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When do you feel gaming hit its apex?

JarlFrank

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Captive (1990) has 65 THOUSAND multi-floored dungeons and I've yet to come across any game that even comes close to that. (No, they're not randomly generated.)

How? :O
 

Siveon

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Shadorwun: Hong Kong
Captive (1990) has 65 THOUSAND multi-floored dungeons and I've yet to come across any game that even comes close to that. (No, they're not randomly generated.)

How? :O

Let's ask Wikipedia.

"The programmer used an algorithm that generates each planet and base, including its inhabitants, using a single numerical "seed" on the game disk - a trick which enabled them to have 65,535 levels in the game without having to store the details of each level individually (only one base is "active" in any given saved game, since each base must be "destroyed" before moving on)."

So it's generated, but only once? Not quite sure, myself. Fascinating, though. Hardware limitations let's programmers explore some really odd techniques.
 

Unkillable Cat

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He used that algorithm once to generate ALL the levels (probably made some alterations to the first ten or so dungeons to create a difficulty curve/introductory curve) then left the rest alone.

I've heard that players have played far enough to reach dungeons where the password for a certain door cannot be found by normal means because it's located in an inaccessible part of the level. Some players have found a way to extract the data so those passwords are available out there on Captive fan-sites.

Fortunately it is not mandatory to play through all the levels. The game does it like this: You start with the co-ordinates for one dungeon, you fly through space over there, land on the surface, walk over to the dungeon entrance (blasting whatever dinosaurs are in the way) then get inside. Once inside there are two objectives; find a computer terminal and input the proper password to get a planet probe, then find the generator room and toss some explosives in there. Once the generator blows a wave of fire will rip through the station, destroying everything in its wake, including the walls. During that time you must run like hell to reach the entrance door before getting caught in the blast. Once outside it's just a case of getting back to the planet lander and dusting off.

Once back in space you release the planet probe and it scouts around for the next location to travel to. Doing this repeatedely (takes about 10 planets or so) will eventually lead to the prison planet where you (the player) are being held captive (hence the name). Once you find yourself on the prison planet (oh the meta!) you have two choices, "Quit" or "Continue". Quitting means the game ends with a short congratulatory message, while Continue sees a monster abduct yourself to another prison planet, and the cycle repeats. Note that the game doesn't restart, you keep your skills, XP and weapons - and the monsters are as tough as they were (even moreso, actually.)
 

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To me, it was 1994. There's been better years, yes, but the combination of game released and my personal "maturity" at that stage (also to take into account is free time to play, and it was a lucky year in that respect) made it the best year in my personal gaming history. One title to represent them all, upon which I wasted hundreds of hours and probably 4 or 5 mice: Tie Fighter.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1994_in_video_gaming
 

the_shadow

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With The Great Temple in Blood.



No cover mechanics? Few cutscenes? No recoil on the napalm launcher? 0/10

Nah, just kidding. Despite Blood and Shadow Warrior not receiving the same amount of publicity as Doom, I found them far more enjoyable to play. I've always wonder why Caleb could suffocate though (eg. drowning, or being choked by the Thing hands). Isn't he already dead?
 

Unkillable Cat

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Nah, he died, then came back from the dead. Still has glowing red eyes and probably smells hellabad.

Also, IIRC the Napalm Launcher has a slight recoil. Nothing major, but still noticable. I could be wrong, though.
 

sser

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If I had to pick a single year it'd probably be around 2001, mostly for the prime games right before that year, and the foundations for some great shit to come.

In retrospect, it was just the most 'well-rounded' time for gaming in general. Fuck the haters: a large reason for it was because of consoles. All the consoles were doing their own things, not just rehashing one another or making ports. Seriously, look at any top-25 list for the consoles. There's all kinds of unique, awesome shit in there. 3D graphics for consoles had come far enough to not be the shit they were in the 90s, but not so advanced and costly as to make developers risk-adverse like they are now. Gameboy Advance came out with its giant library of games. PC gaming's best genres were all still alive. People like to bash the consoles, but as far as I'm concerned this was their collective peak. Each one had something to offer, there was no collusion and watered down garbage like there is now, and not everything was being ported. Also, this was the time for sports games, but I don't know how many people here play those. I 100% believe this time period had the greatest diversity in games.
 

