Heh -- I was laughing about that Atreides hawk strike. I probably don't really understand it that well, but it sure seems pretty lame. Whereas the Harkonnens get a decent nuclear attack, the Atredies get a bird that scares away some soldiers.

So I'm guessing that Tom didn't like Dune.

James,

It's not quite that simple. I have a love/hate thing going with Dune right now. We'll see which sentiment wins out by the time I have to turn in my review for Computer Games Magazine. :)

-Tom

Great Shoot Club as usual !!!

I think Brett Todd hit the high note with:

Good points aside, Emperor: Battle for Dune is a tired game based on a limited concept that was beaten to death in 1998. Dynamic campaign and true 3D engine or not, the essentials of gameplay still come down to the very same basics that have dominated such titles for going on a decade now. Even though Westwood has thrown in everything but the kitchen sink to make this arguably the ultimate traditional RTS, it's still hard to contemplate playing the actual game without yawning.

"It's not quite that simple. I have a love/hate thing going with Dune right now. We'll see which sentiment wins out by the time I have to turn in my review for Computer Games Magazine. :)"

Yeah, and Tom liked Red Alert 2 also. Just consider yourselves warned. Via psionic dolphins.

Westwood needs to be put out of their misery.

"Yeah, and Tom liked Red Alert 2 also."

Again, it's not quite that simple. I've played a lot of Red Alert 2; in fact, I still play from time to time. I like playing it, but I'm well aware of its faults.

In true wumpus style, I will link to a review (mine) to support my point:

http://www.sharkeygames.com/games/reviews/r/red_alert2/

-Tom

"But Red Alert2 has an irresistible ungainly likeability, almost like a dumb puppy that you just can't help but play with."

Which would make this game 50 years old in dog years. 3-legged dog years.

I guess as long as we keep smokin' it, they'll keep gowin' it. Personally I prefer a game where my units are at least wise enough to shoot back without being explicitly told to do so.

Westwood - proof that you CAN make the same game for 8 years and keep selling it.

"I guess as long as we keep smokin' it, they'll keep gowin' it. Personally I prefer a game where my units are at least wise enough to shoot back without being explicitly told to do so."

No kidding. If your shit is being shot at, soldiers, then fire away. It's very annoying to have a mongoose just sit there and let an inkvine catapult bombard it.

The AI is there, because in the campaign when you attack something the AI will respond. It's just when you control a side that your units will have to be explicitly commanded to fight back.

"The AI is there, because in the campaign when you attack something the AI will respond. It's just when you control a side that your units will have to be explicitly commanded to fight back."

To be fair, this problem is hardly limited to Westwood, although they should have gotten a clue by now you would think. As much as I loved Homeworld, your units had to be given some kind of order or they would just sit there while your mothership got pounded to space dust.

"As much as I loved Homeworld, your units had to be given some kind of order or they would just sit there while your mothership got pounded to space dust."

Jason,

Isn't this a function of the aggressiveness setting? When you build a unit, I think it's default setting was Neutral, but if you set it to Aggressive (hit F4), then it would attack any nearby enemies.

I could be wrong. I'll have to try it out later.

-Tom

Yeah, setting your ships to aggressive mode would help. They will attack anything that comes within a certain range, and they'll chase it if it turns around. However, they'll keep on chasing it forever if you let them, there's no "We're not catching up and he's not dumb enough to turn around, so we'll go back to where we started." setting. I guess that you could use "Guard" to accomplish this though. Aggressive mode also causes the ships to move slower and hit harder, and fighters will just sit still and shoot at a larger ship, instead of doing their nifty strafing runs.

On the other hand, if enemy ships get close enough to the mothership in enough numbers to "pound on it," then you're probably screwed anyway.

I've got both of the Homeworld games. Cataclysm was definitely an improvement on the original. I never finished either one though...

"Again, it's not quite that simple. I've played a lot of Red Alert 2; in fact, I still play from time to time. I like playing it, but I'm well aware of its faults."

But not so for Deus Ex. Its faults are so severe that the game is utter crap.

Whatever, Chick. I suggest you choose your targets more effectively in the future. If any game deserves, nay, DEMANDS to be splattered like an overripe melon, it's Red Alert 2 or Dune.

Not trying is the biggest sin of all. How you can blithely overlook that in the name of "fun" is a mystery to me. But it's your thing. Do what you wanna do. (etc)

"I've got both of the Homeworld games. Cataclysm was definitely an improvement on the original."

I agree that Cataclysm was a markedly better game than Homeworld-- which sorta proves that the original, though quite good in its own right, still had substantial room for improvement.

I used to really enjoy RTS games, but I just got burned out on them. They always boil down to the same old thing. Build up your forces, go forth and destroy, guy with the most tanks wins. Sacrifice was great (remember that game?) it was new, it was different. But, like any other game it eventually got old. I'm a big time Dune fan. So I was hoping this game would be good. But if it's just more Westwood cheese... Well, I might just wait until they offer it in the Dune 2/C&C/C&C2/Red Alert/Red Alert 2/ Emperor:Battle for Dune Ultra Hyper Battle Pack for $20.00. That shouldn't be too long from now.

