Hi
I wounder why the developers can't just remake games like moo,mom?
They remake movies all the time why can't they just remake our favorite video games?
I know a mom remake just update the ai graphics would sell a 1000s of copies yet they try things like elemental...I guess it will be a ok game once they finish it but wont ever be as good a mom!
They don't even have to call it mom no need to buy the licence just change the names of specific spells most of the races books spells are genaric fantasy.
If gamplay is the same mabe a boost in the graphics larger maps better ai maybe some new spells events etc they prob could do it in 6months 1yr.
The company who does this will make a fortune!
Look at the civ series they put out the same game with a face lift and few new features ever 1-2 years and it sells like hot cakes!
Why can't stardock do that moo mom I know they have the skill just not the will!
I assume you mean Stardock devs, and not just game devs in the whole industry. To a large extent, I agree with you. And they do, too, when you look at Impulse re-releasing old titles really cheap. But you have to think like a dev: they've got all this creative energy they want to express, and they won't be entirely happy releasing someone else's idea for the rest of their careers. The glory goes to the guy who dreamed up MoM--not the guy who polished the graphics and re-released it. So while it may be good business to re-release old titles, it's also good business to keep your developers happy, too.
That said, I would love to see Galciv2 loaded down with tons of trinkets and weird stuff; just the same way you love to see lots and lots of items and spells and artifacts in fantasy games. I think that is plenty creative, and it's not hard work that a junior developer can do. I'd do it myself if Galciv2 was an Open Source. Probably you would spend 99% of your time balancing and playtesting. Well, maybe not playtesting, because you've got a whole community out there delighted to playtest it for you. They built a little modding into Galciv2, but a lot of the stuff I would want can't be modded.
There are other reasons as well such as what was considered a AAA game in the 90s wouldn't sell commercially. Or another common one is that what was expressed in the 90s with sprites would have to be rendered as 3D models which is vastly more expensive.
That's one of the reasons why iPhone/iPad and Xbox Live Arcade games are taking off. You can get away with making lower scope games that are like classics.
One of my favorite games of all time is XCOM. But if you were to make it today (assume graphics enhanced) it would probably be fine on a GameBoy or an Iphone but you couldn't tell it as a AAA game on the PC. They'd have to greatly increase the scope or "re-envision it".
Well to tell the truth I don't think 3d graphics are necessary for tbs games....a nice looking maps with icons that i can tell from a whats in the stack and what type of
terrain it's on is all i want/need.
What i mean by improved graphic is being able to see this info on a large scale map such as the cloth map from elemental...or the strat map from gal civ..I play most of the time on this lvl rather then zoomed in to see the 3d stuff.
While 3d stuff is ok i much rather have good ui and faster scolling and not crash every 10 mins
Give me gameplay good ai a easy UI sound& graphics in that order.
What developers usealy do graphics & eycandy first then ui then gameplay....I still play mom & moo because the gamplay sucks you in and you forget the 1980 graphics.
I played HOMM1 through HOMM5 and I'm loving it. HOMM's original graphics were pretty cheesy (although I liked it...), and now HOMM5 is the same basic game but with lots of campaigns and the same 3D engine as King's Bounty:AP. I love it. The reviews don't seem to agree, though. I guess you have to fight a glass ceiling of 8/10 when you do a remake. Starcraft 2 is almost a spitting image of the first and it's wildly successful, although that's not a perfect analogy: remake Warcraft I, and that would be a better analogy. And even that had WC2 & 3 and SC1 and 2 in between.
Ooooooh I know what would be aaaaawwwwwesome!!! Remake Nethack, but make it a real-time first-person RPG and give it graphics! OMG that would be a cult. I would leave Diablo III on the shelf to play that. Biggest catch would be that Nethack was loaded to the hilt with Easter Eggs, and that might be a bit hard to copy.
I agree so many games just have to be remade using modern ai maybe a bit of graphics but keep the gameplay.
I think with a few patchs Elemental would make a homm I still don't see mom in it maybe with 1.1
It's the old gameplay that I want remade. copy the gameplay and then maybe try adding new features like the elemental dyansty system added to mom would be fun.
