Thief vs AAA Gaming

[Bad Jim]

Someone in the comments of the video said that the problem with trying to remove quest markers in such a huge map (eg Skyrim) is that the player would get lost very easily. I think one way to fix this is to place signs along the road like in Morrowind, but as a result there would be a LOT more roads in Skyrim. That and quest objectives would need to be designed/placed more specifically and not too far away from any landmarks.

As someone who loves Morrowind, I'd still have to say that the directions were frequently terrible and the vast majority of players looked at faqs for better directions. A quest marker is unrealistic, but it is equally unrealistic that you can't go back to the quest giver and ask for better directions.

What I would do is have quest markers, but confine them to the map and not have them floating in view like you're wearing some medieval fantasy Google Glass. It wouldn't really make it any harder to find places, but I think people would be far more likely to accept it because it is realistic for quest givers to mark locations on your map, and also because people only look at the map when they are trying to find a place. People never complain that your own location is always marked on the map, something a paper map does not do.

 

[ap0cass1n]

As someone who loves Morrowind, I'd still have to say that the directions were frequently terrible and the vast majority of players looked at faqs for better directions. A quest marker is unrealistic, but it is equally unrealistic that you can't go back to the quest giver and ask for better directions.

What I would do is have quest markers, but confine them to the map and not have them floating in view like you're wearing some medieval fantasy Google Glass. It wouldn't really make it any harder to find places, but I think people would be far more likely to accept it because it is realistic for quest givers to mark locations on your map, and also because people only look at the map when they are trying to find a place. People never complain that your own location is always marked on the map, something a paper map does not do.

That's actually a much, much better idea. And what if that map worked like in WoW, by having it so parts of the map aren't revealed until you go there, and until then it's just a blank, but if you haven't discovered the location of a quest objective yet the quest giver puts it there for you but you still don't get the EXP for doing so until you go there yourself?

Really gonna have to agree with this. Indies are far from the saviors of gaming people so desperately want them to be(to the point some have deluded themselves into thinking that anything not EA or Ubisoft is somehow indie). Sure, we get an Undertale every once in a while, but if you look at any release schedule, you realize how fucking insignificant a single good indie is in the grand scheme of things. It comes at like a 1 to 100 exchange rate in regards to good indies to trash indies.

I know the Escapist has a hard-on for AAA to the point that if it has and E in the company name people largely turn their noses up at it after pissing, but c'mon, it's not like people remember a huge amount of indies any given year. And half of the ones remembered are actually backed by AAA in some way. Both have largely the same problems, only difference honestly is that you can be guaranteed a largely polished experience with AAA because they've rubbed their worry stone so much it might as well be crystal.

Edit:
And this is ignoring that there's a startlingly large amount of indies that are just flash games from fifteen years ago with more levels.

I know, can you believe there are people who think Double Fine is indie?

"Backed by AAA in some way" Yep, some good examples of that are Bastion and Brothers, both indie games backed by Microsoft.

"flash games from fifteen years ago with more levels" Didn't Edmund McMillen release a compilation of his flash games on Steam or something?

 

[Redryhno]

Really gonna have to agree with this. Indies are far from the saviors of gaming people so desperately want them to be(to the point some have deluded themselves into thinking that anything not EA or Ubisoft is somehow indie). Sure, we get an Undertale every once in a while, but if you look at any release schedule, you realize how fucking insignificant a single good indie is in the grand scheme of things. It comes at like a 1 to 100 exchange rate in regards to good indies to trash indies.

I know the Escapist has a hard-on for AAA to the point that if it has and E in the company name people largely turn their noses up at it after pissing, but c'mon, it's not like people remember a huge amount of indies any given year. And half of the ones remembered are actually backed by AAA in some way. Both have largely the same problems, only difference honestly is that you can be guaranteed a largely polished experience with AAA because they've rubbed their worry stone so much it might as well be crystal.

Edit:
And this is ignoring that there's a startlingly large amount of indies that are just flash games from fifteen years ago with more levels.

