Not going to lie, this video is pretty shit.
It was already a rough start but the claim that people didn't say things like "the graphics look incredible" was so ridiculous I had to pause it, especially while simultaneously showing clips from around the 7th gen. We absolutely praised games for their graphics back then (and much earlier), not just in terms of technological advancement over other titles but as things that were visually pleasing even outside of being a game. 7th Gen is actually notable for how aggressive the marketing around graphics became.
We did not, in fact, talk mostly about the stories of games. For a long time video game writing was widely considered unimportant. There were exceptions of course, though this thinking was so wide spread that I think younger gamers might be surprised to find that even RPG stories were often secondary - at best - to the game play for a long time. Story became a much larger feature once voice acting came to prominence in the mid-00s, but it would take awhile to catch on.
The author then states that Assassin's Creed 2 and Black Flag had memorable stories. What? I played both at the time, and had enjoyed both, but their stories were entirely forgettable. The writing of the series was even kind of a punch line at the time. You know the thing people really talked about with Assassin's Creed 2? How cool it was to parkour through such a beautiful recreation of renaissance Italy.
The stuff about how there were no microtransactions back then is nonsense as well. The period he keeps going back to for old games was the rise of this bullshit. Oblivion's horse armor was already years earlier.
The vibe of this video is just an awkward teenager lamenting he wasn't born in his imagined version of an earlier time.
The disappointing thing is, I do actually prefer older games. I think there is a wealth of interesting discussion about the things that were done differently. This video just isn't it.
Reviews for the OG Doom called the graphics amazingly realistic. It's easy to forget that when they came out, each generation defining game was the cutting edge of consumer technology, doing things that seemed impossible even a year previously.
Horse Armor was 2006. The year Todd ruined everything. I will forever remember that notorious day.
The time he's taking about was during a time when people were lamenting DLC and other things. The 7th gen (which is a part of the modern era of games as far as I'm concerned) was the beginning of all the things wrong with modern games. The monitsation, the "grizzled white dude" BS, and the push towards US military propaganda. Fuck the 7th gen.
(which is a part of the modern era of games as far as I’m concerned)
Yeah I was ready to shake my fist at the the idea these were "old" games, but in fairness we're talking about 15 years ago. It's entirely possible the creator of the video wasn't even born yet when Oblivion was released. It's way longer than we used to give games before we considered them old, though I think that's a result of how rapid obvious progress was - which has slowed down drastically.
Him fawning over the Witcher 3 as an old game from another era cracked me up though.
It's entirely possible the creator of the video wasn't even born yet when Oblivion was released.
this makes my back ache
I disagree about the stories in RPGs bit. Maybe true of western RPGs, but jRPGs were routinely praised for storytelling. Indeed, 95-2005ish was their golden age
It's easy to look back on JRPG classics today, but 95-05 was also the dark ages of localization. So many titles got mangled that the mainstream perception of JRPGs was very similar to bad cult movies, especially during the trend chasing rush after Final Fantasy VII's success.
Even those that avoided translation butchery were still highly divisive outside of it's niche fanbase. The "western" RPG and JRPG divide was largely defined by people arguing over them in the 00s after western RPGs made their shift towards being narrative focused. The primary need for distinction, for the "western" RPG set at least, was that JRPG writing was seen as pretty poor. Ironic given some of the absolute slop "western" RPGs had put out that was being conveniently ignored in this argument, but I digress.
But that aside, yeah my anecdote was made with western RPGs in mind. There was a heavy emphasis on dungeon crawling and questing as a barebones narrative excuse to adventure. Kill monsters, get treasure. It's very much like the history of D&D in that way (not by accident). It's not until the late 90s, with games like Fallout and Baldur's Gate, that a shift occurred.
Even then, that shift was hardly over night. What defined something as an RPG was a big debate among that crowd. The systems crowd argued it was the mechanical structures brought over from TTRPGs, while the new wave of fans argued it was the narrative elements that made it unique. This hit it's peak as the genre hybridized with 'action' games and started to shed many of the TTRPG structures.
But that's all kind of irrelevant history. The video, and my response, is talking about broad popular trends and conceptions at the time. There were always exceptions, but the era the video mostly fawns over still hadn't even settled the "can games be art?" debate. The medium was still seen as very low-brow as a whole.
The primary need for distinction, for the "western" RPG set at least, was that JRPG writing was seen as pretty poor. Ironic given some of the absolute slop "western" RPG slop that was being conveniently ignored in this argument, but I digress.
I think many WRPG fans just had a negative kneejerk reaction to the aesthetics of JRPGs. They saw colourful anime characters with wacky hair and cute creatures and just instantly rejected them
Assassin's Creed 2 is specifically a terrible example for story since it started with a great past/present premise and turned it into incomprehensible bullshit with alien/gods that can see through time speaking directly to the main character through his ancestor from the past or something? Just a complete train wreck
This video really activates the Morrowind cells in my brain haha.