"But not so for Deus Ex. Its faults are so severe that the game is utter crap."

I didn't have to review Deus Ex, so I was playing just for fun, and the game was aggravating enough to me to drop it. What kind of recommendation should I give the game?

I don't really understand this crusade you've undertaken. So Tom doesn't like Deus Ex and refuses to acknowledge that Counter-Strike is game of the year or even a trendsetter. Why do you continually harp on this, weeks and weeks later? It's boorish.

Yeah, if you're going to bust on Tom at least go to the trouble of whipping out the August 1998 issue of Wired magazine.

"Isn't this a function of the aggressiveness setting? When you build a unit, I think it's default setting was Neutral, but if you set it to Aggressive (hit F4), then it would attack any nearby enemies."

Right, and, as Mark pointed out, at least in multiplayer and skirmish you wouldn't want to get into that situation anyway. However, in the campaign game, of course, there was no avoiding attacks on the mother ship, and I remember the first time playing through it, here I've built all these nice new ships, and I have to tell them to do something or change their AI setting (at least it let you do that, unlike Westwood games) when the mother ship is under attack? C'mon guys!

"Yeah, if you're going to bust on Tom at least go to the trouble of whipping out the August 1998 issue of Wired magazine."

Wow, there's a blast from the past! You have no idea what a the pain in the ass it was to do that tiny little blurb. I must have pitched them a dozen different articles before they let me do a developer profile on Seamus Blackley. Then they wanted it rewritten numerous times. IIRC, it was only like 150 words. And then Seamus goes and releases friggin' Trespasser.

Needless to say, my career as a contributor to Wired didn't last very long... :)

-Tom

"What kind of recommendation should I give the game?"

Which is a bigger problem-- a game which tries a lot of new things and only partially succeeds, or a game that succeeds completely at doing nothing new at all?

I just don't get it. Why open such a giant can of whoop ass on Deus Ex, yet when it comes to the pinata of a game that is Dune, all Tom can muster is.. "I have a love/hate thing going with Dune right now"? Color me disappointed. I appreciate that Tom took the ballsy stance he did on Deus Ex, but why such a meek, tepid stance on Dune and RA2?

On a certain level this smacks of contrarianism.

"I don't really understand this crusade you've undertaken."

There's no crusade; I'm just pointing out what I perceive to be an inconsistency between Tom's viewpoints on Deus Ex, Red Alert 2, and Dune. Would Deus Ex have received a favorable review from Tom if it was a more-or-less exact copy of a previous game, like Red Alert 2 is?

"I just don't get it. Why open such a giant can of whoop ass on Deus Ex, yet when it comes to the pinata of a game that is Dune, all Tom can muster is.. "I have a love/hate thing going with Dune right now"?"

Well for one thing, he's reviewing Dune for someone so he's not going to write a thorough review of the game here.

For another, having played both myself, I enjoyed Dune more. That's not to say that Deus Ex may not be a more impressive game in other ways, but Dune's faults didn't get in my way as much.

The main thing is that it's tiresome to see you bring it up after all this time.

"There's no crusade; I'm just pointing out what I perceive to be an inconsistency between Tom's viewpoints on Deus Ex, Red Alert 2, and Dune. Would Deus Ex have received a favorable review from Tom if it was a more-or-less exact copy of a previous game, like Red Alert 2 is?"

Who cares? I have no idea. You and I don't even know what review score Tom is giving Dune, do we?

Wouldn't it be more sensible to just take objection to Tom's comments about Dune if you disagree rather than dredge up past reviews that you've discussed over and over?

Wouldn't it be even more sensible if wumpus just went away -- forever?

Aha! Here is anonymouse!

Coward! Reveal thyself and face the wrath of... er...well, just face the wrath. period.

I dunno. I don't know if I want Wumpus to just "go away." He often has good contributions. I do agree, though, that it's time for him to drop the whole Chick vendetta. I'd comment further, but I don't wanna open up that can of worms again.

Lando: Don't make me pull a wumpus on you and impersonate you brutally for comic effect!

Apologize sincerely and confirm the need to expel wumpus and I'll spare you ...

-- "Anonymouse"

---

Quote:

Which is a bigger problem-- a game which tries a lot of new things and only partially succeeds, or a game that succeeds completely at doing nothing new at all?

---

And when you've got a game like Red Alert 34, you can count on the fact that there will be some spin that makes it slightly different from its numerous predecessors, and that will make it fun to play, at least at first. Red Alert 2 is different enough from Red Alert that you could enjoy one and not the other, or be "in the mood" to play one but not the other. Sure, it's the same game rehashed, but some of that rehashing makes a tired game fun, at least for a while.

Hey, if you impersonate me brutally, it'll be amusing and entertaining.

Sounds fun!

Proceed! (Coward.)

It's kind of sad when you ask for it. You probably like root canals too. Besides, I've decided your screen persona is not as well-developed as wumpus's. Thus you are actually unworthy of satire.

Blah, blah, blah.

Is that the best you can do?

