POLL / BE HEARD: December Game for TR

[Menegrothx]

I wasn't taking the months listed as the ones actually assigned to the games (we've not yet had that discussion) but as placeholders. A rail game in March and a RNG in December would be fine.

Either way there's less genre diversity that way, which I assume is a priority, as demonstrated by F-zero being picked despite the fact that it didn't generate almost any discourse

[dsheinem]

I wasn't taking the months listed as the ones actually assigned to the games (we've not yet had that discussion) but as placeholders. A rail game in March and a RNG in December would be fine.

Either way there's less genre diversity that way, which I assume is a priority, as demonstrated by F-zero being picked despite the fact that it didn't generate almost any discourse

I don't see including various games that offer shooting as less genre diversity. It would be like saying "we can't have multiple games that use magic".

[BoneSnapDeez]

So is Shock Troopers an MVS exclusive? No AES port? Is it on any SNK comps?

(oh dear god maybe it's on the Neo Geo X........)

[Damm64]

So is Shock Troopers an MVS exclusive? No AES port? Is it on any SNK comps?

(oh dear god maybe it's on the Neo Geo X........)

According to wikipedia; it has been ported to the SNK Arcade Classics vol. 1 (witch is available for PS2, PSP, Wii). Apparently it has some issues but is playable.

This game was re-released by SNK in North America through SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1. However there are minor differences of the game which could be spotted. The game consists of somewhat fairly long load times similar to the loading behavior in Metal Slug Anthology (even longer load on the PSP) and oddly enough, some Japanese Dialog has been stripped out of these versions. It is uncertain why this was done.
The game is also being incorporated into the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable Neo Geo classics line.[1]
Shock Troopers 2nd Squad has been made available to download in its arcade-perfect format on the Wii Virtual Console service in the North American region as of December 27th, 2012.

[BoneSnapDeez]

Good to know. I've also confirmed it's available for NGX. It's NOT one of the built-in titles though, so an additional card is required to play it.

[alienjesus]

I wasn't taking the months listed as the ones actually assigned to the games (we've not yet had that discussion) but as placeholders. A rail game in March and a RNG in December would be fine.

Either way there's less genre diversity that way, which I assume is a priority, as demonstrated by F-zero being picked despite the fact that it didn't generate almost any discourse

This whole 'discourse' thing is a bunch of crap. All the games that generated discourse did so for two reasons.

1) Lots of people have played them and were telling everyone how great they were.
2) Lots of people were opposed to playing the game.


Deus Ex generated more discussion than the other games, true, but 50% of it was people saying it sucks, and the other 50% was people defending it. That type of discourse is hardly representative of a worthy game for Together Retro.

You wanna know why F-Zero generated almost no discourse? Because no-one disagreed with the suggestion. Seems like a fine addition to the roster to me.

[mjmjr25]

I guess that was the point I was making all along and perhaps I could have been more eloquent.

Taking Deus Ex as an example; it had a ton of conversation, but as AJ says, at least 40% of that conversation was those saying they didn't like or would rather play something else. Then another member or 3 come in and say, "nah, it's a good game, +1 from me".

To me, that was the issue with the votes to begin with - since it was never properly suggested to "vote", if no one is talking about F-Zero, it isn't going to get a bunch of +1's. If everyone is talking about Deus Ex, it is going to get a bunch a +1's, but shouldn't we also consider all the "no thank you's" or more to the point, "-1's". Deus Ex had more +1's in that non-voting thread, but in a head to head vote of preference, it is clear to me at least, that F-Zero would be the preference, despite having "less votes" as has been said.

[Damm64]

To me Deus Ex seemed to had more NEGATIVE response than anything else, so maybe is not a good idea force it on TR. Since october will be 2 games, and Dungeons and dragons are another dual game month (maybe more) we should try to focus on one game this time.

[Violent By Design]

I found the decision to not include down votes strange. There's a very big difference between voting against something and abstaining, and I feel the former should have been represented.

