Poll: Shooters, what are they good for?

[Harbinger_]

This is something that I never quite understood from video game reviews and sometimes people who play them.

If the game is a warzone they complain about the fact that it is a gritty environment with a color palette of brown, black, brown and dirt. Honestly I highly doubt that many marines run around ducking for cover wearing acid green and purple with their combat fatigues. So why complain when the developers are creating a war-torn atmosphere that they want it to look like what its supposed to be?

Secondly and I find this happens to Killzone especially: "How come all the enemies look relatively the same?" I don't know perhaps because they're in uniform? The soldiers of Killzone are part of a dictatorship so there usually isn't much freedom of speech or uniqueness as is. Alot of the uniqueness would have been squashed as soon as you joined the military anyway. Look at games like Gears of War, Resistance, Call of Duty 4, etc. Do the enemies in these games look really different from each other? Hell no! If these games aren't getting flak for it then why is Killzone?

One thing that I don't enjoy about shooters that is true is the length of the single player mode. Alot of people buy for multiplayer but I know that alot of people play for single-player as well. Having it a bit longer wouldn't hurt too much.

Not really sure what I was trying to accomplish with this post, seems like a bit of a vent really.

 

[Eagle Est1986]

More need to include local multiplayer with bots, if you ask me. I can deal with a short campaign mode, as long as there's something else I can do offline. I'm not really a huge fan of online multiplayer.

 

[pha kin su pah]

I can't shoot the bunny

I like my story and multi, so lots of both.

 

[J.B]

Honestly I highly doubt that many marines run around ducking for cover wearing acid green and purple with their combat fatigues. So why complain when the developers are creating a war-torn atmosphere that they want it to look like what its supposed to be?

Brown and grey'ish enviorment's might be appropriate in some cases

But when sit down and relax playing a game I'd rather see something more unigue then what I would have seen if I went down to the industrial districts.

 

[shadow skill]

The whole brown and grey backlash comes from the fat that it has been used in place of a truly realistic colour pallete and then dubbed realistic that by the time KZ2 comes around people forget that the brown and grey actually fits given the setting.

 

[khululy]

I don't think every shooter needs to be realistic or about marines or set in an urban enviorment.
There have been many complaints about the gritty style of modern games lately.
And I partly agree with them.
I mean it's mostly western games that utilize that dark and grey while lots of Japanese games use more colors even while the games has serious themes.
Save from Silent hill and Resident evil but then again it fits.
Bioshock is quite a colorfull shooter but still it was dark.
gritty colors are not necessary to make a gritty game.
But I guess lot of people can relate more to a city
because that's where the action happens or something.
On the "country side" nothing happens, take Midsummer murder for example.

another great example on how color can create a certain mood is soulreaver on the playstation it has mostly dark colors but sometimes there are hint of bright purple and green to be seen and yet it remained gritty.
and yes those game aren't realistic but there aren't any realistic games.
bacause it would be a simulator then.

 

[Harbinger_]

I don't think every shooter needs to be realistic or about marines or set in an urban enviorment.
There have been many complaints about the gritty style of modern games lately.
And I partly agree with them.
I mean it's mostly western games that utilize that dark and grey while lots of Japanese games use more colors even while the games has serious themes.
Save from Silent hill and Resident evil but then again it fits.
Bioshock is quite a colorfull shooter but still it was dark.
gritty colors are not necessary to make a gritty game.
But I guess lot of people can relate more to a city
because that's where the action happens or something.
On the "country side" nothing happens, take Midsummer murder for example.

another great example on how color can create a certain mood is soulreaver on the playstation it has mostly dark colors but sometimes there are hint of bright purple and green to be seen and yet it remained gritty.
and yes those game aren't realistic but there aren't any realistic games.
bacause it would be a simulator then.

You're right not all shooters need to be realisitc or about marines or set in an urban environment but thats what seems to be the main selling point right now so thats why I used marines for my example.

 

[vicsrealms]

Shooters need to be realistic, but they also require a good story line and a good reason to get in there and kick butt. They also need to be on the PC, I absolutely hate console FPS games. Either that or the consoles need to make FPS games that allow the use of a mouse and keyboard settings, so I can hit what I'm aiming at. The control pads just don't do the job.

 

[omicronpercei]

The problem with this question is that it a quite subjective question considering there is no definition of too long or short but I would have to say it depends on the developer and game play. A 40 hour game doesn't seem as long if it's coupled with plenty of immersion but a 3 hour game can drag on if it's just that boring

 

[Sparrowsabre7]

More need to include local multiplayer with bots, if you ask me. I can deal with a short campaign mode, as long as there's something else I can do offline. I'm not really a huge fan of online multiplayer.

