Unpopular opinions about video games in general.
- Thread starter 64-Bit Nintendo Machine
- Start date
- Pronouns
- She/her
- MarioWiki
- Ray Trace
Realistic graphics are very expensive to make, and the big publishers mostly focus on big-hitting genres; not everyone can render 4k 1080 @60 fps games.
Also, there's actually a pretty expansive set of genres that use heavy realism. Adventure (Uncharted, Tomb Raider), Racing (Forza), Open world TPS's (Red Dead Redemption 2), dungeon crawlers (Diablo III), action RPG (Skyrim) and yes, the mention of Squeenix's Final Fantasy and Sports titles too.
- Pronouns
- she/her
- MarioWiki
- Mario
There are good parts of realism; it's what gave us lighting techniques that makes scenery beautiful as well as the texturing. But you shouldn't go overboard on it because the more realistic you attempt something, the *less* believable the result will be (hence uncanny valley), and it'll certainly expose the constraints of animation and physics a game engine has.
Look at Cyberpunk 2077 and a lot of Ubisoft open world games like Assassin Creed; the animation and physics bugs completely undermine the world setting the games try really hard to do.
You want to tread the line of suspension of disbelief. Realism, however, falls in a spectrum; this is important to remember. Nintendo's foray into a touch more realism is what gave us Super Mario Odyssey and that was met with positive reception; it's pretty clear in development notes that the decision for the hair, extra hair details, metal wear, overall details, and so on correlates with the eventual New Donk City reveal and the realistic-like T-Rex (spare some feathers, the roaring, and awkward posing in the box art).
I mean look at this Chain Chomp. It has actual damage on it. That's a component of realism. And I generally like the idea of adding damage to this because damage tells a story of wear and tear. It can give indication Chain Chomps have charged and scratched a lot, got a lot of heavy scratching. With cartoon textures, it's super simple and it looks fresh from a production factory. Not saying it's "inferior" but you lose out on information that can be used to communicate. The textures still reinforce the steps toward realism Odyssey went with. It's still cartoon, but we slid a little to realism.
If you think FPS and Horror are the only games that use realism, then, uh, you're really far off; there's a lot more games that have really good realistic graphics. Uncharted (action adventure), Horizon Zero Dawn (open world), Ghost of Tsushima (open world), Cyberpunk 2077 (action RPG), Soulsborne games (Sekiro and Bloodborne), Forza/Gran Turismo, Grand Theft Auto/Red Dead Redemption 2 (open world), Starcraft II (RTS; that one is like 10 years old however and visuals look really choppy now). Additionally, some of those FPS games with realistic graphics don't aim for maximum realism and such, like a simulation, but use that to try to tell a story. I just don't think the storytelling and immersion from the Metro games can really be achieved as well if they opted for less realistic visuals.
But neither FPS nor Horror require realism to achieve their effects. But I think realism is a common choice for those genres as successful FPS and horror games are immersive. Metro games and Bioshock are both examples of FPS AND horror games that are good with immersion and it's partly why they're so praised. As Overwatch and Team Fortress 2 show, you can have great cartoony FPS, and successful cartoon horror games would be like Little Nightmares
I can also tell apart those games just from looking at them, so uh (and on the other hand, I can argue exactly the same for games I know little about, particularly the great amount of anime-style JRPGs). I think Starcraft looks a lot different from Sekiro which looks a lot different from Horizon Zero Dawn which looks a lot different from Red Dead 2 Redemption, but maybe I'm just familiar with those works. There's that upcoming Biomutant game that stars an anthromorphic animal, but the visuals themselves are realistic; I can tell that one really easily apart from the others as well. I mean, what are you guys going to characterize that one? It's clearly cartoon, but the texturing and environments suggest realism.
And there's also stylized realism like XCOM (Mario + Rabbids-like turn based shooter), Borderlands (action RPG) and Monster Hunter (action RPG; I think?)
Look at Cyberpunk 2077 and a lot of Ubisoft open world games like Assassin Creed; the animation and physics bugs completely undermine the world setting the games try really hard to do.
You want to tread the line of suspension of disbelief. Realism, however, falls in a spectrum; this is important to remember. Nintendo's foray into a touch more realism is what gave us Super Mario Odyssey and that was met with positive reception; it's pretty clear in development notes that the decision for the hair, extra hair details, metal wear, overall details, and so on correlates with the eventual New Donk City reveal and the realistic-like T-Rex (spare some feathers, the roaring, and awkward posing in the box art).
