An opinion you're probably all alone with?

[Lord Torath]

Anyway. Homeworld 2 technically also has persistent ships and resources, but the enemy forces in the mission will scale up and down based on what you have, which more or less removes that aspect of it. I can understand why people who enjoyed that dynamic in the first game disliked the change, but for me it was the difference between finishing the game and giving up halfway through. (It also replaced salvage corvettes with marine frigates, which generally aren't worth using - also an improvement, to my mind.)

Homeworld had this to an extent. Each level (other than the first two) had two difficulty levels. If you finished Mission 2 with a large fleet, there were five Assault Frigates in Mission 3. If you just squeaked past Mission 2, there were only three.

I'm not sure if Cataclysm did something similar, though. It did add that you could only salvage severely damaged ships, which made it much trickier to accomplish. You had to keep your workers close by, and be fast enough to tell them to salvage the target when its health bar turned red (under 25% strength) and also tell the rest of your fleet to ignore the wounded ship and focus on something else instead.

Cataclysm also dispensed with Fuel Burn for fighters and corvettes, which I loved at first. But I found I actually missed having my fighters all head back and dock with the Support Frigates.

I liked the corvettes in Homeworld better than the ACVs in Cataclysm.

[The_Jackal]

There is an inverse relationship between how much story a game has and how fun it is.

[Batcathat]

There is an inverse relationship between how much story a game has and how fun it is.

So... Pong is the height of gaming fun?

[Taevyr]

There is an inverse relationship between how much story a game has and how fun it is.

Wow, that's the first one I truly, vehemently disagree with, especially since it's such a blanket statement.

Perfect fit for the thread

[factotum]

There is an inverse relationship between how much story a game has and how fun it is.

Yeah, hard no from me on that one too. Just have to look at stuff like Persona 5 Royal, which is packed to the gills with story yet kept me entirely entertained for the 137 hours it took me to finish it--certainly not a claim many games can make.

[Rynjin]

There is an inverse relationship between how much story a game has and how fun it is.

I think what you PROBABLY mean here is "there is a direct correlation between how much gameplay a game has and how fun it is"? But feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

If so, I agree. I love a great story in a game, but it needs to be bridged by very good gameplay, and even the story moments should be playable in some capacity. The new God of War is a really good example of a good story told really well without sacrificing gameplay fun.

[Lord Raziere]

Yeah, hard no from me on that one too. Just have to look at stuff like Persona 5 Royal, which is packed to the gills with story yet kept me entirely entertained for the 137 hours it took me to finish it--certainly not a claim many games can make.

I'm hard disagreeing with that assertion as well. there are games that devote entirely themselves to gameplay and end up being completely boring and there are games I've played full of dialogue and cutscenes that I had fun with and could only work with the story existing. a lot of games would be lesser without a story in my opinion.

[Zevox]

Forum full of RPG players disagree with someone who doesn't like story in games. In other news, grass is green.

Anyway, personally, I think the best games are those with both great story and gameplay (for me the Persona franchise being the biggest example), but you can have great games with just one or the other easily as well, as long as the one that's the weaker side isn't actively detracting from the experience. Mario can have great games with strong gameplay and a barely-extant story whose quality will never matter, because the story is just there as an excuse for the gameplay to happen; when a Final Fantasy game has a crap story, on the other hand, it will seriously drag the experience down even if the gameplay's good, because the series puts so much emphasis on the story and expects you to care about about enjoy it alongside the gameplay.

[Rynjin]

when a Final Fantasy game has a crap story, on the other hand, it will seriously drag the experience down even if the gameplay's good, because the series puts so much emphasis on the story and expects you to care about about enjoy it alongside the gameplay.

I think this is more because no Final Fantasy game has EVER had good gameplay, so when the story is bad there's no real reason to play it. Every JRPG plays exactly the same, so their only selling point is story.

The gameplay is primarily tolerated because it's "good enough" and not the primary focus.

[animorte]

I think this is more because no Final Fantasy game has EVER had good gameplay, so when the story is bad there's no real reason to play it. Every JRPG plays exactly the same, so their only selling point is story.