I know, I know, I have a life, so sue me.

"If a game tries a million new things and only gets 50% of them right, that probably means it isn't that great a game. You simply cannot review that game and say "It's great they tried all this stuff and only half of it worked. 5 stars!" That's pretty much what happened with Black and White. Are you saying that it deserves super-high review marks just for trying to do new things? You even complained about Black and White's interface and banality of gameplay. I think you're the one being the contrarian here if you believe that reviewing on potential is better."

I'd rather play 15 hours of Black and White and walk away disappointed. I played 1 hour of Dune and walked away disgusted.

There's no question in my mind that the play time I got out of Black and White (didn't finish) and Deus Ex (didn't finish either) is far superior to what I got out of Dune.

I'd much rather play an ambitious game that fails than a me-too game that succeeds. Of course, there are various shades of grey here, but it's fairly obvious that Dune 2 falls on the extreme edge of that "not trying" spectrum. It's more of a regurgitate-repackage experience.

I kinda enjoyed Dune, at least for decent stretches. I thought B&W got tedious very quickly, while Dune was just predictable. Then again, I prefer RTS games to god games.

Jeff, what are you talking about when you say "Dune 2"? The actual "Dune 2" game released by Westwood years and years ago, or "Emperor: Battle for Dune"?

HE LIVES!

What happened to Game Basement wumpus?

I think most of the game buying public would disagree with your opinion. Personally, I like innovation, but I don't think an innovative game that fails miserably at its innovation should get more than maybe an extra half star to an already mediocre score. We don't review potential. If we did that, World War II Online would be getting RAVES!

--Dave

What good is innovation if the game itself is tedious? That's what it comes down to with B&W for me. There's just something fundamentally flawed with the game design in B&W. It's much more a toy than a game.

Was Wumpus abducted by aliens? It sort of felt like he "lost time" between June 18 and July 5. Glad you're back, how was the probing?

"We don't review potential. If we did that, World War II Online would be getting RAVES!"

This is absolutely true.
But.

It's also one of the toughest balancing acts in reviewing. I reviewed EverQuest at launch. To this day GamePower's EverQuest review describes a buggy, laggy gaming experience with skads of potential. It doesn't cover the success and the successful eradication of most of those problems.

I haven't personally revisited EQ since that review but is that review fair today? No. Was it fair then? Yes. Can a magazine afford to update reviews based on patches? No. Would that be a public service particularly for a public (and ongoing) game like WWII Online and EQ? Yes.

So, my WWII Online review is also fair and just... or is it? I panned it hard and honest but, if they fix it up, that review will be wrong and will do a disservice to anyone who looks at the archive and decides not to buy it based on outdated complaints. Potentially speaking of course.

-Andrew

MARK: "There's just something fundamentally flawed with the game design in B&W."

Yes! Only, I'd argue there isn't much game design at all in B&W. There's innovation and it seems to have truly inspired people's imaginations. But, ultimately, there's absolutely no freaking spoon there. It's like a polite/pooping version of Seaman only Seaman never made you follow a monk down a mountain just to give you something to do.

If you read that Keighley opus at Gamespot (even if you just skim it) you'll see the problem eventually. I mean, they didn't even think about gameplay until the end of the project.

I kept thinking about this quote while playing Black & White:

"They were so wrapped up in whether they could do it, they didn't bother to think about whether they should." - from Jurassic Park (paraphrased due to a bad memeory)

-Andrew

Ugh. The last RTS I truly enjoyed was Starcraft, and really only because of the mission design. The trouble is that technology != innovation != gameplay. I don't want innovation. I want gameplay. I agree with the comment about Westwood RTS games. Hey, if people keep buying 'em...

As for B&W, I got my 30 hours out of it, so technically I shouldn't complain.

- Alan

>>I haven't personally revisited EQ since that review but is that review fair today? No.

It absolutely is fair. That review was merely a snapshot of the game at that moment. It's no more or less fair then someone finding a two-year old news report that says Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman are happily married, or whatever old news story you could dredge up doing a search on CNN that's no longer true or relevant.

"no more or less fair then someone finding a two-year old news report that says Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman are happily married"

Good point. And it should also serve as a warning for those of us who enjoy making predictions in our reviews. No worse quote than the one with *you* lavishing undeserved praise for a product that later bombs.

This is the best reason to play a game all the way through, using as many difficulty settings as possible.

Who said credibility is a coin best not squandered? Was it the bard himself? Or maybe just Tom Chick trying to sound offical?

;)

"It absolutely is fair."

Perhaps I shouldn't have said "fair". Particularly since I meant a combination of the words "fair" and "accurate". Since GP trots out a link to that review every time they mention EverQuest in passing it's more than a simple news story. It is the "Official Review & Score" for posterity's sake.

Still, I agree that the "snapshot in time" approach is the only way to handle a review of a troubled game release. Evolving games probably merit updates and re-reviews though. Something that isn't done as often as it should be in this business.

Sounds like a good column idea actually. One that covers troubled releases and what the patches have done to improve or even re-make the game.

