Gord
Arcane
- Joined
- Feb 16, 2011
- Messages
- 7,049
Judging from my personal experience with the newer entries, all are games which are largely designed competently enough.
Nevertheless, neither Prey, DX: MD, nor Dishonored 2 really managed to completely grab me.
They have their own strengths and flaws (and not necessarily the same ones, although there's some overlap), but for all of them I was missing that special something that really had me wanting to continue playing.
Which is something I found coming up in various discussions over different forums (with diverse audiences behind them), so I'm apparently not the only one (which makes me wonder whether the resulting word of mouth somewhat contributed to them staying below expectations, sales-wise).
For all of them I can name at least one or two things which contributed, although it's not exclusively down to gameplay/systems - i.e. DX: MD's setting I found to be implausible in many points, while for Prey it was also down to visual design and lacking variety.
Anyway all three games gave the impression that something had not fully "clicked into place". The potential's there, but they are staying below it - with the exception of a few particularly well designed parts/levels, maybe.
I do, however, have my doubts that it comes down solely to the concessions to modern games mentioned already. Even a hypothetical "oldschool" mode would not suddenly elevate them from "good but not great" to "one of the classics of the genre".
Nevertheless, neither Prey, DX: MD, nor Dishonored 2 really managed to completely grab me.
They have their own strengths and flaws (and not necessarily the same ones, although there's some overlap), but for all of them I was missing that special something that really had me wanting to continue playing.
Which is something I found coming up in various discussions over different forums (with diverse audiences behind them), so I'm apparently not the only one (which makes me wonder whether the resulting word of mouth somewhat contributed to them staying below expectations, sales-wise).
For all of them I can name at least one or two things which contributed, although it's not exclusively down to gameplay/systems - i.e. DX: MD's setting I found to be implausible in many points, while for Prey it was also down to visual design and lacking variety.
Anyway all three games gave the impression that something had not fully "clicked into place". The potential's there, but they are staying below it - with the exception of a few particularly well designed parts/levels, maybe.
I do, however, have my doubts that it comes down solely to the concessions to modern games mentioned already. Even a hypothetical "oldschool" mode would not suddenly elevate them from "good but not great" to "one of the classics of the genre".