View Single Post
Old 12-17-2004, 10:03 AM   #33 (permalink)
MooseMan3000
wouldn't mind being a ninja.
 
MooseMan3000's Avatar
 
Location: Maine, the Other White State.
Well, I'm not going to take the time to write a very long response, but just a few points I'll mention.

Farcry AI. I don't think it's better. They're better at killing you, but they don't react more intelligently. You can make a game hard without having good AI. This is, of course, purely a subjective analysis, but I don't think it was that good. I liked the game a lot, so I'm not complaining, just noting. Same goes for the marines in Half-Life. They may be better at killing you than the enemies in Half-Life 2, but they're not smarter.


As far as the game companies you mentioned, I totally agree with you. There are many very good game development companies. I'm just of the opinion that there are many more that are more interested in making a dollar than a good game. id, no doubt, is a very good company, and I very much enjoy their games. No argument here.

As far as Doom3 graphics setting the bar... I disagree. Again, this is entirely personal, but I believe that Doom3 looks good, but it's not as flexible as Half-Life 2. No, I can't prove it, but that's what I feel whenever I play the two games. Doom3 looks nice, no doubt, but it's essentially a very specific implementation of very specific effects. Feel free to disagree with me, but that's the way I see it.

STEAM. Of course they make more money on a copy of Half-Life 2 bought via STEAM than one bought at retail. That's part of the aim. The other part of the aim, however, is to take out the middle-man in delivering the game to consumers. Ultimately, distribution just causes problems, and if it can be done by the development company itself, I fully support it. How many games do we see that are pushed out too fast and are buggy almost to the point of being unplayable? I would argue that most of the time it's because a publisher is breathing down the development company's neck to get the product out there. How many people want to put out a game that doesn't work?

And this brings me to my main point, and the reason I say Half-Life 2 is revolutionary. They're taking a new approach to everything. They want a world that is entirely interactive. Until this point, we've seen a few walls that can be blown up, and a few chairs than can be kicked around. Half-Life 2 goes a long way beyond that. The gameplay had to be rethought entirely to accomodate the freedom of movement inherent in this design. The AI isn't perfect, but it's not going to be. It's essentially built from the ground up to react dynamically, not to a specific set of conditions (the main reason I think the AI is better than Farcry). Of course this isn't entirely true, but again, I'm talking goals here.

Everything about this game is designed so as to push development forward. I don't think this is the best game ever. I think the design, plot, and gameplay of the original Half-Life are all better than Half-Life 2. There are lots of games that are more fun than Half-Life 2, but there aren't any that are as innovative. I totally agree with you that there are issues, and some of them interfere with the gameplay. There are issues. But I think this game does more expand the field of FPS and gaming in general than any other game since, perhaps, Half-Life.

So my response actually was long. Sue me.
MooseMan3000 is offline  
 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250 251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260 261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270 271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280 281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290 291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300 301 302 303 304 305 306 307 308 309 310 311 312 313 314 315 316 317 318 319 320 321 322 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330 331 332 333 334 335 336 337 338 339 340 341 342 343 344 345 346 347 348 349 350 351 352 353 354 355 356 357 358 359 360