I know, can you believe there are people who think Double Fine is indie?

"Backed by AAA in some way" Yep, some good examples of that are Bastion and Brothers, both indie games backed by Microsoft.

"flash games from fifteen years ago with more levels" Didn't Edmund McMillen release a compilation of his flash games on Steam or something?

I largely think it's because definitions have gotten muddled. Indie anymore has largely just become that thing that means "isn't directly connected to AAA, which I hate with a burning passion"(burning passion not always included). I mean, technically Double Fine is "Indie", but they have budgets that make some AAA games look cheap by comparison. Star Citizen has a budget that is starting to make (or already has depending on what article is saying what ammount) GTA5 and Destiny look average relatively. And that's forgetting that many Eastern(primarily Japanese) devs are AAA as fuck, but they often have such staggered releases that people forget about them if they aren't somehow connected to Nintendo, Square and more recently, From.

Others are DonTNod and TellTale in general. Sure, both are "indie", but they also have huge AAA backing that people don't want to acknowledge half the time.

As for McMillen, I dunno. Maybe? I played through Gish a few years ago and Afterbirth is still fucking amazing(somebody help me, I have something like 1k hours in it). But I wouldn't be surprised, guy's been pumping out content since Newgrounds was brand new. PukeButt(I think that's the name) has one of the sadder stories going on in the background if you pay attention of many games(I'm talking things like what people talk about when they mention To The Moon). And that came out in like 2008.

I was mostly just thinking about Gravity Ghost and Ninja Pizza Girl, and to a point, Trials(mostly I just really have a problem with Gravity Ghost because the mechanics are somehow MORE frustrating than the original rage games like Planet Spinner and Galaxy Jumper). Games that people say are somehow "innovative" and "brave" while being heavily based in the past with nothing but the collectibles for the sake of collecting that people ***** about Ubitsoft games having.

Someone in the comments of the video said that the problem with trying to remove quest markers in such a huge map (eg Skyrim) is that the player would get lost very easily. I think one way to fix this is to place signs along the road like in Morrowind, but as a result there would be a LOT more roads in Skyrim. That and quest objectives would need to be designed/placed more specifically and not too far away from any landmarks.

As someone who loves Morrowind, I'd still have to say that the directions were frequently terrible and the vast majority of players looked at faqs for better directions. A quest marker is unrealistic, but it is equally unrealistic that you can't go back to the quest giver and ask for better directions.

What I would do is have quest markers, but confine them to the map and not have them floating in view like you're wearing some medieval fantasy Google Glass. It wouldn't really make it any harder to find places, but I think people would be far more likely to accept it because it is realistic for quest givers to mark locations on your map, and also because people only look at the map when they are trying to find a place. People never complain that your own location is always marked on the map, something a paper map does not do.

Yeah, I went back and played through Morrowind a while ago with the updated graphics mod that makes it look alot like Skyrim, and jesus christ is it hard to find literally anything in that game. You get directions sure, but the problem is that the map tells you pretty much nothing unless you've been there before. Give me a way to buy even pieces of the world map so you have a rough idea of how shit goes together and half my complaints would be gone. Thing I loved in Skyrim so much was that you sometimes got random map points set down. No reason to go there beyond "strange noises" and "my cousin stopped writing back around that place".

 

[DoPo]

As someone who loves Morrowind, I'd still have to say that the directions were frequently terrible

I do have to disagree. Sure some of the directions are bad but not to the extent that I've been hearing people complain about them. Calling it "frequently" is an overstatement - I'd actually say that frequently you get the location marked on your map as well as the directions of how to get there.

There are several bad directions in quests - yet to this day, I remember, like three or maybe four. And those are ones I had to spend hours combing for until I either managed to stumble upon the location by combination of luck and determination, or I had to resort to looking up online.

A quest marker is unrealistic, but it is equally unrealistic that you can't go back to the quest giver and ask for better directions.

