complex games are made because they can be made.
You dont see metal gear solid being made in 1989 do you.
Think back to the days of the snes, most games were great, all had great gameplay. Then come to next gen. I dont know how many of you have seen the advert for the x-box about how great the games are, ''cause the way I see it is that they have great grafix but barely any of its games have gameplay. So as technology develops so will games because they can. Its like you dont see many people using a typewriter anymore.
Shame really the snes gameplay is still the best, another reason why the gameboy advance is the best selling console because its basically a snes.
Now days you dont get the same feeling. I also suppose that you need a good idea. If someone thought of tetris today it would still be a hit, but with a little more flavour.

Tetris is the kinda game you play when you are bored and you dont have to be a fan of gaming to play it. Sorta like plug and play, not plug, read instuctions, do tutorial, read help file, play for 1 hour to get used to it.

I rule the universe, you just dont know it yet

complexity/simplicity
who cares?
what it all boils down to is how good the gameplay is.
a game could have the worlds best graphics but if the gameplay is shotty and not enjoyable.. then no one is going to buy it.
making a simple idea that people can enjoy is one of the hardest things to do. having yourself a complex game is a little easier to make enjoyable for the player cause there are more elements to tweak.

quote:
Shame really the snes gameplay is still the best, another reason why the gameboy advance is the best selling console because its basically a snes.

agreed. the gameboy advance has 32bit power but none of the 3d hardware distractions. developers have to focus solely on gameplay to make their games sell for this. they can''t boast "BEST 3D ENGINE!" or "BEST GRAPHICS" in order for their games to become successful.

"The human mind is limited only by the bounds which we impose upon ourselves." -iNfuSeD

quote: Original post by iNfuSeD
what it all boils down to is how good the gameplay is.

Let me correct your statement:

"What it all boils down to is how FUN the GAME is"

As you said, It doesn''t care if it is complex/simplex. Jumping the cord is fun, flying an F-14 is fun. Telematch''s Pong was fun, Unreal Tournament is fun. And even games which have a bad gameplay (not too much anoying) can be fun. If the game is fun, people will play it. The rest are details.

quote: Original post by iNfuSeD
agreed. the gameboy advance has 32bit power but none of the 3d hardware distractions. developers have to focus solely on gameplay to make their games sell for this. they can''t boast "BEST 3D ENGINE!" or "BEST GRAPHICS" in order for their games to become successful.

You know, there are several 3d games for GBA, Doom and Doom2 for example. Of course it''s not hardware accelerated gfx...yet

-Luctus

I mainly asked this question because the game ideas disscussed on the board are of the more complex nature...and I was wondering why simpler games are never disscussed here in the game design forum.

quote:
making a simple idea that people can enjoy is one of the hardest things to do.

I think that sums it up best. complexity is easy to do...you can always add more and more stuff...this isn''t to say that complexity is easy to do well...but that it is very easy to add complexity to a game idea....it''s much harder to strip a complex game down into a simple one.

For example in GTA3, players can listen to the radio...they can turn it on, switch channels, and turn it off...it doesn''t really add anything to the gameplay...and players interaction with it is very limited...at best gameplay wise it can act like a mirror, by reflecting what players have already done/what they know about/and what is to come story wise...but all in all interacting with it is more of a illusion...the reason it is in the game is for game immersion...just one more "realistic" option for the player to mess with...players can''t call in and request certain songs to be playied, nor can they change the role of thier character into a radio station DJ.

Also game focus isn''t a myth...in a flight sim the focus is on flying a airplane, not on driveing a car, of performing brain surgery...game focus is "the arena that a game explicitly defines as haveing worthwhile gameplay interactive features"...the radio in GTA isn''t explicitly in the games focus because interaction with it is not paramount throughout the game...in one area/mission it may provide a signifigant story clue...but in others it is little more then background noise...success in the game doesn''t depend on the player "mastering" the radio for each area/mission...Tetris has a very narrow game focus...GTA has a wide game focus...in Tetris, everything seen/heard at all times is in support of the game focus (not exactly part of it, but it allows the player to make better assestments of the game state..."next piece" indicator..."lines" and "level" scores, etc..) But in GTA3, the radio isn''t always in support of the gameplay (immersion, yes...gameplay, no) and players must "master" driveing and various forms of fighting to find success in the game...the focus is wider.