The gameplay is primarily tolerated because it's "good enough" and not the primary focus.

I certainly see where you’re coming from. But I absolutely fell in love with FFXII and their gambit system (I think it was called). Ever since I played that, I’ve searched for a similar system and will try it out under just about any platform. I know Dragon Age had it, and I’ve run AI robot programming simulators. (Admittedly the FFXII licensing map was superfluous, to say the least. Irrelevant to my point though.)

[Zevox]

I think this is more because no Final Fantasy game has EVER had good gameplay, so when the story is bad there's no real reason to play it. Every JRPG plays exactly the same, so their only selling point is story.

The gameplay is primarily tolerated because it's "good enough" and not the primary focus.

Those are two very incorrect statements from where I'm sitting. While I would say that most Final Fantasy games I've played don't have especially good gameplay, there are notable exceptions. FF10, the one post-4 mainline FF with a true turn-based system instead of the ATB, is quite fun as far as gameplay goes. Unfortunately it is one of the victims of a bad story dragging down the overall experience though. The other big exception is FF7 Remake, which I would say has the best action-RPG gameplay of any such game I've played, blending the elements of both excellently, and it thankfully doesn't suffer from a bad story.

As for "all JRPGs play exactly the same," that's laughable even as hyperbole. Hell, there's at least three entirely different sub-genres you can split JRPGs into - turn-based, action-RPG, and strategy/tactical RPG - and plenty of variation within those.

[Rynjin]

Those are two very incorrect statements from where I'm sitting. While I would say that most Final Fantasy games I've played don't have especially good gameplay, there are notable exceptions. FF10, the one post-4 mainline FF with a true turn-based system instead of the ATB, is quite fun as far as gameplay goes. Unfortunately it is one of the victims of a bad story dragging down the overall experience though. The other big exception is FF7 Remake, which I would say has the best action-RPG gameplay of any such game I've played, blending the elements of both excellently, and it thankfully doesn't suffer from a bad story.

As for "all JRPGs play exactly the same," that's laughable even as hyperbole. Hell, there's at least three entirely different sub-genres you can split JRPGs into - turn-based, action-RPG, and strategy/tactical RPG - and plenty of variation within those.

There are definitely 3 sub-genres but they all trend chase each other to the point that they're always homogenous. The FF7 remake is just the inevitable endpoint of Final Fantasy trying to become the Tales of series.

[veti]

If a story is sufficiently stupid or nonsensical, it can make a whole game unplayable for me. I never finished NWN2 or Fallout 4, because in both cases I felt actively insulted by the plot. (HOMM5 may also fall into this category, but in that case the gameplay turned me off even faster.)

A story that is merely tired and forgettable, on the other hand, can keep me going back time and again. Skyrim, Oblivion, Freelancer, Clash of Heroes, Chocobo Tales, Resident Evil 4 - all weak plots I've subjected myself to multiple times, just for the sake of playing them out slightly differently.

I can't offhand think of any game whose story is strong enough to overcome totally unappealing gameplay...

[Zevox]

There are definitely 3 sub-genres but they all trend chase each other to the point that they're always homogenous. The FF7 remake is just the inevitable endpoint of Final Fantasy trying to become the Tales of series.

And yet it plays virtually nothing like the Tales of series, save only in the broadest sense of being in the same sub-genre. You may as well say that it was trying to be like The Witcher, it would be an about equally applicable comparison.

Seriously, it's fine if you don't like and don't play the genre, but pretending that massively different games all play the same same is just a ridiculous assertion to be making. It would be like me trying to claim that all FPS games play the same, I'm sure anyone who actually plays them would laugh at me.

[Rynjin]

And yet it plays virtually nothing like the Tales of series, save only in the broadest sense of being in the same sub-genre. You may as well say that it was trying to be like The Witcher, it would be an about equally applicable comparison.

Seriously, it's fine if you don't like and don't play the genre, but pretending that massively different games all play the same same is just a ridiculous assertion to be making. It would be like me trying to claim that all FPS games play the same, I'm sure anyone who actually plays them would laugh at me.

