Monday, November 24, 2003

i think that what makes some older games unplayable is improvements in the engine that the games run ontop of.

see, the problem with old gran turismos is that they aren't as sophisticated as gt3a. same problem with current gt contenders. in my opinion, need for speed, test drive, and the countless other, far worse driving sims out there (tokyo xtreme, project gotham) just don't simulate well enough. after the experience of racing in gt3a, the superlative experience that was gt2 becomes lost in the mire of other sims that aren't as good as the new gran turismo. it's a curse.

similarly, older 3d shooters are not much fun anymore. doom can still be fun, but it's no quake. the 2.5d makes all the maps essentially planar, and not being able to jump something that you miss immediately. what's worse, though, is wolf3d. no intersections of the map, no changes in elevation, no variance in ammunition. it's a milestone in id's history and i appreciate it for that, but i wouldn't want to play the single player or a deathmatch on that engine.

my feeling on fighting games is that you can totally go back. same with platform games. they're not different. you can do most of the same things -- a couple of extras these days, but nothing special. so you can't block in the air. that's like the difference between mario one and three -- being able to pick up shells, for instance. where the split comes is when tekken came out. once you could sidestep, everything changed, and i can't play a capcom game anymore. so i guess that's a conditional yes.

i'll have to defer to someone else on the subject of sports games. to me it's more or less the same to play tecmobowl or madden 2k3. but that's cause i don't really give a shit. what would revolutionize the genre (this may have happened to a degree already) is to take out this element of control-focus-change. when you play a game, you want to be the center of attention -- i have no problem with that. but i don't like that you always control whoever has the ball (you can choose to switch up a little, as i recall). what i would like to see is a suite of sports games where you only control one player. either you get a bunch of friends to do the rest of the work (whoa, that would be fun) or put that computer to work running the rest of the guys around the field/rink/court if you're fucking no-friends loser.

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