This has nothing to do with whether GTA3 is a good/bad game...or whether complex/simple games are better...or what people prefer...this only has to do with my original question of "why simple game ideas are not being disscussed here on the form?"...

and I now think that: "making a simple idea that people can enjoy is one of the hardest things to do." pretty much sums up the answer

...there''s that, but also there just isn''t as much to talk about with a simple game

quote: Original post by MSW
and I now think that: "making a simple idea that people can enjoy is one of the hardest things to do." pretty much sums up the answer

The reason why I'm not interested in designing simple games isn't because I think it'd be too hard. One of the biggest reasons why I'm not interested in designing them is because the audience for simple games is generally vastly different from complex games. You could probably equate:
simple games -> casual gamers
complex games -> hardcore gamers

Also:
simple games -> shareware/GBA/indie games
complex games -> AAA retail games

Now don't flame me saying this isn't always true. I _know_ this isn't always the case. It's just a generalization I tend to see.

I think most people here want to design the next Counter-strike, Everquest, Baldur's Gate, not a simple shareware puzzle game. I want to design a game respected by my peers, who are hardcore gamers, not casual gamers.

[edited by - beantas on November 4, 2002 7:12:19 PM]

I think I paid about $40 Cdn for Tetris around the time it first came out.

Most of us live in at least two worlds. The real world and the world within. Making complex games is a subconsious desire to turn the real world, where we''re at the mercy of circumstance, into that world within where everything is right and happy.

Well, that''s probably not 100% true 100% of the time.

I''d say that simple games aren''t discussed here because they''re tougher to discuss (at least in the design forum). The real challenge of making a simple game is coming up with the idea. And once you have the idea you can charge on ahead. People around here can''t really help you with the idea. The response would be similar to questions like, "What language do I use," or, "Where do I start?" If you need help coding, there''s another forum for that.

I am working on a simple game and I think if I were to quit my steady job and make a go of game dev as a way of making money, I''d focus on trying to do several simple games rather than one really complex one. Unless you want to count that one complex game in the back of my mind I''ve been working on for 7 years that never get''s past the character creation stage. But I don''t

quote:
I think most people here want to design the next Counter-strike, Everquest, Baldur''s Gate, not a simple shareware puzzle game. I want to design a game respected by my peers, who are hardcore gamers, not casual gamers.

Mmm...maybe there are multiple "groups" of hardcore gamers?..Like maybe a "underground hardcore gamer" crowd?..I mean to myself and many of the "hardcore" gamers that I know...the Japanise game developer Treasure holds just as much "status" as id software does to the more "mainstream" hardcore gamers...or maybe this is considered "old school" gamers?

why do simple games have to be classified as a puzzle game or something childish like that?
one of the most time honoured and most diverse game out there has one of the most simplest rule sets around.
simple ideas can produce some of the most engaging gameplay around. complexity adds alot more to a game but can also fog the general scope of the gameplay making it less fun at times or creates confusion. just because a game is complex and has 100 million rules to it means its for the "HARDCORE GAMERS". simple games can be just as fun, or maybe even more fun. now i''m not saying that just because a game has a simple rule set that it has to have block pixel graphics. i''m just saying that sometimes the simple ideas are the ones that hold the most merrit.

quote:
You know, there are several 3d games for GBA, Doom and Doom2 for example. Of course it''s not hardware accelerated gfx...yet

the gba doesn''t have native support for 3d hardware acceleration. perhaps they''ll have some sort of superfx chip in the cartridges but right now all the 3d games on the gba are done using software alone. the 3d engines that the gba can produce are very crude and won''t ever compare to those on the ps2 or xbox, so developers will have to go looking for other ways to use the 32bit processing power of the gba in more creative ways.

"The human mind is limited only by the bounds which we impose upon ourselves." -iNfuSeD