Saturday 13 March 2010

22 of my opinions (about games): #1

I'm weird. We've got that out of the way. To say that I'm the average gamer is just not true. I'm not very good at games at all. I really love games. But I have some weird opinions. The type of opinions that make most gamers fume and froth at the mouth.

Earlier I made a post [edit: Post has since been removed, hee - Future March] which was flame bait (some people fell for it), about some of my controversial opinions. I'd like to go over them again, in detail, and explain them. They're not as extreme as I earlier stated, but it was fun to watch a few people get frothy over something silly.

I'll be releasing responses in chunks so that posts aren't too long.

1. Nintendo's release model is similar to EA Sports' (Madden).

I called out The Game Overthinker for so violently bashing on Madden for being the same game over and over again, and rewarding Nintendo for doing something very similar. He said the difference was that Nintendo is doing it so people can have fun, and EA is doing it to make money. I think there's one major flaw in this viewpoint, though: It makes Nintendo look like a person. It isn't, it's a soulless corporation. Miyamoto has a soul, sure, but Nintendo doesn't care about you in the slightest. It's a corporation. All corporations are as animals; they simply want to eat, survive, and reproduce in the form of sub-companies and licensees. Claiming that Nintendo is somehow better than EA is a fallacy at its base, as it calls Nintendo a person. They are one and the same.

As for the release model, there are some similarities. Nintendo releases another entry in a series, usually one with very weak plot and little if no connection to the proceeding game. The gameplay follows the exact same formula for each installment, though there are variations in camera angles, level design, powers, and eyecandy. Yes, you could say that it's enough of a difference that they aren't just remaking the same games over and over again. That being said, it's also similar enough that calling them completely separate is rather silly.

Madden games are basically the same thing over and over again, near-identical gameplay with only changes in camera angles, eyecandy, management, and rosters. That being said, Madden 09 is different from Madden 08. It would be silly to call them the same game. Granted, a lot less silly than calling Twilight Princess the same as Ocarina of Time, but still silly.

That's not to say that either of the series are bad, mind you. The former gives nostalgiacs their buzz and allows them to play something familiar in a new way, feeling like once again they are worry-free children. The latter lets football fans feel like they are part of each year's best games. Both are sure to turn a profit, and that's all the corporations care about. Their similarity is in the fact that both are viable ways for a corporation to make money, and both cater to a specific portion of gamers.

Honestly it's kind of silly to fight about. They're not even similar to each other. I just wanted to bring this up because a lot of people seem to hate the opinion that Nintendo may not be a benevolent god-being. Maybe if I actually thoroughly enjoyed most of their games I would feel the same. Regardless, the only ones I did were Super Mario Sunshine, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, and Mario Kart (SNES, Double Dash, and Wii). Sorry, but Nintendo doesn't make my kind of games.You guys can have as much fun with them as you want, but please stop bashing football fans over what they enjoy. You can have your nostalgia and they can have their football. Me? I'll keep to my mysterious islands.

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