@FrozenLiquid:Seriously? I love that game, but that open world was fucking empty.
Counter-points would include:
That's the entire point of SotC being open world. You spend a long time wondering why the entire place is barren, then at some point in your journey it finally hits you. No other open world game has turned its geography into a thematic issue. It's brilliant, and I'll contend it's one of the only open world games where people enjoy playing the game just to traverse the open world. Many open world games end up becoming chores. Which leads me to:
Being empty isn't a sin. Ubisoft fill their open worlds with so much stuff to do, it makes their open world stuff even worse.
So yeah.
I understand perfectly well what the point of the open world in SotC was, and I love the game for what it attempted to do and how well it pulled it off. I believe the setting of the game worked perfectly well. But we're talking about the best open world here, not the best game to have an open world.
Nah, thread basically asked greatest open world game. Shadow of the Colossus is in a way an open world game, although with the loose as definition he's going with Zelda technically fits, and Mario 64. And well yeah if Chaz is asking best game in the genre, well No. Brother is high.
Well, if we're judging it as an open world game then SoTC is a horrible open world game. There isn't shit to do in that world.
It's true, breh. I justified this pretty well in the OP.
I highly recommend you give this game time (assuming you have not played it already, that is)
Yeah, but you think Skyrim is good, so I treat your opinions on open world games the way I treat texasgoldrush's opinion on anything... with an enormous fucking mountain of salt.
And no, I haven't. Played some of the first one, own the second one, have not finished either.
and its the same way I treat your opinions....
Bioshit Infinite is deep......what a laugh.
I don't think I ever called that game deep. Just really good with some neat concepts.
In fact, I don't think I've ever called a video game deep, with the exception of talking about depth in terms of mechanics.
Wow.
It seems like games aren't good enough to deserve to be played by you. You're too superior.
Um... I don't know how you got that out of what I wrote. I just called Bioshock Infinite a very good game with neat concepts and a couple of great characters. I love that game. It's in my avatar and signature, for God's sake.
Do I think its story is deep? No. That's not a slight against the game. Just that, you know, books and movies exist, and it's really hard to tell a deep story in a video game.
I don't think I ever called that game deep. Just really good with some neat concepts.
In fact, I don't think I've ever called a video game deep, with the exception of talking about depth in terms of mechanics.
Wow.
It seems like games aren't good enough to deserve to be played by you. You're too superior.
Um... I don't know how you got that out of what I wrote. I just called Bioshock Infinite a very good game with neat concepts and a couple of great characters. I love that game. It's in my avatar and signature, for God's sake.
Do I think its story is deep? No. That's not a slight against the game. Just that, you know, books and movies exist, and it's really hard to tell a deep story in a video game.
But lacking depth =/= bad.
Depth has a standard but it's different across any medium.
If you want depth, go read a book as you said. But when talking about depth in a game, don't you think lowering the standard to a more acceptable level would be the rational thing to do.
Bioshock Infinite definitely has deeper storytelling than most games out there, easily. Any person that disagrees is just trying to be a hipster and sound unique/special...you'll be surprised how many of these fools exist.
Bioshock games nails presentation...and in terms of video games THEY DO NOT LACK DEPTH AT ALL.
Well, if we're judging it as an open world game then SoTC is a horrible open world game. There isn't shit to do in that world.
Nah you just judge it as a game, and as a game Shadow of the Colossus is stellar and its world absolutely plays a big role in that game being stellar. "The world needs to be filled with bullshit" as some must for the genre is 100% of the problem in terms of everything these games do wrong.
@acp_45: Same level of detail as a book? No. Same level of expectation and knowledge of what the word depth is? Yes. Film can never match detail, but it can absolutely match depth. You are mistaking sheer volume of words on paper to plot depth. And no I have no empathy for them (I'm the consumer, I'm going to look at things from my point of view, critics also should be similar), and I like plenty of games thank you very much (funny enough Bioshock Infinite happens to be one of them). Lowering the bar for story telling and the stories being told is exactly the reason why gaming stories haven't progressed as much as they could have, it's part of the problem. We come up with circle jerk sessions or flowery things like "it's the citizen kane" for straight up mediocrity at times.
