3D Dot Game Heroes

The Core Video Games Forum
#21

You are still misreading what I’m saying. I’m not glorifying the Zelda series at all. I think the series has been a borefest since Ocarina of Time. If I’m ‘glorifying’ anything, I’m ‘glorifying’ Zelda 2, LTTP, and Link’s Awakening - the games in the series which not only were the true gems, but were also the games which 3D DGH tried so hard to emulate. Forget about the new Zeldas. I’m not trying to make any statement about them, and I don’t give a rat’s ass about them cos I don’t like them.

I loved the graphical style and the gameplay was fun without being irritating, fire temple aside. Their game over mechanic was pleasant in how it didn’t fuck you , old school style. The game can take 20 + hours if you try to get extra goodies and the game cost only 40$ new. Its a better deal than a lot of the shit we’ve been fed by a lot of companies.

If this is ‘a better deal than a lot of the shit we’ve been fed by a lot of companies’, that doesn’t say much for the gaming industry. 3D DGH flitted between boringly easy and downright obnoxious (all depending on whether or not you have full life), and there was a huge emphasis on stupid and sometimes time-sensitive fetch quests (which btw, I find it horrifying that gamers are beginning to condone so easily). Whether or not you liked the art style, that doesn’t make a good game, and I honestly don’t see a big difference between 3D DGH’s game overs and any of the Zelda games it tried to emulate. Who cares if it’s 40 dollars? I would still want my time back if I got it for free or not (which I technically did; someone else bought it). Price doesn’t affect how good a game is, plain and simple.

#22

Price affects value. A game that lasts 6-8 hours, like the last Ubisoft stealth game whose name I can’t remember, is not worth 60-70 dollars. Shorter, focused games at a lower price, like Shadow Complex, amongst other XBLA titles, are cheap and worth their value. A piece of shit game like Infinite Undiscovery is so bad, its insulting to pay more than I did for 3ddgh. Hell, I had more fun playing 3ddgh than I did FFXIII and DMC4.

Value is the ratio of how much I enjoyed playing something vs how much I paid for it.

#23

I just disagree. Price fluctuates so heavily with games. Will IU becomes less bad if you only had to pay five dollars for it? What if someone gave it to you for free? Would 3D DGH be that much better if you got one of those $40 + $10 rebate sales that Amazon and Gamestop were doing with the game?

I mean if that’s how you want to enjoy games, sure. Frankly, I don’t give a shit. What matters to me was how fun the time was, not how MUCH time I was having for, and especially not some abstract ratio where i try to measure how much fun I had with it and compare it to the price I paid. This seems like an especially inane practice when I know I could have waited a year and got it for less. Somehow, I think it ultimately doesn’t matter much to gamers either, even if they think it matters to them. Otherwise, they’d be patient and wait for price drops and virtually every game they play, and they don’t. Why wouldn’t they, though? Every game’s value would go up!

Anyways. Until paying less for a game means that the game gets more fun somehow, then I don’t care about price point, and it doesn’t factor into my reviews in the slightest. I’ve only mentioned price point in one review I’ve ever written, and I felt like a total asshole for doing it, cos it had nothing to do with my review or my enjoyment of the game. Yet, there I was, telling someone if I thought the game was worth their forty dollars. What a bunch of crap.

#24

The problem is that things like quality and length of games is extremely variable, yet the pricing for games is not. I agree that what matters at the end is the enjoyment, but not all games are equally enjoyable for equally long. FFXIII, for example, had fun bits, they were just stretched out by tedium. Ultimately, what I’m saying is proven by Steam. This is extremely simple economics.

They create these discounts on a weekly basis and see what happens. Price is affected by demand and at a lower price, more people are willing to pay for a product that isn’t of equal quality as Half Life 2. People will pay what they think is worth them paying. Ie Value. In that line of thinking 3ddgh is well placed at being at a budget for being a simple title, in the same line as games like World of Goo and Plants vs Zombies and several XBLA titles. Pricing doesn’t affect the quality of the game. It affects the value, of which quality is a component.

Mentioning price in reviews is not a bad thing because your review ultimately is about telling people whether or not something is worth their purchase. That is the service being provided by the gaming press. Addressing price addresses the concept of value. What you get vs how much you pay. Since not all games are equal, its obvious why not all games lose their value equally at Gamestop. Its a matter of demand. Its a matter whether or not they perceive they will enjoy a product and this perception is influenced by several factors like marketing or whether or not they know it will be enjoyable. And while speaking of Gamestop, the exact phenomenon you described about people waiting for prices to drop is what drives the 2nd hand market and why publishers are up in arms against it.