-Andrew

"...what the patches have done to improve or even re-make the game"

Now the perennial patch is so ingrained into the system that we're going to review the games pre- and post- patch, are we?

Not that I disagree that it would be a good column (look at Falcon 4, for an example of a game that can really use a good patch, not too mention after market support). But it's sad that it's fast coming to this.

I'm no reviewer. If a reviewer rated a game as good because of possible potential, and I bought a pile of drek as the result, I'd be livid.
Ultima IX blew big, phlemy chunks. But on the U9 message boards, everyone always went on and on about the potential of the game, and how great it would be once it was finally patched. Well, 3 patches later the game was still awful, and Origin shut the U9 boards down. If someone had listed the game as good because of it's pathed potential, I think 2 things would have happened.
1: The review would not have come out until 4 months after the game. This might have been good, saving some people from buying it.
2: It would have been a lie. That game never lived up to anything like a great potential, or even really a good potential.

It'd be like rating Falcon 4.0 as excellent, years before the source code was leaked and fixed. How fair or accurate could that possibly be?

I agree that some sort of "where are they now" periodic column would be a good thing. People could see where a Falcon or an EQ had ended up after all dust settled. But reviewing a game based on some perceived potential? Sorry, guys, can't see it.

Oh, yeah. There was a debate some time back about whether anyone ever listened to reviews. There was a general consensus that people just bought what they wanted and didn't worry about reviews.

I gave this some thought. I don't claim to represent the masses, but for me, reviews do matter.

They might not matter too much for games that are "primary" interests. I like AOE, so when AOK came out, I was probably going to buy it regardless. The same applied to U9, me being an old-time Ultima hack.

Reviews become important for me with what I call "secondary" games, things that are off my usual beaten track, or not known to me. Good examples of this were Warcraft II, the original Civ, the original AOE, Sacrifice, and (soon) Kohan. I'll buy a title that looks hot from a developer I know, and sometimes get burned, without much thought. New stuff, though, only gets into the house after I've seen the reviews.
Since a whole lot of the stuff out there is "new" this way, that makes reviews fairly important, when each bad buy is $50 and at least one day wasted.

"Was Wumpus abducted by aliens? It sort of felt like he "lost time" between June 18 and July 5. Glad you're back, how was the probing?"

Thanks Dave and Rob. We recently became first time homeowners and I've spent the last two weeks prepping the new house. Painting kitchen/bathroom cabinets, replacing light and bathroom fixtures, repairing toilets, replacing electrical outlets and switches, etcetera. Plus the actual move itself, which becomes more and more painful over the years as I'm sure you guys know. Our collection of "stuff" has reached an imposing, critical and rather disturbing SIMS-like level. I really dislike asking friends to do that kind of manual labor, so my wife and I moved most of it ourselves. I'm not a complete masochist though.. I did hire movers for a few hours to take the really heavy stuff over.

gamebasement.com is still around but it's moved to port 82. I had to use that server to host tech-report.com due to a drive failure on the NYC server. Things are in flux on a number of different fronts, both personal, professional, and otherwise.

"We don't review potential. If we did that, World War II Online would be getting RAVES!"

Oddly, I know several people who worship this game. Even though it takes up to ten minutes to load on their systems and is generally slow and buggy. They really do want a new experience, and are willing to suffer through stuff I wouldn't consider remotely acceptable. Granted this is not mainstream gamers we're talking about.. but look at the acceptance of the SIMS, RCT, and B&W by the public. All of those titles are rather innovative; I don't think it's fair to say that the public is just looking for roman numerals appended to the end of a game title. We want new thrills.

"It's much more a toy than a game."

Refer to Steve's comments in another thread: most people don't finish the games they have. Hell, I'm as guilty of that as anyone. I had fun with B&W. Not enough to finish, and not enough to give it an unconditional recommendation, but enough to justify the money I paid for it, at least. I can't say that for a lot of games. There's nothing wrong with this kind of open ended gameplay, as long as you're having fun during the time you do spend with the game. It might even make more sense to actually _design_ for this; the reality is that very few people will actually "finish", so why make "finishing" important in your design? It's unrealistic to expect this. Perhaps this could partly explain the mainstream popularity of SIMS, RCT, et al?

"Jeff, what are you talking about when you say "Dune 2"?"

I meant Dune: The Battle for Emperor or whatever the heck Westwood is calling this latest repackaging of their gameplay.

"Now the perennial patch is so ingrained into the system that we're going to review the games pre- and post- patch, are we?"

No, I mean only "evolving" games, not bad games that get "fixed" (like Ultima 9).

Deus Ex getting mulitplayer as a single player example. We should likewise mention when games DON'T get promised features... ever. Like Dungeon Keeper. The box claims you can "play as the heroes". That never happened.

But really I'm talking about games like UO, EQ, WWII Online (potentially), etc., games that improve or change significantly from their initial release. Those games might merit re-reviews or updates because, well, because they are different games now.

I also completely agree with the idea of a magazine "raking them over the coals" (them being the game company) for their business practices.