Bioshock Infinite is imaginative and certainly does more than most FPS games do. But is it particularly deep? **** and no. The racism lacks any teeth what so ever, ditto for religious elements of the narrative. It doesn't work well at highlighting anything about those subject matters, which is fine I don't need an allegory, but just because it has subject matters that aren't usually found in triple A games doesn't make something deep. In contrary it highlights how they didn't even try to tackle subject matters bigger than shoot shoot bang bang, multiverse bro. Game out right drops them for stuff, and pure writing is concerned it is easily apparent that the game has been rewritten one too many times, Elizabeth's character development just goes from 0 to 60 at the end and is devoid of any elegance, the rapture part adds nothing to the mythos or plot other than a cheap "Look fans, we Bioshock", and the ending completely falls apart. There is no consistent through line to make it all work, and its idea of covering plot holes was "nah, it's multiverse, we hand waving".
That's not depth, that's not even well written, that's not even tackling some taboo subject matters in gaming. That's a farce. Do my expectations create disappointments? Sure, it's why I keep my hype for a video game in check these days.
@jg4xchamp: except SOTC is filled with complete bullshit because the only thing in that world are those stupid lizards. Its not even really an open world, it's more of a hub with different split off sections that you have to tackle in order.
I don't think I ever called that game deep. Just really good with some neat concepts.
In fact, I don't think I've ever called a video game deep, with the exception of talking about depth in terms of mechanics.
Wow.
It seems like games aren't good enough to deserve to be played by you. You're too superior.
Um... I don't know how you got that out of what I wrote. I just called Bioshock Infinite a very good game with neat concepts and a couple of great characters. I love that game. It's in my avatar and signature, for God's sake.
Do I think its story is deep? No. That's not a slight against the game. Just that, you know, books and movies exist, and it's really hard to tell a deep story in a video game.
But lacking depth =/= bad.
Depth has a standard but it's different across any medium.
If you want depth, go read a book as you said. But when talking about depth in a game, don't you think lowering the standard to a more acceptable level would be the rational thing to do.
Bioshock Infinite definitely has deeper storytelling than most games out there, easily. Any person that disagrees is just trying to be a hipster and sound unique/special...you'll be surprised how many of these fools exist.
Bioshock games nails presentation...and in terms of video games THEY DO NOT LACK DEPTH AT ALL.
No, it lacks depth? Why. Because the characters do. That's the downfall of Bioshock Infinite. The character writing is downright terrible. The protagonist barely has a story to him or a motive, with the plot driven by the deus ex Lutece twins, the antagonist has no motives either, he is a religious bigot just "because", Elizabeth's character development is so rushed and forced she really doesn;t develop at all, and Daisy Fitzoy....so bad that the DLC had to retcon her character, and make it even dumber. Fink and Slate exist to throw bad guys at you. And you expect it to pull off a huge character based ending with shitty character writing?
Infinite sucks, its no where near as good as Bioshock 2 or Minerva's Den, despite ripping those games off for its plot. And the Burial At Sea DLC....that's the Ultima IX of the Bioshock series.
If all your concerns lay with the story of a product, then gaming might not be the best venture for you my friend ;)
As subjective as it may be, just like any good story in fact, I care the most about the "fun factor" a game presents me. And that will, of course, change from person A to person B.
If all your concerns lay with the story of a product, then gaming might not be the best venture for you my friend ;)
As subjective as it may be, just like any good story in fact, I care the most about the "fun factor" a game presents me. And that will, of course, change from person A to person B.
No, I expect it to be well written...like Fallout 1, 2, and New Vegas were. Its not.
And the speech checks are fucking stupid....New Vegas had it so right and Bethsderp goes and dumbs it down.
@FrozenLiquid:Seriously? I love that game, but that open world was fucking empty.
