I''m sometimes seeing reviews of japanese games on TV,
russians also think that these games are too weird.And even very unsafe because instead of doing nice effects japanese games and animations sometimes just use 7hz blinking(it''s same frequency as some signals in brain).

I really like great old Japanese drawings,culture,etc. But i don''t like MODERN japanese animations(including games).I like OLD japanese animations.

IMHO,today japanese games and animations are bad mix of japanese and european(american) cultures.

I may be an AP, which probably will hold no lasting merit or whatnot, but no matter.

quote:
It''s as if the world can be quantified in simple terms if it isn''t something they are passionate about.

I''ve been guilty of this myself but, in my defense, it''s not due to a lack of passion, it''s due to wanting to find a nice way to represent some of the amazing things I see in the world.

Part of the problem is that, with the lack of passion, the feeling of "good enough" comes into play. If it''s truely a passionate endeavor the "good enough" feeling might show up after you''ve beat your head against the wall trying to implement some extra feature or whatnot.

quote:
The answer is exactly those games which the subject matter was something the developers were passionate about - usually something along the lines of elves, orcs, auto racing or military hardware. Is is any coincidence that twenty something individuals involved in the tech/animation industry usually are most interested in that type of subject matter?

Interested? Yes. Passionate? Nah, I really don''t think that''s why there are so many orcs and elves (or even military games) these days. What tends to be the case, if you ask me (and no one did (; ), is that some people are rather passionate about such things and toss out a rather good game (ie D&D pen and paper) and people get accustomed to seeing such things and it therefore appeals to an audience that some other materials wouldn''t. I imagine if someone did a study on original fantasy game sales vs derived fantasy game sales those that are derived would probably have better sales. It''s what people know. They like that.

I thoroughly enjoy a good fantasy RPG, for instance, though I''m rather tired of the standard Tolkien/D&D based games. I don''t mind elves but orcs tend to bore me (; That''s beside the point, though, and what I should say is that I like the fantasy based stuff because I really get into the World of it (ie the more complex and fleshed out the backstory of the societies, the culture, the interactivity of the world etc really get me interested).

Hmm, I''m going to kill my own point here and say that those qualities I enjoy in fantasy based games could very well exist in any setting and I''d enjoy the game. I''m just used to it. I like that. Though the fantasy thing can be done well and provide an interesting setting I would like to use a different setting for an RPG whenever I get to the point of creating one (:

I think the problem lies in genres having very overused (tried and tested to the publishers, probably) settings. RPGs have the classic fantasy world. Shooters have either killing nazis or killing zombies or demons, or some combination/derivative. RTS tends to use military rather heavily and those that don''t are more simulation (though I''d love for someone to correct me and uncover some RTS that''s a bit different than the standard fare).

With independent developers this is a double-edged sword. I find myself often thinking of making a rather classical RPG setting with a great story and some fun gameplay dynamics to differentiate it. If I go for some abnormal (wrt my prior classification) setting, I risk turning off an audience or have the possibility of having something fresh and gaining a better audience from it.

I lean more towards blaming the publishers rather than the developers for the staleness these days. Some of these abnormal games do really quite well whereas others are huge flops. With the high cost of productions on games publishers are looking for sure things, and using this tried and tested formulas over and over and over.

Alright, I meant to argue a point in this post and after starting it realized it was going to be a meander through the discussion with a my ideas but I will say I''m in agreement with Taulin and politely request that bishop qualifies his statements in this thread a bit more, ie:

quote:
Based upon my experiences here, I stand behind the gist of what I said.

That''s all fine and dandy, but is useless in the vein of a discussion.

hm, perhaps I''ll register next time (: