Shooter disappointment

[Surgo]

This came from another thread (which was locked), but I was wondering what other people felt about this topic.

The first-person shooter genre is as static and unchanging as the women-in-prison genre of film. I like shooters, but I think the whole genre really peaked with Unreal Tournament and Counter-strike back in 1999. I don't really like the latter so much, I'm more of a fan of Unreal Tournament, but I can certainly appreciate it as a great game.

It seems like, since then, the genre as a whole has been rather uninspiring. There have been a couple gems (Call of Duty 4, Team Fortress 2) but that doesn't even begin to compare to the amount of crap out there. The really good shooters since then have basically been remakes of the Big Two: Unreal Tournament 2004 and Counter-Strike Source. While I don't expect anything to ever top these two because they are some of the greatest games ever made, I think that there should at least be something that equals it in another direction.

That said, I think there are genuinely good developments in the stage of single-player shooters...namely Bioshock and Half-Life 2 (and the original Half-Life, but that was pre-Unreal Tournament). But again, these are few and far between and seem to get buried in the sea of stagnant crap out there. For single-player: how many space marine shooters are there going to be before everyone finally realizes how fucking static that subgenre is and how difficult it is to tell any new or interesting stories in it. I think there's a good reason all the really good single-players have avoided the space marine subgenre.

For reference, here's the post:

i have brawl and im not such a big fan but seriously only 2? i mean in about one month-JUST ONE MONTH i have had fun with 3 different games for the 360 which are L4D GoW2 and PURE just to name a few and I haven't even played my Wii in like about 6 months, some on now you have to agree that the Wii is not consistent with game releases

Gears of War 2 is play it and then never pick it up again (not to mention it's the same damn shooter that I've been playing since 1999, only worse). Same goes for PURE, though it's actually a more original concept which is nice. Left 4 Dead is a PC game for me, and is the only one in those three listed that really deserves to stand next to a game like Brawl or Mario Kart in its combined fun-value, friend-value, and replayability-value (the last two kinda go hand-in-hand).

There's significantly more to consider than quantity. Like, uh, quality.

I have a 360 as well as a Wii. What gets played on my 360 the most? Soul Calibur 4, ST HDR, and Viva Pinata. Not much else ever goes in. It's not like console shooters have ever improved on Unreal Tournament (a genre that is supposedly the 360's greatest strength). And while I certainly enjoy the three of those games, and get great use out of them (especially SC4, my friends and especially my girlfriend just seem to eat that one up), I don't get the same enjoyment out of them as I do with Brawl and Mario Kart. Which, again, all my friends love and we have a blast playing together.

I'd like to make a point here about the shooter genre as a whole...it really peaked with Unreal Tournament and Counter-Strike, IMO (I much prefer the former, though I can appreciate the strength of the latter). Outside of a few rare gems, like Call of Duty 4, the genre as a whole has been rather uninspiring because it refuses to reach Unreal Tournament level greatness. Now this is certainly not easy, because Unreal Tournament is one of the greatest video games ever created, but in a genre as essentially static as shooters the pain is far more keenly felt than it would be in, say, platformers. (As an aside, I know that there will never be an improvement on Unreal Tournament -- I'm looking for a lateral compliment. There are a couple gems out there.)

 

[Silentmartyr]

The Rainbow Six Vegas series is nothing innovative or new but it is definitely different from the generic Gaylo or GoW that you seem to dislike. I recommend giving it a try.

 

[Gorgoroth]

GOW isn't a fps so what are you talking about? Third person combined with a method of cover makes it totally different then the games you are describing such as Halo, Cod4, CS.

 

[Surgo]

You're looking too deeply into the post that inspired this instead of the post itself. (Not to mention I only said "first-person" once which I guess was a mistake, as I really meant to include third-person shit in there too.) While GoW might be third person instead of first, it's still part of the shooter genre as a whole, and it is most definitely part of that ever-unchanging crap that is the space marine subgenre. If I never see another space marine in my life, it will still be too soon.

 

[Firestorm]

Gears of War has very similar mechanics to Halo, CoD4, and Counter-Strike. It's a shooter. I have no idea where you got FPS from Burzum.

