I think the best controller is some combination of everything else. Maybe the Wii U Pro Controller's D-pad, the Dualshock 4's bumpers and triggers, and the Xbox One's face button and stick layout and general shape and weight. Except not powered by AA batteries, because 1940s technology doesn't belong in a modern controller. Put whatever voodoo in it that the Pro Controller uses to make it run for 80 hours between charging.
Except for the Sega Saturn, Nintendo systems have always had the best D-pads though. Pretty sure they have a patent on the design, which is why other companies try and fail to come up with something with the same feel and functionality.
This is the area where linear platformers are getting boring, they refuse to expand on what the characters can do or bring in any new characters or mechanics that put a twist on what you do in the game and as a result the games feel repetitive and stagnant.
Games that I have not even played feel repetitive.
Seriously though, it's hard to care about platformers if you don't care about level design, which you clearly don't.
Games that I have not even played feel repetitive.
The idea's not as ridiculous as you make it out to be. These are concept and design level issues that are immediately evident to anyone watching the game, if there were any new mechanics to be found in the game you would see them. This isn't some magical, indescribable phenomenon that only manifests itself after you actually play the game, it's more like picking up on the rules of Poker by watching other people play. You don't need to play a game of Poker yourself to know what a good hand or a bad hand is or whether a Full House beats a Royal Flush, so likewise you can already pick up on how the game is played before experiencing it yourself. And after 20 games, you're probably going to get bored of regular old Poker, so you'll probably want to put some kind of twist on the rules to keep things interesting. That's what I'm saying here, many of the platformers have gotten stale because they refuse to change the rules, so there's no point in even bothering with them because I already know how the game will play out before even picking up the controller. A video game shouldn't have that level of predictability if it's trying to be entertaining.
Seriously though, it's hard to care about platformers if you don't care about level design, which you clearly don't.
Level design by itself is pretty meaningless though. It's how the game mechanics interact with the level design that matters, and with the game mechanics not changing it leaves the entire experience stale.
Honestly, I don't even notice any sort of problem with Mario's controls, they work fine to me. The rehashing is the only real problem I have with modern Mario games.
Yeah, the genius of Mario is the fact that the game uses so few buttons. That's part of what makes the games controls so tight and intuitive. Y is run/grab/fireball and B is jump. That's it. Then there are combinations of them like hold and then tap Y while dropping the middle of your thumb on b. Or holding down to run upto and grab an item before letting go. Genius and all immediately obvious once you learn what those two buttons are for.
Compare that to a more modern game like GTA....
It's no wonder they have to remind you every five seconds what button does what
But at least GTA assigns one function at a time to a button. This allows for far more intuitive application of the controls. You just press the button when you need it.
I would argue that 2D Mario games, despite the control scheme being simple, have a very complex and difficult to learn applications of that control scheme. You need to press a specific combination of buttons to do a certain thing.
If you ask me, that's not genius, that's being stuck in the 1980s when games were forced to do this due to a lack of inputs. Nintendo even realized this, hence why they shelved it for Mario 64-Galaxy 2.
Currently Playing: Steamworld Heist, The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, Tales of Graces F
I would argue that 2D Mario games, despite the control scheme being simple, have a very complex and difficult to learn applications of that control scheme. You need to press a specific combination of buttons to do a certain thing.
.
Level design by itself is pretty meaningless though. It's how the game mechanics interact with the level design that matters, and with the game mechanics not changing it leaves the entire experience stale.
How the mechanics interact with level design is Mario's single strongest point and why it's still relevant after 30 years while countless others come and go. The key to any good platformer is taking simple, easy-to-learn mechanics and applying it to inventive and increasingly complex level design. You're doing something entirely new in each of SM3DW's 100 or so stages, but it's "stale" because I dunno, there's no grapple hook or something.
You're the reason why Sega can't make more than 2 good Sonic games in a row.