Wish it was longer, though. I could listen to discussions about older games all day. Some days I do lol. I agree with the points but it’s too bad the video doesn’t get real gritty with the details (tech limitations, development details, different visions/expectations, etc.) Although obviously it wasn’t trying to be that kind of video.
Now to hijack this reply for my own discussion lol:
He brings up Assassin’s Creed a bunch, which reminds me that I’ve wanted to do an effort post on the series’s inspirations and how Ubisoft both helped and squandered its potential.
The very first Assassin’s Creed game takes heavy influence from the 1938 Slovenian/Italian novel Alamut (which I’ve yet to read). It’s kind of like the novel The Crucible, which uses a historical narrative (in this case, the story of Hasan-i Sabbah and the Hashshashin) to tell a meta-narrative about anti-fascist movements in Italy that opposed Benito Mussolini.
The original idea of the first game seemed to apply some of these concepts of radical opposition of fascist control to a story about modern day Assassins that are opposed to the capitalist control over the modern world.
Obviously, we now get, well, Assassin’s Creed as it is today. I’ve been meaning to do some research because I’m really curious. I want to do a leftist reading of the first couple of games, plus the novel and other inspirations.
Assassin's Creed II Brotherhood was good and I disagree.Yeah but counterpoint: the Assassin aesthetic was the only thing that kept the 2007-2013 military bro shooters at bay. Plus social stealth is a genre that really needs to come back because I love stealth games.
Boy, shouldn't we be so thankful that Assassin's Creed "kept the bro shooters at bay" so that Ubisoft could refine the vomitous open-world sandbox slop in time so that the industry could pivot to that after Far Cry became massive. As far as games that were an antidote to modern military shooters, I'd have picked the Bioshock games, Saint's Row or Stalker myself.
Assassins Creed has only ever come close to being a stealth game with Unity, which is really weird. That's the closest the series ever got to the Hitman-style closed playground though, plus the climbing mechanics actually sort of worked. I am forever baffled that Unity is the only good one
The difference is that Bioshock, Saint's Row, and Stalker are all actually good games.
Ubisoft has no intention of churning out anything but hot garbage, so I'd rather my hot garbage look like Assassin's Creed than Tom Clancy. I was busy playing Metal Gear Solid and Ace Combat anyway, so I just liked seeing the cool Assassin coats. Plus I'll take "you fistfight the pope" over "the Russians and Chinese have teamed up to declare war on freedom because they're evil."
Also, Unity is only a decent stealth game imo because it added a crouch button and actually tried to make the level layout promote stealth and hiding. I miss the AC era where they tried to put an emphasis on hiding in crowds and using distractions, even if it was complete dogshit because the games were ass.
Idk, I like Bioshock as a setting and for dunking on Ayn Rand, but as a game it's kind of an offensively poor facsimile of the first System shock =)
They used to make good games though, like I enjoyed the reboot Prince of Persias and all, but Assassin's Creed kind of layed the groundwork for their open world trash era. I'd also rather have a game that looks like Chaos Theory or Double Agent than the first Assassin's Creed's goofy blue filter all over it. AC does at least have better politics than a chud shooter, and I can appreciate some Fuck The Church sentiment.
Crouch was so desperately needed, why did that take them so long? I really liked Unity's big crowds that would panic and disperse, it felt like more of a challenge than just hiring courtesans or monks in AC 1 or 2. I really felt that Unity is the only time they did any of this right, and then they ditched it a year later because lol
nuclear take incoming, defcon 5: assassin's creed 3 was the best in the series and the entire series is pretty ok, like 7/10.
meltdown take contained behind spoiler
assassin's creed 4 was the worst one of the series, the parkour is worse than AC3 for trees and wilderness and every city is like a tiny town with 20 buildings. dual wielding 2 long-ish swords of the same length is stupid, the boats were boring and grindy despite being kinda interesting at first, and despite the fact that the cover shows this you cannot wield both a sword and a flintlock like a real poirate.
I didn't finish 3 but it didn't strike me as dramatically different from the others?
And counterpoint: being a pirate is funny. The climbing is worse but it also hadn't ever been good to that point; it was kind of okay in AC1 and it declined in quality over the next few games as it moved toward a "just hold right trigger to climb" philosophy. I understand that climbing needed to change from the Prince of Persia method because that kind of system was designed for linear levels and AC needed open worlds, but they started badly and fucked it up worse lol.
The boats are kind of grindy but I liked them anyway, it was way more interesting than the mandatory side mission bs in the first couple AC games or having to run/horseride across the world to get to it. AC4 was goofy but I was in full support of AC not being its usual dogshit self, tbh.
eh the first assassin's creed was boring as hell. It was not that much more than a tech demo.
I really enjoyed the setting and general vibes of the first Assassin's Creed, but I hated the stupid overarching sci-fi plot, though that criticism goes for the entire series. Drop the Animus, Assassins, Templars and the ancient aliens and just make an anthology of historical games about an Italian man makes it his life's mission to punch the pope or whatever
AC2 does this thing where the guy (I forget his name) actually does some stuff in the real world, and I think if they had paid that off in AC3 by having it set in a future dystopian city it would have worked. That may have originally been the plan too, since AC 2 ends with a scene where you fight mooks in the real world and there's some shit with the apple and the female lead character dies and it's all dramatic.
But I think the Ubisoft execs got cold feet and put the kibosh on anything interesting that might have happened, leading to essentially an entire series that just has to keep recreating the AC 2-based games over and over in slightly different settings. Now they're trapped in limbo, forced to put a modern day plot on every game but unable to do anything interesting with it since that would change the formula and we can't have that.
AC3 did actually have more bits with Desmond Miles, aka the most boring Nolan North character ever. There were even combat sections and I distinctly remember an underwhelming chase sequence where you kill the bearded Templar scientist who was the main villain of the modern day plotline in the Altair and Ezio games.
The female lead didn't die in AC2, but the next game, AC Brotherhood. I seem to recall hearing somewhere that the actress playing her was contracted for 3 games and intended to have a pivotal role in the originally envisioned trilogy, but then AC2 was a huge hit so Ubisoft turned Assassin's Creed into a yearly franchise, starting with the two Ezio spinoffs in between 2 and 3. Her contract was up so they just killed the character off in a filler episode
Oh yeah I 100% agree. I’ve played a little and it’s bland as all hell. But I think the writing and ideas had plenty of potential, whether or not Ubisoft followed up with it lol
Eh if I squit my eyes realy hard I can see a way to make those arguments, but its mostly badly presented. Yes there are valid points, the lack of innovation is inexcusable etc. So I'll focus on what I found to be somewhat hilarious given I'm also a millenial.
I think he is talking about Ubisoft Montreal as "Ubisoft" in general, saying that AC 1 era Ubisoft was a "small developer"
During this period, in 2005, the government of Quebec gave Ubisoft CA$5 million to expand with anticipation of reaching 2,000 employees by 2010.[15] In 2007, with already 1,600 employees, the government increased to CA$19 million to reach 3,000 employees by 2013, which would make Ubisoft Montreal the world's largest game development studio.[16]
Yeah bro, I got you, smol beans indie dev youbisoft out there in 2007 with casualy hiring 1600 employees and receiving Canadian government funding. lol
Anyway you don't need to wikipedia his ass, if you're an actual millenial like he is you'd remember Splinter Cell, Rainbow Six Vegas, Far Cry and other "minor" games like Silent Hunter series.
Again I don't know if he is talking them as publishing or devs so who knows.
The graphics = better discourse was always there since the PS2 era. Actualy I mean hello? The PS2 was revolutionary in part because of the huge jump in graphics quality, MGS2 and FFX were well regarded for having absurd graphics for the time. Of course they were great games. But Kojima was always looking seriously at having the best graphics available at the time.
For example MGS 2 detailed environmental effects even some games today struggle to get that detail. This was in 2000 on a PS2. Sure not every game wanted to be MGS2, but if his premise is people did not care about graphics then that is definitely untrue. The difference was just that high quality was expensive and therefore unattainable for most devs. Today its absolutely dirt cheap you can get 4k HD textures for free almost as an indie solo dev lol.
The FF franchise was also historicaly the big new gen push for Sony, the flagship product. I remember, I know because I was one of the suckers that I almost bought a PS3 specificaly for FF13.
Just go back to the beginning of the console wars shit even. Gamers constantly trying to shill the next big shitty game with great graphics in 2020? No, 2016? No, 2010? No they were doing that in 2006.
The microtransaction shit. Yeah obviously back then they did full expansion packs but don't forget, the fucking horse armor was an Oblivion DLC released in April 3, 2006. Yes its terrible now. But people like him are already severely underestimating how far back it goes.
Its sad to see but he is mostly coming with rose tinted glasses and nostalgia here. This great era of gaming existed for maybe 5 years somewhere in the 1990's maybe.
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
I actually liked the graphics and sound limitations of older games (not the earliest 3d but like, late 90s mid 2000s 3d) because the world's were usually small enough to put all the interesting stuff close together and the shittier graphics meant you had to use your imagination, which in turn immersed you more in the world. I try to play new open world photo realistic stuff and I just lose interest because even though it took so much work to make and is a technical marvel, it isn't exciting.
That or I'm just old
The PS2 was kind of in a sweet spot where you had enough graphical horsepower that everything wasn't an abstract blurry mess of blocks like on the previous generation and game design hadn't completely reached the homogeneity it would later
I found a YouTube link in your post. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
