Been awhile since my last post but news has been very dry. I am not saying this is better, but with the upcoming releases of new games in a couple of beloved series I had to write something.
First, the blunt, straight to the point statement:
GET OVER IT!
Now the more rational statement:
Problem is that when a new game in a long runing series comes out, the first thing people do is attack it on EVERYTHING. We'll break this down in catagories yes? Art. Story. Gameplay. Music.
ART
How a game looks is important. We are talking mostly about art style as opposed to poly count in this section. Many series are getting a facelift so they are more updated in comparassion to other games coming out. This seems to hurt most consumers balls....below are a list of series who have run into these dorks.
Heroes of Might and Magic
Originally released in 1994 for DOS and then later in 1995 for Windows 95 by New World Computing, The Heroes of Might and Magic series was one of the first strategy games I got into. The first game had animated sprites and the whole look of the game was very bright and colourful. It was a good game.
Heroes 2 (1996) and still kept the cartoony like look however it was more polished, so it already had the start of moving away from that bright colourful look.
Heroes 3 (1999) is said to be the Holy Grail of the series. The old art style was thrown out and replaced with more realistic 3D models. Still 2D but the art style really took a dive.
Heroes 4 (2002) sadly really took a dive. 3Do (Division of NWC) was in financial hot water, as they were filed for bankruptcy. Heroes 4 was all they had left and when it was released it wasn't received well. The developers wanted to go a different way and make a new Heroes, by changing the art style to the gameplay. The game did okay in sales, but is still said to this day to be the worst.
Heroes of Might and Magic (entire Might and Magic series) is sold to Ubisoft.
So where does all this "YOU RUINED IT!" crap come in? Ubisoft had Nival Entertainment (a game developer in Russia) develop Heroes 5. As soon as a screen and trailer was released all HELL broke loose. Many gamers of the series claimed that the series was ruined by adding a very WoW (World of Warcraft) look to the game (because heroes 1 and 2 weren't already colourful and BRIGHT), to adding a 3D map (before it was 2D. So now you can look in any direction).
I guess upgraded graphics scare people.
Diablo
I never played the first Diablo, but I have played through Diablo 2. And I liked it, a lot. Was dark, gritty, lots of killing and classic Good vs Evil. So when Blizzard announced Diablo 3, many people were excited about it. Gameplay looked smooth, and the art was colourful (still gritty) and very polished looking. Then again it's Blizzard Entertainment and anything they announce/release is something to look forward to.
Unless you are a so called, hard core Loser - I mean - Diablo fan, then Diablo 3 will look like your worst nightmare. People accused it of looking like WoW (Also a Blizzard product)...it got so bad that people actually sent a petition with 50,000 signatures on it for Blizzard to change the art style back to Diablo 2 (that's why you guys are morons), after Blizzard had been working on the game for 4 years prior to announcement. You idiots realise that to change the art style means to pretty much start over again? Hey if you guys want to pay for it go ahead.
Blizzard being the smart people that they are, threw the petition into the shredder. Where it belongs. Seriously, why the HELL would I want to buy a game that is going to be $70, next year that looks like it was made 11 years ago? Screw that! Diablo 2 had some of the worst lighting ever. Half the time I didn't know where I was going, or what was in front of me. Some things blended too much into the ground textures and what not.
Play Diablo 2 then if you like it so much.
Thief
F***......this series has some of the most rude, ill informed people ever. True many series do, but these people start wars over what the Hell platform it should be released for. But I have to give them credit, at least they don't start art wars like the Heroes or Diablo "fans".
The original Thief series was very blocky in terms of appearance. Everyone was either a stack of cubes or a badly animated polygon. Then again it was first released in 1998 and 3D games were starting to really emerge. Then again it was most remembered for its setting and atmpshpere and not really its graphics. In 2000, Looking Glass Studios was closed and the Series went under the guide of its publisher (Eidos) and in 2004, Thief 3 or Thief: Deadly Shadows was released (Ion Storm) and it got a 21st Century update. Well at least the models aren't blocky anymore, but I admit the atmosphere wasn't really there as much as it was in the previous games. It's still a good game but not AS great as Thief 2. ButI wasn't arguing that it should look like Thief 2.....
Thief 4 was announced last year at GDC, and will be developed by Edios Montreal. There isn't a lot of info on it at this time.
(Part 2 coming....)
