An hour and 15 minutes left in the day 5 podcast and I'm dying here.
"Destiny should be in the top 10, because if you removed all the bad parts and added a bunch of good parts, it would be great! And this is why we need to cut several games that are great as they are."
Why was Jeff such a jerk about the Best Debut rules last year and so lax about them this year? It seems like such bullshit that they wouldn't even consider The Stanley Parable because it was a Portal/Half-Life mod at one point, and then this year hand the same award to a game based on Lord of the Rings.
An hour and 15 minutes left in the day 5 podcast and I'm dying here.
"Destiny should be in the top 10, because if you removed all the bad parts and added a bunch of good parts, it would be great! And this is why we need to cut several games that are great as they are."
Why was Jeff such a jerk about the Best Debut rules last year and so lax about them this year? It seems like such bullshit that they wouldn't even consider The Stanley Parable because it was a Portal/Half-Life mod at one point, and then this year hand the same award to a game based on Lord of the Rings.
Yeah, that whole thing was weird. Very odd rules that Jeff decided to enforce.
I cannot believe Destiny made it into the top 10. Everyone but Brad and Jeff needed to stick it to him. Dan tried, he just didn't follow through with enough specifics as to the lack of encounter design.
Brad was brilliant to basically put off the Destiny discussion until everyone else had gotten their favorite underdog games onto the list. At which point it becomes relatively easy to say "I didn't object to your pet favorite, so why are you giving me such a hard time?" Compromise wins out.
I don't think there is any way that Brad can top the Destiny coup in years to come. It's one thing to weasel an unlikely personal favorite onto the list when nobody else played it or cares about it (Divekick, DOTA2). But to weasel a personal favorite onto the list when everyone else actively dislikes it is another ordeal entirely.
Man, Shadow of Mordor is really overrated. I really liked the time i spent with it. But it just doesnt have enough to warrant it getting so much praise and GOTYs.
Also yeah that Destiny stuff was weak as hell. Can't believe it still got on with everyone dogging it.
Brad was brilliant to basically put off the Destiny discussion until everyone else had gotten their favorite underdog games onto the list. At which point it becomes relatively easy to say "I didn't object to your pet favorite, so why are you giving me such a hard time?" Compromise wins out.
I don't think there is any way that Brad can top the Destiny coup in years to come. It's one thing to weasel an unlikely personal favorite onto the list when nobody else played it or cares about it (Divekick, DOTA2). But to weasel a personal favorite onto the list when everyone else actively dislikes it is another ordeal entirely.
People gave Brad a lot of shit for pulling something so insidious but dammit he played that shit beautifully, it was like a Dan fibbage move. Also honestly i don't why everyone blames Brad for destiny in the top 10 when there were like five other people in the room, the rest of the crew could have said no to that but they didn't.
Also honestly i don't why everyone blames Brad for destiny in the top 10 when there were like five other people in the room, the rest of the crew could have said no to that but they didn't.
Haha, they tried. And then they tried again from a few different angles, and then they tried some more. They broke it down to its features and found almost every last aspect of the game wanting, with Brad agreeing with almost all of those takes. But he was dug in deep and would not be moved.
Its just a GOTY list after all, and not worth making people truly upset, and so Destiny got in so as not to marginalize Brad or piss him off. That's fine by me as I think each of the crew should get one pick, but damn was the Destiny section of the deliberations hard to listen to. Adding the game because it was the most fun Brad had all year is great - its the failed attempts to rationalize the pick along every other doomed line of argument that made it winceworthy.
People gave Brad a lot of shit for pulling something so insidious but dammit he played that shit beautifully, it was like a Dan fibbage move. Also honestly i don't why everyone blames Brad for destiny in the top 10 when there were like five other people in the room, the rest of the crew could have said no to that but they didn't.
Because he almost started to cry at the end but yeah I expected Drew to fight for Wolfenstein vs Destiny because it is his #1 game but I guess he didn't want the podcast to go on for another 4 hours.
People gave Brad a lot of shit for pulling something so insidious but dammit he played that shit beautifully, it was like a Dan fibbage move. Also honestly i don't why everyone blames Brad for destiny in the top 10 when there were like five other people in the room, the rest of the crew could have said no to that but they didn't.