And you know what - that's exactly what Daggerfall did. I played it after I played Morrowind and it was one of the things I was a bit perplexed why it wasn't present in the later installment. You could actually just ask any NPC for directions - if you have a quest to go to cave X, you can go and talk to any of the commoners mucking around in the area and ask "Hey, where is X?" and they will either give you directions or mark it on the map. The lazy way is to spam the conversation until they mark it, check where it is and just head there.

There were few location you could talk to people about in Morrowind, but not really enough and I think the Daggerfall system worked much better.

At any rate, most of the quest giver directions worked quite fine, as long as you paid any attention to them - head out east, when you get to fork in the road go left, then keep following the mountain. That's not really that hard to screw up. And variations thereof.

 

[MysticSlayer]

What I would do is have quest markers, but confine them to the map and not have them floating in view like you're wearing some medieval fantasy Google Glass. It wouldn't really make it any harder to find places, but I think people would be far more likely to accept it because it is realistic for quest givers to mark locations on your map, and also because people only look at the map when they are trying to find a place. People never complain that your own location is always marked on the map, something a paper map does not do.

Given how divisive quest markers can , I think the best thing for developers to do is put in the effort to build them in for the people who want them while giving an off switch for the people who don't want them.

 

[Dizchu]

The reason Thief was so good and games like Dishonored and Thief 4 fall flat is because Thief and Thief 2's systems were built on the idea of stripping away unnecessary components instead of overwhelming the player with choices.

Thief was originally going to be a sort of Hexen-esque medieval combat game from what I've read. The stealth system was just small aspect of the whole game, but the developers realised that it was also the most interesting. So what did they do? They ditched the baggage, focused on what worked best and built a game from that. When they realised that people really liked the stealth and thievery of The Dark Project, they decided to cut even more of the fat for Thief 2. That is the sort of game design I respect the hell out of.

Doom wasn't originally a simple run-and-gun action game, it was initially going to be a sort of weird RPG adventure that was very plot-heavy (much like the original System Shock, actually). But they too decided to cut the parts they found unnecessary and focus on the combat, which they refined into what I personally believe to be the most elegant shooter of all time. Other games I respect (though I may not like as much) are Mirror's Edge and Gone Home, because they too cut the unnecessary parts of the game and ended up making something unique. I'd take Gone Home over a dozen Bioshock Infinites any day.

And there's the problem. Publishers want to release the next "open world, sidequest-heavy, cover-shooting, character-upgrading, gritty adventure" hit and as a result you get all of these games just coalescing into this brown non-descript sludge. They're so eager to impress audiences rather than make a product they can be proud of.

 

[retsupurae yahtsee]

I do agree that there are too many generic shooters and bland open-world games like Call of Duty and Assassin's Creed; and that the Assassin''s Creed style of combat, as used there and in Batman and Shadows of Mordor is, depending on how you play the game either unplayably random or ridiculously easy to break--however, there are some great, imaginative games from recent years:

Little King's Story: Wonderful game, one of the greatest, and filled with variety, imagination and challenge. Gameplay, style and themes change constantly, and you will never see anything coming, not even in the thoroughly insane ending.
Mother 3: Mixes the style of the weirdest game series ever--the previous games have been translated as Earthbound and Earthbound Beginnings--with a more coherent plot and characterization.
Metroid Prime Trilogy: All the color and imagination of Metroid, placed in a glorious new perspective with plenty of charm.
Bayonetta 1 and 2: Wild, fast paced action game with a lot of humor and imagination, creative setting and enemies, and many great cutscenes.
Metal gear Solid 4 and Revengeance: All the strange and detailed style of Metal Gear with exciting stories and great new characters. Revengeance updates the gameplay with awesome swordfights; and has one scene that is a far better commentary on war and human nature than the entirety of Spec Ops: The Line.
Wonderful 101: A supremely weird, incredibly fun and very lengthy trip through a world of giant robots, Godlike nanobots, insane characters and plenty more.
Shin Megami Tensei 4, Persona 3 and 4: Grim, surreal looks at the moral implications of Christian mythology and how life is influenced by the conflict between belief and realistic concerns. Restore the challenge of the early after Nocturne and Persona 2 were too easy.
Citizens of Earth: Strange and hilarious tribute to Mother, where you can explore the entire world and find dozens of characters with great jokes.
Super Meat Boy and Binding of Isaac: Edmund Macmullen's fast, mercilessly difficult games--one a platformer reminiscent of Bubble Bobble, the other a mix of Rogue and Zelda. Unique settings such as a salt factory make these games memorable.
Real Texas: A surreal game that mixes characters from a variety of places and time periods into one strange world. A lot of depth, with a mixture of text and graphical interfaces.
Hotline Miami 1 and 2 and Not A Hero: Very strange and trippy games that require pixel-perfect timing, thought and care. I think the end of Hotline Miami 1 and the entirety of 2 explain too much and more mystery would have been nice, but otherwise these are excellent.
The Evil within: A strange survival horror game in the style of Resident Evil 4, but with its own unique style. A nice antidote to the bland and uninspired Aliens: Isolation.
Rayman: Origins and Legends: Strange platformers, worthy continuations of a great series and filled with detail and style.
Papers, Please: Successfully turns bureaucratic paper-pushing into a great game.
Mario Galaxy 1 and 2: A surreal upgrade of the series into space, with lots of detail and color.
Bionic Commando: Rearmed: An awesome remake of one of the greatest games ever.
Randal's Monday: A wonderful tribute to the classic adventures created by Lucasarts, with its own style and humor and very complex puzzles.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

I played and loved Deus Ex, but have no desire to play the rest of the series based on what I've heard.

Human Revolution is actually pretty damn good, though.

I played Deus Ex 1 first, and loved it. Then HR came around and smoothed the gameplay to a mirror shine. It loses SOME depth compared to the original, but is ultimately deserving of a place in the series.

And Invisible War, while DEEPLY DEEPLY flawed, was pretty fun as well.

 

[retsupurae yahtsee]

What I hate about the combat in Assassin's Creed, Shadows of Mordor and Batman is that it is completely random. I point my character towards the enemy and press the attack button in Zelda, Devil may Cry, The Witcher, Bayonetta or Ninja Gaiden and my character attacks the enemy. I do that in one of the Assassin's Creed style games, and maybe my characters attacks that enemy, or an enemy 20 feet away, or rolls-I have no control unless I spam one move that breaks the combat.

More recent games that have imagination:

Resident Evil: Revelations 2: The last few games were fun, but lacked the imagination of number 4. This game returned to the insanity of Resident Evil 4, with a lot of strange settings and characters and technologies.
Viewtiful Joe: Wonderful game that combines comic books, time manipulation and mercilessly difficult bosses into a strange and fascinating package.
Space Quest incinerations and Vohaul Strikes Back: Satisfying conclusions to one of Sierra's best series. Start with Vohaul Strikes Back, as the other game is a sequel to its bad ending.
Dropsy: An adventure game which tells a coherent story without legible text or comprehensible dialogue. Very impressive piece of work.
Cursed Mountain: An unusual setting: Tibetian mythology. Flawed, but a good horror game.
Deadly Creatures: Another underrated, charming Wii game: Take control of insects and fight your way through a story.
Tex Murphy: The Tesla Effect: Another great continuation of a classic adventure game series--and the plot, while silly, is pretty easy to follow, though I recommend trying every option because some information is in optional scenes and because there a lot of hilarious alternate scenes.
Valiant Hearts: The Great War: Life and death in World War I, presented like an NES or SNES game. Quite interesting and well done game.
Zeno Clash 1 and 2: Nihilistic and completely surreal games about human nature, morality and fighting strange creatures. A unique experience.
Cthulhu Saves the World: Witty and imaginative game where you play a Lovecraftian monster in a parody of R.P.G.s.