#25

Ahh Sin you’re being so subjective it’s killing me. You’re trying to force your lens on the completely standalone quantitative value of how good a game is.

How good a game is, black and white, has nothing to do with how much it costs you. I’d say the cost of games varies just as wildly as the quality, Id say. For example, SG played this game for free. That kind of thing happens a lot, in my experience anyways.

And you guys are obsessing over this shit about how long a game is. I find that has very little to do with how good a game is. I can understand using that variable in Sin’s “value” stuff etc, but not really whether or not it is a good game. Obviously you want games that are tons of fun to be longer… but they aren’t. They are the same~ length no matter what

#26

Allow me to condense this for you:

How much a product people buy depends on whether or not they think its worth their buying.

For video games, what is worth buying depends on whether or not they think they will enjoy playing it.

What they choose to pay is thus dependent upon how much they think they will enjoy it.

Thus publishers do what they can to influence what people will perceive about how enjoyable something is, to maximize the number of people paying full price.

#27

well i just skimmed through some posts again and I see that you are really the only one referencing this Sin-Value. You started out in a manner that probably made people think “quality” and then defined your Sin-Value. I don’t think anyone else cares about your Sin-Value, you’re just quoting and trying to… refute? what someone else thinks (correctly, that price does not affect the quality of a game)

And what about my post made you think I didn’t understand your economics? I think I just didn’t reference them and you got upset

#28

Sorry, I just re-edited my post with a coherent response.

It doesn’t matter what I think is good. What matters is what people at large think is good since it takes more than 1 person buying a game to provide a publisher with a reasonable rate of return.

I explicitely stated that pricing doesn’t influence quality, but the perceived quality will influence what people will be willing to pay.

This relationship is manifested in many ways, whether through Steam or the second hand market.

#29

ahh jesus i have lost sight of what is going on youre explaining economics again and i feel like ive made like 5 posts and you’ve made 1 more and i feel like all of a sudden you’ve made way more posts than me. give me a second to gather myself

oh wow you edited a post not made a new one… ive been doing that too

Okay you are just all about people then. I’m looking at this completely different. I feel like perception, what people want to pay, etc has no place in this conversation… But I’m the one just jumping in now I guess. Unless you’ve been talking about value rather than quality the entire time… in which case I apologize I’ve done way too much ritalin and I’m really pumped to say what I think but I’m kind of scatter brained.

another edit: Do you think that if everyone that exists thinks a game is good, that game is good? and yeah sorry I should have read your posts more carefully I just get excited and try to dive right in. I saw that you had said literally that as the page loaded after I made that post… whoops!

#30

Yeah this was a funny exchange with the edits :P. I agree that the misunderstanding didn’t help. My understanding of the debate was that it was about what people were willing to pay since SG went batshit over how talking about pricing is inappropriate.

EDIT!

I have a short fuse, so I’m not any better. Sorry about the explosion. Your enthusiasm is appreciated though! We need more people jumping into discussions, honestly.

To answer your question, I don’t believe people will equally believe that a game will be good because different people will not experience things the same way or look for the same things. I think there is an unknown number of people that may be interested in a given title, just not necessarily all willing to pay the same price. A prime example is how Walhalla liked the blur effect and SG didn’t.

I think this interview with Gabe Newell accurately describes some of what I’ve been trying to communicate: http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=22378

Here, Newell will claim that when he dropped the price for L4D, sales rose 3000% and eclipsed the initial opening sales of L4D. This was unheard of at the time because games catering the crowd of people that play L4D typically follow a specific pattern where sales drop logarythmically. What he demonstrated was that by lowering the price, Valve reached more people who felt that the game offered a value (expected enjoyment : price ratio) they were willing to pay. And he didn’t just reach a few stragglers. He reached the motherload. The gamasutra article is direct proof that different people will pay differentially based on what they think of the games they buy.

On a similar note about whether or not people will think games are equally enjoyable, this is when its useful to know what reviewers are like when reading a game’s review because the reviewers’ tastes might not match yours. This is why, for example, quality magazines or websites don’t give sports games to the RPG guy, or racing games to the action adventure guy. You’re just not going to get a good evaluation of what the game is about and whether or not it will make that niche happy. The review will be poor because the person may not enjoy the game and it is very likely that this person will not communicate the information relevant to his audience. He will perform a disservice to his readers by not informing them properly as to whether or not a game is of interest to them. From what I can read about SG’s tastes, it would be a bad idea to have him play Diablo since he’s not fond of the point and click / hack and slash model of doing things. However, should SG be reviewing such a game, it would be appropriate to disclose his bias to modulate the readers’ expectation.

#31

Yeah dude I’m pretty sure you’re right I’m gonna just move on to the next topic :stuck_out_tongue: if there is one anyways

ps: You went to med school, right? I’m right behind ya :wink:

#32

Ha!

