|
|
Post by 13thGeneral on Jan 24, 2015 17:47:00 GMT
For me, the ideal godgame is a self-running world-simulation where I can intervene whenever I want to, and watch the consequences unfold over a very long period of time. I know of no game that does this. They all fall into the trap of creating a game where the player HAS to interact. Exactly. I was really hoping for that kind of game in Godus. |
|
|
|
Post by hardly on Jan 24, 2015 20:51:37 GMT
www.xp4t.com/good-godus-molyneuxs-latest-could-be-good/ … So the guy played four hours of GODUS and then wrote a four page article about it with 3 pages of background on Peter? WTF? If I was writing four sentences about my initial impressions that might be fine, but for four pages I expect you to actually finish the content. Plus if its such a good game why are you writing about it and not playing it?
|
|
|
|
Post by hardly on Jan 24, 2015 21:05:24 GMT
In principle spore is perhaps a great concept and perhaps a god game. I can certainly see why you'd argue it's a god game. In terms of the implementation the game sucks and was an epic failure. It is proof that it is better to do one thing well than five things poorly. You guide and shape a species from the cellar level to the space age. You make real choices along the way which determine the races shape, society and physical attributes down the line. During the space age you basically shape entire planets and determine their species, civilisations etc. In presentation it is obviously not a god game, but replace the starship with a divine avatar and how are the actions you take not 'godly' (apart from the trading). It's not a perfect fit, but the player's agency within the game is the closest to a deity I've seen. The game wasn't perfect, but was critically acclaimed and very far from a disaster btw. The expansion....well that was a somewhat different story. What would you consider a closer representation of your ideal of a god game?
I'm not one of those purists who denounce games based on "this isn't a god game." So if my comment was interpreted that way that wasn't what was intended. I agree there is an element of GOD game about it but personally I see it as more a first person experience of evolution (noting some modes are decidedly not first person).
The main point of my comment was to say the Spore was a terrible game because it tried to straddle multiple genres and did pretty much all of them badly. Wow I just checked the box on my galactic edition and its 2008, I would have said much older. This is all based on my memory of the game 7 years ago so if I have something wrong please forgive me.
The good about Spore:
- The cell mode is pretty decent and fun.
- The creature creator and evolutionary mode that it is based in.
The bad:
- The carryover between the modes is poor. So while its awesome to customise your creature the significance of those customisations quickly declines. This neuters the best part of the game which is the continuity of seeing your civilisation progress and having meaningful decisions carry over between stages.
- The RTS (third stage) and Civ level (fourth stage) are crap versions of game styles much better implemented in other games.
These issues were further exasperated for me by the fact that the creature creator was made available for free prior to release. This was easily the best part of the game but I had exhausted the fun before it was even released. Ultimately it was more fun to design creatures in the creator than it was do pretty much anything else and that meant overall it was a poor game.
Will Wright went big with this one and came up short. I don't blame him for it but it feels like a game they released when they knew a lot of it wasn't actually that fun and they hadn't achieved their goal which was having a story from single cell to space exploration.
|
|
|
|
Post by Danjal on Jan 24, 2015 22:34:33 GMT
For me, the ideal godgame is a self-running world-simulation where I can intervene whenever I want to, and watch the consequences unfold over a very long period of time. I know of no game that does this. They all fall into the trap of creating a game where the player HAS to interact. Even by those definitions though - Godus falls short. Because within Godus, your followers do nothing. The world does nothing. Everything is prompted by the player. It requires your interaction through sculpting and then the toggle of follower housing to get them to walk. Moreover, they are immortal to all but direct intervention. They don't starve, they don't age. Just adding starvation and aging alone would add some degree of "life" to the world. The absense of any other wildlife or any life at all in the world plays a part aswell. Being able to see animals and other creatures walk around and go about their business would give a sense of activity. Not only does the world *require* interaction by the player. But it doesn't even bother to give the illusion or semblance of being a self-contained atmosphere. And there are so many great tricks that would make it seem like the world does go on even without your interaction. I've previously suggested materials - one of the reasons beyond my belief that this would be a better progression system than a timer. Is the fact that having your followers gather these materials gives a semblance of life. If you have your woodcutters going from their cottage to a forest/trees to chop them down. Even if its merely an animation and not actually "getting wood" but the wood is just passively generated by a ticking timer behind the scenes. It gives a semblance of life in the world. Expand on that by replanting or otherwise regrowing trees, whether its a true forest (akin to how it goes in Banished) or a forest node as its done in other games. Expand on that and have your housing "damage" from the excessively violent storms that take place in Godus (seriously, they still come out of nowhere and end just as abruptly...) and you would add in another element of "life" - rather than a simple toggle state. Your followers and their housing would become a self-contained atmosphere. They build their houses, it gets damaged, they tap into the resource pool to repair the damage. All of that would happen without the players intervention - it would give the world a semblence of self-contained life. The more elements like