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New Comic Thread: Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Posts
He wasn't like Altair, though. Altair wasn't the bloodthirsty guard-killer I could be.
Let me tell you about video games. Let me tell you about Homestuck
How do these fucking horrible game mechanics make it through the amount of playtesting and scrutiny that had to accompany a game this big? Really some of the content for the combat system doesn't even seem like it would be that difficult in terms of resources/effort to change, and most of the gameplay mechanics could simply be lifted from previous games that were critical successes anyway.
That's a good, nuanced example. I am not as familiar with Mega Man 1 as you apparently are, so I'm not sure of exactly what exploit you mean. Also, in calling it an exploit, you're saying it's a bug; a mistaken feature, one that wasn't supposed to be there. So you're labeling it a flaw already.
You said that only a few areas can be exploited, so let's make a side note that this means that your special trick only breaks part of the game, so the whole rest of the game is unaffected.
Let's look at just the affected areas. This is still less of a problem than AC because the exploit is less effective than really good playing. A similar example would be Maxi in Soul Calibur. Beginner players who just buttonmash with Maxi can often beat the crap out of other beginner players, and even players who are, by conventional standards, slightly more skilled. But once a player gets to the level where he can block, knows his favorite character's moves pretty well, and can land a few parries every now and then, the Maxi buttonmash bullshit stops working.
So the problem with AC is that the overpowered nature of counters is:
1) Not limited to one area like Mega Man 1; it's useful for the entire game, except for the first mission, and it's pretty much required for endgame battles.
2) Very nearly optimal, if not optimal, in almost all cases. There are very few situations where you get a better combination of offensive or defensive power.
I suspect that they sunk a lot of time into the tech, and then didn't have time to finish the game and make it the way they wanted to. I think that they actually did want to have features like "social stealth" and a good combat system, but they were pressured to get it out by a set date and turn a profit on it, so they just put a hot chick out there and marketed the shit out of it because it's easy to go out and describe your ideal game, even if that's not the actual game you're gonna ship.
In the case of Assassin's Creed I'd say you're absolutely right, but more generally I think you can have situations where you can have a game that's deep and rewarding so long as you ignore something that completely tips the balance in your favor, if only hypothetically, which I only say because off the top of my head I can't think of a good example.
Let me tell you about video games. Let me tell you about Homestuck
Steam PSN: DerWaffleMous Origin: DerWaffleMous Bnet: WaffleMous#1483
Satans..... hints..... I'm a mo bro!
Professional research. (Not joking.)
OK, thanks for explaining that.
I won't say that it's totally impossible. However, please consider that you're talking about something game-breaking that you always have at your disposal. So you never really get beaten; when you lose, you know it's because you chose to let the computer beat you by not using the broken move.
So it might be possible, but it would be a lot easier if it were something irrevocable. Like if a certain player character class were broken, you could pick a different class at the start of the game, assuming the game never lets you change class, and then you can play the game without the broken crap. But if the power is always at your disposal, like counter in AC, then you know that you can always win, so instead of losing or being forced to find new ways out of tough spots (or just raise your skill level in general), you're always given the fallback option of "push the I WIN button."
It did look very nice. The framerate was kinda...butts. Still, it did look nice. How far through did you play?
admittedly i only played til, like, the 5th or 6th assassination. but the repetitiveness of the pre-mission shit didn't really bother me.
any major dude will tell you
Defender's whole argument is essentially just like if you said that Michael Crichton is a spec-fic author, and then immediately stated that he sucks at writing spec-fic. It's silly to put a set of constraints on something that weren't there, and then holding the thing responsible for them. At no point in the game was some rule ever given that in any situation you have to do what is the "most effective", and even if it were, it could very easily be argued that any time you're standing there waiting for the enemy to attack, you are wrong. I'd say more but now I want to go play TF2.
any major dude will tell you
Satans..... hints..... I'm a mo bro!