Planetside 1 switching to free-to-play
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Weekend Confirmed 141 - Far Cry 3, Skulls of the Shogun, Darksiders 2
by Jeff Mattas, Nov 30, 2012 11:00am PSTFor November's final Weekend Confirmed, Garnett Lee, Jeff Cannata, and "Indie" Jeff Mattas are joined by Jake Kazdal of 17-BIT Games, the indie studio behind the upcoming strategy game, Skulls of the Shogun. Far Cry 3 gets much love from Mattas, Cannata talks about his joyous return to Darksiders 2, and Garnett gives an update on his slog through the final hours of Lost Odyssey. The lively discussion includes a whole lot more, before the crew's Finishing Moves and post-show TailGate cap things off.
Weekend Confirmed Ep. 141: 11/30/2012
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If you're viewing this in the GameFly application, you can play Weekend Confirmed Episode 141 directly.
Weekend Confirmed comes in four segments to make it easy to listen to in segments or all at once. Here's the timing for this week's episode:
Show Breakdown:
Round 1 - 00:00:35 - 00:30:35
Whatcha' Been Playin Part 1 - 00:31:05 - 00:57:57
Whatcha Been Playin Part 2 00:58:25 - 01:30:07
Listener Feedback/Front Page News - 01:30:40 - 02:02:22
Tailgate - 02:03:05 - 02:10:41
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Jake Kazdal @jkooza
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Original music in the show by Del Rio. Get his latest Album, Club Tipsy on iTunes. Check out more, including the Super Mega Worm mix and other mash-ups on his ReverbNation page or Facebook page, and follow him on twitter @delriomusic.
Comments
All Dark Souls is, is Dungeons and Dragons with an extra spooky Gothic milieu. Skyrim comes from the same premise of undertaking one long grind, except under the pretense of being "lost in the world" etc. That's what a western RPG is basically.
Grinding in JRPGs used to be relegated to the end or of the game, for players who want to explore the systems, and play all the mini games, super hard hidden bosses, etc. Now it is forced on all players because of western RPG design philosophy.
Hence why JRPGs suck now. They're part of the reason I love games, but I wouldn't touch Xenoblade with a ten foot pole.
Thread Truncated. Click to see all 47 replies.
But still, that's not really enough, because if its a co-op experience with the same gameplay, its still going to be a gimped MMO. So that leads to the next step, which is, lets differentiate the combat from an MMO by making it real time. So then you basically get a game like Borderlands. Its like a so-so first person shooter, but its co-op and you have gops of XP points to keep you addicted.
Of course a game like Borderlands doesn't really realize all the different aspects of combat you would get from RPG classes. So what is the game that's attempted to do that in real time? Kingdoms of Amalur---which has a cheesy MMO looking world, left over from when it was going to be an MMO, but amazingly, fully realized real time combat with all the nuances skill system of an RPG.
So what is left for the JRPG to do? Unless developers try to fall back on its trappings, what critics are basically asking for is a MMO RPG with the mechanics of Kingdoms of Amalur. The only games that have come close to this are apparently some Korean MMOs, and I haven't exactly noticed a wild rush from gamers to take up playing those..
So my point is, fundamentally, comments about "pacing" or like a screen wipe for turn based combat, are not criticisms of design antiquities. Solutions to those "problems" exist for the compulsive gamer in varying degrees. Which leaves the conclusion that these criticisms aren't criticisms but sanctimonious attacks on a certain philosophy warped by a cultural bias. There is no game or genre today delivering the experiences those classic JRPGs of yore did. If you don't like that, that's very well and good, but don't subvert a discourse on games by making out your biases to represent some truth about how games should be.
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