Counter-points would include:
That's the entire point of SotC being open world. You spend a long time wondering why the entire place is barren, then at some point in your journey it finally hits you. No other open world game has turned its geography into a thematic issue. It's brilliant, and I'll contend it's one of the only open world games where people enjoy playing the game just to traverse the open world. Many open world games end up becoming chores. Which leads me to:
Being empty isn't a sin. Ubisoft fill their open worlds with so much stuff to do, it makes their open world stuff even worse.
So yeah.
I understand perfectly well what the point of the open world in SotC was, and I love the game for what it attempted to do and how well it pulled it off. I believe the setting of the game worked perfectly well. But we're talking about the best open world here, not the best game to have an open world.
Nah, thread basically asked greatest open world game. Shadow of the Colossus is in a way an open world game, although with the loose as definition he's going with Zelda technically fits, and Mario 64. And well yeah if Chaz is asking best game in the genre, well No. Brother is high.
Well, if we're judging it as an open world game then SoTC is a horrible open world game. There isn't shit to do in that world.
The Assassin's Creed series has the most to do in any open world. Incidentally, Assassin's Creed Brotherhood onwards are the lamest open world games ever.
There's more power in SotC's barrenness than there is in almost all other open world games combined.
On another note if you guys are narrowly defining all open world games as "large sprawling maps with a checklist of busywork to do", seriously, **** all of you. That's like supporting cancer. This is why we get rubbish like Dragon Age 3.
@FrozenLiquid: and I wouldnt consider the assassins creed games good open world games because what you do in the world isn't meaningful. its a balance dude. SOTC is a great fucking game but I wouldnt say its a great open world game. Just like Mass Effect 2 is a great game but I would never say its a great third person shooter.
@FrozenLiquid: and I wouldnt consider the assassins creed games good open world games because what you do in the world isn't meaningful. its a balance dude. SOTC is a great fucking game but I wouldnt say its a great open world game. Just like Mass Effect 2 is a great game but I would never say its a great third person shooter.
I saw you guys already had an argument several pages back and didn't really see eye to eye, but I'll be siding with the other guys on what constitutes an open world game (it's not the same as a sandbox).
One of the reasons I'm on the side of "The Witcher 3 is a really grand open world game" is because they tried really damn hard to handcraft all the things the player would be doing. @charizard1605_ hit it on the head when he said an open world is more of a setting than an actual genre, and @MirkoS77 added that it helps a narrative construct, that being the ultimate landscape that ties all the threads of the Witcher 3's story together. It's actually a helluva lot like the design of Morrowind, which eschewed the earlier roguelike nature of Arena and Daggerfall and went for a static, handcrafted open world. It's still Bethesda's best game, far better than the more dynamic, emergent, but ultimately shallower games of Oblivion and Skyrim.
So if an open world game is not a sandbox, but more of a setting that helps convey the game's narrative construct, then hell to the freakin' yes Shadow of the Colossus is a fantastic open world game. I cannot think of too many other games beyond SotC that live or die by its open world nature. It's a fundamental part of the experience.
@FrozenLiquid: and I wouldnt consider the assassins creed games good open world games because what you do in the world isn't meaningful. its a balance dude. SOTC is a great fucking game but I wouldnt say its a great open world game. Just like Mass Effect 2 is a great game but I would never say its a great third person shooter.
I saw you guys already had an argument several pages back and didn't really see eye to eye, but I'll be siding with the other guys on what constitutes an open world game (it's not the same as a sandbox).
One of the reasons I'm on the side of "The Witcher 3 is a really grand open world game" is because they tried really damn hard to handcraft all the things the player would be doing. @charizard1605_ hit it on the head when he said an open world is more of a setting than an actual genre, and @MirkoS77 added that it helps a narrative construct, that being the ultimate landscape that ties all the threads of the Witcher 3's story together. It's actually a helluva lot like the design of Morrowind, which eschewed the earlier roguelike nature of Arena and Daggerfall and went for a static, handcrafted open world. It's still Bethesda's best game, far better than the more dynamic, emergent, but ultimately shallower games of Oblivion and Skyrim.