Unkillable Cat

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I think sser has a point. Right up until late 2001 the consoles WERE doing their own thing. Look at the PS2, the market strategy for that was just "more of the same, only better" which worked out rather well from what I gather. There are some truly memorable titles on the PS2 like Ico, Shadow of the Colossus and the Katamari games, and then later followed by gimmicky living room party games like Buzz, Singstar and Guitar Hero. You may scoff at them but they're damn fun. Compare that to the PS3 which seemed to focus on being a platform that could compete against the X-Box in asshattery, watered-down games and trying to be better at games than the PC.

And then there's Nintendo. With one hand they try something new and wonderful while the other one is busy churning out the same old shit again and again and again. At least they're consistent.
 

sser

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Right. Gamecube had Pikmin, Eternal Darkness, a new and fresh Resident Evil, the Metroid Prime games. Games like Animal Crossing or Super Monkey Ball. The GBA also ushered in a new wave of great handheld stuff. I mean there was so much weird and fun shit it was great. The PS2's library was huge and you could find a game for almost everything. And GTAIII came out which, IMO, dramatically changed the industry. My point was that the industry was advanced enough to make wicked, original games, but not so advanced in technology - like now - that developers are scared to take risks. That time period was very exciting to me. Now, as in right now, what people say about consoles is true. PS/XBOX are practically the exact same systems, and their games are essentially PC game ports or vice versa. Nintendo is still being Nintendo, but they have seriously cut out a lot of their 3rd-party support which is a shame. The 360/PS3 were also a reflection of probably the shittiest time of being a PC gamer. Because everything needed to be on consoles, adventure games and RTS's really started dying out. Technology for games seems to have stalled out at the anchor of the consoles' power. I don't know how we went from Crysis in 2006 (IIRC) to what we have now. It felt like the huge surge forward came to a dead stop at the altar of Call of Duty and Halo. That said, I feel like PC gaming has bounced back from that little time period quite well, but now the console portion of gaming is pretty shit. Around 2001, though, before/after, I feel like gaming had something for everyone.
 

TheGreatOne

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Kickstarter has brought in a lot of incline but we're nowhere near a situation where I'd say that PC gaming has bounced back on its feet or anything like that. Steam is still full of indy garbage, Valve and Blizzard are still the only remaining AAA PC only developers and the kickstarter incline has mostly been the result of old developers who made good PC games in the 90s. And the budgets they have are really low. But PC gaming is now doing quality wise better than it ever has since 2004-2005, which is a good sign. Financially speaking PC gaming has been doing well for a few years now, PC game sales surpassed console game sales already in 2012 IIRC and more and more people are turning to PC gaming these days. But compared to the situation before the 2001 collapse, the state of the industry is quite catastrophical. PC gaming is more profitable than ever before yet there are virtually no PC exclusive big budget/AAA games. These masses of people who've got into PC gaming recently are contempt playing multiplatform shit on their PCs. To them "PC master race" means better graphics, cheaper prices and being able to play the same game that console gamers play with keyboard and mouse, not games that are more mechanically complex and actually NEED the keyboard and mouse for a large amount of keybinds or fast&precise aiming.
The industry needs to return to the state where it was in the glory days, that is Western games on PC (some on Amiga) and Japanese games on SNES/Mega Drive/Turbografx/Neo Geo&Arcades and later on Saturn/PS1/N64/Dreamcast. But we all know that's not going to happen. What's more likely is that this kickstarter incline thing is caused by 30+ year old people and old fag developers being nostalgig (with some younger, more "hardcore" gamers participating), and once those people are gone, the well will run dry for good. The young generation isn't being brought up even on consoles anymore, kids are playing games on their iPhones these days. Of course there are young kids who'll discover retro gaming on their own, thtourhg their parents or youtube and forums, but I doubt if that's a large enough demographic to fill in the gap once the old guard who was raised on 80s&90s games (or better yet worked on those games). It will increase the demand for these old kickstarter games and throw back budget titles, but I doubt it's enough for penetrating the A/AAA industry to bring to true incline to the masses. There will always be guys making indy games in their basements (Knights of the Chalice), but games like that have no large scale impact on the industry and trends in gaming.