 

[Rastrelly]

What makes a lot of old games really good and really good is that they put effort into being different. Now it seems like a lot of games are trying to be the same.

To be fair, it is a lot easier to do something entirely unique when it has never been done before. Once games like Thief introduce a concept, it no longer becomes a matter of creating something new in that regard. It becomes a matter of improvement and making the experience as enjoyable as possible.

Well, the problem with T2014 is that it did not even try to be different. This game actually managed to try to bite off Dishonored, new Deus Ex and original Thiefs, and it managed to fail at each department.
It's a bad Dishonored, cause it presents ZERO combat possibilities, only stealth.
It's a bad Deus Ex, 'cause not only general plot SUCKS, it, yet again, does not provide what every good DX provided.
It's a bad Thief, 'cause not only it ditched Thief stealth in favour of Deus Ex stealth (which always was easier), it also killed off the main idea of Thief - have a level for you to solve the way you want. In this one levels are linear with rare opportunity to pick a path.
And I don't even mention how much Garrett is NOT the way Garrett is supposed to be (and Garrett was one of the reasons Thief became popular at the time), AAAND I don't even mention all this crap with "this is reboot, but we set this reboot in the setting and continuity of original games to make a dump on everything at once".

And approach like this is prevalent nowadays. Why even bother to invent or create? Just follow the marketing department charts! Like, again, Thief 2014 as prime example. Who made them (devs) to more or less kill off wonderful surface sound system from T1/2/3? Why not improve it with additional sounds - doors, lockpicks? They made a step in right direction with Garrett's body being material, but why not to elaborate on this? Why not to try and develop impoved guard vision, for guards to pick Garrett from improper background even in the dark? To make them notice his shadow as well? And why not to improve their AI? Say, make them notice disappearing colleagues, but allow Garrett to imitate them (for example, wear guardsman boots and walk around, or steal cloth changing from Hitman (I won't mention dress-up level from Thief 1 just because))? Why would one invent some new stupid shite like primal, while even after Thief 3 there were tons of potential in all classic factions? If you want leveling system THAT much - why not just make it a prequel, when Garrett just left Keepers to restart thieving career? There were SO many possibilities, all of them not too hard to implement, and no, what they did was a triple ripoff with mediocre result.

And look around? What AAA games were released in 2015? How many of them were even remotely original? They're either direct remakes, or clones of clones of clones. For Warp's sake!

 

[Sheo_Dagana]

Personally, I think that if the AAA industry wants to be profitable, all they need to do is start focusing on a target audience and stop dumping so much cash into a project that they then have to try to sell to EVERYONE to make their money back. This is one of the reasons that the 'Souls series has been so successful.

Since companies are so intent on selling everything to everyone now, games like Assassin's Creed Syndicate and Rise of the Tomb Raider's idea of depth is to put as many icons on the map as possible and count on the player's OCD complex to wipe them all away.

I still have great experiences with today's AAA games, and lets be honest, a LOT of older games also lacked depth, but it's getting to be a pain these days when most RPGs won't even let you control someone outside of the party leader, something that is also true of Final Fantasy these days.

 

[Adam Locking]

It is simply that we aren't building games on the new ideas.

I'm not denying that. I'm saying that it isn't some unique issue that we face today. We've had this issue from the beginning and will continue to have the issue. People just tend to forget all the generic games of the past. And in the future, they'll forget all the generic games of today and then look back and wonder why games can't be as unique, experimental, and exciting as Portal and Dark Souls.

I'd like to argue otherwise. Here are a list of games that came out in 1998, the same year as Thief. Can you think of a comparable list for 2015?

Banjo-Kazooie
Crash Bandicoot 3
Devil Dice
Future Cop: LAPD
Grim Fandango
Guilty Gear
House of the Dead 2
Kula World
Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Metal Gear Solid
Oddworld: Abe's Exodus
Radiant Silvergun
Resident Evil 2
Spyro the Dragon
Starcraft

Look at how varied that list is! We have 2d and 3d platformers, rpgs, point and click adventures, RTS, stealth games, shoot 'em ups, beat 'em ups puzzle games and a few hybrids. Can you honestly say we've had brilliant games in all those genres, and more, this year?

