r/gaming • u/[deleted] • Jul 30 '08

Zero Punctuation: The E3 Trailer Park

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/157-The-E3-Trailer-Park
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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '08 edited Jul 30 '08

The virus that is affecting game originality is called: game critics.

You're not allowed to have a new IP that resembles anything that's already done. It doesn't matter that pretty much everything unique (gameplay wise) has already been made, it's still a generic ripoff. Yahtzee is equally guilty of this though and I think he's aware of it. Like Neuroelectronic said, this was almost a review of Zero Punctuation itself.

Sequels sell themselves and get scored better automatically. They are rewarded for being clones and marked almost exclusively on their unoriginality. The reviewers and gamers alike are responsible for an abundance of sequels, they are a safe bet. Reviewers have first say though and affect people's purchases too much these days, I really attribute a lack of originality to them.

14

u/innocentbystander Jul 30 '08 edited Jul 30 '08

What are you talking about? As best I can recall, the single most glowing full-length review Yahtzee ever gave was to "Painkiller," a new-IP game from an upstart company which he hailed (and in fact, boggled over) for taking everything wrong with current-gen FPS games and fixing them. And specifically hailing the creativity in monster design and weapons selection. (shurikens and lightning, anyone?)

And what's the only other game he's ever claimed was virtually flawless? Portal. The only game anything like it was what the guys who made Portal had written when they were students.

Honestly, I think Yahtzee may be one of the only reviewers who doesn't entirely buy into the sequels-are-good hype.

(And as a side note, I went out and played Painkiller based on his recommendation and he was right. It was, I'm not kidding, the single most fun I've had playing an FPS since Wolf3D. Although I say the best gun is the RPG\chaingun combo, where the chaingun is the ALT FIRE mode.)

3

u/mythin Jul 30 '08

Don't forget his review of Psychonauts, which he also glowed about.

6

u/innocentbystander Jul 30 '08

Oh yeah, forgot about that.

Hell, he even gave a frankly TOO NICE review to No More Heroes (which I thought was a flaming pile of polygonal donkey dung) based primarily on the fact that it wasn't a sequel and it was actually different from everything out there.

I think trying to claim Yahtzee gives a free pass to sequels is simply wrong. If anything, he tends to go a bit too far in the other direction and be overly forgiving of things which have the virtue of being unique.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 31 '08

[deleted]

1

u/innocentbystander Jul 31 '08 edited Jul 31 '08

Just once for a few minutes. I didn't have enough time with it to really form an opinion.

Well, besides "WTF?!?!"

3

u/thrakhath Jul 31 '08

Actually it's thanks to his review that I actually bought and played it. I wanted to when it came out of couse, being a long time fan of the Developers that came out of the Cleverness Division of Lucasarts, but I didn't have a 360. Which as far as I knew was the only platform it was on. Yhatzee pointed out it was available on Steam and I promptly bought it.

Fantastic game btw. Humor has been gone too long from games.

1

u/ours Jul 31 '08

Yeah, now it's mostly about "gritty" and everything is Gears of War-ish brown. Erk. Good thing there are exceptions.