There was not much point in fighting him because everyone else already had their favorite games on the list. Which is why it was smart to delay the Destiny talk until almost everyone had gotten what they wanted. If they thought Mario Kart or Jazzpunk was going to get kicked off the list in favor of Destiny there definitely would have been a fight.
Patrick might have fought harder for Divinity but he was ten minutes away from quitting so he probably would have felt weird shoehorning something into the Top 10 for a site he doesn't work for anymore. Why Drew didn't fight more for Wolfenstein I'm not sure. I guess he also liked Destiny and saw it as an underdog.
There's also the fact that they don't take these lists as deadly seriously as the people that read them.
Not that I was expecting it to be on the top ten, but hearing Jeff say Forza Horizon 2 was passionless made me sad. I think it's one of the most polished and enjoyable experiences I've had in a while.
Why was Jeff such a jerk about the Best Debut rules last year and so lax about them this year? It seems like such bullshit that they wouldn't even consider The Stanley Parable because it was a Portal/Half-Life mod at one point, and then this year hand the same award to a game based on Lord of the Rings.
I recognize that the situation of each game is different. It just seems like it's really not in the spirit of the award to throw out a game just because it had free betas and prototypes, and then allow in a game that exploits a hugely successful multi-billion dollar IP.
My memory is also that Jeff shot down Stanley Parable in every other category with the same reasoning that it is not a 2013 game.
I recognize that the situation of each game is different. It just seems like it's really not in the spirit of the award to throw out a game just because it had free betas and prototypes, and then allow in a game that exploits a hugely successful multi-billion dollar IP.
My memory is also that Jeff shot down Stanley Parable in every other category with the same reasoning that it is not a 2013 game.
Situations like that could be one of the reasons they added a early access category so all the betas etc can go their and games won't be eligible for the other awards until the final version is released so Gang Beasts will be a 2015 game if the final version is released this year even though gb have played it for ages.
Was worth listening to these clowns if only because it got me to play The Fall. Also it makes me laugh at people who cry about spoilers. Did not impact my enjoyment at all of that simply incredible game.
People gave Brad a lot of shit for pulling something so insidious but dammit he played that shit beautifully, it was like a Dan fibbage move. Also honestly i don't why everyone blames Brad for destiny in the top 10 when there were like five other people in the room, the rest of the crew could have said no to that but they didn't.
Because he had already decided that Destiny would be on there one way or another. Everyone realized this, including Alex who was fighting the good fight. Even Jeff said it shouldn't be on but Brad had to have his favorite game on there.
This year's GOTY discussion opened my eyes to what's wrong with GB's lists: They're a collection of people's personal favorites instead of a site wide recommendation of the 10 best games. It should be what everyone agrees are the top 10. Not Jeff likes this game a lot so it's on there and Alex like this game a lot so it's on as well, etc. There's a reason why there is personal lists.
On a side note: Jazz punk should not have been on that list either since Alex was the only one championing it. If things went a little bit differently I imagine we'd all be talking about how Alex wouldn't give up on his game.
I think this is the last year I listen to these. It just gets me frustrated and I rather just have a good time watching the recap videos.
To rescue both Chico and Paz is because he's afraid they'll reveal secrets behind his MSF, and Paz because she can be used as a bargaining chip against Cipher. To Snake, she's simply a pawn to be used at this point in the story.
Yes, it's fucked up that they have no real value to Snake, but after all Big Boss ends up being the bad guy by the end of this. They're not props because they're already grounded characters in the universe-Paz was a double agent who grew some feelings for the people she was watching over, however she still has ties to Cipher. Chico is simply an idiot kid in love who thinks he can rescue her, and he needs to be rescued because he might reveal information of the inner workings. We don't know what's up with Chico after he gets rescued, none of the trailers have hinted at him, but what we do know is that multiple people get tortured by Kaz and Ocelot after the incident. And it's sick. I feel the torture scenes will get some criticism because from what we've seen, they're disgusting. But these aren't just props they're torturing, but characters that are already grounded and have their own personalities. To say they're throwaway props is an insult to the characters themselves.