I mean look at this Chain Chomp. It has actual damage on it. That's a component of realism. And I generally like the idea of adding damage to this because damage tells a story of wear and tear. It can give indication Chain Chomps have charged and scratched a lot, got a lot of heavy scratching. With cartoon textures, it's super simple and it looks fresh from a production factory. Not saying it's "inferior" but you lose out on information that can be used to communicate. The textures still reinforce the steps toward realism Odyssey went with. It's still cartoon, but we slid a little to realism.
If you think FPS and Horror are the only games that use realism, then, uh, you're really far off; there's a lot more games that have really good realistic graphics. Uncharted (action adventure), Horizon Zero Dawn (open world), Ghost of Tsushima (open world), Cyberpunk 2077 (action RPG), Soulsborne games (Sekiro and Bloodborne), Forza/Gran Turismo, Grand Theft Auto/Red Dead Redemption 2 (open world), Starcraft II (RTS; that one is like 10 years old however and visuals look really choppy now). Additionally, some of those FPS games with realistic graphics don't aim for maximum realism and such, like a simulation, but use that to try to tell a story. I just don't think the storytelling and immersion from the Metro games can really be achieved as well if they opted for less realistic visuals.
But neither FPS nor Horror require realism to achieve their effects. But I think realism is a common choice for those genres as successful FPS and horror games are immersive. Metro games and Bioshock are both examples of FPS AND horror games that are good with immersion and it's partly why they're so praised. As Overwatch and Team Fortress 2 show, you can have great cartoony FPS, and successful cartoon horror games would be like Little Nightmares
I can also tell apart those games just from looking at them, so uh (and on the other hand, I can argue exactly the same for games I know little about, particularly the great amount of anime-style JRPGs). I think Starcraft looks a lot different from Sekiro which looks a lot different from Horizon Zero Dawn which looks a lot different from Red Dead 2 Redemption, but maybe I'm just familiar with those works. There's that upcoming Biomutant game that stars an anthromorphic animal, but the visuals themselves are realistic; I can tell that one really easily apart from the others as well. I mean, what are you guys going to characterize that one? It's clearly cartoon, but the texturing and environments suggest realism.
And there's also stylized realism like XCOM (Mario + Rabbids-like turn based shooter), Borderlands (action RPG) and Monster Hunter (action RPG; I think?)
Last edited:
Thomas the Tank Engine
A Cheeky Little Engine
- Pronouns
- She/They
People love to praise the Nintendo 64 and its library, but I honestly think the N64's library is the weakest out of all the major Nintendo platforms.
Don't get me wrong here, I'm not trying to downplay or dismiss the legacies or influences of stuff like Super Mario 64, Ocarina of Time, or GoldenEye 007 here; my problem with the N64 library and why I think it's so weak is because there's honestly so few games for the platform and entire genres have little to no representation.
Look at this picture:
That's all the games that were released for the Nintendo 64 in the United States, 296 games total. That might seem like a lot, but the Saturn managed to get 258 games released in the US when all was said and done. Sure, that is less than the US N64 library, but a system that managed to sell over 20 million units only having 38 more games than the system estimated to have sold between 1.8 - 2 million units is really not that good.
And that leads into my 'entire genres have little to no representation' thing. Sure if you like 3D platformers, sports games, and shooters of both the first and third-person variety, the N64 has you covered. But say you like RPGs, well on the N64 you got Paper Mario, which is obviously a great game, and then you got Ogre Battle 64, which is also fantastic but after those two you got uhhh.
Uhh.
Uhh you got fuckin Quest 64 and Aidyn Chronicles. Yeah.
And what about 2D platformers? Well you get a whopping five games to choose from there, sure two of them are Kirby 64 and Mischief Makers but still. Five.
Don't get me wrong here, I'm not trying to downplay or dismiss the legacies or influences of stuff like Super Mario 64, Ocarina of Time, or GoldenEye 007 here; my problem with the N64 library and why I think it's so weak is because there's honestly so few games for the platform and entire genres have little to no representation.