I just edited my last post to answer your question.

Edit:

To summarize everything I posted in 1 sentence:

Pricing doesn’t affect the quality of the game, it influences whether or not people will pay for what they expect to get.

#33

The only problem I have with this is that pricing isn’t static. You said in your first response to me that quality and length of games is variable and not price. Beyond the ability to just wait for deals or price drops, different regions in the world have different prices, too. If I were to use Price Point in a review, and say “ultimately this game isn’t worth your $60”, does that mean the game is even worse in Australia where they have to pay $100? That just doesn’t seem right to me.

While most critics try and tell you if a game is worth your money, I do not. I just think that’s very irresponsible. Not only does price fluctuate, but money as an object differs from person to person also. If I think a game isn’t worth $40, maybe some guy who can buy like five or six games a month will think it’s TOTALLY worth $40?

To me, the right way to review a game (or really any medium of art) is to say how the game made me feel. A review worth reading is subjective, and that’s how you do it. You don’t do it by assessing a game’s monetary value…and for who? The middle-class gamer? Lower class? Rich? Australian? European? The gamer who looks for discounts or waits for price drops? People don’t always agree with how I feel about games (and that’s great; seriously, why even write opinion pieces if everyone has the same opinion all the time?), but at least FEELINGS are consistently understood no matter where you go. Price (or more specifically, whether or not a game is worth YOUR $60/$40/$200/$5) is not.

#34

It may not seem right to you but that’s how the world turns. Market forces direct how much a game sells for. I agree that the fact non-US countries pay substantially more on video games (beyond the exchange rate of the currency) is retarded. I think the article I linked in the last page and the explanation I provided is reasonable and supports my claims.

#35

Alright, that’s great, but it’s moving off of what I’m saying: using price as a way to critique any art is downright stupid. While price is obviously important, it has no place in a review. If anything, articles like that, or things like the Humble Indie Bundle prove something that I usually say in response to this issue: it’s up to the GAMER, not the CRITIC, to decide if something is worth their money. Otherwise, wouldn’t an 89 on Metacritic with 5/67 perfect scores and only one score below 80 be automatically well worth $60? If a reader can’t read a few reviews (or find a critic that speaks to them) and make an informed decision on their own about a purchase, then fuck them. Obviously, though, they can figure that out for themselves; they don’t need me or any other critic to hold their hand in that regard.

#36

You’re deviating from the original topic by confusing art critique with game review. First you talk about how the reviewer is supposed to be give an honest impression of his experience. You acknowledge at the end of your last post that the sum of these experiences by different people should aid a consumer make a purchase. Now you bring also the concept of the art critique, which is totally off topic. People are buying entertainment. Not art. This isn’t to say that games aren’t art, but why people buy games.

If we stick to the original discussion, the review has to do with explaining whether or not a purchase should be made. If a game is enjoyable, then yes. If a game is not, then no. Reviews have the direct consequence of influencing purchasing habits and so you can’t pretend reviewers aren’t implicated. Since we live in a grey universe with gradients of experiences, then people decide what they are willing to pay for what they believe they will experience. Thus the price point. Its not just whether or not its worth their money. Its worth how much of their money. QED, Steam, Gabe Newell at gamasutra

Don’t put words in my mouth with metacritic ratings. If you believe I said that then you need to go back and read my posts.

#37

Delayed response, but man, SG. What the hell happened the day you wrote your review? You menstruated all over the game! Seriously. I already said, in less details, pretty much the opposite of what you wrote, so I don’t think it’s worth my time to try to make you change your mind, just like your review didn’t change mine. I guess for the most part, we just don’t like the same things in our games, because I enjoyed (or didn’t mind) most things that you complained about. I don’t know what you were expecting from 3Ddgh, but I was expecting to be entertained and have simple fun, and it delivered. …But really, did you think the game was that much harder without full health (because I probably spent most of my time in dungeons without full health and the only one that frustrated me was the Flame Temple)? And the blur gave you a headache? I thought it was such a neat effect!

Anyway, I don’t consider it a bad thing to mention price in a game review. I think it’s appropriate if a reviewer felt a game was particularly overpriced for what it provided or if a quality game is available for less than full price. Obviously, pricing has nothing to do with the quality of a game, but a reviewer should be able to communicate whether or not a game is worth purchasing.