Really, it's due to FPSes being the new platformers. Since the last generation, FPSes have been the de facto genre for many publishers' AAA titles because they sell so well to their target audience of 16 - 24 year old males. There's little innovation because with the proper marketing budget, there doesn't have to be.

Each shooter does however do small innovations that add up. Gears which you listed did make the cover mechanic more popular. Halo introduced the idea of regenerating health which a lot of games have picked up since to keep the tempo of the game flowing. There aren't often many large advances made in one game.

Does this make them a little stagnant? Yeah, I'd say so. Shooters aren't my favourite genre, but I do like playing the cream of the crop. My biggest thing with shooters is co-op. If a shooter has co-op, no matter hwo mediocre it seems (Gears of War series for example), I'll still play through it.

Multiplayer VS on the other hand... Counter-Strike 1.6, Team Fortress 2, and now Left 4 Dead are the only ones to keep my attention and that's more due friends than anything.

In my Top 10 games of all time, the only FPS on there would be Bioshock which I don't even like the shooting mechanics of. Metroid Prime is the only other one close to a shooter and it's an Adventure game.

 

[Surgo]

I can buy that there's incremental improvements in gameplay (though I still can't see gameplay that's better than the original Unreal Tournament), but what about story? The shooter genre of video games, when it comes to story, is seriously as static as the women in prison genre of film. Some games get around this by not having a real story (Unreal Tournament, Team Fortress 2). Occasionally you'll get breakouts: Bioshock, Half-Life 2, Call of Duty 4. But what do we have beyond that? Space marines, World War 2...and the latter is quite amazing. Despite the incredible success that was Call of Duty 4, the publisher decides to revert to an older developer to develop another WW2 game for Call of Duty 5. Amazing.

How many WW2 games come out per year? How many space marine games come out per year? And how many original-story shooters come out per year?

 

[Gorgoroth]

Well I was going off the first sentence of the first para but anyway, I do agree that the genre is stale.

For me Gears is an exception because it is generally a tougher game to get really good at for a variety of reasons unlike your average Halo and Cod.

When I really think about it what other options do they have for shooters? Aliens and war are pretty much the only options which is why you see Resistance and all these other similar games coming out.

 

[Firestorm]

I wouldn't say CoD4 had an amazing story really. And the reason for that was because Activision, the money-whoring shit company it is, already had Treyarch working on CoD:WaW before CoD4 came out. The next game is going to be by Infinity Ward and they're calling it Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2. This was revealed at a in-game advertising summit last week or the week before (I forget exactly).

I agree with story completely. Bioshock's narrative is the only one to really grip me. I've been meaning to play Half-Life but keep getting sidetracked. I liked Metroid Prime, but again, adventure game. Something tells me I'll like Fallout 3, but it's an RPG, not a shooter. It seems that a lot of the really well done stories in shooters are actually different genres disguised as a shooter to appeal to the mass audience.

Burzum, I really don't see that in GoW. Then again, I'm not really a fan of any of those games except for single-player. All I know right now is that GoW multiplayer is broken and Epic hasn't fixed it yet =p

 

[Gorgoroth]

You made your own point lol. You said you don't see it in GoW but you don't really play the multiplayer. Therefore your opinion is invalid because you don't know if it takes skill or not. Not trying to bash you and although I am a GoW fanboy,

Epic really f'd everything up. I won't even go into detail but they need to fix it.

 

[Bourbon]

First person games are generally the best way to immerse the player in the highly realistic game environment. It's unfortunate that almost every single one of them involves shooting and killing and whatnot. Examples of some absolutely amazing first person games include Portal and Fallout 3. Fallout 3 has guns in it, but you never really need to shoot thanks to VATS, and the movement controls are optimized for getting around, not aiming. Portal has a "gun" but it's goal is not violence, but puzzle solving. And I'm sure we can all agree portal was absolutely stunning.