WHoleheartedly agreed. They should ALWAYS include bots, it's the reason I play GOW2 and the original Perfect Dark so much. Even when playing with friends offline sometimes it's fun to pla a little capture the flag or team deathmatch which, isn't exactly a barrel of laughs when htere's only two of you is it?

 

[mr mcshiznit]

Honestly "too short" kind of depends on how engaging the game is. If there is solid co-op through the story then hell make it as long as you want and i'll love it. However if the pacing to the story is slow and the combat is kind of annoying then i think you should make it shorter to maybe try and conceal these flaws.

 

[Harbinger_]

I was referring more to the fact that the general amount of games produced now have maybe 10 hours tops of single-player gameplay.

 

[Nhilus]

I like my games to be on the really long and really immersive side, kinda like morowind I spent over 200 hours on one char on that =P still enjoying it loads. Thats the good long, bad long is like bioshock, hate that game so repatative and not challanging atall.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

On the subject of color palete: it depends on the game's setting. In many games, shades of brown and grey are entirely appropiate. In gears of war you are fighting a war on a ruined planet where civilization has long since all but collapsed. In Grand Theft Auto, you are playing in the video game equivalent of NYC - and if anybody failed to notice, most buildings, roads and even cars tend to consist of a few shades of grey/brown/black/white. In games of the past, especially shooters, things often seemed to be far to clean and orderly considering there was supposedly a war going on.

On the subject of length: I generally approve of shorter games. It used to be that games would recycle gameplay elements dozens of times to lengthen the game. Who didn't get tired of the jumping puzzles long before completing the Xen worlds of Half-Life? Who didn't get bored searching for keys in Doom 2? The game should finish, ideally, before it starts to overstay it's welcome, and for most shooters that point for me seems to hit at about the 12 hour mark.

 

[KeyMaster45]

Well, as far as I'm concerned, a lot of the times, when Single Player storylines are drawn out, they tend to deteriorate. Like Portal and Call of Duty 4, I think they could have only gotten worse if they were longer.

True enough, some stories just aren't good enough to go on for long periods of time. There are some, however, that as you know they're comming to an end and are sad because of it. Others, on the other hand, you get to the end and think to yourself "Unholy skunk monkies thank god this game is almost over"

 

[Mr_Powers]

More need to include local multiplayer with bots, if you ask me. I can deal with a short campaign mode, as long as there's something else I can do offline. I'm not really a huge fan of online multiplayer.

Here here, I never understood why more game developers didn't do this. I can only guess that it's just too much time and effort to rework you enemy AI so that it provides a decent challenge in bot matches. Bots are always a great way to extend gameplay.

also,

Well, as far as I'm concerned, a lot of the times, when Single Player storylines are drawn out, they tend to deteriorate. Like Portal and Call of Duty 4, I think they could have only gotten worse if they were longer.

If a good story is short, then the developers simply set their initial goal too low when they were coming up with it. It could easily be posible to make CoD 4 12+ hours long and still good, it would have just required a fundamental rework of the whole game. It could be done, however at some point you are sacrificing quantity for quality, and I would agree that in general quality is better.

Portal is a completely different animal. Portal had to be short because in order to finish it you have to figure out how to get from one level to the next. This isn't always easy for everyone, and some people could struggle with completing it. For people like this, 10 hours of Portal would really start to piss them off and give them a very poor impression of the game. Thus, Portal had to be short for stupid people.

 

[Frank_Sinatra_]

More need to include local multiplayer with bots, if you ask me. I can deal with a short campaign mode, as long as there's something else I can do offline.

I agree and thats why I'm happy KZ2 will keep the tradition of KZ1 and include bots.

 

[CIA]

I vote that "absoloutely nothing, say it again!" be added to the list of choices.

 

[defcon 1]

I vote that "absolutely nothing, say it again!" be added to the list of choices.

Damn, beat me to it!

Single player is shorter because production value has gone up and yes, not too many people care about it as much. Besides, when the game can do nothing but shoot someone far away, throw grenades, and duck for cover, there aren't many ways to make it not feel repetitive after playing it for a long time. This is just a generalization of course, there are exceptions.

 

[NXMT]

Color in your shooter you say? Maybe Monolith will get on a No One Lives Forever sequel after FEAR2.