Should games change to attract 'more' people, or remain the same to suit the 'fans'

[pulse2]

Games are ever changing, sometimes for the better but other times for the worse, lets look at a few examples, Fallout seems to be a popular discussion, with the first two Fallout games being top down and more strategy rpg then shooter, is it such a bad thing that it changed in the form of Fallout 3 to appeal to more people or is it a turn off to the original fans. Do you think it should have remained the same as it was and target the niche or do exactly as it did and aim for more people looking for something new to play?

Who remember's Dino Crisis, it wasn't exactly in the same league as Fallout, but it was still fun, some may believe that it should have remained as it was in the first game, rather then becoming an action shooter in the second, or a complete shambles in the third, this could be an example of where things go wrong, but it was clear why it went wrong.

But in the case where a game changes but is still good, is it simply nostalgia talking because the fans want it to remain the same forever or is it that changing in fact ruins the original experience?

How many of you are still interested in Diablo 3, because Diablo 2 fanatics I've seen have criticised it for looking too much like World of Warcraft and alas wish to boycott it. I was a hardcore Fallout and Diablo fan back in the day, despite the length of time between their third outings, I can gladly say that I've still a hardcore fan of both series, despite what they look like and how they play. Yeah, there are some things I'd prefer from the older versions, but I'm all up for a change, I personally think games need that.

What do you guys think?

 

[JeanLuc761]

Ideally developers should look for a healthy balance between appeasing their existing fanbase and drawing in a larger crowd. Business have to make money, after all, but it does you little good to toss away your existing customers in order to do so.

It also, arguably, depends on the game and its purpose. A game like Mass Effect 3, for example, should probably be much less accessible to new players than it is for existing fans, simply because it's the conclusion of a three-game story arc. Re-introducing plot points that have been extensively covered in the first two games just doesn't make a whole lot of sense in the finale.

On the other hand, a game like Half-Life 2 can get away with changing a lot of things simply because knowledge of the previous game is unnecessary.

 

[Liudeius]

They should change with time, to a degree, it's necessary or we would still be playing a ton of low quality games.
If drastic changes are being made to a game's mechanics, it's probably better to just market it as a new series rather than to tie it into an old game. If the alternative if that series going under though, the fans might like to see familiar characters and settings regardless of gameplay changes.

To be fair, Diablo 3 complaints are because Blizzard is trying to screw people out of money, not because they are changing the mechanics too much.

 

[CRRPGMykael]

Games should stay like they are.You don't see movies or books adapting themselves to fit more audiences,do you?Well,actually you do,but that way you end up pleasing nobody.Each type of game or movie or whatever is for a different audience.A great example would be psychological stuff.Not everybody enjoys it.They'd rather play CoD and no matter how hard you try to make them like it,they won't.

Although you could change games like the people of Bethesda changed Fallout.The old games were top down strategic stuff with 2D sprites,which is really different from,say,Killzone 3 with its graphics and 3D and motion controls,etc.That's why games change,and I didn't even know about the Fallout series before Fallout 3,so sometimes it's a step in the right direction.

 

[Zhukov]

Fuck fans. Ignore the whiny little sods and just try to make a good game.

If that means changing something for the better, then go right ahead.

PS. By the way, good question.

 

[nklshaz]

I think we should take it upon ourselves to get our friends and family into gaming. Then more people will get to enjoy it, and the games we like won't get compromised.

 

[the spud]

You shouldn't try to make a game apppeal to any specific group of people (well, every now and then a little fan service is OK) but for the most part the developer should just worry about making a good game.

 

[Aurora Firestorm]

Fuck fans. Ignore the whiny little sods and just try to make a good game.

If that means changing something for the better, then go right ahead.

PS. By the way, good question.

This is most of my response. I don't believe in just shunning fans, but if you set out to make a good game and do it, fans will happen. The one time I think you should really try to please fans, is in a sequel game. If you want to make a sequel, look at what the fans liked, what they didn't like, etc...and try to fix and improve. Give them what they like, and then twist it, or tweak it, but don't depart from what the series is. (Don't go on too long, of course, but a couple sequels never hurt anyone as long as they don't suck.)

 

[AlternatePFG]

I have no problem with games changing, as long as they don't get rid of what makes the game good in the first place.

 

[Zhukov]

Fuck fans. Ignore the whiny little sods and just try to make a good game.

If that means changing something for the better, then go right ahead.

PS. By the way, good question.

This is most of my response. I don't believe in just shunning fans, but if you set out to make a good game and do it, fans will happen. The one time I think you should really try to please fans, is in a sequel game. If you want to make a sequel, look at what the fans liked, what they didn't like, etc...and try to fix and improve. Give them what they like, and then twist it, or tweak it, but don't depart from what the series is.

The problem with that approach is that fans are never in agreement. Some of them will welcome some of the changes, some of the time. Others will hate all the changes all the time.