Like continually releasing buggy games (Activision?) on the public, or those amusingly naive and idiotic statements of FunCom. We should also maybe spotlight titles that aren't sent out in reviewable format before or at release.

ST:DS9: Dominion Wars, for example.
Never a good sign when a movie reviewer isn't invited to ye olde press screening, not having press copies is the same problem.

Though, it could also be a cost cutting measure. I guess.

-Andrew

I do think it would be valuable to re-visit and re-review any game that consumers have to continue paying for to play. As cited in previous examples, EQ is not quite the same game today as it was 2 years ago. A review that went back and compared rules changes, connectivity issues, and community, would be really cool.

Side not: CGW already has a column about patches; can't recall the writer or the name of the column. But it's in there.

Actually, isn't that column about Mods?
Attend the column of Mr. Todd.

-Andrew

I have to throw my hat into this re-review corner. If a game is stil out there selling like hotcakes and the developer has really went a long way to correct the game and improve and add-on to it, that game should get a new review. Otherwise new buyers won't have any resources to get an accurate review.

As for WWII Online, I read Bruce's review of it on Gamespot and like a many people he had a very bad inital reaction on the game. I can understand that completely. When I first bought WWII Online, installed it, and played it I got pretty fustrated and POed also. But after I worked through the game a couple times and tweaked some of it settings I finally have the game running at an aceeptable level. Mind you I have a 900MHz system with 256MBs of Ram and a GeForce GTS 32MB DDR card. With all of this the game runs just "OK" even with the lack luster graphics.

But still when I am in the middle of a huge offensive or some raging tank battle the game is so utterly and entirely consuming and compelling it has made me hopeless addicted to it for the time being.

Sure, I know they should have come out with a better game before they made us pay for it but right now I just don't care (sadly enough). Atleast they haven't started the monthly fee until they get all the features in the game that they promised.

Jeff

Well, the PC crowd is lucky in that most reviewers seem to play the game longer than an hour or so. This isn't the case with console reviews: the final edict is usually handed down after the the Playstation logo is displayed on the reviewer's TV screen.

Funny how most console game reviews on web sites have almost all their screenshots taken from the first fifteen minutes of the game. Well, alright, it's not funny; online console game reviewers are often in the biz for the fame and the attention of the mags. This leads to what I call "status quo reviews" - smarmy blurbs that take their cue from USENET/web forum opinion over actual first-hand experience with the question. Sod that.

Even worse, a couple of 'em have hijacked Erik of OMM fame's "if it doesn't hook me in fifteen minutes, it sucks" argument as validation for their shoody reviewing approach. That's all fine and well, Sparky, IF THE GAME WAS ONE YOU MIGHT POTENTIALLY LIKE IN THE FIRST PLACE. A "hook" is only as good as your potential interest level going in. I can tell you right-fucking-now that fifteen minutes with Stomp Stomp Revolution or Madden Challenge Ex Plus Zero ain't gonna "hook" me, so why in the holy name of Willam F. Buckley would an editor set me to the task of "reviewing" it? I've seen more sloppy reviews of PC-styled RPGs by console game reviewers (who prefer the overdramatic, linear interactive stories of the FF series, in most cases) than I care to wrap my rotten little mind around.

Perhaps this is a bit off-topic, but I really see no point in having people who aren't interested in a particular game review it - the end result leads to atrocious reviews like CGW's Disciples one. Of course, we'd never see a WizardWorks game evaluated, but maybe that's for the better, hm? I'd amend Erik's assertion to state that "it only takes fifteen minutes with a game to find out if I'm utterly disaffected by it," which may or may not imply suckiness, depending on how spectacularly the design goals of the game were defenestrated.

Anyhow.

"Perhaps this is a bit off-topic, but I really see no point in having people who aren't interested in a particular game review it - the end result leads to atrocious reviews like CGW's Disciples one."

Yeah, I think it's a good idea to match a game with a reviewer who likes that kind of game, in general. Even more interesting would be a pair of reviews, one by the fanboy of the genre and one by a reviewer who generally doesn't care for the genre.

BTW, I think Jeff Green has admitted that he missed the boat with the Disciples review.

Wassup with Jeff these days? I notice a distinct lack of Greenness on the board since he got elected Grand Poobah over at CGW. Ordinarily I'd guess his new position involved a lot of work, but given the position...

Hey, he said it, not me.

What's the word, Jeff? Are lots of people looking to email you now that they think you are "the man" to dump all their gaming woes on? Does it make you want to avoid boards like this, where the oily reviews-merchants are constantly peddling their warez?

Also, while I'm at it, I don't know it was a good idea to post that Holly Flemming (sp) rebuttal to the "Babes" letter. Here we have a young writer, no doubt secure in his belief in girls loving geeks, lesbian fantasy get-togethers, the Easter Bunny and the alien mothership. He writes an innocent-looking little letter, probably hoping for some miracle like Holly responding with hot lesbian verbiage, or maybe just a spontaneous gift of booth babe phone numbers, and what happens? Ya club him like a baby seal, right in front of all the other geeks. Geez, why not just take his lunch money while you were at it?

