When did games become about graphics? [DEBATE]

[Mr Jive]

The fact is, old games were a shining example of how it can be entertaining.
Because how you "complete" your game, is based on how you are satisfied with it.

New FPS games such as CoD follow this mundane, boring pattern, CoD consisted of
Go to A. Go through a corridor. Cutscene. Go to B. Go to C. Cutscene. Go through corridor. Cutscene. End mission.


Older FPS games (Quake, Doom, etc)
Complete the level how you want to do it.
Rocket jump over barriers if you had enough health.
Bunny hop your way to victory.
Find all the secrets first before going to next level.
Accumulate as much kills and item pick ups as you can.
Use any types of weapon you want.
Do it as fast as you can.

That was gaming. You were the boss of the game, not some game that attempts at being realistic but fails miserably at being realistic or even delivering the slightest bit of entertainment that you paid for.
Older games consisted of;
Finding as much secrets as you can.
Racking up as much points/kills as much as you can.
Doing it as fast as you can.
Collecting the best items that the level has given you.
Make your own challenge (The old doom speed runs consisting of not using your gun, at all.)

To top it off, people who make maps for the old games, actually spent their time in making it fan-fucking-tastic and entertaining.

This is basically why I don't play modern First person shooters anymore, they are generally pretty boring and the attempts to make realism only bring out the OCD in me to look at all the points where the realism fucked up. I only played CoD: MW2 because my friends got it and when I played the multilayer I used to see how well I could do with just my knife, otherwise it got boring.

I much prefer games when they try to be interesting and unrealistic and just plain silly like in some of the old game e.g. Doom. Still there are a lot of good games out there none the less for people to enjoy that don't follow the boring first person shooter methods that are being overly used nowadays; you just have to look in the right places

Also could you argue that Wolfenstein 3D set the foundations for the FPS?

[Journeyman H. [UK]]

This is basically why I don't play modern First person shooters anymore, they are generally pretty boring and the attempts to make realism only bring out the OCD in me to look at all the points where the realism fucked up. I only played CoD: MW2 because my friends got it and when I played the multilayer I used to see how well I could do with just my knife, otherwise it got boring.

I much prefer games when they try to be interesting and unrealistic and just plain silly like in some of the old game e.g. Doom. Still there are a lot of good games out there none the less for people to enjoy that don't follow the boring first person shooter methods that are being overly used nowadays; you just have to look in the right places

Also could you argue that Wolfenstein 3D set the foundations for the FPS?

Depends. Wolfenstein (Don't forget Spear of Destiny) was indeed the first few games, and many attempted to imitate it's glory, but they couldn't be able to achieve what Wolfenstein did. Wolfenstein has defined how a FPS is made, and it was a simple goal.

But in my opinion, I would say Doom (and then Quake) is what made FPS shooters how it should be. Simply because of it's incredibly diverse gameplay, it set the foundations of what FPS shooters should be aiming for today.

But yeah, ID Software and Apogee/3D Realms were the best when it came to FPS shooters, sadly they either became unpopular, defunct or they just eventually ended up being the typical game designers.
For instance, ID Software's game 'RAGE', it was a fun game, but quickly became boring and felt rushed, also coupled with their poor optimisation for rendering. The PC had the worst of it.

Or Apogee (Known as 3D Realms) made a fantastic game named ROTT, whilst it was overshadowed by Doom. ROTT had original ideas, such as the famous rocket jumping tactic, and it was discovered by pure accident which made the game a lot more interesting.
Or Duke Nukem 3D, many games attempted to try and make characters badasses whilst making a joke response to everything.

The thing is though, back then people always loved seeing "Next gen" graphics, and I believe the game designers are blinded by the fact that people are wanting entertainment and not "Realism", because realism is what causes the game to be dull.


The thing is with Doom and Quake, was that it was so open to people modding their game, that's what made their modding community so big. I reckon Doom and Quake has the biggest modding community, and it's been nearly 20 years since Doom was made for MS-DOS, and you can still see that it's being modded today, simply because that it's open to people modding their game files, they gave them the official tools to complete it.

You can easily look at other games too.
Source Games - Source Development Kit - (In)famous for Garry's Mod, Fortress Forever, Counter-Strike: Source, and other wonderous games.
Goldsrc Engine - GoldSrc Development Kit - Used for Quake, Half-Life.
Unreal Engine - Unreal Development Kit - Killing floor, who could forget that?

The problem is with game developers they want to make DLC for themselves just to make an extra penny from us, rather than letting the community flourish with their mods, they just decide to make it very difficult in doing so, unless you want to hack into the game engine, but no one would dedicate their time attempting to do so.

[Nicknero]

An example would be Minecraft, for instance. Why? It opens up creativity.

Minecraft?
Minecraft was also milked to hell. The transiction from beta to Release: A useless feature, a broken and unfinished game, a lot of unfullfiled promises, and a 20 euro tag

How can 1 single arcade game be milked out?
Perhaps you should look up the definition of milking out.

[Yimmy The Cat]

In your opinion, Verkinin? Well I don't give a SHIT about your opinion.