I remember reading an article by an indie RPG developer, a guy named Jeff Vogel. He said that every single change he has ever made to his games has resulted in whole bunch of people sending him angry e-mails calling him a hack and promising to never buy from him ever again. However, his games continue to sell quite well, at least for little niche titles.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Well games have a very unique ability - interactivity, so give us the bloody choice.
You can easily lop off features to make it more "accessible" for the easily entertained audience, while the rest still get a complex game.

Mass Effect could come with an RPG item system, they could added planet exploration missions instead of that "will strangle people after I finish this god damn resource minigame", and they could have had dialog options.
Then just take all that away for the casual player and we would all be happy.

Dragon Age could have the same casual switch, some people just want the one button gameplay and making it really isn't a problem.

Fallout 3/NV could easily switch into a top down, click-move, VATS only combat system, and they could even go the other way for the CoD fanboys to just spray and pray.

Final Fantasy 13 could have just started with the actual gameplay for people who who played it before, clearly all that is in there they just make you work 20 hours for it...

So that is the progress I want to see, advanced gameplay options.

 

[pulse2]

Well I suppose you could wave the same stick at the music industry, as artists change to appeal to the audience that will make them more money, their fans slander them for "selling out" and losing sight of "creativity and innovation", but the fans alone are not enough to keep the band / artist going, which is why they may have switched in the first place.

So looking at gaming again, fans will never be satisfied with any changes made, but at the same time, a game can't remain the same throughout the existence of its series.

 

[Asti]

I think what I really want to see is not a change into the one or the other direction but rather a diversification of games so all kinds of people can find something they're interested in.

I don't think the hardcore market should be ignored in favor of the larger casual crowd or the other way around. That's what difficulty levels are for. Developers should have a clear vision of who to market their game for because there is no longer "THE gaming crowd" and then stick with it and don't try to build the ultimate game everyone will love.

 

[Inkidu]

There's a fundamental problem with this. There is no really good balance, you can't have it both ways. You have to catch it on the desired "tilt". Developers actually do this quite often, and they've done it for years.

First you want to draw in fans. Then you cater to those fans, but then you have to draw in new fans because the old ones move on, get old, die, etc. It's just the way it is. I think a lot of fans would do better to stop this whole sense of entitlement and try to help their favorite franchises succeed rather than grief about it. It's a real game of give and take.

Though, sometimes a franchise is just beyond help. I'm looking at you Final Fantasy. *ba-zing!*

 

[Therumancer]

I don't think games should change to attract more people, especially seeing as they have been making a profit pretty steadily since the whole 1983 crash. Rather games should be something that causes people to strive to play them, and adapt and improve as a result.

Once you start making money too much of a priority compared to the product, and start focusing on trying to expand a market to broadly, it's all downhill. The problem is that the lowest common human denominator is low indeed. I think little is gained for either the product, or the people, when something (anything) dumbs it down to that level, many attempts to improve humanity and our body of work have failed by simply sinking down into the gutter in pursuit of the almighty dollar.

Please note that this is not to say that making money is in any way wrong, however even a good thing like capitalism can be taken too far. When your sitting on a multi-billion dollar industry, and your still striving for growth and making more money beyond that, it becomes a problem.

In the end the mentality should be one where if a game or other product makes more money than it costs, that's a win. Not "well if we dumbed this down to an extreme, we could sell it to a ton more people, and thus make bigger profits" leading to a steady degeration.

There was a point where I felt bringing games to a wider audience was a good thing, but when that wider audience turned into EVERYONE, and that includes that lowest human denominator... well that's where my problems and "elitism" really got started.

I know a lot of people won't like this point, and I confess to being a bit of a jerk on a lot of levels, but really I developed this way for a reason. The direction of the gaming industry has gotten progressively harder for me to get behind.

 

[trooper6]

Well I suppose you could wave the same stick at the music industry, as artists change to appeal to the audience that will make them more money, their fans slander them for "selling out" and losing sight of "creativity and innovation", but the fans alone are not enough to keep the band / artist going, which is why they may have switched in the first place.

So looking at gaming again, fans will never be satisfied with any changes made, but at the same time, a game can't remain the same throughout the existence of its series.

Another issue is the assumption that artists or games change solely to make more money, to attract more people, to sell out. But what is often happening? The artist/game designer now has more money and now gets to do some things that *they* have always wanted to do, but couldn't afford to before. They can afford to get a top of the line expensive musical instrument that allows them to explore new sonic spaces. Or, like k.d. lang's Shadowlands album, they have a chance to work with a famous producer they always had wanted to work with. Game-wise, they can add more people and start doing the sorts of programming things or improving graphics things that they couldn't have done by themselves or with less money.

It is a problem to assume that a create makes changes only for mercenary reasons rather than because they are engaging in the creative process...that they want to make a *better* game, or try something new. I know many people bag on Dragon Age 2. But from everything I've read from the writers, they were trying to do something new and interesting--not just because they want to make more money--but because they want to push the RPG game forward. And I think they actually did, reused maps aside.

Last point. I am always vaguely amused by folks complaining how games shouldn't change. People who want to stay in the NES/PS1/PS2 eras. Why do I laugh. Because those people are young. If they were my age, the era they'd be going back to is the Pong and Asteroids era. Who would want games to stay in that era? I mean, I liked playing Frogger and Zork...but come on! Games are one gazillion times better now than they were before.

