Springheel on 14/4/2013 at 11:35
The latest interview with Roy had him saying something to the effect of, "It's been 10 years since the last Thief, and the way we play games today is really different than the way we played them ten years ago."
Maybe I'm getting old, but what exactly is so different about it?
jtr7 on 14/4/2013 at 11:56
I know. Other than the controllers, or the tech behind the video and audio, I don't know how a game developer can't see it's the same things being repeated. Thief didn't fit its own times, but of course drew from its time and from what came before, and that part's normal.
retractingblinds on 14/4/2013 at 11:56
The use of glowy things in level design. They're a lot more frequent today.
Melan on 14/4/2013 at 11:58
It looks like the kind of industry "common wisdom" that turns into a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you follow the common wisdom and succeed, you are proving its value. If you follow the common wisdom and fail, you just weren't trying hard enough. Thinking outside the common wisdom? If that was such a great idea, why aren't we seeing games like that, wise guy?
And so on and so on, until everything comes crashing down, or someone gets sufficiently backed into a corner to do the desperate thing and actually innovate.
Development costs also have a lot to do with it.
jtr7 on 14/4/2013 at 11:58
How information is delivered via the graphics has changed, but that's also normal for the entire run of video game development.
Yeah, the industry, while trying to capture the biggest payout, always paints itself into a corner, and consumers who say "That's how things are! Deal with it!" are the primary reason it goes that way.
sterlino on 14/4/2013 at 12:12
i agree .. it's different today.
long time ago it was: ''think.. move.. think.. move''
now it is: ''Kill... jump... kill.. jump''
that's it.
bartekb81 on 14/4/2013 at 12:18
Games are faster, shorter, easier with controls and gameplay, much more forgiving. You have auto-saves every 5 minutes and checkpoints every 20 meters. You have objective and direction markers all the time, levels are often straightforward. Graphics and audio effects are very important. Narrative is very movie-like.
Nuth on 14/4/2013 at 12:20
Maybe he's talking about people not being as engrossed in the game as they used to be rather than the games themselves. Game few minutes, text a while, game a few more minutes, do something else, etc. That's not how I do it, but perhaps he's talking about the people that games are marketed toward these days.
jtr7 on 14/4/2013 at 12:21
Sure, and game developers are pushing it, not a victim of it.
Captain Spandex on 14/4/2013 at 12:36
The sad irony?
Eidos Montréal need look no further than their own studio's first product, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, to see that they're operating under fallacious logic. With the exception of a few cosmetic frills, it's a game that plays like it could have been released in 2000 for PC.
Games like System Shock 2 and Thief aren't 'ancient gaming history', either. If they were a person, they wouldn't be able to drink without a fake I.D.