Yes, it was easier to be new and innovative back then, and so many things hadn't been tried yet, but come on. The above list features a game that blended 3rd person shooter with RTS elements (Future Cop) a game where you play as a freaking beach ball (Kula World) and a puzzler about devils rolling around on dice (Devil Dice, obviously) as well as games that either codified whole genres, or remembered as some of the greatest games ever made. These last few years can't hold a candle.

 

[Rastrelly]

It is simply that we aren't building games on the new ideas.

I'm not denying that. I'm saying that it isn't some unique issue that we face today. We've had this issue from the beginning and will continue to have the issue. People just tend to forget all the generic games of the past. And in the future, they'll forget all the generic games of today and then look back and wonder why games can't be as unique, experimental, and exciting as Portal and Dark Souls.

I'd like to argue otherwise. Here are a list of games that came out in 1998, the same year as Thief. Can you think of a comparable list for 2015?

Banjo-Kazooie
Crash Bandicoot 3
Devil Dice
Future Cop: LAPD
Grim Fandango
Guilty Gear
House of the Dead 2
Kula World
Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Metal Gear Solid
Oddworld: Abe's Exodus
Radiant Silvergun
Resident Evil 2
Spyro the Dragon
Starcraft

Look at how varied that list is! We have 2d and 3d platformers, rpgs, point and click adventures, RTS, stealth games, shoot 'em ups, beat 'em ups puzzle games and a few hybrids. Can you honestly say we've had brilliant games in all those genres, and more, this year?

Yes, it was easier to be new and innovative back then, and so many things hadn't been tried yet, but come on. The above list features a game that blended 3rd person shooter with RTS elements (Future Cop) a game where you play as a freaking beach ball (Kula World) and a puzzler about devils rolling around on dice (Devil Dice, obviously) as well as games that either codified whole genres, or remembered as some of the greatest games ever made. These last few years can't hold a candle.

Add here Fallout 2, Unreal, NFS3, Caesar III, Sanitarium, Sin, Thief, Worms 2, Commandos, Dark Omen, Baldur's Gate and friggin' Vangers. That was THE year!

 

[MysticSlayer]

Well, the problem with T2014 is that it did not even try to be different. This game actually managed to try to bite off Dishonored, new Deus Ex and original Thiefs, and it managed to fail at each department.

I was talking stealth in general, not necessarily Thief 2014. As games like Thief: The Dark Project and Splinter Cell came in to help set the rules for the stealth genre, any following games, no matter how unique, would inevitably be compared to them.

I'd like to argue otherwise. Here are a list of games that came out in 1998, the same year as Thief. Can you think of a comparable list for 2015?

I'm not even sure it is fair to ask me to compare any year to 1998. That's arguably the best year in gaming history, so not even other years in the 80s or 90s could compare. But even then, a lot of games on that list were either sequels or were playing off of genres that were popular at the time. It's just that we got a lot of great games from what was popular at that time during that year.

 

[Jingle Fett]

It is simply that we aren't building games on the new ideas.

I'm not denying that. I'm saying that it isn't some unique issue that we face today. We've had this issue from the beginning and will continue to have the issue. People just tend to forget all the generic games of the past. And in the future, they'll forget all the generic games of today and then look back and wonder why games can't be as unique, experimental, and exciting as Portal and Dark Souls.

I'd like to argue otherwise. Here are a list of games that came out in 1998, the same year as Thief. Can you think of a comparable list for 2015?

Banjo-Kazooie
Crash Bandicoot 3
Devil Dice
Future Cop: LAPD
Grim Fandango
Guilty Gear
House of the Dead 2
Kula World
Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Metal Gear Solid
Oddworld: Abe's Exodus
Radiant Silvergun
Resident Evil 2
Spyro the Dragon
Starcraft

Look at how varied that list is! We have 2d and 3d platformers, rpgs, point and click adventures, RTS, stealth games, shoot 'em ups, beat 'em ups puzzle games and a few hybrids. Can you honestly say we've had brilliant games in all those genres, and more, this year?