As for your second part, GZ is very well a demo/preview. If we treat it as being in its own vacuum, then all the characters are shallow, hollow representations that are all horribly written. But we aren't. It bridges Peace Walker with Phantom Pain. We have to treat them as 3 parts of a whole, since they all take place relatively close(With Phantom Pain doing the time leap into...9 years? into the future.)
Tl;dr- It's fine if you think it's gross what happened to Paz, but when you try to use that as a criticism whilst calling it 'bad writing' and you can't explain why...then that's not criticism.
If you don't justify these characters within the game's story, why should the player care? Having to go seek out optional audio tapes to even remotely give a shit about anyone in the game is ridiculous. The player has no obligation of treating Peacewalker, Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain as a whole when they're sold individually, and in Ground Zeroes case, at an absurd price. They're just props no matter how much you want to defend the writing and what happens at the end is pretty stupid and gross for even Metal Gear. If anyone is insulting the characters, it is Kojima, not the player. He's the one who feel it's not necessary to learn anything about them.
GB fans will be salty about this for years, going by reactions here. And it's the number 10 game on a top 10 list. Some people are reacting to Destiny like Bungie killed their whole family.
If you don't justify these characters within the game's story, why should the player care? Having to go seek out optional audio tapes to even remotely give a shit about anyone in the game is ridiculous. The player has no obligation of treating Peacewalker, Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain as a whole when they're sold individually, and in Ground Zeroes case, at an absurd price. They're just props no matter how much you want to defend the writing and what happens at the end is pretty stupid and gross for even Metal Gear. If anyone is insulting the characters, it is Kojima, not the player. He's the one who feel it's not necessary to learn anything about them.
Still find it hilarious that bayonetta ended up number 2 with like zero passionate speeches or anything. Just kind of snuck in there and planted it's flag.
Still find it hilarious that bayonetta ended up number 2 with like zero passionate speeches or anything. Just kind of snuck in there and planted it's flag.
At the end of the day, I think it was a pretty massive error to have the game connect so tightly to Peace Walker. Hopefully Phantom Pain will have a way to bring players up to speed that isn't just a cut-n-pasted Wikipedia style text dump, because that felt sloppy as hell in Ground Zeroes.
An hour and 15 minutes left in the day 5 podcast and I'm dying here.
"Destiny should be in the top 10, because if you removed all the bad parts and added a bunch of good parts, it would be great! And this is why we need to cut several games that are great as they are."
Nah, there's plenty of whining about the game being on the list at all because the game is SO BAD!!! And people should be used to Brad being Brad in the GOTY deliberations. It's a dumb thing they do every year to show how arbitrary these lists really are. It's such a small thing, and yet here we are with about 40 pages of people whining about it. And what did Brad do? Have some bad arguments and was loud to get a game he loves, despite its flaws, into tenth place on their list? Big fucking deal, come on now.
And I have to have this avatar for 3 months because Brad managed to get Destiny into the top 10!
If you don't justify these characters within the game's story, why should the player care? Having to go seek out optional audio tapes to even remotely give a shit about anyone in the game is ridiculous. The player has no obligation of treating Peacewalker, Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain as a whole when they're sold individually, and in Ground Zeroes case, at an absurd price. They're just props no matter how much you want to defend the writing and what happens at the end is pretty stupid and gross for even Metal Gear. If anyone is insulting the characters, it is Kojima, not the player. He's the one who feel it's not necessary to learn anything about them.
If Kojima felt it wasn't necessary to learn about the characters, he wouldn't have put in any of the audio logs from Paz. That's where you're wrong.
Sure, you can say 'Well the player has no obligation to play any other MGS', but that doesn't mean your criticism is valid. Again, if you treat it in a vacuum, sure you have a point. But it's a series. I'm not going to hop into Uncharted 3 and go 'Oh wow these characters suck, who cares about them, what are they even talking about, who the hell is this dumb guy?'.
You have to treat it as a series. Because that's what it is. According to Konami, the complete MGSV experience is Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain. You also have to mind the fact that in order to get the MOST out of Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain, you have to have played the series or have an understanding to what has happened. And don't say 'Well I don't have time for that.' Bullshit, you've had 17 years to start the series. If you're jumping in now, yeah it's going to be confusing, and the story will only be a piecemeal to the whole course. Many people will and have gone 'Maybe I'll play the other games to understand the motivations of these characters.' But then there's people who think 'No, they didn't explain every facet for every motivation for each character in this 1 hour preview, Ground Zeroes, therefore the writing is bad and it's on Kojima for not adding everything that's characterized the character into this preview.'
