Fountain of Youth?

[snoopy369]

I disagree with you very much. Back in the '90s, plenty of games were buggy. You just don't remember them; you remember the good ones. There simply wasn't enough information available to know which games were bad or buggy... so you couldn't decide whether to buy a game based on its bugginess or not. You had to buy it, unless a friend bought it and bugtested it for you first; but your circle of friends might have been 10, at the most (and probably less if you played computer games ) Nowadays, if you are patient, it's simple to wait a week and see what the 'net says about it.

[Aerion]

Snoopy, my point is that the FoY is one example of something that was fun and interesting removed from a game because it could not be balanced for multi-player.

TBS games are uniquely unsuitable for multiplayer. So few of the players will ever play it multiplayer. Almost no one is going to NOT buy the game because it doesn't have multiplayer.

Balancing a game for both single player and multiplayer is hard to do for the two approaches have very unique challenges. Game mechanics for AI have to be designed with AI in mind. And player's expectations against the AI are different.

In short, multiplayer is the latest fad in game design and for that reason it is way overvalued and overused. This wouldn't be a problem except that it drives game design in a way that isn't helpful to the genre.


As an aside, in the world of MMORPG games, PvP has similarly made many possible good games tank. The MMORPG world is starting to come around that it's ok for a game to be totally PvE.

[Aerion]

Actually, I think both Snoopy and Ebony are half right.

Back in the '90s, there was no easy way to distribute patches. So game producers tried hard to get the game right before it was released. Games were also smaller and somewhat simpler so that was easier to do.

Now, with the internet, games are ridiculously easy to patch. So I think cash crunched game producers are releasing games with known bugs with the notion that they can patch them after release. And, in many cases, games are bigger and more complicated so producing a bug free game is harder to do.

Of the two choices, I like the current system better though I do wish game producers would try a bit harder to get the bugs out. I generally look for game patches right after I install the game and even before I play it for the first time.

I think Civ4:Col automatically looked for a patch when I started it the first time.

[ebonyknight]

Interplay was a good example. They made extremely good games that weren't that buggy (like Star Trek, Descent and Freespace). As they became more popular the quality of the games declined, programmers left and eventually Interplay had to be bought out due to declining sales.

Games were just not as buggy back then, because (in part) they WERE simpler. Same as with the consoles these days. It's hard to find a Nintendo that doesn't work anymore vs. the high failure rates of the cutting edge systems now. More moving parts, mean more chances for things to go wrong. The same applies for programming.

Also with graphics being so poor, gameplay WAS A MUST! Without gameplay, you literally had nothing. Too many "kids" these days are just concerned with the "eye candy". Does it look kool? If so, they buy it. Again, no better example than Spore. It looks fabulous, but the game play sucks and wears thin incredibly fast.

The times have changed from games for gamers, by gamers to being a cash cow. Producers are actually seeing the profits that can be made. Every year since the beginning of this century, I hear news story after news story about how the gaming industry is growing and is economically independent of economic conditions. Just yesterday I saw a report that now hard economic times are upon us, video games are going to be the new "speak-easys" for this economic downturn.

Quality is, has been and (especially now) will continue to go down. Col was originally a SP game and now the remake has really removed a lot of the elements that made it a fun SP game. It has had a lot of the complexity removed to become more "mainstream". If Sid is willing to submit (an inferior product) to corporate greed at the expense of the quality of his work, then forget him. If he cannot or will not provide the same quality of games that he has become famous for, then there is no need to run to the store when the next Sid Meier game hits the market. Even the Civ games have been going down hill. People are just using his name to make money and apparently, he lets them.

There is too much of this mentality today. A good product comes out, then as it becomes more popular, the quality fades and finally the "sell-out". Sad part is people then become apologists for poor quality, while clinging to the name, like a drunk and his bottle. Very sad.