So if an open world game is not a sandbox, but more of a setting that helps convey the game's narrative construct, then hell to the freakin' yes Shadow of the Colossus is a fantastic open world game. I cannot think of too many other games beyond SotC that live or die by its open world nature. It's a fundamental part of the experience.
its not really though. you're just going from one monster to the next. there is zero reason to explore. witcher 3's world is too big. There are large chunks of it that you never even see because there are no sidequests or missions or reasons to go there. both games are great but not because of the open world
@acp_45: Same level of detail as a book? No. Same level of expectation and knowledge of what the word depth is? Yes. Film can never match detail, but it can absolutely match depth. You are mistaking sheer volume of words on paper to plot depth. And no I have no empathy for them (I'm the consumer, I'm going to look at things from my point of view, critics also should be similar), and I like plenty of games thank you very much (funny enough Bioshock Infinite happens to be one of them). Lowering the bar for story telling and the stories being told is exactly the reason why gaming stories haven't progressed as much as they could have, it's part of the problem. We come up with circle jerk sessions or flowery things like "it's the citizen kane" for straight up mediocrity at times.
Bioshock Infinite is imaginative and certainly does more than most FPS games do. But is it particularly deep? **** and no. The racism lacks any teeth what so ever, ditto for religious elements of the narrative. It doesn't work well at highlighting anything about those subject matters, which is fine I don't need an allegory, but just because it has subject matters that aren't usually found in triple A games doesn't make something deep. In contrary it highlights how they didn't even try to tackle subject matters bigger than shoot shoot bang bang, multiverse bro. Game out right drops them for stuff, and pure writing is concerned it is easily apparent that the game has been rewritten one too many times, Elizabeth's character development just goes from 0 to 60 at the end and is devoid of any elegance, the rapture part adds nothing to the mythos or plot other than a cheap "Look fans, we Bioshock", and the ending completely falls apart. There is no consistent through line to make it all work, and its idea of covering plot holes was "nah, it's multiverse, we hand waving".
That's not depth, that's not even well written, that's not even tackling some taboo subject matters in gaming. That's a farce. Do my expectations create disappointments? Sure, it's why I keep my hype for a video game in check these days.
I agree with you. My point I'm trying to make is that depth in video game storytelling in general isn't exactly great. It's held back by conventional ways or just the fact that to present a well-written story in a game is difficult. That's why I was comparing Bioshock Infinite to other games. Bioshock are deeper than most games out there....and at least it doesn't ride on conventional storytelling trains..It's unique in a sense regardless of the how the ending just fell flat on it's face.
I don't think I ever called that game deep. Just really good with some neat concepts.
In fact, I don't think I've ever called a video game deep, with the exception of talking about depth in terms of mechanics.
Wow.
It seems like games aren't good enough to deserve to be played by you. You're too superior.
Um... I don't know how you got that out of what I wrote. I just called Bioshock Infinite a very good game with neat concepts and a couple of great characters. I love that game. It's in my avatar and signature, for God's sake.
Do I think its story is deep? No. That's not a slight against the game. Just that, you know, books and movies exist, and it's really hard to tell a deep story in a video game.
But lacking depth =/= bad.
Depth has a standard but it's different across any medium.
If you want depth, go read a book as you said. But when talking about depth in a game, don't you think lowering the standard to a more acceptable level would be the rational thing to do.
Bioshock Infinite definitely has deeper storytelling than most games out there, easily. Any person that disagrees is just trying to be a hipster and sound unique/special...you'll be surprised how many of these fools exist.
Bioshock games nails presentation...and in terms of video games THEY DO NOT LACK DEPTH AT ALL.
No, it lacks depth? Why. Because the characters do. That's the downfall of Bioshock Infinite. The character writing is downright terrible. The protagonist barely has a story to him or a motive, with the plot driven by the deus ex Lutece twins, the antagonist has no motives either, he is a religious bigot just "because", Elizabeth's character development is so rushed and forced she really doesn;t develop at all, and Daisy Fitzoy....so bad that the DLC had to retcon her character, and make it even dumber. Fink and Slate exist to throw bad guys at you. And you expect it to pull off a huge character based ending with shitty character writing?