Anyway, Deus Ex is getting another poll regardless, so we'll see what happens. I honestly don't care about Space Harrier, so I might vote for Deus Ex despite me being one of the guys who were whining about it.

[Menegrothx]

Deus Ex generated more discussion than the other games, true, but 50% of it was people saying it sucks, and the other 50% was people defending it. That type of discourse is hardly representative of a worthy game for Together Retro.

You wanna know why F-Zero generated almost no discourse? Because no-one disagreed with the suggestion. Seems like a fine addition to the roster to me.

Like I said, I could've easily made points why other nominations I disagree with "suck". I disagree with F-zero, but rather about whining other people's picks, I'd rather make points why the nominations I support are good or explain why I think my pick would be better. Saying something "sucks" with out explaining your opinion is poor unconstructive criticism, not worth anything. So far the negative criticism has been:
you saying in this thread that "you think that Deus Ex sucks", Violent by Design saying that he'd rather play Shock Troopers than Deus Ex and dsenheim saying that when he didn't like the game when he played it for couple of hours (has never completed game). Atleast he made an effort of engaging in some level of actual discourse, but it's mostly just he saying the writing and mechanics were "poor" with out ever explain why they are "poor".
Those are the 3 major ones I remember, I don't remember there being any other vocal critics on the TR 2014 thread (correct me if I'm wrong here).

That same scenario could've easily happened to any game, like Shock Troopers or Ikaruga. One guy says "I think this game sucks", other says that he'd rather play Virtua Tennis than Shock Troopers and third saying that he once played the first 2 stages of Ikaruga and found the mechanics to be poor.

As for Deus Ex's credentials, it's equally or more deserving to be featured on this list as every other a game on this year's list. There are some really well designed games on this year's list (like Ikaruga), and some games where the design really isn't that good (Psychonauts is not that good as a platformer, it's the writing and level design that carries this game). Many people don't really seem to care that much about game design and mostly choose games based on what they personally want to play, but whether you look at it from game design perspective point of view, critical acclaim, impact on the genre&industry or being a perennial fan favorite&cult classic Deus Ex is one of the greatest and most important games in it's genre.

Third best written RPG on RPGfan's top 10 best written RPG
http://www.rpgfan.com/features/Top_10_B ... tten_RPGs/
Number 10 on RPGcodex's top 10 best RPGs of all time
http://www.rpgcodex.net/content.php?id=8869

http://www.complex.com/video-games/2011 ... es/deus-ex
http://listverse.com/2011/05/09/10-best ... deo-games/
Number 2&11 on "best video game stories of all time" ranking. I don't put that much faith on these kind of listing that are made outside of genre forums as less known games aren't often featured and there are some stupid choices at the tops spots as it becomes a popularity contest, as demonstrated by OOT being number 1 here

You don't see as "academic" analysis like this on that many games
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-p09vmFSKU

It won over 40 game of the year awards when it was first released and it has been voted number 1-10/100-200 best game of all time on countless lists and polls.

The game received universal critical and industry acclaim, including being named "Best PC Game of All Time" in PC Gamer's Top 100 PC Games[2] and in a poll carried out by UK gaming magazine PC Zone.[3] It was a frequent candidate for and winner of Game of the Year awards,[4][5][6][7] drawing praise for its pioneering designs in player choice and multiple narrative paths.[8][9

Deus Ex has earned a number of awards and many nominations, including over 40 "Game of the Year" and/or "Best in Class" awards in magazines and websites.[85] This includes awards from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, IGN, GameSpy, PC Gamer, Computer Gaming World, and The Adrenaline Vault, among many others.[6][77][86] Deus Ex was also awarded "Excellence in Game Design" and "Game Innovation Spotlight" at the 2000 Game Developers Choice Awards and won in the "Computer Innovation" and "Computer Action/Adventure" categories at the Interactive Achievement Awards.[7][87][88] It has additionally received many "Best Story" accolades, including first prize in the 2006 Gamasutra "Quantum Leap" awards for storytelling in a video game.[89][90]