Yes, it was easier to be new and innovative back then, and so many things hadn't been tried yet, but come on. The above list features a game that blended 3rd person shooter with RTS elements (Future Cop) a game where you play as a freaking beach ball (Kula World) and a puzzler about devils rolling around on dice (Devil Dice, obviously) as well as games that either codified whole genres, or remembered as some of the greatest games ever made. These last few years can't hold a candle.

Dang, that really was one hell of a year. I think the only year that has ever gotten close since then was 2007:

-The Witcher
-Mass Effect
-Portal
-Assassin's Creed
-Bioshock
-Crysis
-Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
-Halo 3
-Uncharted: Drake's Fortune
-Super Mario Galaxy
-Metroid Prime 3
-Supreme Commander
-Orange Box
-God of War 2
-Lost Planet
-Crackdown
-Heavenly Sword
-Command and Conquer 3
-Peggle
-Unreal Tournament 3

That being said...2007 was (now) 9 years ago, which was itself 9 years after 1998. It was also not long after 2007 that things seem to have started going downhill for the industry come to think of it. I wonder if perhaps this is something that happens in 10 year cycles, like every 10 years we get a golden year or something like that. Maybe the industry is just waiting until 2017/2018...

 

[MysticSlayer]

I wonder if perhaps this is something that happens in 10 year cycles, like every 10 years we get a golden year or something like that.

At least in 1998's case, it was really more the pinnacle of an already great 3-4 year run for gaming. We had just made the jump to 3D, and many companies were either figuring out what they could do with it (e.g. Nintendo with Super Mario 64 and Ocarina of Time) or jumping at the success of those pushing new grounds (e.g. Banjo Kazooie was no doubt Rare's take on the Mario 64 formula). Furthermore, at the same time, from what I remember, there were some clear differences between the major platforms (e.g. N64, PlayStation, and PC) and what their audiences were into. Combine that with the embracing and reacting to of popular trends of the time, and it was a very favorable landscape for great games to come out.

By now, though, we don't have a lot of that. There hasn't been a major technological leap that allows for greater gameplay innovations for years, and certainly there hasn't been anything on the level of the jump to 3D. Furthermore, all major platforms can succeed with just about any genre, and the only real outlier is Nintendo, who is technologically behind and throwing gimmicks left and right that may or may not resonate with core gamers.

Overall, the landscapes are just different. The mid-90s forced developers to do something different or be left behind. Those that succeeded blew our minds and have set standards that continue to this day. Those that failed have either been completely forgotten or turned into a joke today. We haven't had anything quite like that in years, and it doesn't look like we're getting anything on that level any time in the near future (and no, I haven't forgotten about VR).

 

[Adam Locking]

Banjo-Kazooie
Crash Bandicoot 3
Devil Dice
Future Cop: LAPD
Grim Fandango
Guilty Gear
House of the Dead 2
Kula World
Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Metal Gear Solid
Oddworld: Abe's Exodus
Radiant Silvergun
Resident Evil 2
Spyro the Dragon
Starcraft

Dang, that really was one hell of a year. I think the only year that has ever gotten close since then was 2007:

-The Witcher
-Mass Effect
-Portal
-Assassin's Creed
-Bioshock
-Crysis
-Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
-Halo 3
-Uncharted: Drake's Fortune
-Super Mario Galaxy
-Metroid Prime 3
-Supreme Commander
-Orange Box
-God of War 2
-Lost Planet
-Crackdown
-Heavenly Sword
-Command and Conquer 3
-Peggle
-Unreal Tournament 3

That being said...2007 was (now) 9 years ago, which was itself 9 years after 1998. It was also not long after 2007 that things seem to have started going downhill for the industry come to think of it. I wonder if perhaps this is something that happens in 10 year cycles, like every 10 years we get a golden year or something like that. Maybe the industry is just waiting until 2017/2018...