Not really, I'm a huge FPS fan but there are really only two subgenres of FPS game (Arena/Movement shooters and Military/Tactical shooters), and they pretty much all play the same as each other for the most part within said subgenre.

It's why FPS fans tend to just float to whatever's popular at the time, the main thing that determines whether an FPS is fun is the current active player count.

[Zevox]

Not really, I'm a huge FPS fan but there are really only two subgenres of FPS game (Arena/Movement shooters and Military/Tactical shooters), and they pretty much all play the same as each other for the most part within said subgenre.

It's why FPS fans tend to just float to whatever's popular at the time, the main thing that determines whether an FPS is fun is the current active player count.

Uh-huh. Ordinarily I'd trust the word of someone who plays the genre given I've hardly touched it since the 90s, but under the circumstances I'm sure you'll understand me being skeptical. Especially since I know that last is simply something that affects all multiplayer titles - to most people there's less fun to be had when there's fewer people playing those, since it can take longer to find games and you're less likely to find players of your skill level to play against.

[NeoVid]

An opinion I am and probably should be alone with: You aren't qualified to judge a game until you've completed it. Yes, even the ones where it's not humanly possible to do everything if you have unlimited free time. Any game could have something that redeems or ruins it, but you can't know if that's there until you've seen everything.

Example: I loved the Mass Effect series, but the final 15 minutes of the third game managed to go back in time and retroactively taint my enjoyment of the entire trilogy.

I think this is more because no Final Fantasy game has EVER had good gameplay, so when the story is bad there's no real reason to play it. Every JRPG plays exactly the same, so their only selling point is story.

The gameplay is primarily tolerated because it's "good enough" and not the primary focus.

The Epic Battle Fantasy series are JRPGs with almost no story, made for people who like JRPG mechanics, and has made it to the 5th game in the series. Though despite saying that and being engaged enough by EBF that I've completed the one I tried, I do agree with the story being the reason to play JRPGs.

[Razade]

An opinion I am and probably should be alone with: You aren't qualified to judge a game until you've completed it. Yes, even the ones where it's not humanly possible to do everything if you have unlimited free time. Any game could have something that redeems or ruins it, but you can't know if that's there until you've seen everything.

Yeah, you probably are. I'm qualified to judge a game as soon as I feel qualified because I'm generally only offering my opinion and there is no objective criteria in which to judge a game outside of game breaking bugs/issues. It doesn't matter if it's twenty minutes in where I get frustrated with controls I feel are poor or 160 hours where it finally dawns on me the game isn't really that great for deeper reasons. I don't need to get to the end of a game to tell you my opinion anymore than you need to get to the end of this sentence to know whether you agree with me or not.

[Rynjin]

Uh-huh. Ordinarily I'd trust the word of someone who plays the genre given I've hardly touched it since the 90s, but under the circumstances I'm sure you'll understand me being skeptical.

It's genuinely true. Basically all multiplayer shooters on the market can trace their lineage back to one of two games:

Quake and Unreal Tournament (arena/movement shooters)

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (specifically, not the games that predate MW) and Battlefield

There's a bit of a sub-split in tactical shooters with the ones that take after Battlefield being focused more on large scale battles (see: ARMA) and the ones that take after Call of Duty 4 being smaller scale, and there's a bit of mixing between the two occasionally, but these are mostly direct lines.

The arena shooter line doesn't even have any splits or muddied history. You can quite literally trace a direct unbroken line of succession from every current movement shooter back to Quake and UT.

Team Fortress was a Quake mod. Team Fortress Classic was an update to said mod developed by Valve on the then-new Source Engine. Team Fortress 2 is obviously Team Fortress 2. Overwatch is Team Fortress 2 but bad. Paladins started off as a direct knockoff of Overwatch, but evolved into its own thing, etc.

And, of course, Doom is the primordial ooze from which all such spring, but is more of an artifact in these days than anyone taking true inspiration from it.

There are a few "pure lineages" besides these, like Rainbow Six, but as a multiplayer franchise R6 is VERY new to the game, and takes a lot of cues from COD 4 in the moment-to-moment gameplay rather than its own franchise or similar (single player) games like SWAT.

