Felipepepe's Videogame History Articles Thread

[Cosmo]

Wow felipepepe , even a article on the AV club ?

 

[felipepepe]

Yup, the gallery got reported on AV Club, PC Gamer, Multiplayer.it, Shazoo.ru, Metafilter... this one really went places, although oddly it didn't get any traction on NeoGAF or Reddit.

The kinda disappointing part is to see just how little link follow-thru there is... all those articles probably reached many thousands, but less than 300 actually clicked to visit the goddamn gallery.

 

[Archibald]

Better than nothing? I mean nobody said that its going to be easy to incline the industry.

 

[felipepepe]

I'm more disappointed at the lack of curiosity in the general audience... with the internet the whole world is just a click away, but even that seems to be too much effort for some.

 

[tormund]

Yup, the gallery got reported on AV Club, PC Gamer, Multiplayer.it, Shazoo.ru, Metafilter... this one really went places, although oddly it didn't get any traction on NeoGAF or Reddit.

The kinda disappointing part is to see just how little link follow-thru there is... all those articles probably reached many thousands, but less than 300 actually clicked to visit the goddamn gallery.

Much like that article of yours that was featured on Kotaku: that they link it means next to nothing if its contents are of no interest to their usual audience.

 

[Archibald]

I think it is important to understand that billions of things are just a click away. Honestly I wouldn't be surprised if something like 1% conversion rate (assuming that article was seen by 30k people and you got 300 clicks) is normal in this day and age regardless of the topic.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

Eh, it's not all doom and gloom. felipepepe, You are like me. Almost too passionate for our own good at times. There's not much you can do to change human nature. Keep doing what you do as long as you love doing it and the people who are going to be interested by it will find it, IMO.

Any thoughts on my comment about RPG devs nowadays not studying older RPGs for some reason? It's almost as if they feel that older games have just been improved and/or are archaic, but IMO that's not really true. Games today are different and have been evolving but there are still many great ideas from old RPGs that have just been dropped and/or never explored enough.

 

[felipepepe]

I think we have to be careful here. Many journos are ignorant of older games and this is easily proven, but most devs do study their trade - they just don't can't / won't be allowed to apply those studies into modern games.

See Sawyer and his undying passion for Darklands - yet he never made anything remotely similar because of several reasons.
Mass Effect: Shun is being led by Ian Frazier, a massive bro who made Ultima V: Lazarus and even wrote a review for my book... but he still needs to make it a BioWare RPG(tm).
Some years ago the Barkley devs dropped a wall of game concepts that they had, some of them based on goddamn Sorcerian, an obscure PC-only JRPG from the 80's. they know their shit, but just making Barkley 2 is taking 5 billion years.

Also, there's the drive to innovate and create. I played almost 300 RPGs, yet if they gave me a studio to make my dream RPG, it would be very different - influenced by stuff like AoD, Way of the Samurai, Dynasty Warriors and 7.62 High Caliber. That doesn't mean I don't know about great concepts from the past.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

I didn't mean Sawyer and them, I meant young new developers. And learning from the past and putting new twists on it *is* innovating.

The example I give is the first 2 Gothics. No one but PB does that style of open-world. Lords of Xulima has a somewhat similar style, but most open-world RPGs today are now defined by Skyrim's style, i.e. you can go anywhere at any level, basically.

I'm not saying that's a bad thing or a bad idea or anything, but I'm saying that anyone who studies Gothic and makes a modern version with a twist will be doing something that others really aren't right now. IMO, there is still room for different styles of RPGs that have been forgotten or overlooked. Someone can learn those ideas and put a new twist on them rather than just having them buried as fossils by time.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

Maybe because I played Risen recently as my first PB game and it blew my mind that I use that style as an example. I went and played G1 and G2 after that and was blown away again. I was thinking to myself, why doesn't anyone do this style of RPG now? Not just in the open-world design (which is excellent), but in dialogue with NPCs, the way skills and stats work, the amazing start and feeling like you are a true weakling for awhile, getting beat up by colonists (guess I can mention the prison colony setting as well), hell, even the lockpicking is clever and cool! And making armor actually meaningful and a big accomplishment? Gaining trust from factions and fat-cat NPCs? It seems some developers took something from the faction design but still a lot can be done there.