Look at this picture:
That's all the games that were released for the Nintendo 64 in the United States, 296 games total. That might seem like a lot, but the Saturn managed to get 258 games released in the US when all was said and done. Sure, that is less than the US N64 library, but a system that managed to sell over 20 million units only having 38 more games than the system estimated to have sold between 1.8 - 2 million units is really not that good.
And that leads into my 'entire genres have little to no representation' thing. Sure if you like 3D platformers, sports games, and shooters of both the first and third-person variety, the N64 has you covered. But say you like RPGs, well on the N64 you got Paper Mario, which is obviously a great game, and then you got Ogre Battle 64, which is also fantastic but after those two you got uhhh.
Uhh.
Uhh you got fuckin Quest 64 and Aidyn Chronicles. Yeah.
And what about 2D platformers? Well you get a whopping five games to choose from there, sure two of them are Kirby 64 and Mischief Makers but still. Five.
- Pronouns
- She/her
- MarioWiki
- Ray Trace
At least racing had a pretty good library, you had Mario Kart 64, Diddy Kong Racing, Beetle Adventure Racing, and Snowboard Kids 1 + 2. Pretty satisfactory if you ask me.
MiracleDinner
Power Star
- Pronouns
- She/her
- MarioWiki
- MiracleDinner
Only N64 games i really care for are the original super mario 64, which was good but not amazing and i am likely going to get the NDS version anyway, and paper mario 64, which is excellent
Dell Conagher
The engineer is engihere
"Too much water" is a perfectly valid complaint about Pokémon ORAS. I'm 99% sure that the people who make memes about that IGN review have either never seen the video, or have never played ORAS, thus meaning they don't understand what the complaint even means.
The reviewer didn't like how many water Pokémon were in the game, as it led to a balance problem. She also said that the water routes (Which make up around 40% of the overworld) were tedious. I don't really care about the "too many water Pokémon" thing, but I totally agree on the surplus of water routes.
ORAS has a theme of Land vs Water, so a large portion of the game takes place on the water. But while the land has a ton of different locals, the water is bland and boring. Diving is cool at first, and Pacifidlog town is okay, but most of the time you're surfing on the big, empty water routes with nothing interesting on them, where every single tile can trigger a random encounter. It's seriously the worst part of the game. Once you're finished with most of the game, you have to go through several boring water sections at once. It's the main reason why I don't like Hoenn as much as the other regions.
This whole situation is why I hate review scores. Arlo made a really good video about why they suck, but basically, people care more about the number assigned to a game than the actual written review. So when people saw that the reviewer gave ORAS a 7.8/10, they nitpicked the review and turned a very valid complaint into something that seemed like a minor detail. They even ignored her other complaint about HMs and made it seem like the only reason why it didn't get a perfect score was because of the water. I'm 100% sure that if the reviewer didn't give the game a score at all, the backlash wouldn't have been nearly as harsh.
Also, a 7.8/10 is still a great score.
TL ; DR - People should care less about whatever number is given to a game, and more about what information the review actually contains.
The reviewer didn't like how many water Pokémon were in the game, as it led to a balance problem. She also said that the water routes (Which make up around 40% of the overworld) were tedious. I don't really care about the "too many water Pokémon" thing, but I totally agree on the surplus of water routes.
ORAS has a theme of Land vs Water, so a large portion of the game takes place on the water. But while the land has a ton of different locals, the water is bland and boring. Diving is cool at first, and Pacifidlog town is okay, but most of the time you're surfing on the big, empty water routes with nothing interesting on them, where every single tile can trigger a random encounter. It's seriously the worst part of the game. Once you're finished with most of the game, you have to go through several boring water sections at once. It's the main reason why I don't like Hoenn as much as the other regions.
This whole situation is why I hate review scores. Arlo made a really good video about why they suck, but basically, people care more about the number assigned to a game than the actual written review. So when people saw that the reviewer gave ORAS a 7.8/10, they nitpicked the review and turned a very valid complaint into something that seemed like a minor detail. They even ignored her other complaint about HMs and made it seem like the only reason why it didn't get a perfect score was because of the water. I'm 100% sure that if the reviewer didn't give the game a score at all, the backlash wouldn't have been nearly as harsh.
Also, a 7.8/10 is still a great score.
TL ; DR - People should care less about whatever number is given to a game, and more about what information the review actually contains.
