"Consoles are not responsible for the decline of the shooter"

[GrainWetski]

Thumb sticks have finesse for action games, fighting games and platformers.

Nobody that didn't play fifty thousand hours of Smash uses the analog stick to play a fighting game. It's a 4-way switch system at the root.

Not to mention platformers.. They're good for action games(mostly the ones with locked cameras), sports games and racing games. Everything else D-pad or mouse+keyboard is far superior.

 

[Average Manatee]

You've got small hands.

You can stretch but its far from a comfortable resting position. And if you do stretch then you literally can't hit Q/A/Z well while moving, making those keys useless which defeats the purpose of moving to ESDF to begin with.

 

[Ash]

All those things are absolutely horrid, especially the level design which makes or breaks a game, and you never even noted the two weapon limits nor regen health. Halo was shit for what it was. It and the "realistic" military shooter boom of the early 2000s, and other sellout PC devs of the 2000s looking to make big bucks, along with M$' takeover of the console market is what killed the shooter and the industry at large, both PC and console. It's as if PC devs together with M$ conspired to make it happen, even, given the simultaneous rapid chain of events from them. American Capitalist pigs weren't going to let the Japanese have the bigger market. But that's just tinfoil pondering of the unknown.
I was happy when they were separate markets, both with a lot to give.

Try noting Halo's merits instead, because as far as the singleplayer experience goes I've got nothing.

 

[Mozg]

I played it MP with buddies. Useful hotkey melee and hotkey grenades with good physics were notably good, but they may have come from earlier FPS (I pretty much stopped playing PC FPS after Doom/Duke Nukem until Half-Life 2).

 

[Ash]

"Useful hotkey melee and hotkey grenades"

Melee on demand/hotkey melee had been done before (e.g Kick from Duke Nukem as one example. It was weak as shit but there were other games too). Nothing on grenades is coming to mind right now, at least not in an FPS.

Edit: Alien Trilogy (1995) had grenades on demand.

 

[Neki]

The problem is that every game nowadays is that gonna be a crossover by default, and that take out the oportunity of make unique games that only woud 'work' for that plataform, i woud never play jet set radio, mario kart, fifa or burnout 3 on kb+m as i would never play Icewind dale, CIV, Machine:contraptions or Unreal tournment on a joystick.

Consoles should stick to make good console games(Plataformers,JRPGs,Non-realistic Racing,Flying games and Simple but fun games that you can sink hours in it without even notice. )
PCs should stick to make PC games(Tatical FPS, Isometric games,Strategy,CRPGs,Realistic,racing and flying games,Complex and fun games that you can sink hours in it without even notice.)

Of course some games can be fun on both plataforms, but when they started making games to please both crowds they created a new crowd: The gaymerz, they dont know what is a good pc game nor a good console game, that is why we get shit like skyrim, god of war, etc.

 

[Ash]

Nah, consoles can do complex and PCs can do simple. they just need to drop the shitty mass market design and make games that are actually good by our standards, standards they set themselves a long time ago, but that ain't going to happen. I don't like most modern PC games nor modern console, simply because 90% of the time the design is shit. Utterly commercialized. Assassins Creed, Gears of War and utterly banal shit like that isn't what old school console gaming was about, just as Skyrim and Duke Nukem: Forever isn't what old school PC gaming was about. It's all gone to shit and what's worse is the mobile gaming market appears to be putting console and PC to shame with it's raking in of the Jew Gold.

If you're old school you're irrelevant at this stage, and what we know as good game design is a lost art. The new generation of game devs will set in, where all they know is decline.

 

[DeepOcean]

The consoles had a terrible effect on gamming as soon as Microsoft invented the XBOX, before, the consoles were their own ecosystem that could live along side with the PC. There were the console guys and the PC guys and they could live fine. As soon as Microsoft entered, it had an worse effect to gamming than Gengis Khan. On a single stroke, Microsoft destroyed most what was good on both the PC and the consoles, what came later was a completely different gaming industry, the monster we know. So yeah, the consoles indeed brought the decline but more because of a massive shift on strategy of the companies involved than on just an input method (Remember, people that are easily impressed with cheap spectacle aren't exactly demanding of high level gameplay and a keyboard would be useless to them despite the advantages). There isn't anything stopping companies making PC exclusive shooters AND their console cinematic shooters, the reason this doesn't happen has more to do with a question of cash than design.

Just look to Steam and see the amount of walking simulators and the praise they get. Do you think this industry care about gameplay? How many people on forums did you met that could discuss gameplay with you on a decent way?

 

[sullynathan]

nah, PC gamers became Graphics whores. Why is Crysis so praised yet so mediocre? Graphics wowed everyone and someone pointed this out earlier.

 

[Ash]

Look: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_PC_games

Early decline of the shooter.

Half-Life
Far Cry
Counterstrike
Doom 3
Battlefield
Crysis
Bioshock

All PC exclusive (some later ported to consoles, which has no influence on the original version) except Bioshock which is utter garbage, I was just annoyed to see it in the list of top selling PC games as someone whose second favorite game of all time is System Shock 2.