So, I don't know. Theres many, many examples of this from many different RPGs with ideas that can be flipped in new RPGs and isn't really being done. Nothing wrong with totally new ideas but some of these old gems resting in dusty, ancient ruins are worth checking out.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

Mass Effect: Shun

Ikkiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Maybe because I played Risen recently as my first PB game and it blew my mind that I use that style as an example. I went and played G1 and G2 after that and was blown away again. I was thinking to myself, why doesn't anyone do this style of RPG now? Not just in the open-world design (which is excellent), but in dialogue with NPCs, the way skills and stats work, the amazing start and feeling like you are a true weakling for awhile, getting beat up by colonists (guess I can mention the prison colony setting as well), hell, even the lockpicking is clever and cool! And making armor actually meaningful and a big accomplishment? Gaining trust from factions and fat-cat NPCs? It seems some developers took something from the faction design but still a lot can be done there.

So, I don't know. Theres many, many examples of this from many different RPGs with ideas that can be flipped in new RPGs and isn't really being done. Nothing wrong with totally new ideas but some of these old gems resting in dusty, ancient ruins are worth checking out.

Worth checking out, yes. Worth spending time and money to make as a game to sell? No.

The gaming market has become polarized to the point that only two types of games can thrive and survive: Small, cheap games and very big and expensive games.

A game like Gothic falls somewhere in the middle, needing "only" a budget of $30 million, I'd reckon. That's not a feasible amount to spend on a video game, you'll never make bank on it.

That's why Gothic 3 changed so much from Gothic 2, that's why Risen changed so much from the Gothic games, and why the Risen sequels are two festering piles of garbage.

 

[pippin]

Mass Effect: Shun

Ikkiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!

_____________

Problem here goes two ways: games do not only have to answer to economical pressure, but also to creative input from many, many people. There must be some cool guy at Bethesda who wants to make quests without markers, maybe add some non combat option, or simply try to make something more to his liking. But what can you do when the order is the opposite? Same goes for Bioware, especially if you consider games like Neo Scavenger or The Banner Saga were made by former employees. The "one man army" in game development hasn't completely gone away, but as always, underground and independent studios will only survive because there's a mainstream "thing" going on.

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

I played almost 300 RPGs, yet if they gave me a studio to make my dream RPG, it would be very different - influenced by stuff like AoD, Way of the Samurai, Dynasty Warriors

So in your dream cRPG you wold be a superhero turned field commander?

Spoiler

Dynasty Warriors is fun!

 

[felipepepe]

Dynasty Warriors devs are (or used to be) masters of characterization. I can't remember anything about the new ME3 and DA:I companions, but I know 100+ DW generals with Chinese names.

Same goes for Sengoku Rance - they make caricatures that are still relatable and interesting, and actually have more depth than "HI, I'M VEGA AND I'M A GUIDO". I wish more games would do that, as opposed to going down the BioWare path.

 

[pippin]

Dynasty Warriors devs are (or used to be) masters of characterization. I can't remember anything about the new ME3 and DA:I companions, but I know 100+ DW generals with Chinese names.

It helps that DW is retelling the same story with the same characters every time

Bioware's story "model" is old enough to vote, drink, drive and get hookers.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

Worth checking out, yes. Worth spending time and money to make as a game to sell? No.

The gaming market has become polarized to the point that only two types of games can thrive and survive: Small, cheap games and very big and expensive games.

A game like Gothic falls somewhere in the middle, needing "only" a budget of $30 million, I'd reckon. That's not a feasible amount to spend on a video game, you'll never make bank on it.

That's why Gothic 3 changed so much from Gothic 2, that's why Risen changed so much from the Gothic games, and why the Risen sequels are two festering piles of garbage.

I disgaree on your assessment of the Risen games being all that different from the Gothic games as well as them being bad games in general, but that's beside the point.