Thomas the Tank Engine
A Cheeky Little Engine
- Pronouns
- She/They
Don't forget how complaining about the water routes had literally been one of the Pokémon fandom's main goddamn criticisms of the Hoenn games since they came out on the Game Boy Advance. So why that very same criticism became a meme, I don't understand. I can only assume that maybe it started because of younger fans who'd never played the OG Hoenn games before thought it'd be funny in an attempt to make fun of video game reviewers?
Also my issue with review scores is that the numbering is completely fucked up in terms of what they mean. Like you'd think a game being 6/10 means it's 'above average' but it really means it's borderline trash.
Also my issue with review scores is that the numbering is completely fucked up in terms of what they mean. Like you'd think a game being 6/10 means it's 'above average' but it really means it's borderline trash.
- Pronouns
- she/her
- MarioWiki
- Mario
The real issue with the water routes lies a fundamental problem that has been only recently changed: random encounters. Hoenn's water routes could've been more fun if the random encounter was limited to just some reefs or such, like the water version of tall grass. No, they're treated like a vast expanse of underground and cave, which are already bad enough and have this reputation for stopping you every 5 steps you take.
I do think the complaints about water routes are a little overblown but I think I've just changed my attitude regarding wild encounters to just "destroy everything that appears" rather than flee. That being said, I never really remembered them being particularly terrible honestly; I always felt I spent more time in Mt. Moon or Rock Tunnel than in those routes, and Victory Road was certainly worse than the water routes just for requiring waterfall, strength, rock smash AND flash???
As for the amount of water Pokemon, water types do seem to be a majority in the dex. There's the Wingull and Tentacool spam and you do encounter Lotad and Surskit, and there's Wailmers, Spheals, Corphish and Carvanha (late game though), and then there's rain (but also sunshine), and there's deep sea Pokemon, and there's fishing. But a lot of those are late game, and some of these you won't encounter at all (Huntail, Gorebyss). Also water being majority isn't unique to Hoenn, as the generations prior also had water types that regularly outnumber the species count for other types including normal and bug (though Kanto has poison outnumber water).
The obsessiveness about numbering IS a problem. A 6/10 is basically "slightly above average, bordering on existing to exist". I think that's generally the idea for some games, but I also think context kind of matters. A 6/10 for a hyped up so-called """AAA""" game would indeed be considered intensely disappointed, just as how Paper Mario: Sticker Star, which was hyped up, was viewed as trash despite the mild scores. Cyberpunk 2077 getting that score would not reflect well on Cyberpunk, but I think something like Mario Party getting there would actually be okayish.... ....
And then there are games where professional review scores don't really match up to the perceived quality of the game.Pokemon Mystery Dungeon games regularly get middling scores on the professional side, but users tend to like them a lot more? Hell I recall Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon as cited among Nintendo's "dark" era examples for having relatively lowly rated Metacritic scores, but leaving out the usual inexplicable lukewarm reception professional critics have for these games. I mean I think the user score here for Super Mystery Dungeon more closely reflects my opinion on that game, and that disparity should be noted in Wikipedia at least, especially when the score, I don't think is from a raiding.
On the other hand, there's the usual professional reviewers frequently rating these Madden games constantly above 7/10 but you see user scores as like 0.5/10 such as Madden NFL 21.
So always take the scores with a grain of salt, and especially take context and relative perception into account. A 7/10 for a Mario Sports game is immediately seen as pretty standard and still a worthwhile Mario sports game (or at least that's a reasonable appraisal). The same score for Smash Bros. or Paper Mario, I generally think they have some flaws that hold the game back especially compared to the predecessors; in Smash Bros.'s case I'd wonder what the hell went wrong. Paper Mario: Sticker Star sat right smack on the middle of the 70-80 range for the Metacritic average and guessed how THAT turned out.
I do think the complaints about water routes are a little overblown but I think I've just changed my attitude regarding wild encounters to just "destroy everything that appears" rather than flee. That being said, I never really remembered them being particularly terrible honestly; I always felt I spent more time in Mt. Moon or Rock Tunnel than in those routes, and Victory Road was certainly worse than the water routes just for requiring waterfall, strength, rock smash AND flash???
