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Comments
On a side note, I hate how RPG girls tend to be so wussy. Apparently it's a relic from the days of kabuki.
@GMH: Summon Night: Swordcraft Story and its sequel, both for the Gameboy Advance. The first game was excellent. The second, from what I've played, was a bit less excellent but still fun.
I don't know how any of the other games in the Summon Night series are, or if any of them have female protagonists though.
If you want to get technical, Ocarina of Time allows you to alter the entire timeframe of the game, as does Majora's Mask.
Clearly, the lines are very blurred. Common sense dictates that altering the nature of time is about as sandboxy as it gets, but clearly Zelda games are not sandboxes -- my point was only ever that they contain many common elements, falling closer to that kind of environment than a Metroidvania.
Sandbox is an ill-defined term, anyway, as are most video game genres. As I said above, I believe in defining genres moreso by the experience than the technical details. Zelda games engender a feeling of freedom, open exploration and direct interaction with the environment in a way that doesn't follow the more restrictive, claustrophobic elements of Metroidvanias. They "feel" comparable to games that are more open than they are. Given that games are conduits for experiences, I feel as though that's the major point here.
After all, we can draw a distinction between Dead Island and Resident Evil. Both have zombies and guns, but the latter evokes a more sombre experience (pre REmake dialogue notwithstanding, CHRII-IIIS) that focuses on the player's vulnerability and lack of resources -- ergo, horror. The former gives the player resources in spades and often features environments with plenty of free space, as well as allowing four-player co-op and placing plenty of human NPCs around the place. It doesn't evoke anything like horror, being far too domestic and safe as an experience.
So I don't believe in looking purely at the technical elements of a game and deciding what it is based on those. Most of us consider the Mass Effect games to be RPGs, for instance, despite the fact that they mechanically resemble third-person-shooters. They have very simple levelling mechanics, but I think the major factor is really that you "roleplay" outside of combat alone, being responsible for social interactions and a higher level of decision-making than in most games, which is what characterises what we've come to understand as a WRPG. We have that term for what accompanies that experience moreso than what accompanies those mechanics -- after all, that experience could be achieved with any number of mechanics.
I'd say that this is (sadly) an aspect of media as a whole these days. Mostly of "nerd" media, though.
Or at least, it's either wussy or what we have come to know as "Man with tits" (IE: A female character who behaves like a stereotypical male)
@Abyss_Worm: That is pretty much the woobie archetype.
@DYRE: I've been meaning to check them out anyway. Thanks for the pointer.
@MadassAlex:
> If you want to get technical, Ocarina of Time allows you to alter the entire timeframe of the game, as does Majora's Mask.
Though, sandbox games imply that their nature allows a player to do something significant outside of the game's specified sequence. So unless you get to alter the timeframe in many ways that are totally and completely irrelevant to the plot (and any predesigned sidequests).
> As I said above, I believe in defining genres moreso by the experience than the technical details.
As they currently exist, genre terms actually have several different functions:
* specifying gameplay mechanics (platformer, FPS, point-and-click)
* specifying play experience (horror, adventure, action)
* specifying setting (fantasy, sci-fi, steampunk)
I think that these genre naming conventions should be cleaned up and people should differentiate between what a particular term specifies. In fact, notably, the conflict over the term "RPG" comes in part from whether its used to specify play experience (role-playing) or gameplay mechanics (abstractions).
"@Abyss_Worm: That is pretty much the woobie archetype."
Pah. Being a victim of fate doesn't mean you have to let circumstance dominate you.
In other news, I got to the scene in Skyward Sword after you pass through the Gate of Time. I must say that it actually becomes more profound when Link doesn't talk because then you can fill in the reaction yourself. And Link never got to tell Zelda that Groose said "What's up."
Anyways, two things:
1) I learned how to knit on Thursday. Imma knitting... Well, it will likely be a scarf in name, but in reality probably a, "Holy crap beginners suck" chunk of fabric
2) I. Fucking. Hate. Colds
You can't enter the Zora world until you have bombs. A bunch of massive boulders block your way.
Yeah, you need Zelda's Letter to convince the guard to open the gate for you.
> I thought Zelda was an action-adventure with some puzzle and rpg elements?
Metroidvania is a subgenre of action-adventure.
Puzzles are a very common gameplay device seen in multiple genres.
However, I'm not sure how Zelda has "RPG elements". I know that people say that it does, but I don't know how this is true. What elements does it have that are typically distinctive to RPGs?
In other news, y'know how a lot of people misuse "unique" to mean something that's not necessarily unique but just very characteristic of something and few other things if any? The correct word is "distinctive".
Specifically, Skyward Sword and, I think, Zelda II have RPG elements. I've only played Skyward Sword, but it has the usual crafting method you'll find in RPG's (drops from monsters, and you can upgrade your gear with these drops).
It's an rpg, but in a very loose sense
^^ I haven't played SS or Z2, but randomly-dropping materials does sound kinda RPG-ish.
^ The health and magic bars are not much different from Samus having an energy meter and a missile count. The swords...no equivalent in Metroid, but has equivalents in other action games where different weapons do more damage.
My theory so far has been that people attach the term "RPG" to the Zelda series because it looks like and has an interface like that typically used in an RPG.
I feel like I'm fundamentally separated myself, on a philosophical basis, from everyone else on this board, with no hope of reconciliation.
Has anyone else ever felt like that?
I really liked it. I might be biased, considering that David Fincher is pretty much my favorite director, but the remake is probably my favorite of the three versions of the story.
^^ Why do you feel that way?
I can't compare it to the original versions, but I still felt somewhat...ambiguous about that movie. It's not bad, but it's not really good, either.
Fair enough. Then again, maybe I'm expecting too much out of 21th century Fincher.
How so? Depending on the answer, probably.
Anyhow, I cube drafted today with some friends, and Boros Deck Winned each match ^^
@DonZabu: I think you might be exaggerating, really. Although I have felt like that at times. Hell, I still do, sometimes.
Boros is the second best guild. Izzet's the first~
Like the things that piss me off aren't the things that piss anyone else off, and the details of each reflect systemic differences.
If it helps, lately I've been sharing a few of the annoyances you've posted about (not that I remember the details).
Hhmm, soldiers of order with fiery angels and Lightning Helix, or magical scholars doing crazy experiments and Electrolize. Can't choose.
Let me try and illustrate this with an example:
Way back on the old IJBM on TV Tropes, I made a thread complaining about people abusing the term "realistic" in terms of video game graphics and mechanics.
Even back then, I thought this was a cliched complaint (or at least less esoteric than my usual ones), and I felt kind of awful and compromised for making it, but it was one of the few times anybody's ever agreed with me when I expressed an opinion, or at least the first time they made their agreement public. And from then on, whenever I made a complaint of similar faculty, I'd know beforehand that people were going to agree with it, and sure enough, they would, most of the time.
I hope I didn't insult anybody there, or sound too narcissistic.
So, what you're saying is that you feel that there is a dissonance between the way you see the world and the topics you're interested in, and most of the IJBMers, if not all and that the few times you have presented a similar view to us (For a loose def. of us, anyway) you've felt retroactively regretful about them
Pretty much. Though "most of the IJBMers" can also include large swaths of the rest of the Internet for good measure.
Point taken. The thing is, I've found that most of the internet hardly syncs up with my views. I come for the discussion and so I can learn to express my views clearer.
> get new PC for Christmas, brother handles it; don't get anything that can interface with the internet
> get ME3 from brother for birthday; has hardcore DRM and requires online activation
He means well, of course.