How the mechanics interact with level design is Mario's single strongest point and why it's still relevant after 30 years while countless others come and go. The key to any good platformer is taking simple, easy-to-learn mechanics and applying it to inventive and increasingly complex level design. You're doing something entirely new in each of SM3DW's 100 or so stages, but it's "stale" because I dunno, there's no grapple hook or something.
See this is the problem right here. Platformers are getting too simple and generic, and they don't need to be. There's nothing wrong with introducing something new from game to game to switch things up, Nintendo did it a lot more often in older generations than they do now. And no, relying on level design to change things up doesn't work. Gameplay mechanics feel more like gimmicks when they only last for a few levels.
You're the reason why Sega can't make more than 2 good Sonic games in a row.
Entirely opposite extreme. SEGA constantly switches the core gameplay. They should keep the core gameplay, but put a twist on it. Better examples are the Mario collectathons and the Prime trilogy, those series actually have meaningful changes between games but they always stick with the same core mechanics from game to game.
Yes it is. And it's still woefully silly to take pride in ignorance.
It's not ignorance. I know everything about the game that I even need to know going in. Playing it will not give me some kind of dawning epiphany on how creative it is.
@Bolt_Strike Your comment just proves (yet again) that Platformers aren't your thing. Making it varied and making it focused aren't mutually exclusive. You can have both. They did a wonderful job of that in 3D World and Tropical Freeze, actually. And yeah, actually, when it comes to platformers, the more focused the game is, the better.
Also, DK64 was far from a linear Platformer. It doesn't prove at all that DK's mechanics should be narrowed down into a 3D World setting, and besides that, isn't that the exact sort of thing you're complaining about? Why would you want them to take 3D World and stick DK characters in it, instead, then sell that as a new game? Instead of a game where you can explore a massive world with all sorts of challenging platforming action to get you through.
Further, hard and unfair are also two different things. Tropical Freeze is one of the first DKC games to be fair while still being ball-bustingly difficult. It presents the player with a challenge without having to be like "oh, and you can only take one hit the whole time" or without making mechanics that force the player to move faster than they should have to or without forcing players to master two completely separate almost entirely unrelated arcade games just to reach the final boss or... yeah, I think you get my point. TF is as hard as any other DK, but unlike other DKs, it's also extremely fair.
Besides THAT, it's got easily the best music and art direction in the entire franchise, to date. The background is absolutely amazing, beating out DKCR with ease and blowing the pre-rendered shenanigans of the DKC SNES games completely out of the water. On top of that, it does more for replayability than any other game in the franchise (though DKCR comes close) with Hard Mode and Time Attack runs, which also come with their own leaderboards complete with videos to help you learn tricks to handle levels faster. This may seem small time, to you, but this is a big, BIG deal. It actually gives casual players an incentive to try something a little more difficult.
What you seem to not realize is that the newer DKC games do make things quite a bit different and a WHOLE lot better than the original games. DKCR screwed up in a few ways (one-hit kills are freaking bull), but TF did a lot to fix what DKCR did wrong and THEN SOME.
Also (again), I don't know what you're talking about "not always doing the same thing." Last I checked, Prime consisted of "enter a room, explore the room, potentially kill things lurking in the room, potentially solve a puzzle in the room, find a door and go through it. Rinse and repeat. Any game can be boiled down to a routine. To the people that actually play those kinds of games, those routines don't really exist, or they're not really the focus, rather. Platformers put an incredible amount of focus on what you, the player, are doing in every single frame. Action-Adventures tend to focus more on what the character does and tries to vary that up, but no matter which way you go, you'll catch a groove and create a routine. Difference is you want to explore everything you see. I just want to overcome the challenge. This is why there are different kinds of games, and this is also why the Wii U doesn't need more side-scrollers. That doesn't, however, mean that we need to waste Retro's talent on doing something they've already done when they could be doing something new and exciting.
As a side note, I'm still getting this strong feeling you just hate DK because it wasn't Metroid.
I still Returns is by far the better game for these reasons :
Lasts longer because of the higher difficulty.