The shooter decline is homebrew.

What pureblood shooters of note were even multiplatform with the original xbox? Half Life 2 the tech demo (which didn't have any aim assist or anything like that, by the way)? Anything else? Seems the original xbox did not have much influence on the shooter as originally thought. Surprised callofdooty isn't in the list too, another PC exclusive decline shooter.

 

[Higher Animal]

Both Halo and Unreal are iterations on the Doom-Quake shooter model. Halo had more diverse weapons and a new health system but was mostly an endurance version of Quake - headshotting as many "flood" aliens as possible over a large expanse with near unlimited health. Unreal added movesets and powerups in smaller, yet still massive maps where player twitch skill mattered battle to battle. Both iterations on the Doom model lost out to the shooting gallery model of Medal of Honor.

 

[Carrion]

You mentioned console DX had mouse & keyboard support in the very same post.

You can't design a console game for mouse and keyboard. DX had many of its features redesigned or entirely removed to make it playable on a console. Mouse and keyboard support, just like aim assist, was just a crutch to make up for the fact that the game was never designed to be played with a controller.

It's just another example that games are not designed in a vacuum, and when you're taking a pure PC title and turning it into a console game, compromises have to be made, almost always for the worse.

And again, you're defying logic by claiming you happily play classic FPS' to date with the keyboard only, but think a controller is the root of all evil simply because the aiming doesn't stand up to a mouse.

It's not really a hard concept to grasp.

Pro Evolution Soccer 5 is my favorite football game. It's got the most fun, entertaining and long-lasting gameplay of any sports game I've played, and I played it entirely with the keyboard, with a very simple control scheme. Since then, I don't think the game has been topped in its respective genre, but there's one huge bit of incline has that happened to the genre since then: not giving a fuck about keyboard controls anymore. Instead, the developers started designing games for gamepads with analog sticks, as that's the superior control method for those games, allowing for stuff like 360-degree movement and full manual control of your passing and shooting, whereas the older keyboard/d-pad titles were limited to eight directions and therefore had to use a level of "aim assist" for the controls. Sounds remotely familiar somehow...

Anyway, if the next PES or FIFA or whatever decided that they were getting rid of analog control and going back to eight directions, it would undoubtedly be decline — they would be giving up the clearly superior control method in favor of a simplified one that is much more limited and lacks a lot of the good stuff of the better method. Granted, it could still be the best football game ever if there was enough incline on other areas (like the best AI ever, or incredibly deep game modes), but it would be good despite the control scheme rather than because of it.

 

[DeepOcean]

Early decline of the shooter.

Half-Life
Far Cry
Counterstrike
Doom 3
Battlefield
Crysis
Bioshock

What is your definition of decline?

There is a big difference on this reasoning: "I will make my game linear because I can control this encounter this way and it will be fun, to have this puzzle there, to have this enemy appearing there, to have marines ambushing the player and giving him a hard time.", to "I need to include shooting galleries, cover shooting, aim assist, recovering health, static enemies that are easy to headshot and are mostly harmless, make shooting gallery levels because otherwise I won't sell."

Depends of what your definition is, with exception of Biocock (Pure decline garbage in comparison with System Shock 1 and 2), those are really diferent games with diferent proposals, I don't much of a common ground between them to claim there was a decline and conscious popamole design on them.

If your definition of decline is broad like linear games are decline, games with scripted moments are decline, why not go wild as you can and do like some people here on the codex that see the whole shooter genre as awful decline? If your personal taste is non linear, labyrinth level style games that is one thing but a definition that placed that standard on all FPS shooters is going too much on subjective territory.

I had great fun playing Fear, Half Life, Doom, Thief and Deus Ex, they are completely different games that have completely different proposals and completely different level design, a Half Life level design on a Deus Ex game would be awful but it is acceptable on a dumb shooter. I don't consider Fear decline because it isn't like Doom, they both have crazy good gameplay for different reasons. Only progressive gamming journos dipshits would consider a game good or not based on the release date.

To me, the requirements for a good run and gun shooter are speed, skillful aiming and movement, challenges that demand skill to solve and keep you surprised, weapons that feel good to shoot, all the rest depends on the proposal of the game. I wouldn't play a linear Thief or Deus Ex because their gameplay isn't suited to that and a Fear or Half Life style of game would be far different if they had non linear levels.

 

[ᚱᚨᚷᛖᚠᚢᛈ]

Half-Life

This is basically the source of evil. Literally rails.

Unlike many other games at the time, Half-Life features no cutscenes; the player has uninterrupted control of Freeman, and the story is told through scripted sequences seen through his eyes. Valve co-founder Gabe Newell said the team had wanted to create an immersive world rather than a "shooting gallery". The game's engine, GoldSrc, is a heavily modified version of the Quake engine licensed from id Software.

 

[Average Manatee]

Even if you think Half Life was decline, it certainly wasn't the start of it. At the very least Jedi Knight beat it by a year with its immersive worlds, mostly linear gameplay, cutscenes, etc. And I can't think of anyone who thinks Jedi Knight 2 was decline.