Infinite sucks, its no where near as good as Bioshock 2 or Minerva's Den, despite ripping those games off for its plot. And the Burial At Sea DLC....that's the Ultima IX of the Bioshock series.
Never once did I say the writing was good in Bioshock Infinite. I didn't play the DLC so I'm just gonna go with your criticism.
Bioshock games. Deeper doesn't equal good. Bioshock games are easily deeper than most games out there. It switches between controversial topic to social commentary. I have played my share of games....maybe you have played more than me..but Bioshock games are one of the relatively better games that tackle these types of stories.
@acp_45: Same level of detail as a book? No. Same level of expectation and knowledge of what the word depth is? Yes. Film can never match detail, but it can absolutely match depth. You are mistaking sheer volume of words on paper to plot depth. And no I have no empathy for them (I'm the consumer, I'm going to look at things from my point of view, critics also should be similar), and I like plenty of games thank you very much (funny enough Bioshock Infinite happens to be one of them). Lowering the bar for story telling and the stories being told is exactly the reason why gaming stories haven't progressed as much as they could have, it's part of the problem. We come up with circle jerk sessions or flowery things like "it's the citizen kane" for straight up mediocrity at times.
Bioshock Infinite is imaginative and certainly does more than most FPS games do. But is it particularly deep? **** and no. The racism lacks any teeth what so ever, ditto for religious elements of the narrative. It doesn't work well at highlighting anything about those subject matters, which is fine I don't need an allegory, but just because it has subject matters that aren't usually found in triple A games doesn't make something deep. In contrary it highlights how they didn't even try to tackle subject matters bigger than shoot shoot bang bang, multiverse bro. Game out right drops them for stuff, and pure writing is concerned it is easily apparent that the game has been rewritten one too many times, Elizabeth's character development just goes from 0 to 60 at the end and is devoid of any elegance, the rapture part adds nothing to the mythos or plot other than a cheap "Look fans, we Bioshock", and the ending completely falls apart. There is no consistent through line to make it all work, and its idea of covering plot holes was "nah, it's multiverse, we hand waving".
That's not depth, that's not even well written, that's not even tackling some taboo subject matters in gaming. That's a farce. Do my expectations create disappointments? Sure, it's why I keep my hype for a video game in check these days.
I agree with you. My point I'm trying to make is that depth in video game storytelling in general isn't exactly great. It's held back by conventional ways or just the fact that to present a well-written story in a game is difficult. That's why I was comparing Bioshock Infinite to other games. Bioshock are deeper than most games out there....and at least it doesn't ride on conventional storytelling trains..It's unique in a sense regardless of the how the ending just fell flat on it's face.
Most is a fallacy that ignores that most works of anything actually aren't good, by the very nature of something being good and great are. It's story telling was totally conventional, more so than the original Bioshock and System Shock. A lot of the stuff in Infinite just didn't fit the game nearly as well as it did in Bioshock (Voxophones for instance came off silly where as the audio logs in Bioshock at least sort of make sense).
@acp_45: Same level of detail as a book? No. Same level of expectation and knowledge of what the word depth is? Yes. Film can never match detail, but it can absolutely match depth. You are mistaking sheer volume of words on paper to plot depth. And no I have no empathy for them (I'm the consumer, I'm going to look at things from my point of view, critics also should be similar), and I like plenty of games thank you very much (funny enough Bioshock Infinite happens to be one of them). Lowering the bar for story telling and the stories being told is exactly the reason why gaming stories haven't progressed as much as they could have, it's part of the problem. We come up with circle jerk sessions or flowery things like "it's the citizen kane" for straight up mediocrity at times.