I hope game developers realize, however, that the market is over-saturated with shooters. Halo, COD, Half Life, FEAR, Unreal, GOW, all came out this year. And there's probably some smaller companies putting out FPS too. I have around 9 Xbox 360 games, and only three of them, Banjoo N&B, Castle Crashers, and Guitar Hero III, are not first person shooters. This is pretty ridiculous, that's 66% first person shooters in my game collection.

A few FPS a year is definitely more than enough, right now the game market is absolutely flooded with first person shooters.

 

[Firestorm]

I have 8 shooters and 16 other genres. So I'm in the exact opposite situation skiddle =P

Shooters
Halo 3
Gears of War
Gears of War 2
Call of Duty 2
Call of Duty 4
Perfect Dark Zero (which is so bad not even co-op saves it)
Bioshock
Rainbow Six Vegas

Non-Shooters
Sonic the Hedgehog (;_;)
Blue Dragon
Assassin's Creed
NHL 09
Viva Pinata
Tales of Vesperia
Eternal Sonata
Marvel Ultimate Alliance
Fallout 3
Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts
Kameo: Elements of Power
Mass Effect
Grand Theft Auto IV
Naruto: Rise of a Ninja
The Simpsons Game
Mirror's Edge
Sonic Unleashed coming in the mail (god I never learn)

And if you include XBLA games, more:
Worms
Penny Arcade Episode 1
Penny Arcade Episode 2
Uno (everything after this, including this, was free)
Hexic HD (which everyone with a 360 has. Play it. By guy who made Tetris)
Robotron 2048
Joust
Yaris (;_;)
Aegis Wing
Totemball
Frogger
Bankshot Billiards

So my point here is, although the market is fairly saturated with first person shooters, it doesn't mean there aren't a lot of games in other genres being made as well.

 

[DeathScythe]

Well, I'm a PS3 & Wii owner, so I can't comment on the 360 shooters. When playing the PS3, I alternate between the PS3's amazing "Big 3", (MGS4, LittleBigPlanet, and Resistance 2).

Now R2, is an amazing game, mostly thanks to it's online 8-player co-op. Seriously, image a raid in WoW, in the form of an FPS. The more people you're playing with, the higher the difficulty. You pick 3 classes, all of which require teamwork and each other to prevail. This is because the Soldier always needs ammo for his minigun and shield for his allies, the Special Ops needs to provide the soldier with that ammo and pick off enemies from afar, and the Medic obviously heals the duo while recieving protection from the other two. Also, if the whole team dies, or "wipes" you fail the mission. This further strengthens the need for teamwork.

There are many different types of missions for each individual maps, to keep variety. I have barely touched the game's campaign, just because I'm having so much fun playing and leveling in co-op. The game's other modes are just icing on the cake for me.

tl;dr: While I agree some of the latest FPS games are a dissappointment, you must admit that there are a few that stand up from the pack.

 

[Bourbon]

I have the following games:

Orange Box
Halo 3
COD 4
GOW 2
FEAR
UT 2007
Fallout 3
Banjo Kazooie
Guitar Hero 3
Mass Effect

I had more than 9 games, I forgot about mass effect and COD4. I'm not going to lie, I love first person shooters, but it's sad that there are so few good games in other genres nowadays. XBL Arcade helps some, bringing cool games like Castle Crashers and Braid.

 

[Mr.E]

The shooter genre has been a historically weak storytelling platform, but not every game needs to contain a life lesson or tell a heart-wrenching tale. Platformers behave similarly, let alone puzzle games and the like. (And let's not touch upon Portal...)


The atmosphere, unique setting and gameplay of Bioshock really gripped me and I had a blast playing through it. Do I think any less of the Halo series for it? Not really. I don't pay much attention to the story because it's mostly just there to give us a reason to blow shit up (like most standard shooters) but that's fine because blowing shit up in Halo is pretty fun. Mostly for co-op/MP, then again I can't play Bioshock with a friend at all.

i.e. Different games are strong in different areas, even within the same genre. Being original doesn't mean you have to abandon the past, either. Even as the "space marine" or "real past war" storylines become super-bland, there's been steady improvement and innovations in gameplay mechanics that can still engage the player and positively impact the genre as a whole. Sometimes just a change in scenery is enough for many people to continue enjoying themselves.