Halo is likewise a bit of its own offshoot (Doom to Marathon to Halo), but still starts in the same place, and generally ends up as a parallel evolution to the same end-genre.

[MCerberus]

Oddest lineage would have to be when one of the slower mil-sims split off from Unreal (Red Orchestra and thus Rising Storm)
But I think you're underestimating how directly you can track inspirations for tactical shooters. So let's take battlefield

Wolfenstein 3d -> Doom -> Quake (plus team fortress -> Return to Castle Wolfenstein -> Enemy Territory -> Battlefield
Goldeneye -> Medal of honor + perfect Dark --------------------------^

[DaedalusMkV]

It's genuinely true. Basically all multiplayer shooters on the market can trace their lineage back to one of two games:

Debatably there's a third, very specific FPS genre in the Counter-Strike-likes, which are mostly carbon copies of the original game with different skins and some tweaked numbers but can easily be identified by their extremely quick time-to-kill, predictable bullet spray patterns and near-pathological focus on planting bombs on letter-marked sites as the ultimate in objective design. They're popular enough, and common enough, to represent a distinct sub-genre while being distinct enough in overall style to not fit into either the Quake-like or MilShoot-like paradigms (despite being military shooters, the gunplay really bares nothing in common with the Battlefield or CoD style). They also predate Battlefield and CoD4 without really contributing to their DNA. Things like Rainbow Six Siege are the result of crossbreeding between the CoD style and the Counter-Strike style, but I'd argue that true CS-likes don't really fit the CoD/BF mold.

You've also got a few oddballs like Escape from Tarkov and DayZ, which are kind of close to the MilShooters in gunplay terms but because of meta-game issues don't actually play anything like them in practice.

The Looter-shooter subgenre is the result of mixing Quake DNA with ARPG DNA, but rarely actually have much focus on competitive multiplayer, instead being single-player or co-operative much like the ARPGs they mimic. Battle Royale games have borrowed their concepts, but tend to play more like MilShooters with random guns in practice.

Finally you've got stuff like MechWarrior, which doesn't traditionally get lumped in with FPS games but perhaps should be, which would be distinct if you actually wanted to count it. In the past there were some experiments incorporating Cover Shooter mechanics into FPSes, but that generally worked poorly and seems to be a dead thing.

Overall multiplayer shooters are very incestuous, especially given the overwhelming prominence of CoD4 mechanics into basically everything that came after that wasn't just being 'Quake but now you pick your guns before the match'. It's not too disingenuous to put them all into one of the two-to-three categories and call it a day. You can put down Halo and pick up Battlefield 2042 and adjust almost instantly. Put down TF2 and switch to Paladins without too much trouble. Put down CS:GO and play Valorant no big deal. It's only switching from TF2 to Valorant, or Tribes: Ascend to Modern Warfare 5 that might require some work.

[Vinyadan]

Spoiler

Show

It's genuinely true. Basically all multiplayer shooters on the market can trace their lineage back to one of two games:

Quake and Unreal Tournament (arena/movement shooters)

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (specifically, not the games that predate MW) and Battlefield

There's a bit of a sub-split in tactical shooters with the ones that take after Battlefield being focused more on large scale battles (see: ARMA) and the ones that take after Call of Duty 4 being smaller scale, and there's a bit of mixing between the two occasionally, but these are mostly direct lines.

The arena shooter line doesn't even have any splits or muddied history. You can quite literally trace a direct unbroken line of succession from every current movement shooter back to Quake and UT.

Team Fortress was a Quake mod. Team Fortress Classic was an update to said mod developed by Valve on the then-new Source Engine. Team Fortress 2 is obviously Team Fortress 2. Overwatch is Team Fortress 2 but bad. Paladins started off as a direct knockoff of Overwatch, but evolved into its own thing, etc.

And, of course, Doom is the primordial ooze from which all such spring, but is more of an artifact in these days than anyone taking true inspiration from it.

There are a few "pure lineages" besides these, like Rainbow Six, but as a multiplayer franchise R6 is VERY new to the game, and takes a lot of cues from COD 4 in the moment-to-moment gameplay rather than its own franchise or similar (single player) games like SWAT.