I have to agree with Frogboy. People's expectations of games have changed drastically since the 80s and 90s. Back in the 80s one of the best games I ever played was Rogue. Today a pure remake of Rogue who be criticized (Read: rip to shreds by almost everyone) as a pathetic Diablo knock off. Or how about Super Pitfall, a remake of that would be ripped apart as a pathetic attempt at a platform game. Even the original Rampage would suffer horribly if someone tried an updated re-release (yes I know there was a new rampage back in the 90s but when you compare the 2 versions you'll see easily it was more than an re-release).
Now 90s games, look at the original Warcraft. That game wouldn't survive the critics with only a 'face-lift'. "Only 2 factions? and they don't even play that differently?" Or maybe MoM as you suggest "Horribly unbalanced." "Basic city building." "Doesn't do anything innovative with the genre." etc... The trouble is game review sites base their reviews heavily on graphics, innovation (that works).
Another problem is a lot of things that worked really well in 2d simply do not work in a 3d game but any game that is not 3d gets destroyed by critics as having 'bad graphics'. Look at the Ultima series for an example. The shift over to 3d was not good for the series. Ultima 8 is none to affectionately called 'Super Avatar Bros' because they changed the formula to integrate some level of 3d-ish appearance. Or Ultima 9 where it went full 3d. Problem is 3d doesn't support parties in rpgs very well.
People also want 'real-time combat' and don't want to 'wait for loading screens'. Look what that did for the Final Fantasy series. The shift to real-time combat without loading screens did not do good things for the series. Although to be fair that series started its downward spiral with the shift to 3d graphics as well. As Frogboy mentioned 3d models are much more expensive and more expensive means less overall content. Take a look at FF6 vs. FF10 for the amount of stuff in the game, size of the world, and places to go. The difference is caused by graphics.
Another factor is probably that in the days of 'poor graphics' there were far more game companies around and so it was a more competitive market. As is always the case competition produces a better product. However today companies like EA buying up all the competition they can reduces competition and as competition decreases so does quality because it becomes "buy our product or don't have anything." The high expectations of the graphics of a game also ensures that Joe Blow can't make a killer game in his garage anymore, at least not one that most people will play.
In a nut-shell in the 80s and 90s most of the development time and money was focused on gameplay because graphics were much more basic. The more time and money spent on pretty pictures the less time and money there is for the actual gameplay part of the game. Ironically many people will refuse to play retail games with bad graphics and yet as Frogboy pointed out they will spend hours on cell-phone games, browser games, and facebook apps which generally have terrible graphics by today's standards because no one expects good graphics from those so as long as the gameplay is good they play it.
Sorry if you disagree but in my opinion the heyday of games was 1990-1998 (give or take a few years) and to a large extent it has been downhill since with a few exceptions.
Does Doom 3 count as a remake? If so, then that remake kicked FPS ass!
For it to happen either the majority of gamers would need to stop judging games by the pretty screen shots / trailers, or developers will need to crank up the prices (and people be willing to pay them) to where they can afford to put in the time and funding into doing a remake that matches the original, only with better graphics. Neither seems likely to happen soon.
might as well remake some of the old classics because im getting tired of the same types of games from different companies every quarter..
There is one company you may want to look at if you want "different", and that is Soldak Entertainment.
If they remade your favorite game like they remake movies and old TV shows into movies, you'd be very disappointed.
Oh, but what about the Lord of the Rings trilogy? That's a remake. Lion, Witch, and the Wardrobe is a remake. Both of those remakes are fantasy, both overhauled the graphics, and both are AWESOME.
Rogue is a direct ancestor to Nethack. Incidentally, Rogue also birthed Moria (a close sibling of Nethack), which in turn birthed Umoria, which in turn Blizzard freely admits heavily influenced the original Diablo design.
What you're saying would be a pathetic ripoff, I am saying would be an AWESOME remake. I would borrow from Diablo in that you would be hacking at monsters in real-time (and maybe sharing a dungeon with 5 other people--something Nethack/Rogue did NOT do). But if you make the interface more Doom-like, that right there makes it not look like Diablo at all. More like Wizardry. And that's just the start of it. Nethack in its late stages (as in for the Mac II) had like 50 levels, you started off with a dog for your companion, tons and tons of secrets and easter eggs, shops throughout the dungeon, but you were allowed to shoplift (but that meant pissing off Asidonhopo the shopkeeper, and you did NOT want to piss him off!!!), and tons of keystone kops came after you and blinded you with creme pies. You could get telepathy or clairvoyance and that would partially counteract the blindness. It's just a different ballgame.