No messing around with secret exits just pay for the extra path. (Or super kong if people want).
Cannot get lucky or succeed by being totally wrong. (Bits I just took the lost health instead of bothering to do it properly.)
It does have multiple hits just lose diddy. (Which gives a chance but a good incentive to try not to but not as unforgiving as real one hit like hard mode on Tropical Freeze).
Better distancing between checkpoints.
Maybe the art is not as good in Returns but I can actually remember it due to playing it for longer or actually noticing when jumping from front to back.
Doesn't have the issue where doing 2-K destroys the difficulty for the entirety of the rest of the game.
Hard bits throughout the game (Sensible time to stop - makes it last longer).
Variety in terms of one off levels like the Sea coming in etc
Better in Tropical Freeze
Music
Controls
Bosses being less annoying due to the extra hits maybe.
(Think I would have even loved a Lost Levels type sequel I would still be playing and loving it now).
Variety due to different extra characters.
@Unrandomsam Pretty Much just sounds like you preferred Returns because it was overall more difficult. That's one way to look at it. To me, though, Returns was just pure BS. It worked fine, but I definitely felt TF was a massive step up for stream lining the game without making ut too easy. Gave me reasons to actually attempt Time Attack and Hard Mode, which I wouldn't even bother with in DKCR, as it would just feel like adding bs on top of bs. On top of that, there's no doubt that Dicie and Cranky bring somethig to the game. If nothing else, zooming around at ridiculous speeds with Cranky's cane bounce was amazing. I felt like the sexret exits were more rewarding than just buying a key, but whatever floats your boat. I will concede that Bopopolis just makes the rest of the game (aside from other Temple levels, and even then, only four and six as well as World 7 didn't) feel like a cake walk, but I'll also point out that DKCR's Temple levels kinda make the rest of the game feel a lot easier, too. Aside from other temple levels, again.
I know this is probably just a coincidence but most of the time I play the Animal Crossing track outside of Time Trials, I get the winter track variant. In addition to Time Trials forcing the summer track variant, maybe subliminal messaging saying Animal Crossing U announced at E3 for release holiday 2015.
IDK why but Animal Crossing feels more like a Spring release to me.
Aside from the lack of a big release left by Zelda's delay, I don't think the Wii U needs any more holiday releases, it already has plenty (although the 3DS is definitely lacking, so I'd like to see at least one big 3DS game announced). I'm more concerned with what's happening in 2016, because that's when most of the unannounced games are going to release. But as long as the lineup is decent all the way through, more 2015 games are always welcome.
IDK why but Animal Crossing feels more like a Spring release to me.
Aside from the lack of a big release left by Zelda's delay, I don't think the Wii U needs any more holiday releases, it already has plenty (although the 3DS is definitely lacking, so I'd like to see at least one big 3DS game announced). I'm more concerned with what's happening in 2016, because that's when most of the unannounced games are going to release. But as long as the lineup is decent all the way through, more 2015 games are always welcome.
I'm not sure that's the case though, there's lots of games but no release dates or windows. Star Fox could be 2016, given that Japanese version is still being used so could XCX, the Project games could be part of Star Fox, etc. Really all we know is Splatoon in May, Yoshi in June/Fall for EU/NA and Mario Maker in September.
Level design by itself is pretty meaningless though. It's how the game mechanics interact with the level design that matters, and with the game mechanics not changing it leaves the entire experience stale.
Whadaya talkin' about!?! Gedouttahere wit ya garbage opinions! Straight to tha ga-bage dump!
[accent: off] Really, though, even if Skyrim was only that map, walking around, and talking to people it'd still be a great game. Not every game needs to be focused around jumping, shooting, or any of the more explicit modes of interaction. Level design has inherent value in spades.