that are added in that aren't timers with a "toggle" for the player to harvest/reset once done. And the more life the world would portray. Animals whether domesticated or wild would add an element of activity. Once you then enter in the element of choice from the player, you run into balancing consuming vs sustaining. Suddenly the introduction of a god in this carefully balanced ecosystem can result in a thriving civilization where you help them grow and advance - or your careless greed can run them into the ground and force them to make choices they would otherwise never run into. Yet Godus has none of that. All Godus has is a bunch of buckets that slowly fill as the timers tick and then freeze untill the player interacts with them. The world does absolutely nothing without the interaction of the player. And yes. The interaction of the player IS an important part of a godgame aswell. Its what sets the godgame apart from a simulation. Without player interaction, you have a passive simulation, effectively a screensaver. Without a living world, you have a switchboard, a bunch of toggles for the player to switch when prompted. The godgame requires both. It requires that living world, and it requires relevant choices with consequences for the "god" (player) to engage with. |
|
|
|
Post by Aynen on Jan 24, 2015 23:36:16 GMT
For me, the ideal godgame is a self-running world-simulation where I can intervene whenever I want to, and watch the consequences unfold over a very long period of time. I know of no game that does this. They all fall into the trap of creating a game where the player HAS to interact. Even by those definitions though - Godus falls short. Quite right, Godus does exactly the opposite of what I'm describing. Godus is designed such that player input is the only driving factor in the game. For most games this is actually the standard, and for most games it works great. But I don't think it works very well for a god-game. |
|
|
|
Post by hardly on Jan 25, 2015 0:19:19 GMT
For me, the ideal godgame is a self-running world-simulation where I can intervene whenever I want to, and watch the consequences unfold over a very long period of time. I know of no game that does this. They all fall into the trap of creating a game where the player HAS to interact. Even by those definitions though - Godus falls short. Because within Godus, your followers do nothing. The world does nothing. Everything is prompted by the player. It requires your interaction through sculpting and then the toggle of follower housing to get them to walk. Moreover, they are immortal to all but direct intervention. They don't starve, they don't age. Just adding starvation and aging alone would add some degree of "life" to the world. The absense of any other wildlife or any life at all in the world plays a part aswell. Being able to see animals and other creatures walk around and go about their business would give a sense of activity. Not only does the world *require* interaction by the player. But it doesn't even bother to give the illusion or semblance of being a self-contained atmosphere. And there are so many great tricks that would make it seem like the world does go on even without your interaction. I've previously suggested materials - one of the reasons beyond my belief that this would be a better progression system than a timer. Is the fact that having your followers gather these materials gives a semblance of life. If you have your woodcutters going from their cottage to a forest/trees to chop them down. Even if its merely an animation and not actually "getting wood" but the wood is just passively generated by a ticking timer behind the scenes. It gives a semblance of life in the world. Expand on that by replanting or otherwise regrowing trees, whether its a true forest (akin to how it goes in Banished) or a forest node as its done in other games. Expand on that and have your housing "damage" from the excessively violent storms that take place in Godus (seriously, they still come out of nowhere and end just as abruptly...) and you would add in another element of "life" - rather than a simple toggle state. Your followers and their housing would become a self-contained atmosphere. They build their houses, it gets damaged, they tap into the resource pool to repair the damage. All of that would happen without the players intervention - it would give the world a semblence of self-contained life. The more elements like that are added in that aren't timers with a "toggle" for the player to harvest/reset once done. And the more life the world would portray. Animals whether domesticated or wild would add an element of activity. Once you then enter in the element of choice from the player, you run into balancing consuming vs sustaining. Suddenly the introduction of a god in this carefully balanced ecosystem can result in a thriving civilization where you help them grow and advance - or your careless greed can run them into the ground and force them to make choices they would otherwise never run into. Yet Godus has none of that. All Godus has is a bunch of buckets that slowly fill as the timers tick and then freeze untill the player interacts with them. The world does absolutely nothing without the interaction of the player. And yes. The interaction of the player IS an important part of a godgame aswell. Its what sets the godgame apart from a simulation. Without player interaction, you have a passive simulation, effectively a screensaver. Without a living world, you have a switchboard, a bunch of toggles for the player to switch when prompted. The godgame requires both. It requires that living world, and it requires relevant choices with consequences for the "god" (player) to engage with. I agree and it always puzzled me that this type of thinking never made it into the game. Trees are super obvious. Settlers 2 which was released in 1996 had woodcutters, tree planters, hunters, etc. It really would have been a no brainer to include this type of thinking but for some reason GODUS has completely avoided any type of resource system apart from the strange wheat/ore system. The weird thing about wheat and ore is your people don't use it, you as a god use it. It would make so much more sense for wheat to be eaten by your people. Ore could be used for weapons which then equip soldiers.
There are some unsolved problems in game. AI is relatively hard and we don't expect 22Cans to get AI right all the time, but hunting, gathering, farming and harvesting has been successfully implemented in so many games, there is really no excuse for ballsing it up in GODUS (well really not even trying).
|
|
|
|
Post by 13thGeneral on Jan 25, 2015 4:32:41 GMT
They HAD animals in the game - wolves, sheep... um, that's about it - and then they vanished like a few other initial interesting features. Why did they go away, and why haven't they returned?
|
|
|
|
Post by earlparvisjam on Jan 25, 2015 19:10:26 GMT
It's Saturday! Time for our bi-monthly dose of irony. That same crap article was posted on PC Gamer. I even bothered to post because it pissed me off so much. |
|
|
|
Post by 13thGeneral on Jan 25, 2015 22:40:16 GMT
It's Saturday! Time for our bi-monthly dose of irony. That same crap article was posted on PC Gamer. I even bothered to post because it pissed me off so much. It's peculiar that they don't even mention Godus and the controversy and contention surrounding it - because it would be very appropriate to the story, setting Molyneux's credibility to a proper level. At least they could then comment on if he's admitting his mistakes; but he'd never really do that. It's as if this article, like so many others, are purposefully avoiding the issue... is someone paying them off? Because that wouldn't be just unethical, it would be illegal (in many countries). |
|
|
|
Post by earlparvisjam on Jan 26, 2015 1:11:44 GMT
That same crap article was posted on PC Gamer. I even bothered to post because it pissed me off so much. It's peculiar that they don't even mention Godus and the controversy and contention surrounding it - because it would be very appropriate to the story, setting Molyneux's credibility to a proper level. At least they could then comment on if he's admitting his mistakes; but he'd never really do that. It's as if this article, like so many others, are purposefully avoiding the issue... is someone paying them off? Because that wouldn't be just unethical, it would be illegal (in many countries). I hope the writers are reading the responses. I've decided that from now on, when I see another of these crap pieces, I'm going to remind everyone that these writers are missing a much juicier story. |
|
|
|
Post by hardly on Jan 26, 2015 3:28:06 GMT
It's peculiar that they don't even mention Godus and the controversy and contention surrounding it - because it would be very appropriate to the story, setting Molyneux's credibility to a proper level. At least they could then comment on if he's admitting his mistakes; but he'd never really do that. It's as if this article, like so many others, are purposefully avoiding the issue... is someone paying them off? Because that wouldn't be just unethical, it would be illegal (in many countries). I hope the writers are reading the responses. I've decided that from now on, when I see another of these crap pieces, I'm going to remind everyone that these writers are missing a much juicier story. Given the style of recent articles and the outlets chosen I feel like peter is both getting less traction with the media and more scepticism. In some pieces they are quite direct with their questions about hype and reality. The connection between godus and curiosity is interesting because if he doesn't deliver on the God of gods concept that is two promises he's breaking. |
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jan 26, 2015 5:49:44 GMT
I hope the writers are reading the responses. I've decided that from now on, when I see another of these crap pieces, I'm going to remind everyone that these writers are missing a much juicier story. Given the style of recent articles and the outlets chosen I feel like peter is both getting less traction with the media and more scepticism. In some pieces they are quite direct with their questions about hype and reality. That's most likely because some of these "journalists" are ending up looking like fools for wearing their rose-tinted glasses when writing such bubbly stories about such a broken, identity-confused game. |
|
|
|
Post by Aynen on Jan 26, 2015 8:03:28 GMT
It doesn't mean they're being payed off though. Most journalists know that if they ask certain things from certain people, those people will simply no longer talk to them, so those journalists could no longer do their job. If a journalist wants to bring up a difficult issue with the person they are interviewing, they have to go about it very diplomatically, or accept that their journalistic efforts have an expiration date.
This makes honest journalism, whether in games or anywhere else, quite difficult indeed.
|
|
|
|
Post by hardly on Jan 26, 2015 8:26:03 GMT
It doesn't mean they're being payed off though. Most journalists know that if they ask certain things from certain people, those people will simply no longer talk to them, so those journalists could no longer do their job. If a journalist wants to bring up a difficult issue with the person they are interviewing, they have to go about it very diplomatically, or accept that their journalistic efforts have an expiration date. This makes honest journalism, whether in games or anywhere else, quite difficult indeed. Agreed. I also think up until recently most people had a high opinion of peter Molyneux, I know I did. The short comings of his game never bothered me because he always made an honest attempt a good game. Godus on the other hand... |
|
stuhacking
Master
Posts: 170 
Pledge level: Partner
|
Post by stuhacking on Jan 26, 2015 11:24:14 GMT
You guide and shape a species from the cellar level to the space age. You make real choices along the way which determine the races shape, society and physical attributes down the line. During the space age you basically shape entire planets and determine their species, civilisations etc. In presentation it is obviously not a god game, but replace the starship with a divine avatar and how are the actions you take not 'godly' (apart from the trading). It's not a perfect fit, but the player's agency within the game is the closest to a deity I've seen. The game wasn't perfect, but was critically acclaimed and very far from a disaster btw. The expansion....well that was a somewhat different story. What would you consider a closer representation of your ideal of a god game?
I agree there is an element of GOD game about it but personally I see it as more a first person experience of evolution (noting some modes are decidedly not first person). Well, Spore was effectively (but perhaps unintentionally) an interactive demonstration of Intelligent Design. I can't think of a game that better encapsulates that particular argument. As the player, you are in control of choosing the most beneficial attributes of the creatures (or perhaps not.. but the *control* and *design* aspects are undeniable). The only limitation placed is the allocation of 'DNA points'. If Spore was intended to demonstrate evolution, I believe it fell flat if only because it lacked a function of natural selection... (I don't think it's possible for the player to create a creature which is impossible to progress through the tribal phase?) |
|
Lord Ba'al
Supreme Deity
Posts: 6,260
Pledge level: Half a Partner
I like: Cats; single malt Scotch; Stargate; Amiga; fried potatoes; retro gaming; cheese; snickers; sticky tape.
I don't like: Dimples in the bottom of scotch bottles; Facebook games masquerading as godgames.
Steam: stonelesscutter
GOG: stonelesscutter
|
Post by Lord Ba'al on Jan 26, 2015 12:00:45 GMT
Well, it was basically (but perhaps unintentionally) an extremely interactive demonstration of Intelligent Design. I can't think of a game that supports that particular argument better. As the player, you are in control of choosing the most beneficial attributes of the creatures (or perhaps not.. but the *control* and *design* aspects are undeniable). The only limitation placed is the allocation of 'DNA points'. I'm confused here. Are you talking about Godus or some other Molyneux game? |
|
stuhacking
Master
Posts: 170
Pledge level: Partner
|
Post by stuhacking on Jan 26, 2015 12:37:42 GMT
Well, it was basically (but perhaps unintentionally) an extremely interactive demonstration of Intelligent Design. I can't think of a game that supports that particular argument better. As the player, you are in control of choosing the most beneficial attributes of the creatures (or perhaps not.. but the *control* and *design* aspects are undeniable). The only limitation placed is the allocation of 'DNA points'. I'm confused here. Are you talking about Godus or some other Molyneux game? Sorry, was talking about Spore. |
|
Lord Ba'al
Supreme Deity
Posts: 6,260
Pledge level: Half a Partner
I like: Cats; single malt Scotch; Stargate; Amiga; fried potatoes; retro gaming; cheese; snickers; sticky tape.
I don't like: Dimples in the bottom of scotch bottles; Facebook games masquerading as godgames.
Steam: stonelesscutter
GOG: stonelesscutter
|
Post by Lord Ba'al on Jan 26, 2015 14:49:29 GMT
I'm confused here. Are you talking about Godus or some other Molyneux game? Sorry, was talking about Spore. I see, my mistake. |
|
|
|
Post by morsealworth on Jan 26, 2015 15:18:42 GMT
Shit happens. Make a new one.
You can... in  . Damn, why did I even? |
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jan 26, 2015 16:05:42 GMT
Missed this post by SamVT on the Godus Steam forums on the 24th. Can't say I'm surprised.
Originally posted by vv FuMM:
Samvt and george left by their choice as far as I know. I don't think either was pushed. SamVT has some interesting tweets about his time at 22cans if any one can be bothered to search for them. I'd really like to see some further comments from samvt about all that's been happening. The general gist of the tweets was lack of respect (I'm paraphrasing) and peter's lack of comprehension and totally ignoring his paid professionals in their area of expertise. In samvt's case the social/community and communication side of things. This is when the great silence of 2013/2014 really began. Sam was in the process of leaving just before and then shortly after this. Again this is paraphrasing and reading between some lines. If I'm wrong I'm sure sam will jump in and correct me/clear up what actually happened.
Oh. Also it looks like other 22cans'ers have left the studio in the last few weeks.
SamVT
Yes I resigned. It was my own choice but I wanted to keep sane. There will be a time when I can comment further on my experience, but that's in the future, not right now. Let's also not forget I've been close to Peter for over 10 years but haven't spoken or seen him since I left and don't wish to do so either.
I've also heard more people have left in the last few weeks and I'm 100% sure that more people will be leaving very soon(us) .
|
|
Aug 21, 2024 19:32:37 GMT
Aug 21, 2024 19:32:37 GMT