As for the amount of water Pokemon, water types do seem to be a majority in the dex. There's the Wingull and Tentacool spam and you do encounter Lotad and Surskit, and there's Wailmers, Spheals, Corphish and Carvanha (late game though), and then there's rain (but also sunshine), and there's deep sea Pokemon, and there's fishing. But a lot of those are late game, and some of these you won't encounter at all (Huntail, Gorebyss). Also water being majority isn't unique to Hoenn, as the generations prior also had water types that regularly outnumber the species count for other types including normal and bug (though Kanto has poison outnumber water).
The obsessiveness about numbering IS a problem. A 6/10 is basically "slightly above average, bordering on existing to exist". I think that's generally the idea for some games, but I also think context kind of matters. A 6/10 for a hyped up so-called """AAA""" game would indeed be considered intensely disappointed, just as how Paper Mario: Sticker Star, which was hyped up, was viewed as trash despite the mild scores. Cyberpunk 2077 getting that score would not reflect well on Cyberpunk, but I think something like Mario Party getting there would actually be okayish.... ....
And then there are games where professional review scores don't really match up to the perceived quality of the game.Pokemon Mystery Dungeon games regularly get middling scores on the professional side, but users tend to like them a lot more? Hell I recall Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon as cited among Nintendo's "dark" era examples for having relatively lowly rated Metacritic scores, but leaving out the usual inexplicable lukewarm reception professional critics have for these games. I mean I think the user score here for Super Mystery Dungeon more closely reflects my opinion on that game, and that disparity should be noted in Wikipedia at least, especially when the score, I don't think is from a raiding.
On the other hand, there's the usual professional reviewers frequently rating these Madden games constantly above 7/10 but you see user scores as like 0.5/10 such as Madden NFL 21.
So always take the scores with a grain of salt, and especially take context and relative perception into account. A 7/10 for a Mario Sports game is immediately seen as pretty standard and still a worthwhile Mario sports game (or at least that's a reasonable appraisal). The same score for Smash Bros. or Paper Mario, I generally think they have some flaws that hold the game back especially compared to the predecessors; in Smash Bros.'s case I'd wonder what the hell went wrong. Paper Mario: Sticker Star sat right smack on the middle of the 70-80 range for the Metacritic average and guessed how THAT turned out.
Toasty Toad
All toasters toast toast
- Pronouns
- He/him
- MarioWiki
- GreenWeegee
the game that causes the least amount of violences is flappy bird
supermariofan
Dry Bowser
Unless you're trying to go for S rankings, I've played much harder games than Cuphead.
- Pronouns
- She/Her
- MarioWiki
- Flygon64
The monster catching genre needs more diversity in series
there are a lot of indie monster catching games but the problem with most is they're just trying to improve on Pokemon
whether they succeed at improving the Pokemon formula doesn't matter, they aren't trying to change it up
I just want to see a new formula in the monster catching genre. Pokemon has too much of a damn strangle-hold on the thing, there's no competition at all. What could of been competition is just dead, Yo-kai Watch, one of my favorite franchises ever, died because of Level-5's general incompetency in recent times and died over in the east with horrible sales of 4, the finale to the series. When was the last time you heard any real major news about Digimon in the west? I'm just crossing my fingers until some big AAA company comes along and makes a new original monster catching game and keeps it afloat.
Modern Pokemon is alright in my opinion, but man am I so damn tired of the same thing again and again with the fandom reacting the same way again and again
Where some new little Pokemon inspired game pops up and people shout to the heavens it will show it to the man but it gets forgotten a month later
there are a lot of indie monster catching games but the problem with most is they're just trying to improve on Pokemon
whether they succeed at improving the Pokemon formula doesn't matter, they aren't trying to change it up
I just want to see a new formula in the monster catching genre. Pokemon has too much of a damn strangle-hold on the thing, there's no competition at all. What could of been competition is just dead, Yo-kai Watch, one of my favorite franchises ever, died because of Level-5's general incompetency in recent times and died over in the east with horrible sales of 4, the finale to the series. When was the last time you heard any real major news about Digimon in the west? I'm just crossing my fingers until some big AAA company comes along and makes a new original monster catching game and keeps it afloat.
Modern Pokemon is alright in my opinion, but man am I so damn tired of the same thing again and again with the fandom reacting the same way again and again
Where some new little Pokemon inspired game pops up and people shout to the heavens it will show it to the man but it gets forgotten a month later
Koopa con Carne
call me Hot Lips, 'cause i'm a one-shot wonder
- MarioWiki
- Koopa con Carne
Somewhat recently, I had the privilege to play with an authentic GameCube controller. It's a godawful piece of shit.