Atari Jaguar illustrates well what ruined PC gaming and console gaming alike after 2001. American console with only Western developed games and the system hasn't got a single good exclusive and its game library is all around horrible, even though the 93-95 time period is among the greatest both for Western developed PC games and Japanese console games.
There are some truly memorable titles on the PS2 like Ico, Shadow of the Colossus and the Katamari games, and then later followed by gimmicky living room party games like Buzz, Singstar and Guitar Hero. You may scoff at them but they're damn fun.
You list Buzz and Singstar as PS2 highlights when PS2 had Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne? :lol:
 
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Unkillable Cat

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Valve and Blizzard are still the only remaining AAA PC only developers

:retarded:

Valve has released games on consoles since 2001. In fact the third Half-Life expansion, Decay, was console-exclusive until 2012 or thereabouts when a (fan-made) PC port was finally released. (You should have seen the number of self-proclaimed HL fans claiming fanboyism back to the turn of the millennium who all went "Wait, there's a third Half-Life expansion?")

Blizzard's VERY FIRST TITLE EVER was a console title, back in 1991. EVERY TITLE FROM THERE ON UNTIL STARCRAFT was multiplatform. From the Starcraft expansion and until Diablo 3 they only released titles for the PC and Apple computers. That's still "multiplatform", by the way. Diablo 3 is also available on the consoles.

Care to revise your statement?

But compared to the situation before the 2001 collapse, the state of the industry is quite catastrophical.

While I have certain ideas about what you may be talking about, I still want you to enlighten me of this "collapse".

PC gaming is more profitable than ever before yet there are virtually no PC exclusive big budget/AAA games.


OK, let's have a time-out. You need to get one thing straight. When a title is released for Mac OS's, that means that they're NOT being released for the PC. There are ways to get them to run on a PC, but that's NOT the idea. That said, every developer with half a brain develops a Mac OS version alongside the PC version. It's the clever thing to do, considering that the "walls" between the two platforms are very thin. Some of them even go so far as to make Linux versions. So I'm going to assume, for your sake, that when you say "PC exclusive" you mean "home computer exclusive". Please let me know if I'm jumping to conclusions on this one.

With that said, the biggest earning video games out there are only released on... PC and Macs. They're called "MMOs". If we expand just a little bit we get these games called "MOBAs". League of Legends? DOTA 2? How much can you imagine it cost to develop and maintain them? How much money are they making?

Scary thought of the day: If what I'm hearing is true, then Riot Games (LoL developers) has enough money lying around that they can buy small countries. Imagine what Valve (DOTA 2 developers, plus all that other stuff we all know about) can afford.

These masses of people who've got into PC gaming recently are contempt playing multiplatform shit on their PCs. To them "PC master race" means better graphics, cheaper prices and being able to play the same game that console gamers play with keyboard and mouse, not games that are more mechanically complex and actually NEED the keyboard and mouse for a large amount of keybinds or fast & precise aiming.

I get your point, but the inevitable question still pops up: Where's the problem?

One of the more positive aspects of gaming evolution for the past 25 years, and that's just my perspective, is that controls, UIs and HUDs have become simpler and more intuitive without a major loss in functionality. The console controller is a bottleneck, yes, but it's still a clever little beast. I'm sure several flight simulators can be made to work perfectly fine with your average console controller.

Excluding FPS games, which everyone knows are better with Kbrd + Mouse rather than any controller ever made, what game types that are currently enjoying (good) sales and recognition, are benefitting from having a Kbrd + Mouse control scheme, rather than a console controller?

The industry needs to return to the state where it was in the glory days, that is Western games on PC (some on Amiga) and Japanese games on SNES/Mega Drive/Turbografx/Neo Geo&Arcades and later on Saturn/PS1/N64/Dreamcast. But we all know that's not going to happen.

True, because progress frequently passes Points of No Return. Secular titles based on world regions and gaming platforms are a thing of the past. Deal with it.