It's like I said before with the book analogy- it's like if you jump into Dances with Dragons from the Song of Ice and Fire series and saying 'Wow look at all these prop characters, what are their motivations? What bad writing.'
In Phantom Pain, Big Boss will have motivations that aren't explained in that game. There will be call backs to The Boss, and you would have to play Peace Walker/MGS3 to get the full experience. You just can't go 'Wow this is bad writing', you have to realize that telling this story-The story of Big Boss, Snake, Les Enfant Terrible, Outer Heaven, the Patriots, has been a 17 year endeavor. You just can't hop in and go 'Wow chapter 70 is bad writing, I mean I haven't read the rest of it, but where are the motivations, why all the prop characters?'.
This is the one thing that pisses me off. Welcome to MGS, read up.
If Kojima felt it wasn't necessary to learn about the characters, he wouldn't have put in any of the audio logs from Paz. That's where you're wrong.
Sure, you can say 'Well the player has no obligation to play any other MGS', but that doesn't mean your criticism is valid. Again, if you treat it in a vacuum, sure you have a point. But it's a series. I'm not going to hop into Uncharted 3 and go 'Oh wow these characters suck, who cares about them, what are they even talking about, who the hell is this dumb guy?'.
You have to treat it as a series. Because that's what it is. According to Konami, the complete MGSV experience is Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain. You also have to mind the fact that in order to get the MOST out of Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain, you have to have played the series or have an understanding to what has happened. And don't say 'Well I don't have time for that.' Bullshit, you've had 17 years to start the series. If you're jumping in now, yeah it's going to be confusing, and the story will only be a piecemeal to the whole course. Many people will and have gone 'Maybe I'll play the other games to understand the motivations of these characters.' But then there's people who think 'No, they didn't explain every facet for every motivation for each character in this 1 hour preview, Ground Zeroes, therefore the writing is bad and it's on Kojima for not adding everything that's characterized the character into this preview.'
It's like I said before with the book analogy- it's like if you jump into Dances with Dragons from the Song of Ice and Fire series and saying 'Wow look at all these prop characters, what are their motivations? What bad writing.'
In Phantom Pain, Big Boss will have motivations that aren't explained in that game. There will be call backs to The Boss, and you would have to play Peace Walker/MGS3 to get the full experience. You just can't go 'Wow this is bad writing', you have to realize that telling this story-The story of Big Boss, Snake, Les Enfant Terrible, Outer Heaven, the Patriots, has been a 17 year endeavor. You just can't hop in and go 'Wow chapter 70 is bad writing, I mean I haven't read the rest of it, but where are the motivations, why all the prop characters?'.
This is the one thing that pisses me off. Welcome to MGS, read up.
But the fact that he made it optional is what makes it not necessary. A smarter choice would be to pepper information and dialogue about Chico and Paz throughout the mission. But that doesn't happen. It's all fucking Miller talking all the damn time about who knows what. You don't actually need to play Uncharted 1 or 2 to understand 3. Because they are all self contained stories with pulp characters who don't have well defined backstories. They establish relationships between characters through interaction and dialogue. Something that Ground Zeroes lacks.
These games do exist independently. It is absolutely right that the player doesn't need to play any other MGS, or at least should not have to play past games. The story should be able to stand on its own. My first Metal Gear game was MGS2. I didn't need to play MGS1 to understand the characters and story in that game, but MGS2 is also deeply connected with MGS1 and MGS1 is referenced throughout the game in every way. Having played MGS1, it helps in adding to the experience enormously but it is not absolutely necessary. MGS3 is even more sel contained. You get enough content and context through dialogue between the characters that ISN'T optional that tells you the information you need. Ground Zeroes is not like that though. It completely depends on Peace Walker and you giving a shit about anyone in that game. You have an intro cutscene, Miller talking about stuff, an audio tape of Chico, Paz saying delirious lines, and the conclusion. There's not enough there.
