Daikatana- The concept only.

[Altorin]

The real tragedy of Daikatana is that it highlights a very sad moment in gaming history - the moment the two Johns split up, and both became far less then the sum of their wholes. Ion Storm died IMMEDIATELY, id's held on for a lot longer, but John Romero and John Carmack together were most certainly better then the sum of both of them seperated.

Gaming lost its first real superstar team, and really, we've never replaced them with anyone else. We've come close, and I think the two Drs at Bioware are probably the closest thing we have, but they don't have as clear an impact on their games, they just run house. John and John were instrumental in making their games - Wolfenstein 3d, Doom and Quake what they were.

Carmack was in charge of moving the technology forward, Romero was in charge of giving us worlds that we wanted to inhabit and destroy. Once they split off, they started exaggerating those aspects of their game making philosophy, and the games after their split are all worse then what they did together.

In summation (because I've rambled a LOT about this), if John Carmack were involved with Daikatana, it would have been the best FPS ever made. Because he wasn't, and he brought the "good FPS Gameplay" to the Romero/Carmack team, it suffered and failed horribly.

The best team I can imagine that still exists is Suda 51 and Shinji Mikami. Twice have they worked on a game together. The first one was gold and the second hasn't come out yet. It's them or Mikami, Inaba, and Kamiya. With those three we were blessed with Resident Evil 4, Devil May Cry, Viewtiful Joe, God Hand, Okami, Mad World, and Bayonetta. Just awesome.

Now time to use our imagination, if only Cliffy B would team up with Warren Specter.

Those are some pretty awesome games, and I'm sorry that I don't know more about japanese developers, at least by name. I understand tag lines like "from the makers of *blank*", and i know the big ones, Kojima, Miyamoto etc.

I think that's another instance of culture differences. I don't think those japanese developers live in a world where they are technically counterculture. In the US, we've made big strides, but despite the fact that it deals with greater money then the movie industry, gaming is still counterculture.

We need some more gaming rock stars. I wonder if we'll ever get them again. Guys who rose up in the industry almost singlehandedly, became millionaires, and lived the rock star life. I don't think that's possible anymore. We may have eccentric geniuses like Will Wright, Peter Molyneux or Sid Meier bubble to the top, but none of them are the same as John/John.

 

[nazzer]

I say Cliffy B & Peter Molyneux, so you can either dance, fart, or filet someone in Fables IV.

This thread is turning into a Game Design Dream Team thread... which isn't a bad idea.

I say Will Wright and Sid Meyer. Civilization and Pirates mixed with Spore and The Sims. The world would explode.

We need some more gaming rock stars. I wonder if we'll ever get them again. Guys who rose up in the industry almost singlehandedly, became millionaires, and lived the rock star life. I don't think that's possible anymore. We may have eccentric geniuses like Will Wright, Peter Molyneux or Sid Meier bubble to the top, but none of them are the same as John/John.

Notch.

 

[kazriko]

It was like American manga. Had some of the surface trappings, but not really very Eastern.

I think this is fairly accurate. A friend I had in college who was studying abroad from Japan took a look at the box and said something to the effect of "What the heck is Dai doing in the same phrase as Katana? One's the Chinese reading and the other is the Japanese reading."

 

[DigitalAtlas]

I say Cliffy B & Peter Molyneux, so you can either dance, fart, or filet someone in Fables IV.

This thread is turning into a Game Design Dream Team thread... which isn't a bad idea.

I say Will Wright and Sid Meyer. Civilization and Pirates mixed with Spore and The Sims. The world would explode.

We need some more gaming rock stars. I wonder if we'll ever get them again. Guys who rose up in the industry almost singlehandedly, became millionaires, and lived the rock star life. I don't think that's possible anymore. We may have eccentric geniuses like Will Wright, Peter Molyneux or Sid Meier bubble to the top, but none of them are the same as John/John.

Notch.

>Notch

Ya know, my friend actually was shocked to find out that Notch didn't look like Cliffy B

Hmmm How about we just tag team Fumito Ueda with John Carmack and get a real combination of cultures going?

Furthermore about Daikatana, what is with all of Ion Storm's games looking like complete and utter CRAP? I played Halo and Half-Life, neither bothered me. I'm trying out Anachronox now and it's the same graphics as Deus Ex and Daikatana where it looks like the director threw up on the paper and said to the artists "I need you to make a human being out of this."

It was like American manga. Had some of the surface trappings, but not really very Eastern.

I think this is fairly accurate. A friend I had in college who was studying abroad from Japan took a look at the box and said something to the effect of "What the heck is Dai doing in the same phrase as Katana? One's the Chinese reading and the other is the Japanese reading."

This is all very true. Still, just meant the concept man

 

[DigitalAtlas]

I just think it's about the differences in what is popular in the West. The JRPG is no longer as popular as it was in the PS2's days, so I think it's just because the elements aren't too interesting to US audiences. We like burly space marines and the military. Notice that you don't see too many fantasy-themed FPSs do too well in general, people prefer sci-fi and realistic themes in the West.

Fantasy-themed FPSes don't do well because they don't have guns in fantasy. How can you have a first person shooter with nothing to shoot?

That being said, Heretic and Hexen both did decently. As did the Thief series, the first two games of which are quite possibly some of the best games I've ever played. And yes it's a stealth game, but it's first person and has shooting elements.

Painkiller is arguably fantasy as well, so is Doom for that matter. Doom is about demons. Not aliens. What's more fantasy than biblical bad guys?

Heretic and Hexen? I've never heard of these. Could you please elaborate?

 

[teh_Canape]

I say Cliffy B & Peter Molyneux, so you can either dance, fart, or filet someone in Fables IV.

This thread is turning into a Game Design Dream Team thread... which isn't a bad idea.

I say Will Wright and Sid Meyer. Civilization and Pirates mixed with Spore and The Sims. The world would explode.

I'll say Doug Church, Gabe Newell, Ken Levine and John Carmack

think about it

and the best part is that 50% of that team is already there

wait wait, almost forgot, the guys who did Serious Sam need to be there too for the mapping

 

[Drunkbot]

Heretic and Hexen were both very fun games back in the day. It has been a while since I played them, so my memory is fuzzy, but in one of them your weapon was a wand or something that could shoot different spells you switched between like guns.

I think with a little tweaking to the magic system from Oblivion, that could have been a much more enjoyable magic oriented FPS. Getting weapons involved with the spellcasting with more dynamic effects than static stat boosts, or being alternate fireballs, would have been more fun for me. Wands/staves with enchantments that allow for zoom and additional accuracy or target tracking (go magic sniper), or alter the cast time to spell power ratio, or perhaps include a minor cast of another spell every time you cast a spell with it equipped (I explode the bad guy and heal myself for a little, and then heal myself for a lot and a little), etc etc