Thomas the Tank Engine
A Cheeky Little Engine
- Pronouns
- She/They
Yeah the GameCube controller is hella overrated.
The only reasons I can think of why it's praised as high as it is is because of Smash fans who refuse to learn to play the game on a different controller and kids who grew up with the GameCube and mistake their nostalgia for the system with it actually being good.
Like the damn thing was missing buttons that the controllers of its contemporary competitors had (no clickable sticks, only three shoulder buttons [sure you could argue that the Xbox controller only had the two shoulder triggers, but they also had the black and white buttons that gave it the same number of buttons as the PS2 controller overall], no select button), an awful d-pad, the little c-stick is the worst thing, and the entire button layout is just awful for games that weren't specifically designed for it.
The only reasons I can think of why it's praised as high as it is is because of Smash fans who refuse to learn to play the game on a different controller and kids who grew up with the GameCube and mistake their nostalgia for the system with it actually being good.
Like the damn thing was missing buttons that the controllers of its contemporary competitors had (no clickable sticks, only three shoulder buttons [sure you could argue that the Xbox controller only had the two shoulder triggers, but they also had the black and white buttons that gave it the same number of buttons as the PS2 controller overall], no select button), an awful d-pad, the little c-stick is the worst thing, and the entire button layout is just awful for games that weren't specifically designed for it.
- Pronouns
- She/her
I wouldn't say the GCN controller is a piece of shit, but it's definitely not worth the hype. I happen to have very large hands so trying to jam them into the little gaps isn't usually very fun. The C stick and D-Pad are also pathetically small, I can agree with those.
My unpopular opinion about controllers is that I hated the SNES controller when I got to use it. It felt so flimsy and plasticky and I just couldn't really adjust myself to the button layout. It also made my hands cramp trying to use it when it had no grips.
My unpopular opinion about controllers is that I hated the SNES controller when I got to use it. It felt so flimsy and plasticky and I just couldn't really adjust myself to the button layout. It also made my hands cramp trying to use it when it had no grips.
Mcmadness
The idiot who puts things in the wrong board.
Modern xbox yes, not that big beef cake thing from the original xbox, I hated that.
I'm the lil bro.
I'm hooked on the brothers!
- Pronouns
- kit/he
Time for a more disgruntled version of Lynx to come out here for a complaint I've had about internet reviewers of video games for a long time now. (Note: I don't dislike any of these people personally and at the end of the day, it's fine for them to disagree. It just kind of bites that it feels like I'm of the minority opinion here.)
Specifically: I think reviews focus way too much on details that honestly don't matter and you won't notice in a casual playthrough, and there isn't enough appreciation put into the heart and passion that goes into games that are made... And honestly, the increased cynicism in these reviews is just... Not... Fun. Especially when they resort to attacks against the game companies (which, don't get me wrong, there are problems in the industry, but suggesting animators are lazy because they're trying their best with a limited timeframe that they were given never sat right with me).
The details that I think reviewers are either usually outright incorrect about or otherwise place way too much important on boil down to these more specifically:
Personally, I find it really important when playing a game to ask why the developers did a specific thing in the game. Why is this here, what is it for, and does it accomplish the thing that it's there for? Trying to judge a game based on what it is not trying to do is simply not fair to the game. I am not about to judge a cartoonish-styled game for not looking exactly the same as a high fidelity realistic FPS, since the game is making no attempt to compete with that. I am not going to get frustrated at a story that is clearly attempting to be communicated with no dialogue for being vague and open interpretation. That's the kind of experience you should be expecting going into a game like that, and bringing in what you wish the game to have been to suit your own personal tastes rather than attempting to understand the vision of the game is inevitably going to lead to disappointment and cynicism.
I am not one to suggest that people have to make their own games in order to criticize them, but sometimes I wonder if the reviewers of these games wouldn't be happier making the RPG that they clearly want when going into a puzzle game with only light RPG elements. You know what I mean?
Specifically: I think reviews focus way too much on details that honestly don't matter and you won't notice in a casual playthrough, and there isn't enough appreciation put into the heart and passion that goes into games that are made... And honestly, the increased cynicism in these reviews is just... Not... Fun. Especially when they resort to attacks against the game companies (which, don't get me wrong, there are problems in the industry, but suggesting animators are lazy because they're trying their best with a limited timeframe that they were given never sat right with me).