You addressed part of the point here but not the most important part, IMO. Learning and/or taking some idea and flipping it into something new does not require a huge budget necessarily. To make a "true" new Gothic-style RPG, etc., with every single element to a very high degree might take a larger budget. But you can still find great ideas in RPGs of yesteryear that you can "sample" and use in a new game without breaking the bank.

Very simple example, but Stardew Valley took the basic formula of Harvest Moon, including SNES-style graphics, etc., put a few new twists on things and is a very successful game right now. One person created that.

I'm not even talking about taking an entire game's formula, either. Take some elements from different games and reimagine them. Quick off the top of the head example, but why doesn't any RPG use elements from the Might & Magic: Isles of Terra UI? The graphic elements in the viewport area weren't just for show, i.e. if the dragon started to roar, enemies were nearby. If a certain gem started glowing, etc., your Thief was detecting a secret area or door nearby. It is a small thing but it is a good one, and something like that can be done inexpensively and add more charm and uniqueness to a modern game.

I could give more examples of this if you want. Dungeons & Dragons: Warriors of the Eternal Sun. The game switches from 3rd-person isometric combat to first-person action dungeon-crawler when you enter dungeons. Or to go back to the Gothic example, the way the open-world is built and more of a "linear open-world", with skill checks blocking access to some areas, etc. You don't have to make a huge game with a big budget to put some of those deisgn principles in your game, and your game would be different than the myriad of what everyone else is doing currently.

Just my 2 cents on this. Just for the record I have no problems with most modern games or RPGs in general. I am the guy who played and enjoyed Oblivion, Skyrim yet also goes back and plays ToEE. So to me, it's all good. I just wouldn't mind seeing more developers coming in and doing new things to take some cues from older games that, IMO, are still very much gems that are in a certain sense still waiting to be discovered

 

[Unkillable Cat]

You addressed part of the point here but not the most important part, IMO. Learning and/or taking some idea and flipping it into something new does not require a huge budget necessarily. To make a "true" new Gothic-style RPG, etc., with every single element to a very high degree might take a larger budget. But you can still find great ideas in RPGs of yesteryear that you can "sample" and use in a new game without breaking the bank.

Very simple example, but Stardew Valley took the basic formula of Harvest Moon, including SNES-style graphics, etc., put a few new twists on things and is a very successful game right now. One person created that.

I'm not even talking about taking an entire game's formula, either. Take some elements from different games and reimagine them.

True, taking (great) ideas from RPGs of yesteryear doesn't have to be expensive, but the first example you provided (Gothic & Risen) most certainly will be. Your second example of Stardew Valley was just one guy, blatantly copying a game instead of "sampling ideas from games of yesteryear", therefore he didn't have to waste time taking these ideas and having to make them work together.

And that took him 4 years. For a team of developers that's a death sentence for your project, for a one-man show it's an endangerment of his personal life... all for a video game that may or may not sell.

Sure, this particular 4-year project paid off, but for every one success story there are hundreds (if not thousands) of failures.

Quick off the top of the head example, but why doesn't any RPG use elements from the Might & Magic: Isles of Terra UI? The graphic elements in the viewport area weren't just for show, i.e. if the dragon started to roar, enemies were nearby. If a certain gem started glowing, etc., your Thief was detecting a secret area or door nearby. It is a small thing but it is a good one, and something like that can be done inexpensively and add more charm and uniqueness to a modern game.

Evolution of HUDs and UIs. Do you know what has been the goal of almost every video game ever designed? To be an immersive full-screen game with the smallest HUD and/or UI imaginable. Games that could do that didn't hit the streets until the early 90s at the very earliest because of technological limitations, and it goes double for games using a non-fixed perspective, such as first-person perspective or third-person with adjustable camera.

So before that people had to make do with the viewscreen only having a fraction of display real estate. It's the reason Dungeon Master, Eye of the Beholder and almost all of the Might & Magic games weren't full-screen. It's the reason Ultima Underworld has a tiny viewscreen. So someone thought, if we can't use this part of the display for the game world, what else can we use it for? How about the HUD? And a few bright souls figured that the HUD doesn't have to be a simple statline or bar graph - there's room to do more. As a result we have not just the critters of some Might & Magic games acting as part of the HUD, but also the critters in Ultima Underworld.

