven’t played one of them at some point in your lifetime, even for just ten minutes, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that you probably should if you desire a career in the games industry, be it production, development, or journalism.
I don’t care if you’re only making web games, or phone games, or FPSs. There’s a whole gamut of games out there that you should have played, or should be playing. Broadening your taste in genres will only make you a stronger designer. Occasionally I can be stumped by a specific game (usually a sequel), but for the most part, I like to think that I’ve got at least one of the classics for each genre under my belt. If I had to make a list of what I consider a proper gamer’s primer, it might look something like…this:
US RPG: Elder Scrolls, Baldur’s Gate. Bonus points: Wizardry, Ultima (NOT online).
JRPG: Final Fantasy, Chrono Trigger
Sci-Fi RPG: Mass Effect, Fallout, KotoR
Fighter: Street Fighter, Tekken, Soul Caliber, Virtua Fighter
Combat Flight Sims: X-Wing/Tie, Wing Commander, (I know I’m missing some here)
Casual/Puzzle: Sims, any Maxis game, any PopCap game, Portal
Shmup: 1941, Robotron/SmashTV, Time Pilot, Ikaruga
Driving: GT, Burnout, Need For Speed (older)
Car Combat: Twisted Metal, Vigilante 8
Mech Combat: Mechwarrior (old and console), Virtua On, Battletech Center
Skateboarding: 720, Tony Hawk, Skate
Sports: Madden, NBAJams, Tecmo Bowl. Extra credit: Arch Rivals, Pigskin.
Platformers: Mario, Sonic, Crash Bandicoot
Action Adventure: Zelda, Metroid, Castlevania
Roguelike: Nethack, Dwarf Fortress
RTS: Command & Conquer, Starcraft, Dune, Warcraft
Turn Based Strategy: Final Fantasy Tactics, X-COM, Advance Wars
4X: Civilization, Age of Orion, Galactic Civilizations 2
Stealth: Metal Gear, Thief, Splinter Cell. Ultra bonus points: Wolfenstein (the original ancient Apple][ one).
Okay, I’m exhausting myself trying to come up with this list. Obviously, I’m engaging in an excercise of futility, but I don’t mind fanning some fanboy flames here.
What have I missed? Entire genres? Classics that can’t go without making it on the list?
Update: Added a bunch of category suggestions based on comments or oversights due to my lack of sleep when posting the original list. I imagine if given enough time this list could become something a bit like the AFI Top 100 Films.
Only enough time for a blurb here, but after just the first big day of nothing but E3 coverage, I’m already E3′d out. I haven’t heard any bombshells I didn’t already expect. Maybe the Final Fantasy XIII going to the 360 in the U.S. was kinda big? I don’t know.
Either this is going to be a snoozefest for big titles this X-Mas or the gaming industry has just gone so leak-prone that nothing is surprising anymore.
Possibly a little from column A, and a little from column B?
Anyone else burned out or underwhelmed? I should probably just go buy myself a 3G iPhone just to get some of that technolust high back.
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