The above was a (probably lame) joke, in case anyone missed it.

I exchanged a couple of emails with Jeff in the last week. He's pretty swamped being the EIC.

I kinda figured that. I hope he doesn't get so buried that he loses his sense of humor (or reality).

"No kidding. If your shit is being shot at, soldiers, then fire away. It's very annoying to have a mongoose just sit there and let an inkvine catapult bombard it.

The AI is there, because in the campaign when you attack something the AI will respond. It's just when you control a side that your units will have to be explicitly commanded to fight back."


Westwood has fixed that in the latest patch.

People *want* the same games over and over. It's been shown in many online polls. People buy these games! They're best-sellers! Starcraft was just a dressed-up and improved War Craft 2 (IMHO), Diablo 2 was just Diablo 1, the same thing also true for Westwood RTS games. The many successful expansion packs out there are also proof. My point is, the games sell, so why would management want to suddenly risk the years spent on an existing franchise and make a completely new, unfamiliar concept of a game? It's too bad for those that need constant innovation that all the big developers seem to be following the same old formula, but personally I don't mind.

For example, my opinion of Black&White is, "why would anyone play more than 5 hours of it?" Sure it's innovative, but that's all it is. It combines different genres and fails to be engaging in all of them. There's a difference between being innovative and being fun...

That's why you won't see me over-exerting my windpipe mentioning how "Diablo 2 is the same as Diablo 1" or "Emperor: Battle for Dune is the same as Red Alert 2 and all the other WS games". I know that these statements are essentially true, but if the game is fun, why should I care?
If I think the enjoyment I got from playing a game is worth the money I spent, why should I care if it's different from other games before it or not?

That is my humble opinion.

I agree to some extent, but the problem with Dune is that it ignores some of the nice changes that other RTS games have made. There's nothing wrong with the basic formula, but why not include better formation support? why not make the AI better? etc.

Total Annihilation was at the same time highly derivative and highly innovative. I like developers to use the tried and true formulas. I just want them to take the good and make it better and to fix or discard the bad.

Sigma looks to be an ordinary RTS in a lot of ways, but mixing and matching animal parts is an inspired stroke. I was skeptical, but seeing the game in action at E3 sold me. Still, at its heart, it's just an RTS. Gather some essential resources and crank out units and attack.

I believe Kohan has been a reasonable success for Timegate Studios, despite said title's hopeless innovation. ;) I suspect Kohan 2: Kohan's Revenge will be rather a large seller if they can crank the production values up a serious notch or two, much as Warcraft 2 capitalized on the slightly amateurish but reasonably successful formula of its predecessor.

I love Kohan. Hate the name, but love the game. I don't know if it's the best game of the year so far, but it's the one that stands out as coming out of nowhere and being really interesting.

>Evolving games probably merit updates and re->reviews though. Something that isn't done as >often as it should be in this business.

I hate the term "slippery slope", but introducing re-reviews into the mix is a slippery slope if there ever was one. A magazine (or Web site) needs to have an official stance on each and every game it reviews; as soon as you start re-reviewing games, what's the official stance on the game? Is it the original score? Is it the new score? I know this something that most freelancers don't concern themselves with, but maintaining editorial consistency is a major concern for editors.

The other problem is that as soon as you start re-reviewing games (even if you limit them to games like Asheron's Call or EQ) every PR flak in the world is going to want their game re-reviewed, simply because their latest patch is just another step in their particular game's "evolution". Sure you can tell those PR fools to buzz off, but that takes time, which is always in short supply.

And the final reason I'm against them is because it encourages sloppiness. Games are already buggy as hell when they're released; there's no reason to give developers and publishers another reason to ship a game a year before it's done.

All of that said, I do think major updates to games like Asheron's Call do warrant a news story or something similar that tells people what's going on with the game. (Which is exactly what Gamecenter did with Asheron's Call.) However, those updates should not alter or modify, in any way, the original review.

--Billy

>>People *want* the same games over and over.

People don't know what they want. It's just harder to convince them they want something that isn't familiar. Sequels and derivative games are safe bets, for the companies and the people buying 'em.

People didn't know they wanted The Sims, and indeed it almost got canned by EA multiple times--they wanted Will Wright to work on SimCity 4000.

But with risks come occasional rewards, and producing sequel after sequel, or derivative game after derivative game will eventually run the well dry. People will eventually tire of the same old thing; are we already seeing that in the first-person shooter market?

Companies are like this. They identify a trend, rush to market to capitalize on it, use it up, and move on. This happens in movies, music, books, and games. People play along for a while, get bored, and move on. I think these trends are speeding up, so it only lasts for a while.

"It's very annoying to have a mongoose just sit there and let an inkvine catapult bombard it. "

And we wonder why normal people don't understand us.

Innovation can really pay off. It can also be really sneaky. I don't think it's correct to call Starcraft a Warcraft clone. It had 3 distinct sides, all with very distinct styles and play methods. It had a good back-story to it. The graphics were better. It did have a similar "feel" about it, being a Blizzard game, but it was a much different experience that WC2, and I personally liked it MUCH better for it.