Bioshock Infinite is imaginative and certainly does more than most FPS games do. But is it particularly deep? **** and no. The racism lacks any teeth what so ever, ditto for religious elements of the narrative. It doesn't work well at highlighting anything about those subject matters, which is fine I don't need an allegory, but just because it has subject matters that aren't usually found in triple A games doesn't make something deep. In contrary it highlights how they didn't even try to tackle subject matters bigger than shoot shoot bang bang, multiverse bro. Game out right drops them for stuff, and pure writing is concerned it is easily apparent that the game has been rewritten one too many times, Elizabeth's character development just goes from 0 to 60 at the end and is devoid of any elegance, the rapture part adds nothing to the mythos or plot other than a cheap "Look fans, we Bioshock", and the ending completely falls apart. There is no consistent through line to make it all work, and its idea of covering plot holes was "nah, it's multiverse, we hand waving".
That's not depth, that's not even well written, that's not even tackling some taboo subject matters in gaming. That's a farce. Do my expectations create disappointments? Sure, it's why I keep my hype for a video game in check these days.
I agree with you. My point I'm trying to make is that depth in video game storytelling in general isn't exactly great. It's held back by conventional ways or just the fact that to present a well-written story in a game is difficult. That's why I was comparing Bioshock Infinite to other games. Bioshock are deeper than most games out there....and at least it doesn't ride on conventional storytelling trains..It's unique in a sense regardless of the how the ending just fell flat on it's face.
Most is a fallacy that ignores that most works of anything actually aren't good, by the very nature of something being good and great are. It's story telling was totally conventional, more so than the original Bioshock and System Shock. A lot of the stuff in Infinite just didn't fit the game nearly as well as it did in Bioshock (Voxophones for instance came off silly where as the audio logs in Bioshock at least sort of make sense).
You see I didn't mind the voxophones. I guess you're starting to tread onto subjective territory now.
Well, if we're judging it as an open world game then SoTC is a horrible open world game. There isn't shit to do in that world.
On another note if you guys are narrowly defining all open world games as "large sprawling maps with a checklist of busywork to do", seriously, **** all of you. .
That's how they talk games in general man, rpgs too. It's 80 hours long, so it has "substance", when that's not how the word substance works.
Most is a fallacy that ignores that most works of anything actually aren't good, by the very nature of something being good and great are. It's story telling was totally conventional, more so than the original Bioshock and System Shock. A lot of the stuff in Infinite just didn't fit the game nearly as well as it did in Bioshock (Voxophones for instance came off silly where as the audio logs in Bioshock at least sort of make sense).
You see I didn't mind the voxophones. I guess you're starting to tread onto subjective territory now.
Audio logs made sense in a city crumbling and all that jazz, or in terms of doctors/scientists just recording their work. The Voxophones feel incredibly after a certain point given how many of them there are, the subject matter in them, and the fact that the city isn't exactly on the downswing until mid game. Subjective is the liking it part, the part where it fits the story of Infinite to have something like Voxophones really doesn't have much leg to stand on other than devs haven't found a better way of conveying this stuff.
Nah, Skyrim is still a better open world. Witcher 3's side quests get predictable. There isn't much running into random things in the open world, pretty much every side quest can be found on a notice board first. The treasure hunting becomes super useless really fast unless you're looking for Witcher gear. There isn't nearly as much to interact with like with skyrim.
Also, the npc chatter and actions are fucking horrible. Its not really any different than what the older asscreed games did. There are tons of nameless npc clones wandering the streets doing nothing and the "sound" of the city is just as bad as previous Witcher games where there is a noticeable loop.
It has no emergent game play. You'll never travel to a major city or town and see it getting attacked by a dragon while some npcs fight it and others run for cover. I never even saw monsters fight each other in the open world like they do in skyrim.
Bethesda games have so many more systems and their games are so much more ambitious than any other open world games. Yea, Witcher 3 did it's best to imitate Skyrim but it failed in a lot not ways.
I have to second this. The Witcher 3 was too story heavy and cinematic driven for an open world game far less being the best open world game. Its also interesting that exploration of the world was not rewarding because most of the things you get from exploration was too high of a level in addition to the acquisition of these treasures grew stale pretty quickly. For an open world game, it went out if its way to punish the player for not taking sidequests and following the storyline with XP penalty. The world was huge and vastly empty. That is not to say the game is bad, its far from it but it lack the core elements that make open world games amazing that being exploration, encounters and side quests that are created from the exploration. Also exploration was a chore rather than a reward.