Half Life 2, on the other hand, was pure decline incarnate that got incredible amounts of undeserved praise and pretty much screwed FPSs for the future. Halo also had a big part but at least Halo had decent fundamental gameplay mechanics and good multiplayer, so I can't fault it too much.

nah, PC gamers became Graphics whores. Why is Crysis so praised yet so mediocre? Graphics wowed everyone and someone pointed this out earlier.

Crysis is a pretty good game. Graphics were and are irrelevant to it being good. Large areas that you can approach in any way you want + lots of destructibility make it good, and it still hasn't really been beat since. As far as (semi-) realistic shooters go, its among the top.

Of course it all goes to shit when the aliens arrive, but that's been repeated so many times by now that I shouldn't need to say it.

 

[Higher Animal]

Half Life 2 is responsible for Portal, a great FPS.

Mirror's Edge is another great FPS.

Mirror's Edge and Portal are in the top ten FPS of all time.

 

[Ash]

It's just another example that games are not designed in a vacuum, and when you're taking a pure PC title and turning it into a console game, compromises have to be made, almost always for the worse

Compromises so great that regen health, two weapon limits, cinematic cutscenes, QTEs, excessive "realism"-focused design, banal linear as fuck level design, and objective markers have to be introduced? No. We're talking scaling back of graphics, maybe a change to the weapon swap system, mostly negligible shit like that. Don't forget I am the one who actually has played nearly every fucking notable shooter out there on a wide variety of platforms. Heck I've even played the Gameboy version of Doom.

 

[Higher Animal]

But have you played the N-Gage version of Red Faction?

 

[Ash]

Heh. No. Played the original Tomb Raider on an N-gage though. Phone buttons were horrid. they marketed the phone as a gaming phone, yet didn't bother making the controls gaming-optimized, at least that was what I thought of it. Probably had a plugin accessory to deal with that but it wasn't something I explored.

 

[Higher Animal]

In any case, you're wrong about Halo. It's an endurance shooter meant to be coplayed on legendary. Two weapon limit works really well for ammo scarcity.

 

[Ash]

Two weapon limits can suck a dick in singleplayer/co-op campaigns. Ammo scarcity can work just fine with good ammo placement.

 

[Higher Animal]

I thought Halo was above average - some good ideas mixed in with some boredom. Probably not as important an iteration in the shooter genre as Unreal, but still good.

 

[Ash]

By the standards of shooters today it's alright I guess. The level design may have been shit but at least it was sometimes open, wasn't broken up by constant garbage cinematics and had no shiny objective marker guiding you around by the nose. Still, shit level design is instant decline for me. To me it is one of the most important aspects of design for the vast majority of genres. And of course the whole regen health, two weapon limit thing I abhor.

 

[Average Manatee]

Two weapon limits can suck a dick in singleplayer/co-op campaigns. Ammo scarcity can work just fine with multiple weapons and good ammo placement.

Ammo scarcity is a horrible mechanic if it encourages you to back track for 10 mins to pick up more rockets. Which is what would happen in a game like Halo (mostly linear with large levels and slow movement speed). There's a reason why most linear games tend to simply give you tons more ammo then you'll ever need, thereby making ammo scarcity an irrelevant mechanic beyond the absolute immediate needs.

By the standards of shooters today it's alright I guess. The level design may have been shit but at least it was sometimes open, wasn't broken up by constant garbage cinematics and had no shiny objective marker guiding you around by the nose. Still, shit level design is instant decline for me. To me it is one of the most important aspects of design for the vast majority of genres. And of course the whole regen health, two weapon limit thing I abhor.

Halo 1 didn't regen health. It regened shields, but in SP on highest difficulty shields basically gave you 1 or 2 hits protection. It'd be like regening up to 25% health in Doom.

But yeah, shit level design. MP was good fun though.

 

[Ash]

There is no real functional distinction with regards to gameplay. The shield is just another name for 80% of your health that happens to regenerate, while the remaining 20% doesn't and can only be restored with medkits. The only difference is damage to the shield doesn't spill over into your other health pool once broken, unless it's explosive damage. At least from what I gather. I'm not a Halo expert but I know enough of the decline.

Ammo scarcity is a horrible mechanic if it encourages you to back track for 10 mins to pick up more rockets.

Garbage excuse also used to justify regen health in a singleplayer game. The solution? good ammo and health management so you don't have to backtrack 10 mins. See some rockets that you can't pick up due to full ammo? Use the rocket launcher for a bit on some nearby tough enemies and then back track for 10 seconds to pick it up.

There's a reason why most linear games tend to simply give you tons more ammo then you'll ever need, thereby making ammo scarcity an irrelevant mechanic beyond the absolute immediate needs.

The reason is called shit design. There are untold amounts of linear games that don't bombard you with health and ammo. I seem to recall in super mario bros backtracking for health not even being an option as you don't know which block is health or not until you smack your head on it, so you inadvertently ending wasting a mushroom here and there.
If you have to backtrack 10mins, stop being shit; git gud fag. If you're playing linear games with shit design, stop.