And when games arrived that could do full-screen, what was the first thing to go? Those small little HUD touches, because then they took up too much display real estate.

But today there's no need for any of that. There are no longer any technological limitations - only limitations on the imagination of the developer... and that's sorely lacking in 98% of them, sadly.

I could give more examples of this if you want. Dungeons & Dragons: Warriors of the Eternal Sun. The game switches from 3rd-person isometric combat to first-person action dungeon-crawler when you enter dungeons.

Again, a workaround to overcome technological limitations, something Lord British had figured out to do back in 1979. And he maintained that this was the only way to go until the mid-1990s, when others upstaged him and showed that one perspective could not only be used exclusively, but that it added to that Holy Grail of games: Immersion.

Or to go back to the Gothic example, the way the open-world is built and more of a "linear open-world", with skill checks blocking access to some areas, etc. You don't have to make a huge game with a big budget to put some of those deisgn principles in your game, and your game would be different than the myriad of what everyone else is doing currently.

You don't have to make a huge game with a big budget to put some of those design principles into a game, no. But with a game like Gothic, and with RPGs in general, you do. That was my original point. Gothic was a bold experiment that turned out to be financially successful... for the first two games. The third one was a flop, we don't talk about the fourth, and when it came to the Risen games they were altered to appeal to a lower common denominator - namely, console players. And due to the size, scale and cost of making each game the Risen series had to be constantly altered to maintain the attention span of mouth-breathing console gamers; to follow the money.

And there are plenty more examples like the Gothic/Risen games, and many of them fall within the RPG category. 16-bit JRPGs follow a formula to the point that there's a dedicated game making program commercially available for them. Together that cuts down on costs and development time, but it also fences off the game, it will always be limited and restricted within its space, but even then people can work within those confines to create something brilliant, like Undertale. But that takes imagination, which I've already mentioned is in short supply.

I just wouldn't mind seeing more developers coming in and doing new things to take some cues from older games that, IMO, are still very much gems that are in a certain sense still waiting to be discovered

That's the problem with the game industry: You going back in time to dig up something that wasn't commercially viable back then is heresy to the industry. Old ideas that didn't break new ground or sell well are dead ideas, taboo ideas. And that's before we factor in the rampant ignorance that runs through the game industry. There are plenty of small, good ideas lying scattered over the history of gaming... but keep in mind there are also plenty of small, bad ideas there as well. Like whomever thought that making an action-adventure with platforming elements could be controlled with a icon interface before the age of computer mice?

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

I disagree with a lot of what you're saying but it's not really necessary to get any deeper into it. The last thing I'll say is that the ideas of tomorrow come from the experiences of yesterday. I'll leave you all to make up your own minds about what I'm saying.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

Dynasty Warriors devs are (or used to be) masters of characterization. I can't remember anything about the new ME3 and DA:I companions, but I know 100+ DW generals with Chinese names.

Same goes for Sengoku Rance - they make caricatures that are still relatable and interesting, and actually have more depth than "HI, I'M VEGA AND I'M A GUIDO". I wish more games would do that, as opposed to going down the BioWare path.

Dynasty Warriors devs are much helped by the fact that they base their games on an ancient classic, while Bioware have to invent their shit themselves. Not saying that they aren't talented in that regards. Many of the much loved game characters barely had any personality in the original book.

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

Dynasty Warriors devs are (or used to be) masters of characterization. I can't remember anything about the new ME3 and DA:I companions, but I know 100+ DW generals with Chinese names.

Same goes for Sengoku Rance - they make caricatures that are still relatable and interesting, and actually have more depth than "HI, I'M VEGA AND I'M A GUIDO". I wish more games would do that, as opposed to going down the BioWare path.

Played only Dynasty Warriors 8 and I am not sure If I remember more than a few main generals. I assume Tokei storytelling was stronger in the previous installments or was it just an effect of playing only 1,5 campaign out of the single game out of the series of games retelling the same story with every installment ?