I don't think I ever called that game deep. Just really good with some neat concepts.
In fact, I don't think I've ever called a video game deep, with the exception of talking about depth in terms of mechanics.
Wow.
It seems like games aren't good enough to deserve to be played by you. You're too superior.
Um... I don't know how you got that out of what I wrote. I just called Bioshock Infinite a very good game with neat concepts and a couple of great characters. I love that game. It's in my avatar and signature, for God's sake.
Do I think its story is deep? No. That's not a slight against the game. Just that, you know, books and movies exist, and it's really hard to tell a deep story in a video game.
But lacking depth =/= bad.
Depth has a standard but it's different across any medium.
If you want depth, go read a book as you said. But when talking about depth in a game, don't you think lowering the standard to a more acceptable level would be the rational thing to do.
Bioshock Infinite definitely has deeper storytelling than most games out there, easily. Any person that disagrees is just trying to be a hipster and sound unique/special...you'll be surprised how many of these fools exist.
Bioshock games nails presentation...and in terms of video games THEY DO NOT LACK DEPTH AT ALL.
Would it be the rational thing to do given the medium? Sure.
Should we hold games to a lesser standard? Absolutely not. If we do that, they don't get any better. Game writing has, in my opinion, actually gotten worse over the last 15 or so years. If you point to really well-written games, a lot of them came out in the mid-late 90s and early 2000s.
I think Bioshock Infinite tries to be deeper than most things, but it doesn't always succeed. It touches on stuff like racism and American exceptionalism and religion, but that's all it does - touches. It doesn't go any further than that. It actually drops that stuff for the multiverse plot points later on, which is fine, but it brings up some genuinely cool concepts and then doesn't do a lot with them, which is a little disappointing.
I think things work in Infinite. I think Booker as a character works. I think Elizabeth as a character works, despite the fact that most of her development is backloaded. I think Columbia is a cool place with a lot of neat environmental storytelling. But it either went through one too many script drafts or one too few, and it bites off a lot more than it can chew in the runtime it has. If it had scaled back the universe stuff, I bet it could have handled the social commentary better, and vice versa. It just tries to do too much. It's too ambitious.
The original Bioshock was a lot better in regards of delivering theme and development, and that game kind of falls about in the last act, post-Ryan.
I don't think I ever called that game deep. Just really good with some neat concepts.
In fact, I don't think I've ever called a video game deep, with the exception of talking about depth in terms of mechanics.
Wow.
It seems like games aren't good enough to deserve to be played by you. You're too superior.
Um... I don't know how you got that out of what I wrote. I just called Bioshock Infinite a very good game with neat concepts and a couple of great characters. I love that game. It's in my avatar and signature, for God's sake.
Do I think its story is deep? No. That's not a slight against the game. Just that, you know, books and movies exist, and it's really hard to tell a deep story in a video game.
But lacking depth =/= bad.
Depth has a standard but it's different across any medium.
If you want depth, go read a book as you said. But when talking about depth in a game, don't you think lowering the standard to a more acceptable level would be the rational thing to do.
Bioshock Infinite definitely has deeper storytelling than most games out there, easily. Any person that disagrees is just trying to be a hipster and sound unique/special...you'll be surprised how many of these fools exist.
Bioshock games nails presentation...and in terms of video games THEY DO NOT LACK DEPTH AT ALL.
Would it be the rational thing to do given the medium? Sure.
Should we hold games to a lesser standard? Absolutely not. If we do that, they don't get any better. Game writing has, in my opinion, actually gotten worse over the last 15 or so years. If you point to really well-written games, a lot of them came out in the mid-late 90s and early 2000s.