Halo is likewise a bit of its own offshoot (Doom to Marathon to Halo), but still starts in the same place, and generally ends up as a parallel evolution to the same end-genre.

What about the Tribes series?

[Rynjin]

What about the Tribes series?

I've only played Ascend, but I'd imagine it's easily traced back to Quake as its progenitor. The entire game is basically built around taking the ideas of bunnyhopping, overbouncing, and crouchsliding to their illogical extremes as explicit features rather than bugs.

[Rodin]

There are a few "pure lineages" besides these, like Rainbow Six, but as a multiplayer franchise R6 is VERY new to the game, and takes a lot of cues from COD 4 in the moment-to-moment gameplay rather than its own franchise or similar (single player) games like SWAT.
.

Rainbow Six has had a dedicated multiplayer fanbase since 1998. The idea that Modern Warfare (which came out a decade later) is the primary influence is rather ridiculous. It’s possibly true of the more recent games (not my genre), but the original game kickstarted the tactical shooter genre which went through a completely different evolutionary path (Rainbow Spear, Ghost Recon, Operation Flashpoint) that arguably culminated in Modern Warfare trying to make a more accessible entry in the genre.

Hell, Rainbow Six actually predates Counterstrike.

[Rynjin]

Rainbow Six has had a dedicated multiplayer fanbase since 1998. The idea that Modern Warfare (which came out a decade later) is the primary influence is rather ridiculous. It’s possibly true of the more recent games (not my genre), but the original game kickstarted the tactical shooter genre which went through a completely different evolutionary path (Rainbow Spear, Ghost Recon, Operation Flashpoint) that arguably culminated in Modern Warfare trying to make a more accessible entry in the genre.

Hell, Rainbow Six actually predates Counterstrike.

It sounds like it, but Siege genuinely plays nothing like an actual Rainbow 6 game. The true spiritual successor to the earlier R6 games would be something like Zero Hour.

And, much like earlier R6 titles...while it HAS competitive multiplayer, the real meat of the game and where it shines is the single player/co-op.

[DaedalusMkV]

What about the Tribes series?

Quake family. To be specific, Tribes started as a result of people trying to capture the part of Quake multiplayer they really liked; rocket launcher only matches. Tribes was, initially, Quake but with every gun that wasn't a rocket launcher removed, a couple variations of rocket launchers added in, and a jetpack bolted on to make the rocket jumping a little bit more fun and intuitive, and slightly improved jump physics and momentum mechanics to make the rocket jumping even more fun. The signature gameplay was actually the result of a glitch; those same momentum mechanics they added, combined with a crouch-sliding glitch in the physics engine, allowed people to 'ski' down hills, potentially achieving immense speeds and blasting around the map if they performed well. The Tribes devs thought it was even more fun than the game they had actually designed, added a 'ski' button to Tribes 2 and the rest was history.

At the end of the day, it's got Quake deep in its genetics. Call it Quake with jetpacks and the most fun bugs deeply integrated into the core experience and you're pretty much right on track.

Rainbow Six has had a dedicated multiplayer fanbase since 1998. The idea that Modern Warfare (which came out a decade later) is the primary influence is rather ridiculous. It’s possibly true of the more recent games (not my genre), but the original game kickstarted the tactical shooter genre which went through a completely different evolutionary path (Rainbow Spear, Ghost Recon, Operation Flashpoint) that arguably culminated in Modern Warfare trying to make a more accessible entry in the genre.

Hell, Rainbow Six actually predates Counterstrike.