Tried Sengoku Rance a few months ago. Ended up playing for a few days straight, totally ruining my sleep. Immediately started my second playthrough after the first. I am still shocked how good it was. Rance is the most likeable and fun hero ever, the combat was very good, there were many C&C and the whole thing was written well. And the music! The fact that our top 70 list lacks Sengoku Rance destroys its credibility.

 

[felipepepe]

BioWare hacks set up the Illusive Man as this "realistic" character when in fact he's an illogical saturday morning cartoon villain with unlimited resources. You play along expecting depth, yet you get nothing.

Meanwhile Sengoku Rance gives you characters that are interesting from the get-go - a giant, a country of raccoons, a floating eye, a spider-girl, etc - and as you interact with them you see they are actually interesting as well, with creative stories and unexpected twists.

Wasteland 2 kind tried to go in this way, but the writers and artists and everything in that game were just HORRIBLE. I mean, come on... they go "let's have a mutant!" and what we get is this:

Not to mention creative landmarks like - "Hi, I'm a hobo, I make shit jokes all the time". And people say Rance games are tasteless...

 

[Infinitron]

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/Feli...meline_of_computer_and_video_game_history.php

1975-2015 - Building a timeline of computer and video game history
by Felipe Pepe on 03/28/17 09:39:00 am

One thing that always bothered me is that whenever we casually talk about video game history, what we usually end up with is something like this:

A timeline divided into console generations, showing the big console and game releases. Cool.

But where's the Apple II, C64. Amiga, Spectrum ZX and the IBM PCs? Where are world-changing technologies like CD-ROMs, smartphones, the mouse or the Internet?

Sadly, video game history is often "abridged". This is just a graph, of course, but even in the narrative of mainstream websites we rarely hear anything on the history of pre-Windows 95 computers.

And I don't blame malice or "those damn millennials". There are several complicated factors in play.

One is that consoles were indeed much more popular than 70's & 80's computers. Other is that home computers don't have platform owners promoting their history - Commodore, IBM, Atari, Sinclair, etc, all closed down or left the business, and Apple never showed to care about Apple II games. Bloody ingrates.

But the biggest problem is how complicated their history is. Consoles are divided into eight cute and self-contained generations, but learning about home computers requires understanding things like what's a goddamn IBM PC-Compatible or the difference between CGA, EGA and VGA.

Yes, this information is available online - "just read Wikipedia". But it's a terrible approach to take a 16-year old that was born after Halo and send a 15,000+ words Wikipedia page just to know "what's an IBM PC". And even if he did, he lacks the historical context about the Apple II, C64, etc.

A 70's computer to someone from the 2017 is as shocking as a 2017 computer to someone from the 70's. Just watch a bunch of teenagers in awe of a Windows 95 PC if you need proof (and wanna feel old).



As such, while working on the CRPG Book I decided to create a timeline of ALL types of video games - one that would be visually pleasing, easily shareable and ease in readers of any background.

Over 16 pages (or 8 pngs) I tried to give a notion of the importance of each event and machine, building a road map - self-contained enough to be understood without checking Wikipedia, but leaving hooks that point readers towards places that can later be explored in-depth on their own.

So, without further ado, here's the full timeline gallery: http://imgur.com/gallery/u1tE9



And here I would like to invite you all to give it a read and share your opinions. I must warn beforehand that my background is in Marketing, not Computer Science, so I tend to focus on the Macro Environment a lot - and probably made a technical mistake or two along the way.

If you spot anything wrong of have any suggestions, please comment or e-mail me at crpgbook@gmail.com . Consider this article a request for "peer review" - or an Early Access.

PS: I know that the timeline is currently confusing to read and I'm already working on a better way to show the years & months. Cheers!

 

[PlanHex]

I'd say report infinitron for brofist harvesting, but why has this been up for days without you posting it here, felipepepe?

 

[Delbaeth]

home computers requires understanding things like what's a goddamn IBM PC-Compatible or the difference between CGA, EGA and VGA.

Don't forget MCGA (Excalibur series for instance).

And no, it doesn't mean Mister Chris "the Great" Avelone.