This isn't to say there aren't a gozillion clones out there, natch. But what is a clone, and what is just evolutionary?

Starcraft is light years ahead of War 2. War 2 featured almost identical sides and campaigns that mirrored one another. Starcraft featured three unique sides that all play differently yet are well-balanced, three unique campaigns, a much more compelling story, much better multiplayer support, much better AI, and a much better editor.

In a lot of ways Starcraft is yet to be surpassed by an RTS.

It was also, what, two, three years later?

Personally, I still enjoy War2 more than Starcraft, but that's mostly just because of the setting. We love it in multiplayer, though.

And I don't know about the two races being nearly identical. Sure, they have the same basic tech trees, but the units are substantially different. Ogre-mages are far superior to their paladin counterparts, but mages are way cooler than death knights. Okay, other than that, they are pretty much the same...

It's still a whole lotta fun, though.

"Okay, other than that, they are pretty much the same..."

Heh. Yeah, it's been several years since I played, but the big difference is the mages and the paladins, right? The trolls regen and the elves have a slightly longer range as I recall, but that's a small difference. The other units and spells are more or less mirrors of one another, right?

Is it just me, or has there been a shift in perception towards Blizzard in the last year? I remember before Diablo 2 was released everyone seemed very confident that this would be the next mega-smash gamer's game that Blizzard would craft to perfection. Then, after the game was released, I remember a large patch right off the bat, and some troubles with battle.net.

Now this year, I hear talk of War 3 and it seems very subdued. Not the big, revolution in RTS gaming that the original idea was. Is Blizzard peaking, do you reckon? What caused this? It certainly doesn't seem to be reflected in sales. I have decided that, $35 (augh! Argh!) or no, I'm going to pick up the LOD add-on. It sounds too fun, especially since a computer crash cost me all my old games a few months back, anyways.

Well I have played another day of LOD and it is definitely a worthwhile addition to Diablo II.

Diablo II may be nothing more than a super advanced action dungeon hack but it is a very polished game. Great for a quick 5 minute session or a 5 hour session. :-)

I love D2: LOD. My biggest complaints are the still too small stash space and playing in Hell mode. Hell mode is quite difficult and the lack of a way to save is a bit of a pain. To kill Diablo, for example, means that you have to start from the last checkpoint, the bridge outside his cathederal. In hell mode you have to fight your way across the network of bridges and then clear out his cathederal, which can take 45 minutes. If for some reason you have to quit before killing Diablo, you'll have to clear those areas again. It's not that hard in Normal and Nightmare, but in Hell it's danged tough.

This may be a blatantly stupid question Mark but I can't for the life of me remember how to set difficulty level when starting a new character.

(Maybe I will get off my ass and actually read the manual !)

You can't. You have to play through the entire game to get a new difficulty level unlocked. There may be hacks around this. I'm not sure.

It would be difficult to take a new character into Nightmare or Hell mode regardless.

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The trolls regen and the elves have a slightly longer range as I recall, but that's a small difference. The other units and spells are more or less mirrors of one another, right?

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I don't think that Blizzard's peaked at all. There has always been a round of Battle.Net updates after the release of any "big game." And I think that Warcraft 3 is pretty anticipated - especially considering we're still, what, 6 months from release? And, maybe it's way too early to say this, but I'd say that it'll deliver on the majority of its promises. Not that I have any "inside tracks" or anything, but I'm optimistic. I thought War2 was great, and I expect that 3 will have all the great aspects of 2, plus some new innovations. It's still in the Warcraft universe, but "technologically" speaking, I think it's going to be more the successor of Starcraft.

But, then, I'm admittedly biased -- Warcraft 2 is still one of my all-time favorites that I still play pretty regularly.

Blizzard will announce a new game at ECTS. I've heard rumors that it's a shooter, but who knows? At this point Starcraft 2 or a Diablo MMOG wouldn't surprise me.

The only thing that really surprises me is how Blizzard doesn't capitalize more on their brands. Just think how many Diablo games 3DO would have put out by now. We'd be on Diablo 5, probably.

I hope they do another Diablo 2 expansion as well.

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We'd be on Diablo 5, probably.

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ECTS is the European version of E3, but it pales in comparison from what I've been told. Blizzard and Big Huge Games are making game announcements there, but many companies are skipping the tradeshow.

And yeah, I agree about the quality. I didn't mean to infer that Blizzard was doing anything wrong. I wouldn't mind seeing them staff up a bit and maybe getting three games going at once instead of their usual two, though.

I think it's great that Blizzard is still releasing patch updates. Even their older products still have the occasional update released.

Okay, Mark, I'll ask again: WHEN is ECTS? :-)

Bah. Okay, I quit being lazy and went and found out for myself. September 2-4, in case anyone else is curious.

Anyone here going? My wife and I are both on vacation that week. Might see if she'd be interested in going to London. ;-)

When...what...sorry for the confusion.

I've never been to ECTS. Instead of a mag sending everyone, like they do at E3, they typically send one person. And since it's in London, it's something of a boondoogle and EICs usually go instead of someone from the rank and file.