That's the thing, I don't have to treat it as a series. There's nothing that's going to make me or force me to. Because that's not what this is. This is one game that they decided sell like this. It is absolutely on Kojima, the writer and director, to fucking make the player care about these characters.
The Dance with Dragons comparison is absurd. You get POVs of multiple characters colouring the world as well as GRRM's descriptions telling you practically everything. Kojima wishes he was as good a writer as GRRM.
The only standout part of Destiny is the shooting mechanics which are a carbon copy of halo ce(2001). I'd bet that the code was simply reused for that part of the game.
Nothing else in that game is good. Calling it a top 10 game is laughable.
The Dance with Dragons comparison is absurd. You get POVs of multiple characters colouring the world as well as GRRM's descriptions telling you practically everything. Kojima wishes he was as good a writer as GRRM.
Then that's a bad way to look at it(I deleted the rest of the block because..it's a block.) If you treat each game in a vacuum, then your criticism of the story or how the characters are treated in this one instance are invalid. Simple as that.
As for your last part..tell me, what's the motivation of Dani just reading Dances of Dragons? How did she get where she is? Dances with Dragons is not a standalone book. You cannot just pick that up and expect to know every single characters motivations and how they've grown up. Especially those you don't get a point of view of.
And that is your problem that you choose to view it that way. Not Kojima; He provided materials for some background. Did you want mandatory radio calls that take 45 minutes before you even start playing the game? Hmm? Because it sounds like you do. It sounds like unless they force feed it to you, then you won't pay attention.
It's a series. You can say 'Well I choose to play each game in a vacuum and critique it that way' all you want, but your critique will be invalid. Because in the end, you just can't hop in and say 'Boy that story made no sense and I didn't know half the things they were talking about.' Again, you just can't jump into Star Wars Ep. 6 and complain about not knowing the motivations of the characters.
true. but those releases were recent stuff. i remember quite a few people were pissed each time a 'mainline' kh game is announced for the opposite handheld as the one that the previous game was announced.
I was really disappointed with the bomb crews to allow Brad to get what he wanted. Vinny pointed out probably the most obvious flaw of Destiny; if a game requires you to invest 10-15 hrs to see the best part of it, then it can't be considered a good game. Nobody in the bomb crew emphasized this fact at all. In stead, they kept silent and let Brad babbling about how much time he put into Destiny. So what? Just because he played this game a lot doesn't mean it's a good game. I played Fruit Ninja a lot more than I played The Last of Us so Fruit Ninja should be considered a better game? Hell the fuck no.
The only standout part of Destiny is the shooting mechanics which are a carbon copy of halo ce(2001). I'd bet that the code was simply reused for that part of the game.
Nothing else in that game is good. Calling it a top 10 game is laughable.
But it's the 10th game on a top 10 list, so who cares?
Nah, there's plenty of whining about the game being on the list at all because the game is SO BAD!!! And people should be used to Brad being Brad in the GOTY deliberations. It's a dumb thing they do every year to show how arbitrary these lists really are. It's such a small thing, and yet here we are with about 40 pages of people whining about it. And what did Brad do? Have some bad arguments and was loud to get a game he loves, despite its flaws, into tenth place on their list? Big fucking deal, come on now.
And I have to have this avatar for 3 months because Brad managed to get Destiny into the top 10!
But my point is that it's absurd how angry some people have gotten over a decent game (not great, but decent) getting into 10th place of the GB top 10 list. Sure you can say that Brad pretty much bruteforced it into the list, but what it comes down to is that it's the 10th game on their top 10 list. Brad didn't insult anyone, and talking shit about other games to get the game you care about into the list is the nature of the beast, always has and always will with these podcasts.
Yeah, even if Destiny had more content they'd still have t fix the awful missions structure. Shit was way too grindy as well. More content wouldn't necessarily make it better.
Then that's a bad way to look at it(I deleted the rest of the block because..it's a block.) If you treat each game in a vacuum, then your criticism of the story or how the characters are treated in this one instance are invalid. Simple as that.
As for your last part..tell me, what's the motivation of Dani just reading Dances of Dragons? How did she get where she is? Dances with Dragons is not a standalone book. You cannot just pick that up and expect to know every single characters motivations and how they've grown up. Especially those you don't get a point of view of.