The details that I think reviewers are either usually outright incorrect about or otherwise place way too much important on boil down to these more specifically:
- PACING. I've seen this brought up in so many reviews but none of them define at all what they mean by this, and what's thrown off by it; it's to the point that it's become a buzz word shorthand that you're supposed to understand, but I never grasp the memo. To me it comes across like they are bothered by something with how the story or gameplay progresses, but they aren't able to articulate it well so they just settle for a catch-all "pacing" term. This is likely because they want to just get a review out rather than actually pinning down how they feel about a game specifically which, while understandable with the upload schedules a lot of reviewers have, makes me no less frustrated in practice.
- VOICE ACTING. I've seen a lot of needlessly harsh panning of voice actors in all my time within gaming circles, and honestly? They're usually not as bad as people make them out to be. You probably know a few examples of this yourself — Super Mario Sunshine is particularly infamous for this kind of complaint, and Jason Griffith back when he voiced Sonic got panned pretty hard, too. I've even seen people say this about FNAF: Security Breach, which... Absolutely baffles me? The voice actors are amazing in Security Breach. Is there something I'm missing here?
- PLOT HOLES. I do think that plot holes and inconsistencies are legitimate complaints. My problem comes not in the fact that they're brought up at all, but the amount of importance that they're given. Small inconsistencies and errors here and there are really not that big of a deal and aren't a sign of laziness or anything like that, especially for long running game series in which such things, if anything, are practically a given. There could be an argument made to plan things out more in advance and plan out an ending to your game, but such an argument is never made. Continuity errors are instead often pointed out to be a sign of the people working on the games to not be caring about the product. I certainly disagree that these inconsistencies alone will entirely break a story for me.
- PREDICTABILITY. Here's a point that I just straight up disagree with. I don't think a plot twist being predictable makes it a bad plot twist. Obviously you don't want it to feel phoned in, but that's different. If anything, having a plot twist able to be guessed earlier on means it's foreshadowed well. No, to me, the merit of a plot twist comes in what it changes about anything that came before once it's revealed; if the plot twist is simply there to be a twist, it won't have substance on subsequent viewings once the shock value fades. But if it changes up the dynamic of the game, recontextualizing past events, it can be a pretty cool thing, especially if it has something to say about the characters or about people.
Personally, I find it really important when playing a game to ask why the developers did a specific thing in the game. Why is this here, what is it for, and does it accomplish the thing that it's there for? Trying to judge a game based on what it is not trying to do is simply not fair to the game. I am not about to judge a cartoonish-styled game for not looking exactly the same as a high fidelity realistic FPS, since the game is making no attempt to compete with that. I am not going to get frustrated at a story that is clearly attempting to be communicated with no dialogue for being vague and open interpretation. That's the kind of experience you should be expecting going into a game like that, and bringing in what you wish the game to have been to suit your own personal tastes rather than attempting to understand the vision of the game is inevitably going to lead to disappointment and cynicism.
I am not one to suggest that people have to make their own games in order to criticize them, but sometimes I wonder if the reviewers of these games wouldn't be happier making the RPG that they clearly want when going into a puzzle game with only light RPG elements. You know what I mean?
PlanteraBlade
Greenie
- Pronouns
- He/It
I don't really have many "unpopular opinions", including when it comes to games, but there is one that I suppose is worth mentioning here.
I...didn't like Breath of the Wild.
Bought it with my Switch in April 2017, thinking it would give me something to do until MK8D came out later that month. I played through the starting area and thought it was pretty alright, but as I got further and further into the game, I just felt...lost. There wasn't really anything telling me where to go, I found it hard figuring out what I should be doing. It was fun to explore the landscape but even then, it felt like a lot of areas were off-limits to me. The only thing I enjoyed doing was hunting out the shrines. But eventually I got to a point where I realized all I wanted to do was hunt for shrines and not much else. There wasn't much captivating me or compelling me to play more.
Although to be fair, this was my first Zelda game since Spirit Tracks, so I wasn't up-to-date on the lore, backstories and timelines of the whole series, so that didn't help much either.
I...didn't like Breath of the Wild.