#38

I don’t make a distinction. Games are ‘art’, that doesn’t mean they have to be artsy-fartsy, avant-garde, or even try to make a statement. Art is anything not created for survival purposes. But sure, if you’d like to call it ‘entertainment’, then sure, entertainment should be critiqued in all the ways I just said. All that’s changing is terminology, and it’s nothing more than splitting hairs. My primary goal is to tell people how I felt when playing the game; aiding someone’s purchase is a secondary effect, one which will inevitably happen, but it’s not what I’m aiming to do. Maybe I’ll just help them decide if they want to play it at all, and they’ll just pirate it, or rent it or borrow it. It’s not like movies where you have to wait a few months; you can rent them right away. I just want to let people know whether or not I liked it, and why. Whether to player decides to play it or not, and how they decide to get their hands on it, is something I have no true effect over.

If we stick to the original discussion, the review has to do with explaining whether or not a purchase should be made. If a game is enjoyable, then yes. If a game is not, then no. Reviews have the direct consequence of influencing purchasing habits and so you can’t pretend reviewers aren’t implicated. Since we live in a grey universe with gradients of experiences, then people decide what they are willing to pay for what they believe they will experience. Thus the price point. Its not just whether or not its worth their money. Its worth how much of their money. QED, Steam, Gabe Newell at gamasutra

And since we live in a gray universe with gradients of experiences, wouldn’t we be more helpful to gamers by employing a more personal touch to our reviews, rather than trying to simply decipher if we think some game is or isn’t worth “someone’s” spending the retail price on it? This is how critiques of all other art/entertainment/whatever works; it’s an absolute mystery to me why gamers are the only people who think this way.

And, I refuse to believe it’s because games are more expensive than other forms of entertainment; people pay out the ass to see a movie in a theatre, just ONE time, so it’s not as if we’re reaching some sort of logical conclusion. Gamers could totally get games cheaper if they wanted to, either by looking around for deals or waiting for price drops, and they don’t. We just have this collective sense of entitlement that’s really fucking retarded. You know that Indie Bundle I linked to? Did you know that the devs estimate that 25% of people with that bundle pirated it? They pirated a bundle of games that you could buy for ONE_CENT. How could I hope to discern whether or not something is worth someone’s money in a world where people will pirate games to save a penny?

Don’t put words in my mouth with metacritic ratings. If you believe I said that then you need to go back and read my posts.

I’m not sure what you mean, sorry if I offended you though.

#39

LOL! Well, I don’t try to come into a game with any expectations. I admit my impression was a bit colored cos I watched my roommate play through quite a bit of the game. But, if anything, my experience was waaaaaay better than what I thought it would be. And no, I don’t think the game was HARDER without full health (I actually got a lot of the trophies for beating bosses without taking damage).

What I mean is that it’s more frustrating; suddenly, your sword isn’t very powerful (which makes boss fights take for-frickin’-ever), it gets caught on everything, any practical application of the dash attack is hampered, etc. A lot of these problems stem mainly from the nerfed sword being still waaay too long. Having an oversized sword is kinda funny when it can go through walls, otherwise it’s more like a game mechanic made to ensure that everything is more tedious than it has to be. The fact that the game glitched several times on me wasn’t help either. I’ve had my sword catch empty air, and I’ve even crashed into nothing with a dash attack. That’s infuriating.

And, if it’s not frustrating, then you just have a big sword that goes through walls, kills everything in one hit, and can reach one end of the room from the other. That’s also not very fun…it’s boring.

I guess I’m not saying anything that I didn’t write already, so lemme just say, I don’t think the game was terrible. I’ll admit, I THOUGHT it was going to be terrible, and it really wasn’t. But no, I didn’t really find anything about playing it worthwhile. I don’t feel like I saw anything interesting or fun, or anything I hadn’t seen before. It was just a game, trying to be like another game that was already made, only better.

P.S: What’s with everyone bitching about the flame temple, the wind temple was like forty times more annoying. The only thing I disliked in general about the flame temple more than any other dungeon was the need to use the freeze spell a lot, which caused a lot of slowdown.

#40

Movies are the same as games, so I wouldn’t say gamers are unique. Its just the atmosphere around games is different because the community / crowd is different. The dialogue is different, but the concepts are the same. Regardless of what you believe your primary goal is, your action to review something and to post this review is an endorsement or not an endorsement. Since games aren’t free, the direct consequence is that someone will make a value judgment as to whether or not something is worth their money. The proportion of people who will regard their purchase as art is so small as to compared to the global market that they don’t significantly count in the bigger sales picture. Regardless of the artistic nature of a game, publishers need to recoup their investment to make more games.

I didn’t find the wind temple that bad. It was long, but the fire temple was assinine with the blue-yellow tentacle things. Its the only temple where the “can’t attack because you’re in the door” phenomenon pissed me off. It was also assinine that you could be attacked while your screen was loading when changing stairs. I died right before I got to the boss. Ergh.