@Unrandomsam Pretty Much just sounds like you preferred Returns because it was overall more difficult. That's one way to look at it. To me, though, Returns was just pure BS. It worked fine, but I definitely felt TF was a massive step up for stream lining the game without making ut too easy. Gave me reasons to actually attempt Time Attack and Hard Mode, which I wouldn't even bother with in DKCR, as it would just feel like adding bs on top of bs. On top of that, there's no doubt that Dicie and Cranky bring somethig to the game. If nothing else, zooming around at ridiculous speeds with Cranky's cane bounce was amazing. I felt like the sexret exits were more rewarding than just buying a key, but whatever floats your boat. I will concede that Bopopolis just makes the rest of the game (aside from other Temple levels, and even then, only four and six as well as World 7 didn't) feel like a cake walk, but I'll also point out that DKCR's Temple levels kinda make the rest of the game feel a lot easier, too. Aside from other temple levels, again.
The DKCR Temple levels I did afterwards in Returns because just getting through it was enough at first. Getting the letters was much more challenging I found. (Tropical Freeze basically got all of them first try - I don't like collectables really so I decided to deal with all that as I went along which I don't normally do).
It is less that it is just difficult but the difficulty curve was ideally matched to me. (Which barely ever happens).
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I'm not sure that's the case though, there's lots of games but no release dates or windows. Star Fox could be 2016, given that Japanese version is still being used so could XCX, the Project games could be part of Star Fox, etc. Really all we know is Splatoon in May, Yoshi in June/Fall for EU/NA and Mario Maker in September.
A few of them could get pushed back to 2016, that's a possibility. Since XCX is already out in Japan, it probably won't take until 2016 to finish. It took them less than 10 months to localize XC in NA, and that's when they weren't even planning an NA release. Now that they are and the localization process is likely overlapped with development of the original Japanese version, releasing it within 8 months is fairly reasonable. Star Fox may get pushed back since it was fairly early in development last year IIRC, but that's about it. I'm not expecting any other delays.
Whadaya talkin' about!?! Gedouttahere wit ya garbage opinions! Straight to tha ga-bage dump!
[accent: off] Really, though, even if Skyrim was only that map, walking around, and talking to people it'd still be a great game. Not every game needs to be focused around jumping, shooting, or any of the more explicit modes of interaction. Level design has inherent value in spades.
Not really, because then that would be a sim game and those are fairly pointless. Why would I play a game going around and talking to people when going out an interacting with people IRL or at the very least going to a social media site gives me the same brand of interaction but with more depth?
They will cancel localization for xenoblade x, delay star fox u and announce 8 new mario games. At which point I will promptly burn all my nintendo products and get a so called "life".
parapup
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They will cancel localization for xenoblade x, delay star fox u and announce 8 new mario games. At which point I will promptly burn all my nintendo products and get a so called "life".
What is this, the video game version of FMK?
Cancel: Project Giant Robot
Delay: Star Fox
Announce: Metroid Prime 4
Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze was good but not great Metroid Prime series always look pretty solid enough gameplay again good but not great would I be excited for new entries in the series yeah because I love good games would I be even more excited for something fresh like Splatoon of course!! There's a balance between old and new and I think Nintendo are starting to find it. Metroid deserves a new entry I hope its something completely new though not 2D not Prime make the space opera the series deserves but keep the new IPs coming.
I would argue that 2D Mario games, despite the control scheme being simple, have a very complex and difficult to learn applications of that control scheme. You need to press a specific combination of buttons to do a certain thing.
.
Then there are combinations of them like hold and then tap Y while dropping the middle of your thumb on b. Or holding down to run upto and grab an item before letting go. Genius and all immediately obvious once you learn what those two buttons are for.
Currently Playing: Steamworld Heist, The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, Tales of Graces F
Not really, because then that would be a sim game and those are fairly pointless. Why would I play a game going around and talking to people when going out an interacting with people IRL or at the very least going to a social media site gives me the same brand of interaction but with more depth?
Exploration, man; to see the world they created. If you don't want to enjoy that, then that's your choice, but you can't deny that level design has inherent value.
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