Lateralus
More [H]uman than Human
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2004
- Messages
- 18,538
- One I already made two posts ago - games do not have to have huge budgets to be enjoyable.It was just not to reput the whole video in there, lot of good points (not sure which you meant obviously has you do not point which one?), a lot of misinformed points as well....
- As many of those franchises become popular, they are often guilty of becoming extremely formulaic (Assassin's Creed). This is a problem with American cinema as well, and why a lot of people are growing tired of the superhero and Star Wars crap that keep getting endlessly rehashed. This causes a lot of gamers to go and seek out new, fresh and exciting experiences in other games that aren't bound to existing sets of lore that have been beaten to death over the past 20+ years. Games that weren't bound by huge corporations, DEI initiatives, and most importantly shareholders where profit comes above ALL else, fun and creativity included.
- Actually, after seeing the stats on Americans who are fine eating McDonald's and don't travel, read, or experience incredible indie films...it's no wonder so many are happy with overpriced, undelivered games that cater to the lowest common denominator.
- There's more but I've already burned 20 mins of my lunch on this.
Extremely well said.AAA games are by definition high-budget, so they will always at the very least look better than indie games, but they are also very conservative, targeting established markets and producing very little that is new. Indie games on the other hand span a wide range from Babby's First Gaem with literally 0 budget, up to games from well-established developers with relatively large budgets that compare well to AAA games. They frequently stray far from the beaten path, which means a lot of failures, but also some great successes.
Take a game like a pet shop after dark. It's poorly drawn, has barely servicable writing, and is very short. Nonetheless it has gameplay that you will never, ever see in an AAA game. It's a game that made me smile all the way through. That's not a double-standard, it's judging it by how much I enjoyed it.
And there are quite a few indie games that can be compared more directly with AAA games. For instance, I think Trepang² is a better single-player FPS than most AAA games. While not quite as pretty, it looks good enough, and it's a full-sized, smooth experience.
In the end, I think if I was forced to choose between only ever playing AAA games or indie games, I would choose the indie games because they are so diverse, while most AAA games are just more of the same.
There are, for sure, a plethora of indie games that will never interest me.
There are also, for sure, AAA games like RDR2 that completely eclipse the writing, story, graphics and gameplay that you'd typically expect to see in an indie game. But I don't want every game to be RDR2. I don't want every game I play to cost $70 or be a 30/50/100 hour experience.
I've never played A Pet Shop After Dark, but I agree with the premise behind your statement 100% based on some other indie games I've played. There are a ton of fresh and interesting ideas that you will never see in an AAA game. Contrary to some opinions, that doesn't necessarily mean they're bad. There are a plethora of reasons that a developer might not be associated with a large studio and I'm willing to bet that raw talent isn't the only one.
I welcome all the things happening in independent spaces right now as I think they're vital to the industry. I think overall, gamers benefit from having both camps to influence each other. It drives some indie devs to make games with more quality while also keeping some of the big boys in check when they blow hundreds of millions on something that "doesn't meet shareholder expectations" and bombs, forcing layoffs.