What's more likely is that this kickstarter incline thing is caused by 30+ year old people and old fag developers being nostalgig (with some younger, more "hardcore" gamers participating), and once those people are gone, the well will run dry for good. The young generation isn't being brought up even on consoles anymore, kids are playing games on their iPhones these days. Of course there are young kids who'll discover retro gaming on their own, thtourhg their parents or youtube and forums, but I doubt if that's a large enough demographic to fill in the gap once the old guard who was raised on 80s&90s games (or better yet worked on those games). It will increase the demand for these old kickstarter games and throw back budget titles, but I doubt it's enough for penetrating the A/AAA industry to bring to true incline to the masses. There will always be guys making indy games in their basements (Knights of the Chalice), but games like that have no large scale impact on the industry and trends in gaming.

Nostaliga is a VERY powerful force, I get the feeling that you're underestimating it. Everyone wrote off vinyl records a few years back, look where they are now.

I predict that a time will come where the "gamers of today" (dependant upon the era this will occur in) realize that the games of the 80s/90s/early 00s were the big shit, and they'll scour that era for ideas and inspiration to use in the games that they'll be making in their respective eras. That's the beautiful part of history, it'll always be there and some people actually LEARN from it. Just... don't count on being alive when this happens. :)

That said, I get the feeling that you're also trying to convey, that us people that grew up on "the games of old" are being written off as old dinosaurs and has-beens. This applies double to "gaming journalists" because those guys know we can easily trounce them in a half-decent gaming debate. :)

TheGreatOne said:
There are some truly memorable titles on the PS2 like Ico, Shadow of the Colossus and the Katamari games, and then later followed by gimmicky living room party games like Buzz, Singstar and Guitar Hero. You may scoff at them but they're damn fun.

You list Buzz and Singstar as PS2 highlights when PS2 had Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne? :lol:

Read my post again, I listed Singstar and Buzz as "gimmicky living room party games", not "highlights".

(The underlined words? Learn2spell. :smug: And I'm drunk right now.)
 

TheGreatOne

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Care to revise your statement?
Blizzard and Valve are the only developers putting out PC exclusive AAA games like Starcraft 2. Since the release of Crysis and Witcher, I can't think of any other PC game that was made by some one else than Blizzard/Valve that was a big budget AAA game with lots of mainstream exposure. Mid budget stuff Paradox games aren't the kind of games that have enough mainstream exposure to be considered some of the biggest games of the year. In fact most games like that are downright obscure; unless you are into the specific genre, you likely won't hear/read about games like that (goes for console gaming as well)
Valve and Blizzard have both started porting their games on consoles during the recent years, so it remains to be seen whether or not Half Life 3 will be multiplatform, if we'll ever get Warcaft 4 and so on.
While I have certain ideas about what you may be talking about, I still want you to enlighten me of this "collapse".
Start of decline, both for PC and console gaming, though the decline of PC gaming happened more rapidly.
when you say "PC exclusive" you mean "home computer exclusive". Please let me know if I'm jumping to conclusions on this one.
I consider mac and linux to be part of PC gaming, where as IBM PCs and home computers like C64 and Atari ST were two different things. I would use computer games as an umberella term for all of them.
With that said, the biggest earning video games out there are only released on... PC and Macs. They're called "MMOs". If we expand just a little bit we get these games called "MOBAs". League of Legends? DOTA 2? How much can you imagine it cost to develop and maintain them? How much money are they making?
Not really relevant in discussion about single player games and the AAA game industry, MMOs are their own thing. LoL and DOTA are huge games but I don't really see them as being comparable to the fact that during 90s PC got a lot of high budget, high quality games that were exclusive to PCs. Everything is multiplatform these days.
I get your point, but the inevitable question still pops up: Where's the problem?
That we don't get big budget "AAA" PC games anymore like we did in the 90s, such as Sierra/LucasArts adventure games, Thief, Wing Commander and even those FMV atrocities.
The console controller is a bottleneck, yes, but it's still a clever little beast. I'm sure several flight simulators can be made to work perfectly fine with your average console controller.
Excluding FPS games, which everyone knows are better with Kbrd + Mouse rather than any controller ever made, what game types that are currently enjoying (good) sales and recognition, are benefitting from having a Kbrd + Mouse control scheme, rather than a console controller?
In 90s developers were able to port Wing Commander 3 to 3DO, a console whose controller has 3 main buttons and 2 shoulder buttons. There's a lot of misguided elitism when it comes to controllers. You can do a lot with those things as long as you're willing to combine keys, and a peripheral that was intentionally designed for controlling video games (analogue stick) is superior to one that wasn't (WASD). And if a game is turn based, you can cram an almost infinite amount of of depth and complexity to a console game as long as you're willing to stare at a lot of menus and submenus (Japanese SRPGs).

Still there are things that you can't do with a controller when you're working on real time games, and PC exclusivity should be the answer to that.
I predict that a time will come where the "gamers of today" (dependant upon the era this will occur in) realize that the games of the 80s/90s/early 00s were the big shit, and they'll scour that era for ideas and inspiration to use in the games that they'll be making in their respective eras. That's the beautiful part of history, it'll always be there and some people actually LEARN from it. Just... don't count on being alive when this happens. :)
The popularity of AVGN type shows has made a lot of younger kids look into retro gaming. But I doubt whether that's enough to raise a new generation of kids who want to change the entire industry (and not just the small budget stuff that hasn't got any mainstream visibility). I want the industry to return to the state when the most marketed and hyped "big budget" (relatively) games were also the best games.
Read my post again, I listed Singstar and Buzz as "gimmicky living room party games", not "highlights".
You said that "there are some truly memorable titles on the PS2" and then added how they were later on followed by gimmicky living room party games. How ever you worded it, I don't see how those games are the ones that should be mentioned first when there were a lot better games on the system
(The underlined words? Learn2spell. :smug: And I'm drunk right now.)
Nostaliga
Like Chuck Schuldiner used to sing: practice what you preach. I misspelled those words because I was tired and in a hurry to go to bed because I'm a respectable citizen who has to get up at 6 am and has no time to be drunk in the middle of the week :smug:
 
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Keldryn

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The apex of gaming is right now, simply due to an unprecedented level of availability and accessibility.

No matter what type of game you prefer, you can find a game that you'll like and be playing it within minutes. On virtually any modern platform.

You are not limited to playing games: sitting in front of a monitor; sitting in front of the TV with a game console; squinting at a non-backlit 2" screen. Playing Baldur's Gate or The Secret of Monkey Island on a tablet while riding the train in to work? Hell, yeah.

Emulation allows for almost the entire historical catalog of games, across all platforms, to remain playable and outlive the hardware they were created for.

Good Old Games continues to release classic PC games from the past, fully patched up and configured to run on modern operating systems. No farting around with EMM386.EXE, MSCDEX.EXE, disk caches, SET BLASTER=, or trying to load your mouse driver into that high memory block between 640K and 1024K. All of this at a very reasonable price.

Looking for a physical copy of a favorite or more obscure game? eBay.

Thriving fan communities patch games that were rushed out by publishers and create mods to add new content -- often for years after the game's release. Some of them will even rewrite older gaming engines from scratch (Exult, ScummVM).

Digital distribution, targeted online marketing, and alternative models of funding (i.e. Kickstarter) have made it more feasible to produce niche games that AAA publishers are reluctant to take a risk on. And we're really just seeing the start of this.

And if you're really a narcissist, you can record every moment you spend gaming and put it up on YouTube for the whole world to see. :P
 

Destroid

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The apex of gaming is right now, simply due to an unprecedented level of availability and accessibility.

No matter what type of game you prefer, you can find a game that you'll like and be playing it within minutes. On virtually any modern platform.

You are not limited to playing games: sitting in front of a monitor; sitting in front of the TV with a game console; squinting at a non-backlit 2" screen. Playing Baldur's Gate or The Secret of Monkey Island on a tablet while riding the train in to work? Hell, yeah.

Emulation allows for almost the entire historical catalog of games, across all platforms, to remain playable and outlive the hardware they were created for.

Good Old Games continues to release classic PC games from the past, fully patched up and configured to run on modern operating systems. No farting around with EMM386.EXE, MSCDEX.EXE, disk caches, SET BLASTER=, or trying to load your mouse driver into that high memory block between 640K and 1024K. All of this at a very reasonable price.

Looking for a physical copy of a favorite or more obscure game? eBay.

Thriving fan communities patch games that were rushed out by publishers and create mods to add new content -- often for years after the game's release. Some of them will even rewrite older gaming engines from scratch (Exult, ScummVM).

Digital distribution, targeted online marketing, and alternative models of funding (i.e. Kickstarter) have made it more feasible to produce niche games that AAA publishers are reluctant to take a risk on. And we're really just seeing the start of this.

And if you're really a narcissist, you can record every moment you spend gaming and put it up on YouTube for the whole world to see. :P

By that definition it's impossible for gaming to get worse unless industrialised society totally collapses. We're talking about new releases.
 

Keldryn

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By that definition it's impossible for gaming to get worse unless industrialised society totally collapses. We're talking about new releases.

You're no fun. :)

1990 to 1995

The PC went from being laughed at by Amiga and even C-64 owners to wiping the floor with every other gaming platform in existence.

The height of Origin Systems, Sierra Online, LucasArts, Westwood Studios, Microprose, and many others. The days when Computer Gaming World's "Top 100 Games" charts were dominated by RPG, strategy, and adventure games.

The 16-bit consoles (SNES and Genesis) refined the gameplay of their 8-bit predecessors, giving us classic games that still hold up well today.

This was the period in time where the innovative concepts of earlier games really gelled into something polished and refined that would stand the test of time.

Before the dark times. Before Ultima Online and Everquest.
 
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The apex of gaming is right now, simply due to an unprecedented level of availability and accessibility.

No matter what type of game you prefer, you can find a game that you'll like and be playing it within minutes. On virtually any modern platform.

You are not limited to playing games: sitting in front of a monitor; sitting in front of the TV with a game console; squinting at a non-backlit 2" screen. Playing Baldur's Gate or The Secret of Monkey Island on a tablet while riding the train in to work? Hell, yeah.

Emulation allows for almost the entire historical catalog of games, across all platforms, to remain playable and outlive the hardware they were created for.

Good Old Games continues to release classic PC games from the past, fully patched up and configured to run on modern operating systems. No farting around with EMM386.EXE, MSCDEX.EXE, disk caches, SET BLASTER=, or trying to load your mouse driver into that high memory block between 640K and 1024K. All of this at a very reasonable price.

Looking for a physical copy of a favorite or more obscure game? eBay.

Thriving fan communities patch games that were rushed out by publishers and create mods to add new content -- often for years after the game's release. Some of them will even rewrite older gaming engines from scratch (Exult, ScummVM).

Digital distribution, targeted online marketing, and alternative models of funding (i.e. Kickstarter) have made it more feasible to produce niche games that AAA publishers are reluctant to take a risk on. And we're really just seeing the start of this.

And if you're really a narcissist, you can record every moment you spend gaming and put it up on YouTube for the whole world to see. :P


+ bunch of new translations of wapanese game that made them finally playable

But the best era for being a gamer doesn't mean 'the apex of gaming'.
 

Norfleet

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I'm not entirely sure when it happened, but I know that as I sit here posting in an inane thread on this forum, instead of playing a game, we passed it.
 

RK47

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This thread
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Burning Bridges

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1990 - 1999. Up to that there were several great games every year. 1999 was the last I remember with new franchises like Shogun Total War, Hidden and Dangerous, Thief.
At that time software developers were not used to being lazy and when hardware stopped being the limiting factor, for a short time games made full use of 3D hardware and advances in software (like OOP).
Then XBox came and everything went down. 3Dfx, Dynamix, Looking Glass etc went bust, and things never were the same.
 

Infinitron

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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
There were two apexes or "sweet spots" in gaming - an early 90s "2D Apex" and a late 90s-early 00s "3D Apex", with a short mid-90s slump period separating them.

We may be entering a new one right now.
 

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