Deus Ex has appeared in a number of "Greatest Games of All Time" lists and Hall of Fame features, placing in the top twenty for most, and in the top ten for many. This includes IGN's "100 Greatest Games of All Time" (#40, #21 and #34 in 2003, 2005 and 2007 respectively), "Top 25 Modern PC Games" (#4 in 2010) and "Top 25 PC Games of All Time" (#20 and #21 in 2007 and 2009 respectively) lists;[79][91][92][93][94][95] GameSpy's "Top 50 Games of All Time" (#18 in 2001) and "25 Most Memorable Games of the Past 5 Years" (#15 in 2004) lists;[96][97] GameSpy's "Hall of Fame";[78] PC Gamer's "Top 100 PC Games of All Time" (#2, #2, #1 by staff and #4 by readers in 2007, 2008, 2010 and 2010 respectively) and "50 Best Games of All Time" (#10 and #27 in 2001 and 2005) lists;[80][81][82][83][98][99] PC Zone's "101 Best PC Games Ever" (#1 in 2007) list;[35] Yahoo! UK Video Games' "100 Greatest Computer Games of All Time" (#28) list;[100] Edge's "The 100 Best Videogames" [sic] (#29 in 2007) and "100 Best Games to Play Today" (#57 in 2009) lists;[101][102] and GameFAQs' "Top 100 Games of All Time" (#67 in 2005) list.[103] It was also named the second-best game of the decade by Gamasutra.[76] In 2012, Time named it one of the 100 greatest video games of all time,[104] while G4tv ranked it as the 53rd top game of all time for its "complex and well-crafted story that was really the start of players making choices that genuinely affect the outcome."[105]
References

Face it: you can't use the game itself to argue against Deus Ex. You can argue against it by saying something like "but I dont wanna play it" or "I'd rather play something else", but not by saying it's a bad game or by criticizing it's game design. There are games even in the current Together Retro calendar that are kind of poorly designed (again Psychonauts comes to mind), while Deus Ex is a master piece of "early" 3D game design and one of the best examples of a thought provoking and "thematically deep" story in an action game.
And no, I'm not claiming it's a flawless game, it has many problems (poor graphics even for the time, bad AI, some bad dialogue etc), but so have many other games on our list. And all of the problems of the game are caused by it's ambition (it's a lot easier to design a flawless shmup than a flawless sprawling 3D cyberpunk action rpg in 2000). Even the RPGcodex write up on the game has people saying that it has some wonky gameplay elements etc

Infinitron (RPG Codex News Staff): Legendary FPS/RPG hybrid. Deus Ex's mechanics are rather wonky and the enemies and combat are downright lame, but the game is still a winner because of content, content, content. The huge, non-linear maps are full of things and are incredibly fun to explore, the near-future setting and storyline are easy to become immersed in, and the augmentations and abilities are just fun to play around with, regardless of how ridiculous or unbalanced they are. The game's mission-based structure keeps players focused on achieving short-term goals in diverse settings, and thus prevents gameplay from losing coherency because of the game's mechanical weaknesses. The game also has C&C, but I find its importance overrated. What's sad about Deus Ex is that it may be the least likely game on this list to ever get a sequel that improves on its weaknesses while completely preserving its qualities, due to the technological limitations of consoles and the ballooning development budget of modern first person games.

Trash (Tacticular Cancer Editor-In-Chief): What's there to say about this game that hasn't been said already? That its mechanics kinda suck on their own but come together marvelously? That you can do things in so many ways that it's almost impossible to fathom the developers imagining them all? That your abilities are utterly unbalanced but amazingly fun to play around with? That its near future storyline of bleak dystopianism, inequality, tyrany, post humanism and conspiracy theories remain utterly fascinating even today? That snooping in your co-workers private email is a very enlightening thing to do? Deus Ex is a hallmark of gaming that really is the very definition of being more than the sum of its parts.