Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
If you have an email ending in @hotmail.com, @live.com or @outlook.com (or any other Microsoft-related domain), please consider changing it to another email provider; Microsoft decided to instantly block the server's IP, so emails can't be sent to these addresses.
If you use an @yahoo.com email or any related Yahoo services, they have blocked us also due to "user complaints"
-UE
If you use an @yahoo.com email or any related Yahoo services, they have blocked us also due to "user complaints"
-UE
Comments
Yes, but the terms currently used for videogame genres are just interfaces. Like I said earlier, it's like saying "black and white" is a genre of film.
@INUH:
So basically, you consider Portal an FPS even though most people probably don't, and then you consider FPS a stupid genre because it doesn't make sense to consider Portal one? What?Also, I can't think of any genre other than FPS / 3PS that can at all be considered to be defined solely by the interface.
Err, no. What he said was that the current classification system allows for Portal and Call of Duty to be in the same category and that that system of classification is stupid, as those two games simply don't have much in common besides of superficial similarities.
2D side scrollers come to mind.
Pretty much what Juan said. I consider FPS a stupid genre because some games that fit the definition are obviously not in the genre.
Not if you're doing a pacifist run. :P
Fuck this shit, let's stop calling them FPS so you guys can have Portal freed of the taint of Halo. Let's call it: DOOM CLONES!
Where did you get this? I mean, there are a lot of games I love that use the FPS mechanic, like Half Life, Left 4 Dead, Bioshock, etc. But I don't play them for any of the reasons why I play Portal. They're just not very similar games, aside from camera perspective and having a thing that shoots stuff. The only person who mentioned Halo or FPS being bad is you.
@Juan:
Does anyone really think platformers, beat-'em-ups, and side-scrolling shooters are the same genre?@INUH:
I guess I can see where you're coming from, but maybe the problem is what you see as the definition of FPS? From the name it might seem to mean anything with a first-person perspective and shooting, but I think there are other elements to the genre. "Combat in which you make people die by shooting them" is a fairly uncontroversial one from where I'm standing.Evidently not according to vandro and eelektross
I'd be right with you, except that TPS gets a different genre label, which to me is an indicator that somewhere the terminology went horribly wrong.
And don't even get me started on RPGs.
The names descriptive capabilities are rather irrelevant, simply because even if Noir was called "private detective flicks" and FPSs were called "Brown" or "Maroon", the fact is that Noir has a set of variable characteristics that are easily recognizable and variable whereas FPSs just has two big broad characteristics that cover a lot of games which share nothing but superficial similarities.
I mean, let's list three very different Noir movies:
*The Maltese Falcon
*L.A Confidential
*Touch of Evil
Similarities: All three star detectives that fall under the Private Detective archetype etablished by characters like Sam Spade and Phillip Marlowe (Hell, one of these has the Sam Spade). All three involve crimes that the police is unable to solve for whatever reason (Or alternatively, the police is involved in the crimes, which doesn't allow for a proper police investigation), all three movies feature the femme fatale and "unreachable criminals" archetypes as well.
In contrast:
*Call of Duty
*Portal
*Bioshock
Similarities: *In the three stories your character is mute (Unless I misremeber Call of Duty, anyway)
*You use guns to solve your problems (Although you can easily argue that the Portal gun is a misnomer, really)
...and that's seriously all I can think of. Maybe linearity? But I don't think that linearity is a feature that makes or breaks a game into a genre, except for maybe sandboxes.
See, here's the deal. You're doing this thing where you're misrepresenting our arguments just to make us look as if we somehow are idiots for holding a position different than your own rather than presenting an argument. As you may notice, this may be or may be not both annoying and hardly a winning strategy.
@INUH:
First-person and third-person action games play differently; I agree that the two probably don't need to be considered separate genres but the distinction is relevant.
RPG I can admit has problems as an actual genre description, since all it actually means is that the game has elements lifted from tabletop.I play them all for the sake of a first person narrative. Except Left for Dead, which I play for co-op narrative. It makes no difference with Portal in that regard.
Expected element isn't equal to necessary element. That's my point.
It is definitely mechanically relevant. And that's my point; videogame genre distinctions tend to focus too much on mechanics rather than, say, why you play the game.
That is definitely a thing in common between the games, but first-person perspective is not a genre.
Tell me of an FPS game that isn't Portal or Portal two where you don't shoot things, then.
I mean, FPSs have been on this earth for more than ten years. Surely someone besides Valve has explored this obvious design space.
Mirror's Edge. It has guns but they are not necessarily used to shoot to traverse the enviroment. And it is a DICE game.
I rest my case.
I mean, seriously, Mirror's Edge and Halo play ridiculously differently (If LPs and gameplay vids are anything to go by) but they are put in the same category because they decide to use the same perspective. It's ridiculous. It's like calling any story with first person narration a noir story (Again with the noir comparisons)
It is completely possible to beat the game without shooting anything.
It isn't a genre, it's the reason I play Bioshock, Half-Life, Portal, Call of Duty 4, etc. Misread.
Isn't Portal seen as a puzzle game not a shooter?
I thought so until everyone here told me otherwise.
Mirror's Edge has guns because police officers shoot at you, and you can disarm them, you don't have guns of your own and you can't even reload them.
See the edit.
Yes, because it's silly to categorize it in the same genre as Bioshock because of the camera angle.
Well, but my point is that you still use guns, even if you can avoid using them. It's still a valid gameplay option, which is what I'm getting at, that FPSs by default use guns and use them to shoot things. In fact, Portal's the only "FPS" (And again, it's most definetly a misnomer) that has been discussed so far where you don't even use a gun or shoot with firearms or bows at your enemies.
All I'm asking is, that if FPSs don't have to involve shooting things, then why haven't there been more FPSs where you don't shoot things, even as a choice?
This actually ties into the larger point that unless a game is a puzzle or simulation of some sort, it's almost always about combat. The thing is, combat is really really easy to represent.
Because Mirror's Edge tanked and we haven't gotten to the point where someone made a Portal Ripoff.
How the fuck did I miss two pages of discussion?
But again, Mirror's Edge barely counts. Just because you can do a pacifist run in a game, it doesn't stop it from being a game where lethal violence happens. It's just an available option, nothing more, nothing else. And it's not like a pacifist run here is the default or anything. (I could be wrong about that, thought)
As for the Portal ripoff, you might see the issue with a game following on a another game's trend not really being a mark of originality and exploration of unexplored design space.