I think this year might be the year. This is what we have coming out so far:

The Witness
Scalebound
Drawn to Death
Dark Souls 3
No Man's Sky
Horizon: Zero Dawn
BattleBorn
Cuphead
Mighty No. 9
We Happy Few
The Last Guardian (maybe...)
Miegakure (no release date, but has had all levels finished and has been in playable state for months)

Plus whatever surprises throw themselves out there. Fingers crossed for another golden year!

 

[CaitSeith]

they cost so much to make these days especially with marketing that the only way to recoup money is to make them appeal to as many people as possible and once you do that you loose a lot. someone once said if you try to be everything to everyone you will end up being nothing to anyone.. and its true up to an extent.

the AAA games are the equivalent of the big summer action blockbusters, mindless fun to appeal to the masses and if you find something deeper with them you are doing well

Such a shame that, unlike the film industry, there are no good alternatives to those AAA games that have the same production value. Ok, maybe Bloodborne; and I'm still curious about how David Cage's game will come out.

 

[Rastrelly]

What makes a lot of old games really good and really good is that they put effort into being different. Now it seems like a lot of games are trying to be the same.

To be fair, it is a lot easier to do something entirely unique when it has never been done before. Once games like Thief introduce a concept, it no longer becomes a matter of creating something new in that regard. It becomes a matter of improvement and making the experience as enjoyable as possible.

Well, the problem with T2014 is that it did not even try to be different. This game actually managed to try to bite off Dishonored, new Deus Ex and original Thiefs, and it managed to fail at each department.
It's a bad Dishonored, cause it presents ZERO combat possibilities, only stealth.
It's a bad Deus Ex, 'cause not only general plot SUCKS, it, yet again, does not provide what every good DX provided.
It's a bad Thief, 'cause not only it ditched Thief stealth in favour of Deus Ex stealth (which always was easier), it also killed off the main idea of Thief - have a level for you to solve the way you want. In this one levels are linear with rare opportunity to pick a path.
And I don't even mention how much Garrett is NOT the way Garrett is supposed to be (and Garrett was one of the reasons Thief became popular at the time), AAAND I don't even mention all this crap with "this is reboot, but we set this reboot in the setting and continuity of original games to make a dump on everything at once".

And approach like this is prevalent nowadays. Why even bother to invent or create? Just follow the marketing department charts! Like, again, Thief 2014 as prime example. Who made them (devs) to more or less kill off wonderful surface sound system from T1/2/3? Why not improve it with additional sounds - doors, lockpicks? They made a step in right direction with Garrett's body being material, but why not to elaborate on this? Why not to try and develop impoved guard vision, for guards to pick Garrett from improper background even in the dark? To make them notice his shadow as well? And why not to improve their AI? Say, make them notice disappearing colleagues, but allow Garrett to imitate them (for example, wear guardsman boots and walk around, or steal cloth changing from Hitman (I won't mention dress-up level from Thief 1 just because))? Why would one invent some new stupid shite like primal, while even after Thief 3 there were tons of potential in all classic factions? If you want leveling system THAT much - why not just make it a prequel, when Garrett just left Keepers to restart thieving career? There were SO many possibilities, all of them not too hard to implement, and no, what they did was a triple ripoff with mediocre result.

And look around? What AAA games were released in 2015? How many of them were even remotely original? They're either direct remakes, or clones of clones of clones. For Warp's sake!

Funny. I don't recall games like MGSV, Splatoon, Xenoblade Chronicles X, or Witcher 3 being direct remakes or clones of clones. You're using one game (the most recent Theif) to paint all AAA games with a brush.

I'm sorry, but console games, especially exclusives, do not exist. As for MGSV and Witcher 3 - seriously? Yes, they are good (or, with MGSV, playable), but what novelty except for balloon cow throwing did you find in those two?