Also, we don't even have to go back that far. The Mass Effect games are better than KotOR in terms of graphics, GUI design, fluidity...but also in terms of writing. KotOR has some great plot moments, but it is really, really black/white and doesn't have a lot of nuance. Mass Effect 2 has a lot more...Dragon Age a *LOT* more. Bioware has gotten better and designing RPGs. And yeah, some people may not like real time combat, or that the game isn't using the d20 rules set. But so what? D&D is not the only RPG. And there is nothing wrong with wanting to improve and expand your game.

A lot of people complained that Mass Effect added TPS elements and that is the devil! RPGs aren't like shooters! Oh doom! Bioware is adding shooter elements to "dumb it down" to "get more money"--"the sellouts!" But couldn't it also be that Bioware looked at their RPG and thought...our combat really could be improved than the way it has always been done up until now. Let's spend a lot of extra development money on seeing if we can take inspiration from some shooters to make our game better.

Sometimes developers make choices that I don't like. For example, I'm not excited about the radical shift in the upcoming Brothers in Arms game...but you know what? I'm not the center of the universe. It isn't all about me. The developers decided to go that way. I'll probably not buy the game. But the game may be a success with others who'll think it is the best ever.

 

[sooperman]

While the fans are an important chunk of any game's sales, devs should never be afraid to improve a game. And besides, fans had ought to remain fans even if something gets changed in a sequel. They still have the original to swoon over.

Games should stay like they are.They'd rather play CoD and no matter how hard you try to make them like it,they won't.

I noticed this problem with Battlefield 3's changes to gameplay. It seems as though they are trying to attract the Call of Duty audience with prone and sight sway etc and a general faster pace. Frankly that doesn't make any sense, because isn't the Call of Duty crowd going to buy, you know, Call of Duty?

 

[Therumancer]

Games are ever changing, sometimes for the better but other times for the worse, lets look at a few examples, Fallout seems to be a popular discussion, with the first two Fallout games being top down and more strategy rpg then shooter, is it such a bad thing that it changed in the form of Fallout 3 to appeal to more people or is it a turn off to the original fans. Do you think it should have remained the same as it was and target the niche or do exactly as it did and aim for more people looking for something new to play?

Who remember's Dino Crisis, it wasn't exactly in the same league as Fallout, but it was still fun, some may believe that it should have remained as it was in the first game, rather then becoming an action shooter in the second, or a complete shambles in the third, this could be an example of where things go wrong, but it was clear why it went wrong.

But in the case where a game changes but is still good, is it simply nostalgia talking because the fans want it to remain the same forever or is it that changing in fact ruins the original experience?

How many of you are still interested in Diablo 3, because Diablo 2 fanatics I've seen have criticised it for looking too much like World of Warcraft and alas wish to boycott it. I was a hardcore Fallout and Diablo fan back in the day, despite the length of time between their third outings, I can gladly say that I've still a hardcore fan of both series, despite what they look like and how they play. Yeah, there are some things I'd prefer from the older versions, but I'm all up for a change, I personally think games need that.

What do you guys think?

Well, my basic attitude is that if you want to change things signifigantly you should create a new game series entirely, or create a spin off series if you want to use the same world. The point of continueing a series is to pretty much make more of the same, perhaps with some tweaks, improvements, and expansion within the same basic engine, world, and style of play.

The problem I have is when they decide they want to take an turn based strategy game for example, and turn it into a FPS, and yet claim it's part of the same series. Or change everything about a game, and call it a numerical sequel to a given series.

In the case of things like Diablo 3 for example, they pretty much took a dark and gritty series, simplified it, made it bright and colorful for a more casual audience, and so on and so forth. There is no reason to call this game "Diablo 3" other than marketing purposes and that is what slots people off. They should pretty much start a new action RPG franchise for that and if they want to make a proper "Diablo 3" do it in the same vein as the first two games, with increasingly deeper gameplay, and the dark and forboding artwork and such.

See, I'm not opposed to developers creating new games and trying new things, but I am opposed to sequels where really the only thing connecting a series between chapters is the title. If a game is popular enough to warrent a sequel to begin with, the sequel should generally be more of the same, because that's what fans of the original want. If the game developers want to do something totally new, then it's time for a new series/franchise.

I am more or less re-stating the same thigns here in differant ways, but I really think if the game developers/producers were to finally have their brains click and "get it" here, there would be a lot less fan rage in general.

As far as Dino Crisis goes, my basic attitude with that is that it was a giant cash in on the whole "Jurassic Park" craze, but by using it's own world/set up, rather than the one from Jurassic Park towards the same end it wound up creating a great game, which was far superior to any of the movie tie in products. The problem to me appears that the sequels were less creative and tried to be more like the movie tie in games, featuring more action and so on, and in doing so it destroyed what made the first game something of a cult classic. Oddly the survival horror take on things fit the concept a lot better than a shooty, shooty bang-bang game.