Hey, no problem! ;-)

It makes sense that not many people would go. I mean, heck, if every magazine sent fifteen freelancers to London for ECTS...well, I imagine we'd all have a lot less to read!!

If ECTS was as big as E3, more people would go. It looks like it's dying on the vine, though. I think it's just too hard for a lot of these companies to do more than one major tradeshow a year. A lot of the press and buyers who will be at ECTS probably were at E3 anyway.

I'd love to go if someone wants to send me, but like I said the EICs seem to feel it's important that they go. :)

>If ECTS was as big as E3, more people would go. It looks like it's dying on the vine, though

I've been the past two years, but even I'm not going this year. It really is a joke of a conference -- it's really not even as big as the small rooms that no one ventures into at the E3. The first year was decent, because WarCraft 3 and Icewind Dale were announced - last year the Diablo 2 expansion was announced, but that was about it. While it's impossible to see everything at the E3 even using all three days, it's easy to see everything worthwhile at the ECTS in half a day (yet it's also three days long). Fun, but expensive, city though.

Something I wish we'd see is an...well, expansion to expansion packs. Look at the radical improvements that the Conquerors made to AOE2 as an example. Now, take it further. Instead of designing a whole new game every time, release a series of expansion packs that tweak and improve the game while offering new content. It seems to me that while this wouldn't generate the sales of a successful major new release, it would generate a pretty good revenue stream for each successful title. With each successful title that gets packs made, the number of those streams increases, until you are making a lot of cash off of them. Last, you don't make the pack for any title until you know if it's going to be a susccess, so no resources are wasted on iffy projects (which is what most NEW releases are). I know some games do a little of this, but it seems to me that mostly they just give add-on scenarios and the like, generally without much tweaking of the game itself. And they hardly ever make more than one such pack (like the AOE pack and the Diablo 2 pack).

What do you guys think? Would this fly in wide use?

>It seems to me that while this wouldn't generate the sales of a successful major new release, it would generate a pretty good revenue stream for each successful title.

The problem with the proposal is that each expansion pack generally appeals to a smaller and smaller subsection of the original group of purchasers.

You can somewhat avoid that by releasing stand-alone expansion packs that don't require the original game, and there have been more than one expansion pack released for a number of games (first 2 Wing Commanders, Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe, Half-life, the Sims), but generally companies tend to feel that they can use their resources better, and get a better return on their investment, by focusing on new products. Except for crazy popular games like Diablo 2, Sims and Half-life, they're probably right (and companies like Blizzard spend as much time on their expansions as most companies do on full products).

I wonder how right that is. It seems like all I ever hear is how little money companies receive back from publishers when their games are finally released. It makes me wonder if there will even be any successful "garage" gaming companies anymore. Maybe when broadband gets big there will be a chance.

Anyway, I've heard about the smaller and smaller returns for expansions. But that keeps the notion that all you are doing is releasing expansion packs for the same game. What if those packs were actually evolving the game; tweaking the engine, adding playability, responding to user feedback? Over time it would evolve into a whole new game. Say, something like AOE gradually becoming AOE2 over the course of 2 years and 4 moderately-priced expansion packs, rather than all at once after two years and a gazillion bucks of development time. The cost to the consumers would be higher in the end, but the game would be played and evolving all through the period.

Yes, it might only work for crazy popular titles. But it might also work for the smaller companies, allowing them a shot at revenue return while developing the "new" title.

Just an idea. I don't think anyone's really tried this yet, have they?

No matter how you slice it, expansions always sell far fewer copies than the original game.

What you describe sort of sounds like what's been done with the Infinity engine. They've tweaked it a lot and added functionality, but I don't think each game has used a new engine.

I dunno, man. People are even getting tired of expansion packs for the Sims -- and they just announced another one. And who wants to buy four or five expansion packs for every game? (Maybe if they were 10-15 bucks apiece, instead of the typical $35 they are now, but still...) And what if I don't get the first one, but I want the second one? Do I have to go out and buy them both now, or will the second one work without the first? And what if I don't see anything I want in 1, 2, and 3, but then out comes expansion 4 with every feature I've been saying the game needed all along -- but I have to buy the first three for the game to work. Now I have to shell out eighty bucks ($20 apiece) for these expansion packs, which is WAY more than the game cost new...

I don't think it would fly, man.

Now, if they followed Black Isle's lead, and did some free downloadable expansion to expansions, I'm all for that.

Speaking of this expansion pack conversation, in relation to sales... does anyone know if 3DO pushing out all those small HOMM3 "episodes" was a good business decision? It didn't seem like it at the time and now, at Babbages, all of them are in the $10 and under rack (I think they were $20 when released?)

-Andrew

Yeah, the $30 price point on expansions bothers me a whole lot. It's even worse when the Gold Edition bundle costs less than the expansion pack alone.

- Alan

Well the last two expansions I purchased - AOE2 Conquerors and D2:LOD - were each AUD$49.95 or US$26. That represents excellent value for two high quality addons.

I don't remember them that cheap. They were $35 US each. $70 for 2 add-on packs.