And that is your problem that you choose to view it that way. Not Kojima; He provided materials for some background. Did you want mandatory radio calls that take 45 minutes before you even start playing the game? Hmm? Because it sounds like you do. It sounds like unless they force feed it to you, then you won't pay attention.
It's a series. You can say 'Well I choose to play each game in a vacuum and critique it that way' all you want, but your critique will be invalid. Because in the end, you just can't hop in and say 'Boy that story made no sense and I didn't know half the things they were talking about.' Again, you just can't jump into Star Wars Ep. 6 and complain about not knowing the motivations of the characters.
Nope, it's absolutely valid. If you release a game individually, then it's going to be judged individually. Anything on top of that judgment, knowledge of the past of the series is additional.
As for Dany's motivation, trying to become a better ruler by maintaining order in the kingdoms she's conquered so she's deserving of being Queen of Westeros. Dance is part of a series yes, but you do get the gist and understanding of the characters and past events are referenced and mentioned constantly. I don't know why you're acting like this doesn't happen.
He provided a list of audio tapes to listen to on my own time instead of writing a damn story to fit that information in. Pretending like this isn't bad writing is silly. Radio calls? How about cutscenes? Dialogue between characters as you're playing instead of Miller just talking? At least then I would know the writer actually thinks this stuff matters. And who knows, maybe it would help to make an half hour game longer.
Nope, it's one game. You choose to have this one game piggy back off others in order to prop up everything in its "narrative". In Star Wars Episode 6, everyone's motivation and relationships are established within the movie. Because the writers decided to have the characters interact with each others, reference past events, and y'know, have dialogue.
But it's the 10th game on a top 10 list, so who cares?
Nah, there's plenty of whining about the game being on the list at all because the game is SO BAD!!! And people should be used to Brad being Brad in the GOTY deliberations. It's a dumb thing they do every year to show how arbitrary these lists really are. It's such a small thing, and yet here we are with about 40 pages of people whining about it. And what did Brad do? Have some bad arguments and was loud to get a game he loves, despite its flaws, into tenth place on their list? Big fucking deal, come on now.
And I have to have this avatar for 3 months because Brad managed to get Destiny into the top 10!
If they spend hours discussing the matter, then it's apparently not just "a dumb thing they do." If you listen to all the entirety of their discussions, then proceed to post about it on a message board, you can't convincingly say it's so meaningless as to be safe from criticism.
Nope, it's absolutely valid. If you release a game individually, then it's going to be judged individually. Anything on top of that judgment, knowledge of the past of the series is additional.
As for Dany's motivation, trying to become a better ruler by maintaining order in the kingdoms she's conquered so she's deserving of being Queen of Westeros. Dance is part of a series yes, but you do get the gist and understanding of the characters and past events are referenced and mentioned constantly. I don't know why you're acting like this doesn't happen.
He provided a list of audio tapes to listen to on my own time instead of writing a damn story to fit that information in. Pretending like this isn't bad writing is silly. Radio calls? How about cutscenes? Dialogue between characters as you're playing instead of Miller just talking? At least then I would know the writer actually thinks this stuff matters. And who knows, maybe it would help to make an half hour game longer.
Nope, it's one game. You choose to have this one game piggy back off others in order to prop up everything in its "narrative". In Star Wars Episode 6, everyone's motivation and relationships are established within the movie. Because the writers decided to have the characters interact with each others, reference past events, and y'know, have dialogue.
Then you must hate sequels and any sort of series?
As for Dany, her motivations of wanting to make a better kingdom aren't explained in Dancing for Dragons. Considering her brother and Drogo are a huge part of how she has a perspective shift, you need to read the previous books WITH those characters in order to understand her motivations.
So yes, it sounds like it's your problem. I mean, you must hate Dark Souls for having no story force fed to you, right?
Oh, and you don't know the complete motivations for all the characters in Star Wars ep. 6. Why the hell is Han Solo doing anything for anyone? Watch the previous movies.
So in the end, it's your problem. Simple as that. I mean, it's not Kojimas fault you have the attention span of a 3 year old, is it now? It's not my fault you choose to not listen to all the tapes, it's your fault.