Very true, but there hasn't been an actual multiplayer entry in the tactical shooter genre in ages. Not a competitive one, in any regard. Rainbow 6 Vegas was the last, and it had already actionized itself heavily and removed many of the tactical elements, and the competitive multiplayer had pretty much none at all. Single-player FPS is a much more diverse field than multiplayer, it has tactical shooters and RPG hybrids, looter shooters and boomer shooters and all sorts of variations. Hell, we have rhythm shooters and roguelike shooters now. Rainbow 6 would definitely become an inspiration for Counter-strike, that influence is clearly there (to the point I wouldn't be surprised if 'make a better Rainbow 6 multiplayer experience' was an explicit goal of the mod team), and like you say down the line it's part of the influence on Call of Duty, which then spawns both Battlefield 1942 (which was envisioned as Call of Duty but with a bit more scope and the ability to drive all the vehicles around) and eventually Call of Duty 4. So debatably Rainbow 6 lays the foundation for both the CS-likes and the entire modern MilShooter genre. It's just that Rainbow 6-likes themselves aren't really a multiplayer genre anymore, they developed into the more accessible and refined versions we see today. Just like Quake slowly morphed into TF2 and Tribes and Overwatch.

We don't call them Rainbow 6-likes because, well, there's a lot of Half Life Deathmatch and Wolfenstein and GoldenEye in those genes too, and the references to Call of Duty 4 come out because the innovations of that game define the modern MilShooter multiplayer experience to the point that Call of Battlefield: The WW2 One (there have been several, pick your favorite) had more in common with Call of Duty 4 than the actual WW2 games that made up the entire series prior to that point.

Like Rynjin says, Rainbow 6 Siege isn't truly an entry in the Rainbow 6 series. It's got some similar ideas, but tactical concepts play second fiddle by far to accurate shooting and twitch reflexes. It's Counter-Strike objective/team play with CoD shooting and token Rainbow 6 elements in the form of the use of fortifications and gadgets which ultimately aren't actually that important to it except in how they enable you to better shoot the other team, or occasionally blow them up with grenades. You pretty much never see Montaigne leading the way through a door breached by Ash while two more operatives cover the flanks and Glaz covers the windows from a vantage point across the street. Flashbangs are rare to the point of nonexistence. Use of drones after the drone phase, for any purpose other than to identify the other team's operatives and locate the objective sites, is extremely rare. Tachanka's mounted machine gun, something that should be extremely valuable in a tactical shooter, was so worthless that they removed it from the game. Counter-strike, with CoD shooting mechanics and a progression system ripped straight from Modern Warfare.

Rainbow 6 is a game that's 90% planning and 10% execution. It's a phenomenal single-player experience, and the style of game still exists today albeit rarely. It's just... Not really what people want in a multiplayer experience, at least as far as mass appeal goes.

[Rodin]

It sounds like it, but Siege genuinely plays nothing like an actual Rainbow 6 game. The true spiritual successor to the earlier R6 games would be something like Zero Hour.

And, much like earlier R6 titles...while it HAS competitive multiplayer, the real meat of the game and where it shines is the single player/co-op.

Yeah, that's what I meant about not knowing about the more modern versions, and if they're aimed at the Counterstrike/Modern Warfare crowd that's fair enough.

However, that doesn't detract from my earlier argument that there are at least 3 different sets of succession. The multiplayer in the tactical shooter genre wasn't just some throwaway thing like the Dragon Age multiplayer - it was a fully developed and very popular mode that really helped push voice chat* in modern shooters. Ruling an entire genre of games out because they don't fit the category brings us into "what is an RPG" territory.

*much hay was made over the requirement for a headset before such things were standard

[Vinyadan]

Rainbow 6 is a game that's 90% planning and 10% execution. It's a phenomenal single-player experience, and the style of game still exists today albeit rarely.

This is probably why Rainbow Six felt more like playing Blood Money than, say, Soldier of Fortune.

[Imbalance]

I dunno, my first FPS was Duck Hunt. It set a pretty high bar until games where the player character could move and shoot.

[Vinyadan]

I dunno, my first FPS was Duck Hunt. It set a pretty high bar until games where the player character could move and shoot.

I remember shooting games where the scenery moved, but you didn't choose where to go or look. For example, the setting was a bank heist, and you saw what one of the robbers would see, but movement was preprogrammed and you moved the reticle on the video screen. If you didn't manage to shoot the police quicly enough while it was chasing you, you lost and got captured.

They pretty much were a more cinematic equivalent of analogic coin-ops with tiny cowboys you had to somehow shoot as they appeared and disappeared among plastic cutouts of mountains.