Bought it with my Switch in April 2017, thinking it would give me something to do until MK8D came out later that month. I played through the starting area and thought it was pretty alright, but as I got further and further into the game, I just felt...lost. There wasn't really anything telling me where to go, I found it hard figuring out what I should be doing. It was fun to explore the landscape but even then, it felt like a lot of areas were off-limits to me. The only thing I enjoyed doing was hunting out the shrines. But eventually I got to a point where I realized all I wanted to do was hunt for shrines and not much else. There wasn't much captivating me or compelling me to play more.
Although to be fair, this was my first Zelda game since Spirit Tracks, so I wasn't up-to-date on the lore, backstories and timelines of the whole series, so that didn't help much either.
I don't think you need much prior experience to enjoy BotW, it's just a matter of how you approach the game really.
There was a time where I myself was a little iffy on it cause it felt empty in places (expected but not something I can shrug off easily) but once I decided I was just gonna have some fun fucking around the game truly shone. But again that's just the kinda person I am I suppose.
There was a time where I myself was a little iffy on it cause it felt empty in places (expected but not something I can shrug off easily) but once I decided I was just gonna have some fun fucking around the game truly shone. But again that's just the kinda person I am I suppose.
Thomas the Tank Engine
A Cheeky Little Engine
- Pronouns
- She/They
It's perfectly fine if some video games are difficult and lack 'easy modes'. Not every game has to be playable and beatable by people of every skill level.
(Obviously I'm not talking about like accessibility options here, I think all games should have ways so people can play regardless of any disabilities they may have)
(Obviously I'm not talking about like accessibility options here, I think all games should have ways so people can play regardless of any disabilities they may have)
- Pronouns
- she/her
- MarioWiki
- Mario
The way Legend of Zelda works is just a very loose continuity that you don't need much prior experience of to make sense of the current situation. They're practically soft reboots, since each Link, Zelda, Ganon, etc tend to be different "reincarnations" rather than recurring "individuals". The lore and whatnot are usually self-contained though you'll see recurring nods here and there involving locales, but you'll probably learn their connections either way, as the games do tend to explain.
While I don't think easy modes should be mandated in every game, like with developers behind Sekiro not wanting an easy mode for design philosophy reasons, I do think they're worth consideration as easy mode can simply be a good accessibility package for some players, or even just time-strapped players with full-time jobs who probably don't have means or patience of dealing with very difficult components of a game. Sekiro was a game my boyfriend enjoyed, who also had a full-time job, he really did, but I had to help him install difficulty tuning mods so he could more easily play and have more fun rather than get stuck on a boss for hours (he somehow managed to complete Dark Souls 1 and 2 weirdly). It's really demanding of your time, and that's just not a resource everyone has. That being said, developers also may not have resources for an easy mode inclusion, it's still a valid reason to lack an easy mode, since that requires the game to be reworked to balance between easier while still being fun.
I'm the lil bro.
I'm hooked on the brothers!
- Pronouns
- kit/he
I think this is especially worth consideration now that mobile gaming seems to be a larger focus. Super Mario Odyssey structured its gameplay so you could accomplish something in the game within five minutes with consideration to the greater hustle and bustle and mobile...ness of the modern world. There is certainly a niche for games that are specifically ball-bustingly hard, which is why I liked the previous post, but if difficulty isn't this massive component in your game and you're simply not including easy mode because you have this general mentality that people should "get good", you're not bearing in mind that that alone actually is an accessibility issue in the modern social climate.
It's worth remembering that arcade games were so hard to begin with because they wanted to eat up your quarters. You'd have to pay to play the cabinet, so they want to make you compelled to keep trying, and difficulty was one way to do that. This difficulty carried over to older games (that's why people generally remember older games being harder), because they didn't have the know-how to fine tune the difficulty specifically structured for arcade games for home consoles. That was years ago now, though; there's a lot more resources out there on balancing your game, and there's actually greater risk in not including more accessible difficulty options because it gatekeeps the game from being played by certain people. If the gatekeeping is your point (and it can be, it's not a bad thing to make difficulty a focus of the game), then by all means, but if you're making it difficult simply because arcade games were back in the day... I mean, to be frank, your game isn't an arcade game. It's archaic game design to base it off of them.
It's what a lot of game critics miss when they bring up this sort of thing, how the newer generation is apparently being catered to with difficulty.