I think Bioshock Infinite tries to be deeper than most things, but it doesn't always succeed. It touches on stuff like racism and American exceptionalism and religion, but that's all it does - touches. It doesn't go any further than that. It actually drops that stuff for the multiverse plot points later on, which is fine, but it brings up some genuinely cool concepts and then doesn't do a lot with them, which is a little disappointing.
I think things work in Infinite. I think Booker as a character works. I think Elizabeth as a character works, despite the fact that most of her development is backloaded. I think Columbia is a cool place with a lot of neat environmental storytelling. But it either went through one too many script drafts or one too few, and it bites off a lot more than it can chew in the runtime it has. If it had scaled back the universe stuff, I bet it could have handled the social commentary better, and vice versa. It just tries to do too much. It's too ambitious.
The original Bioshock was a lot better in regards of delivering theme and development, and that game kind of falls about in the last act, post-Ryan.
I'm just saying that instead of comparing a game to a book/movie why not just compare it to other games...
@jg4xchamp: we live in an age where every game is every genre. just because one game is a good rpg doesnt make it a good open world game.
Mildly true, except your idea of "open world game must have all this bullshit to do" isn't exactly some universal metric worthy of merit. I don't want games chalk full of banal checklists. The actual world in Shadow of the Colossus adds to the atmosphere, tone, and narrative of that game. If you made it a series of hallways it would lose so much of its appeal, it is absolutely an important part of that experience.
This isn't a Mafia 2 scenario where the hub world was completely devoid of point other than "look how pretty this is".
@jg4xchamp: I mean, Mafia 2s open world is pretty similar to SOTC. Its all just dressing. Mafia 2s world is only there for atmosphere as well.
I'm not saying a good open world should have tons of collectibles and checklists, in fact, that's what asscreed does and those are bad open world games. The world has to do more than just add atmosphere. SOTC has a great world for what it's trying to accomplish but I'd never call it a good open world game because it's not really. Everyone that plays that game is going to play it the same way and fight the bosses in the same order. That would be like calling Mario 64 an open world game.
@jg4xchamp: I mean, Mafia 2s open world is pretty similar to SOTC. Its all just dressing. Mafia 2s world is only there for atmosphere as well.
I'm not saying a good open world should have tons of collectibles and checklists, in fact, that's what asscreed does and those are bad open world games. The world has to do more than just add atmosphere. SOTC has a great world for what it's trying to accomplish but I'd never call it a good open world game because it's not really. Everyone that plays that game is going to play it the same way and fight the bosses in the same order. That would be like calling Mario 64 an open world game.
That I sort of agree with, I wouldn't call it an open world game. It's probably going back to that thing where we're being too loose with what we're calling open world. By these definitions Metroid, Zelda, and Mario 64 (well Mario 64 is an open world game) would fit the bill.
I'd say the greatest open-world game of all time is still Shenmue. Not only was it an open-world pioneer that was light-years ahead of its time, but it remains unique to this day. While most open-world games follow the Rockstar/Bethesda school of open-world design, Shenmue's approach to open-world design is radically different and refreshing.
The detail this game has per square metre/yard is still second to none in the genre. The only ones that came close were those walking simulators like Gone Home, which are tiny in comparison.
Exactly. While most open-world games today are trying to be as big as possible, Shenmue instead focused on density, packing as much detail and content as possible into every street corner (although Shenmue was large as well for its time).
I'd say the greatest open-world game of all time is still Shenmue. Not only was it an open-world pioneer that was light-years ahead of its time, but it remains unique to this day. While most open-world games follow the Rockstar/Bethesda school of open-world design, Shenmue's approach to open-world design is radically different and refreshing.
The detail this game has per square metre/yard is still second to none in the genre. The only ones that came close were those walking simulators like Gone Home, which are tiny in comparison.
Exactly. While most open-world games today are trying to be as big as possible, Shenmue instead focused on density, packing as much detail and content as possible into every street corner (although Shenmue was large as well for its time).
This is one of the main reasons why I'm looking so forward to Shenmue III. In Shenmue I & II, I actually cared to look around and get immersed in the world, because there is is so much detail. Most other games just focus on making the world big and do nothing else.
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