Do you think Doom 3 was made for graphics? NO. They made it for people to have fun, it didn't slacken my jaw. And you scream "BF3 has teh bestest graphuc evar1" funny, how it's graphics are lower def then COD. Funnier, if you sin around fast enough, you can find wall textures failing to render. You care only about graphics, I guess you'd play a game where you are Josef Frytzl, and you wouldn't care if it looked like you were looking out of a coffee filter (like BF3, brown graphics)

And you think somebody cares about your opinion?

There's no need to be fucking rude. If you continue to be an ass, I'll show you just how rude a person can be.

BF3 graphics LOOK better than COD, fuck def, my screen isn't even 1920x1080.

"Funnier, if you sin around fast enough, you can find wall textures failing to render."

When you're ingame, and bullets are flying around you, is that what you do? Do you spin around trying to find an error in the game? If you do so, you'll get shot. As long as the textures render fast enough in normal gameplay (which they do in BF3), you should be happy.

". You care only about graphics(...)" Did I ever say that? No. Don't post shit directed towards me when you don't read my fucking posts.

"You care only about graphics, I guess you'd play a game where you are Josef Frytzl, and you wouldn't care if it looked like you were looking out of a coffee filter (like BF3, brown graphics)"

What the fuck is wrong with you?? I think I'll refrain from commenting any more on that obviously retarded post.

Just because you don't say you only care about graphics, but it seems like you do. So calm the fuck down. Just because some disagrees with you doesn't mean you need to flip shit.


Back on topic:

Graphics don't mean anything. As long as I can see what I am doing, and the game play is good, I will be fine. Graphics add a bit of a cool toch, but the game should still be fun.

Look at Borderlands, the game was fun, and had some funny and cartoon graphics. Good Graphics only mean something if the game is fun itself.

[Uubucks]

In your opinion, Verkinin? Well I don't give a SHIT about your opinion.

Do you think Doom 3 was made for graphics? NO. They made it for people to have fun, it didn't slacken my jaw. And you scream "BF3 has teh bestest graphuc evar1" funny, how it's graphics are lower def then COD. Funnier, if you sin around fast enough, you can find wall textures failing to render. You care only about graphics, I guess you'd play a game where you are Josef Frytzl, and you wouldn't care if it looked like you were looking out of a coffee filter (like BF3, brown graphics)

And you think somebody cares about your opinion?

There's no need to be fucking rude. If you continue to be an ass, I'll show you just how rude a person can be.

BF3 graphics LOOK better than COD, fuck def, my screen isn't even 1920x1080.

"Funnier, if you sin around fast enough, you can find wall textures failing to render."

When you're ingame, and bullets are flying around you, is that what you do? Do you spin around trying to find an error in the game? If you do so, you'll get shot. As long as the textures render fast enough in normal gameplay (which they do in BF3), you should be happy.

". You care only about graphics(...)" Did I ever say that? No. Don't post shit directed towards me when you don't read my fucking posts.

"You care only about graphics, I guess you'd play a game where you are Josef Frytzl, and you wouldn't care if it looked like you were looking out of a coffee filter (like BF3, brown graphics)"

What the fuck is wrong with you?? I think I'll refrain from commenting any more on that obviously retarded post.

You're funny, graphics are WAY under gameplay.

Fuck graphics, I like looking at the ASCII characters when playing Dwarf Fortress, and it STILL has better gameplay than any other game I know.

Again, graphics don't mean SHIT if the gameplay is terrible.

[Comrade Venetia]

Graphics VS Gameplay is a bit of a double-edged sword, really. On one end, you want to be enjoyable, and not be something that people dread playing because of sheer boredom and frustration. At the same time, you don't want a game that looks like someone barfed on an art easel, smeared their feces around the edges, and called it the next best thing since the Mona Lisa.

[Nicknero]

The thing is that Graphics mattered back in the 90s. Where everything was still new, and better graphics were REALLY better.
Today, it's all the freaking same. You have games that look close to real life regarding graphics, so you pretty much know it all.
This means that graphics no longer make a game new and original, because you have tons of games out there with AWESOME graphics. That was matters these days is the gameplay, because that is what makes new games really new.

[SkeptiK]

TBH any FPS now days except for BF3 I get bored of.

[smt]

games are about both, things like far cry 2 and crysis 1 where arguably just really big tech demos, both graphics AND gameplay are important, it's when a company focuses on one too much is when it gets shit

[Phoenix]

IMO I think Battlefield is a well made game. But if I were to exchange gameplay for graphics I would. Battlefield has a mixture of gameplay and graphics (if your computer can run it well) then it is a great game. But I still like HaloCE, Minecraft, Mount and Blade Warband, Any old game really. New games today seem to have less and less fun in them. The older games had a lot more creativity and all that and now most of the newer games that are all the hype are FPS's which i'm not fairly into. Unless they are realistic like RO:2 or ARMA 2. Even though my computer can run a game on Ultra with a tiny bit of lag. I would rather turn the settings down to low and have amazing gameplay then look at some eye candy and die.