konstantin.neo on 5/10/2009 at 22:52
I mean like what happened to this game, why didn't it took off and owned the sales.
Kolya on 6/10/2009 at 01:27
SS2 didn't "own the sales" but it didn't sell bad either. Your question is posed from a retrospective point of view. Nowadays SS2 is considered a classic but when it came out it was a hard, disturbing game that required more than a kid's passing glance to note it's quality. Gamer demographics have changed since 1999, there are more mature gamers around today.
D'Arcy on 6/10/2009 at 08:42
Are you sure about that? Sure, there might be a few more mature gamers around, but most of these are the ones who were already playing games back when SS2 came out, they just got older. A game like SS2 would most likely be successful within a niche market of older or more experienced gamers, but in general terms a commercial failure, simply because it's just too complex and complicated for today's newer generations of gamers.
The tendency of gaming is, and has been for a long time, dumbing things down, in order to appeal to the masses - that's why, for instance, you got Bioshock to be the way it is, and not the game that Levine promised us. Most of today's newer gamers would probably get fed up and give up on the game after quickly running out of ammo, or simply don't having a clue on what to do next because they wouldn't bother to pay attention to the logs and e-mails. Even SS2 was already, when compared to the original Shock, dumbed down.
Enchantermon on 6/10/2009 at 11:50
Quote Posted by D'Arcy
A game like SS2 would most likely be successful within a niche market of older or more experienced gamers, but in general terms a commercial failure, simply because it's just too complex and complicated for today's newer generations of gamers.
Which is why we have sixteen million different versions of EA's sports games floating around, instead.
Quote Posted by D'Arcy
Even SS2 was already, when compared to the original Shock, dumbed down.
I don't know so much about that; with the cyber modules, SS2 brought a depth to the gameplay that SS1 didn't have.
Kolya on 6/10/2009 at 12:07
What I mean is that SS2 is likely to be more appreciated by mature gamers. And I'm sure there are more of those now than in 1999 when computer games as a mass phenomenon were barely more than ten years old.
Of course that's part of a general trend, there are also more younger gamers, and it's easier to aim marketing at that group, or at best somewhere in the middle as Bioshock did very successfully.
But hey if you don't like that theory, I've got others. :D
SS2 (and even more so SS1) is a nerd game, that requires you to think and plan, instead of just blazing through a fun time shooting. And those have and will always appeal to only small subset of gamers. The fact that SS2 is drawing a wider audience today is mostly based on that small subset's continous praise and work.
D'Arcy on 6/10/2009 at 12:53
Quote Posted by Enchantermon
I don't know so much about that; with the cyber modules, SS2 brought a depth to the gameplay that SS1 didn't have.
If you, at any time in SS2, have no idea of what to do next, all you need is open your 'to do' list. You don't even need to listen to the logs in detail. In the original Shock, all you had were the logs and e-mails. Sometimes, they weren't even very clear in telling you exactly what to do; you just had to figure things out for yourself. Which could lead to long periods of wandering around aimlessly, especially if you hadn't found the particular log that would let you know what to do next.
Plus, the original Shock is a lot more difficult for a first time player than SS2 is. There's no tutorial, or training, you just wake up inside Citadel station and all of the sudden you start getting attacked right after you open the first door. And using the lead pipe is a LOT more difficult than using the wrench. Shock is definitely not a user friendly game.
Kolya: yes, the Shock games are nerd games. What they have today is a cult status amongst its fans, and that itself might be enough to get new people curious about them. Furthermore, with the tendency to dumb down games, it's easy to get bored about new releases, because gameplay tends to be very similar between different games. So older games give you a chance to experience something new and different, not available in today's games.
Al_B on 6/10/2009 at 20:30
Quote Posted by D'Arcy
Plus, the original Shock is a lot more difficult for a first time player than SS2 is. There's no tutorial, or training, you just wake up inside Citadel station and all of the sudden you start getting attacked right after you open the first door.
Just a tiny nitpick - but although there's no
in game tutorial there was one included in the Terminal Access manual. I agree that even with that it's not as 'new player friendly' as SS2 - particularly for players coming to it for the first time today.
I don't know if it would be called 'dumbing down' but the thing I missed most in SS2 was the lack of cyberspace. Although cyber modules did give an additional depth to the sequel, the mixture of the virtual and non-virtual worlds in the original gave an extra dimension to the game.
Nameless Voice on 6/10/2009 at 21:42
Quote Posted by D'Arcy
If you, at any time in SS2, have no idea of what to do next, all you need is open your 'to do' list. You don't even need to listen to the logs in detail. In the original Shock, all you had were the logs and e-mails. Sometimes, they weren't even very clear in telling you exactly what to do; you just had to figure things out for yourself. Which could lead to long periods of wandering around aimlessly, especially if you hadn't found the particular log that would let you know what to do next.
That's one of the things that's great about SS1 which SS2 is lacking. There seems to be an ever-increasing trend towards hand-holding in games these days. Oblivion is a prime example, with a window popping up and telling you exactly what to do in every quest, whereas older Elder Scrolls games at least kept the journal hidden unless you looked at it, and had far less in-depth suggestions as to what to do.
At least it's justified in SS2, as SHODAN believes you to be an incompetent lackey who needs to be constantly reminded of what they're doing in order to do a simple task.
D'Arcy on 6/10/2009 at 21:54
Lansing, Bracail, and the other people on Earth do more or less the same thing in Shock. But they don't send you messages so often, and many of the times their messages are just cut short by SHODAN, leaving you guessing what were they trying to tell you.
You're right about the hand holding thing, which is part of the whole dumbing down trend. In the last couple of years, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. was probably one of the few games I've played that doesn't treat the player like a little kid. It's rough, not easy to get into, and you can easily get killed shortly after starting. In many different ways. Maybe that's why I liked it so much. Of course, then the developers just followed the trend and kind of ruined things in Clear Sky. I'm just crossing my fingers regarding Call of Pripyat, hoping that it can be more like the first game.
Zygoptera on 6/10/2009 at 21:58
While I agree that Oblivion is a good example of handholding run wild, I think it isn't unreasonable for there to be some form of 'quest log' in SS1. I would have thought that one of the first things to be put into any cybernetic enhancement would be a diary equivalent (and there certainly is email/ log/ data etc storage) which would include a to do list- and in much the same way that it isn't necessary for the player to know how to reload a minipistol or magpulse it would be logical for the Hacker to know to put important goals into that to do list.
And I say that as someone who never got 'stuck' in SS1 and loathes the current trend towards making games impossible to lose.