In fact--Nethack is still alive and well: http://nethack.wikia.com/wiki/Forum:Watercooler . We're talking a game using ASCII graphics, been around for a couple decades. People are still recompiling it, porting it, hacking it.
I think there is a growing trend of gamers that are fed up of just shiny 3D games with QTE, epic CGI cutscenes, for games that have content, features and... deep gameplay.
I've been spellbound with games like Dwarf Fortress & Space Station 13. In no way are those games on par in terms of graphics with today's AAA titles. Hell once is ascii based the other tilesets. But the game has so many features, possibilities that it gives them that extra something that makes you look past the graphics and immerse yourself in a unique gameplay experience.
I mean, look at how Minecraft exploded on the PC gaming scene. It's a bit shocking given the fact it's still in it's alpha stages and yet has gotten the attention of so many.
I hope this serves as a lesson to the big publishers/developers that it's not all about the beautiful and the shiny, gameplay stands for more than people think. Sadly, a lot of people are content with dribbled down gameplay for a few shiny 3d models, but I think there might still be hope.
More content, more features, more gameplay please!
Cheers,
V
I would love if they remade the old command and conquer series. Though have someone rather than EA do it, since they botched RA3 C&C3 and C&C4
I suppose it's not very nice of me to bring that up.
You're damaging us all.
We need remakes of Dark Wizard, Warsong, Brigandine, or Alpha Centauri. Come on Frog, you got millions and shit, lets make my dreams happen with your money!
Dominions3 is completely sprites-based and has 82 overall score on metacritic. EU series don't have shiny 3D, and are well-received too. AoW:SM is sprites-based, and you can see sells stats on Impulse yourself, I'm sure they are good enough for such old game
Whenever I see franchise moving to 3D, I always think that they are just shooting themself in the foot. Just look at Space Empires, IV was popular and awesome, and when they moved to 3D in V, it got haunted with bugs and sucked, becoming end of series.
I like Space empires v. Dominions 3 is the shit, love that game. I need to finish that Shining Force mod nation I was working on...
God I *loved* XCOM. I was so excited at hearing about the reboot I just went and google'd only to find from 2k's press release that this is going to be... a first person shooter....
That makes me a saaaad panda.
Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic came out around the time spite graphics were at their best. It does however use a 3D mesh with textures for the terrain (which worked out very well).
Not all franchises do bad when transitioning, but they really need to think about what they are doing if they go that route. Full 3D is a bad choice if it is not made an important part of the gameplay (meaning movement in all three dimensions), otherwise partial 3D can be better if the 3D and 2D graphics are of comparable quality (like the terrain in AoW:SM and the character models in Beyond Divinity that allowed for players to design their character).
Some games that make good use of full 3D: the Black and White series, 3D flight games, and RPGs/other genres where you are only controlling one character in real time.
For Elemental, the only uses for 3D in it are unit designing and selecting units hiding behind a dragon (why can it not be just clicking the tile, rather than the tile or the unit? it would avoid this problem).
In Jagged Alliance 2 (or was that from the 1.13 mod?) you can hold SHIFT to tag the selector to the ground, ignoring all hotspots such as doors, chests... and units.Easy way to make a unit move to a square "behind" another unit, that you would normally have trouble hitting with the pointer.
Personally 'd have no problem with a semi-3D isometric environment (XCom etc.) but reviewers would probably throw a fit about not being able to rotate the map - even if it's utterly useless to do so.
XCom was playable on the 2d "cloth map", too. Every tile also had a top-down representation.
A little part of the gaming industry was scared away with the invention of 3d.
It ocasionaly comes out of hiding, but not for long. Hard to say what exactly the part is, but its one of the best parts.
Why didn't the world stop in 1992 back when it seemed like a breve new world? Answer is there is no Golden Age until it is long passed into memory, that is when it gets good. As per a recent question " why don't we go back to gas light to employ people?" !
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:
Sign in or Create Account
