A Black Falcon

Isn't denial wonderful?

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OB1

What does this have to do with Doom 3 you weirdo!

A Black Falcon

Look at the top 80% of page two...

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OB1

...

Oh about the FPS in the charts thing? Why didn't you say that in the first place! You posted links to console charts, you weirdo.

Anyhow, I believe I said "aside from Sims games". And aside from Sims games and Warcraft, there are just FPSs.

And I'd be willing to bet the farm that 2004 has a lot more FPSs in the top ten. Doom 3, Far Cry, HL 2, Battlefield Vietnam, Riddick, etc.

A Black Falcon

Actually, the 'top selling games of 2003' list I linked has both console and PC charts. The 2004 one is just consoles because as I said I didn't see a 2004 PC list... only one from the previous week.

EXACTLY as I said. If you can't win, redefine your position until it's correct without admitting that you ever said something wrong! I've proven well beyond reasonable doubt that FPSes are not the only popular PC gaming genre, as you first asserted. Then you said 'well except for casual sim games'. Now you add Warcraft. Just replace that last one with 'RTSes and some MMORPGs' and you'd pretty much have driven yourself into what I'd say is the correct interpretation of PC gaming sales charts.

The point is, why can't you just say 'I was wrong to say it's just FPSes.'? Why must you amend what you say without ever admitting that what you originally said was inaccurate or wrong? It's pretty annoying.

As for why I didn't say more when I posted the links, I had no time to (had to go right then) or I would have said more.

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OB1

Nice try, stupid, but my position hasn't changed at all. Look what I said last page:

And that's still true. I said mostly FPS's not counting Sims games. MOSTLY means a large percentage, not EVERYTHING. I know you have trouble understanding the English language sometimes, but look it up if you don't believe me.

If those Sims games did not exist then you would see a whole lot more FPS's. The Sims get those numbers because of casuals, and if you took them out and looked at the top 20 you would see a whole lot more shooters.

A Black Falcon

30% is not "mostly", never has been "mostly", and never will be "mostly"! 50% or 60% also does not qualify for "mostly" (which is what the ratio of FPS-to-RTS/RPG is, on average, I'd say). So no. That term is definitely not correct. "Mostly" implies some kind of significant majority which does not exist when you look at the sales lists. "Half or so of hardcore game sales that show up in best-selling games lists"? Now that I wouldn't argue with. But "most of PC game sales"? I've proven that that is wrong!

Sure, you use the excuse "sims/"casual" games don't count." Of course I find that premise absurd. Of course they count! Do the games casual gamers on consoles buy not count by the virtue of them being casual gamers? Can we discount whole genres just because of their popularity? Of course not! Now, saying 'let's also look at the "hardcore" games seperately", okay. But you cannot act like sim games don't exist or that when you're looking at what games sell you can ignore them. Especially if it's games that are as critically acclaimed as The Sims... popular game it is, but also obviously very well done for any gamer interested...

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OB1

Mostly, NOT INCLUDING SIMS GAMES. *repeats same sentence in mock-retard speach*

A Black Falcon

I added a bunch to the previous post, read it over...

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OB1

I don't care if you say that they "count" or not because that's not what we're debating. I originally said that the highest-selling PC games are FPS's, NOT INCLUDING SIMS GAMES. I still maintain that. I just didn't think that the top ten lists would have so many Sims games, so you'll have to look at a top 20 list for a more accurate reading. The PC gaming industry really is going down the crapper.

Great Rumbler

At least Simcity 4 made it to the top ten...

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A Black Falcon

This is probably the closest I'll ever get to getting an admission of anything from you... so it's nice to hear... As I said from the beginning, I have better knowledge of this because I've been looking at PC sales lists for years. You hadn't before you talked about PC game sales. Oh well, you should know better now...

Anyway, OB1, FPSes have a much more limited appeal than The Sims does. Can't you understand that? Sim games (SimCity, The Sims, management simulations like ____ Tycoon, etc) have very wide appeal. Almost everyone likes them. Fewer people like first-person games where you shoot people. And since the PC gaming industry is the one with the largest userbase, obviously the games with the widest appeal have a better chance of making top-10 lists. So PC charts will have a higher ratio of casual-to-hardcore games -- everyone has a PC, after all, and only people who want to play games have consoles.

If you go back and look at that 1998 list, you'll see that the PC market has always had a large percentage of casual titles.

But really, I'd say that the biggest thing that showed that you hadn't actually looked at many sales lists wasn't forgetting about casual games. It was forgetting about strategy games. RTSes show up on these lists almost as frequently as FPSes do, after all, as those lists show, and your forgetting them was surprising... MMORPGs are usually games that just show up for a little while every so often, like adventure games do whenever a Myst title comes out (unless it's a Blizzard MMORPG of course... WoW is selling amazingly well...), but RTSes? They're pretty much always in the top 10 and are probably a close second to FPSes in terms of sales and popularity on the PC. Saying that FPSes are a 'vast majority' of hardcore game sales is a massive misrepresentation of the facts... even when we ignore the fact that seperating 'hardcore' from 'softcore' games can be tricky when the 'softcore' ones are also great games, like The Sims or SimCity are.

That's a "casual" game, GR... a good game, but "casual" by the way the term is usually defined. Like The Sims (though a better game, IMO).

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Great Rumbler

What do you mean by that?

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A Black Falcon

"Casual" game -- a game that people who are normally not gamers still often like. See: The Sims, Myst, SimCity, probably Tetris, etc... games which "real" gamers might not buy just because of the stigma of them being 'casual' games... and OB1 made it clear that he doesn't think casual games should "count" when we discuss which genres of PC games are the most popular. Which is a silly decision of his, but it's what he said...

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Great Rumbler

Simcity 4 is an awesome game...

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A Black Falcon

How many people do you know of who play The Sims or SimCity but very little else?

...

Yeah, see what I mean now?

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OB1

Of course there have always been great-selling casual titles. I never contested that. What I've said from the beginning of this debate is that FPSs are the best-selling games amongst the more hardcore PC gaming crowd. I said that two pages ago and I'm saying it again. I've been completely consistent with my opinion on this. The reason why I brought that up was to illustrate my point that PC gamers do not care about new and innovative gaming experiences like hardcore console gamers do. You will never see games like Katamari Damashii sell as well on the PC as it did on a console. And as someone who can only make games for the PC in the foreseeable future, that worries me. I want there to be a market out there for different kinds of games. That fact is made even more difficult by the fact that most PC gamers don't want to get gamepads, and making different kinds of games for the kb&m severely limits what you can do.

A Black Falcon

The gamepads thing is because most people who want to play console-style games simply buy consoles. Most games are designed for the type of system they are on and PC games are on PC so most of them are made for keyboard and mouse, just as they should be. If most PC games used gamepads what would be the point of playing them on PC? And anyway, I absolutely reject the idea that the keyboard/mouse combo is a bad one for playing games on. There are a lot of genres that are ideal for keyboard/mouse play, and the PC has plenty of games in those genres and does them well. Complaining because it doesn't do some other types of games, which are more peripheral to the PC gaming experience, well is kind of silly when there is such a massive breadth and depth of PC games as it is...

Originality? I don't think that the PC market is any worse than the console one, overall... there are a lot of niche titles out there. The main problem is selling them at retail. Going that route does often seem to lead to games that follow in the footsteps of past successful titles (same as it often is on consoles)... but where the PC is different is online sales and freeware. That allows people to make anything, including all those kinds of games that simply would never get retail distribution. It won't show up on top 10 lists, probably, but staying away from the big publishers allows for more originality and uniqueness (or simply a game designed in a classic manner in a genre which the big companies are convinced doesn't sell anymore,such as the use of online sales for genres like wargames that no one wants to publish in stores).

Anyway. Is the hardcore PC market dominated by one genre, FPSes? No, it is not. You were wrong to say that. Is it dominated by a few genres? Yes. FPS, RTS, and sim games dominate. Myst-ish adventure games, TBSes, RPGs, MMORPGs, third-person action games, console ports, etc. are often successful. Many fewer titles are released in other genres like classic-style graphic adventures, flight/tank/boat sims, wargames, etc (wargames have mostly survived through online sales). Sure, not many PC titles fall outside the big categories, except for the occasional console port. But it's not a one genre dominated market, OB1. Never has been, still isn't.

Back to originality. It really depends on what you mean by the term. On the one hand yes, probably most PC games are derivitive. But most console games are too! Yes, there are exceptions. But don't pretend to think that the console market is bursting with original titles... it simply is not... yes, there are some. But Nintendo has been saying for years that a big part of the Japanese videogame downturn is because of a lack of originality and when you look at most of the titles produced they probably have a point. America? We have the same lack of originality, but not as many people trying radical things because here that formula is still working fine. No downturn yet. (Which is, of course, why Nintendo's constant statements about having to save gaming from its doom of unoriginality fall flat here... people haven't tired with games as they are as much as they have in Japan.) Anyway... true, PC gaming doesn't have Katamari Damacii and it probably wouldn't sell too well. Hardcore PC gamers are a very different market from console gamers and a lot of them react very badly to any title that feels too "console-ish" (see, for instance, the reaction to Deus Ex 2...). Hardcore PC gamers expect more complexity from their games on average than console gamers do, and when games are designed for consoles too they often see the titles as dumbed down and not as good as a result. True? Sometimes yes, sometimes no, but there's definitely truths behind why people feel that way. It is definitely true that console games are on the whole simpler and PC games more complex.

PC gaming innovation is less about innovative new control schemes or add-on controllers or stuff as it is about just using what already exists in different ways... console games do this too of course, but with their additional complexity perhaps PC games have more room to do this in. Of course sometimes a game comes along that changes everything game mechanics-wise (Wolfenstein 3D, Homeworld, Dune 2, etc), but those aren't too common (and even then such games are often at their core a game of a familiar genre, just done in a new way). So perhaps PC games do have fewer totally unique games than consoles do. However, I would probably say that within genres that already exist PC games do at least as well at innovation as console games do and probably do better. Look at RPGs... console ones have some changes, certainly, and a few that try to be different, but there are so many more varieties and complexities in PC ones...

So in short, what I'd say is that when games are relased in established genres PCs and consoles are pretty close as far as innovation goes. Perhaps I'd say PCs are ahead of consoles, by virtue of greater variety among PC games in the same genres as seems to be the case much of the time on consoles. But in the category of 'totally original games' yes, consoles probably win. People thought of most of the genres that PCs can do well quite a while back and given how many of those there are and how many possible gameplay experiences (and how many innovative ideas you can include in titles in existing genres) most new games fall into one of those. Just like it is on consoles, except for a few titles (mostly Japanese) that are unique and perhaps don't have a great PC analog... PC games are often unique or innovative in story, setting, theme, the details of gameplay, etc, but not in the base type of game the title is. If I had to say something, though, I'd probably say that the closest analog to such things would be freeware. From Japan.

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OB1

There is a reason why there are only a few main dominant genres on the PC, ABF, and why there aren't any new gameplay experiences. The keyboard and mouse is good for a few genres and that's it.

You would never, ever see a game like Katamari Damashii on the PC, and have it sell well. Again, there is a reason for that.

FPSs are the majority among the non-casuals. That is a fact. If strategy games didn't take so much longer to make then perhaps that would not be the case. But unfortunately that is the case, which is why the FPS is the most dominant non-casual genre on the PC.

Believe me, I know more about the sad state of gaming on all platforms than you do. Most games on consoles are just copies of other successful titles, and EA is the prime example of that design philosophy. But there are truly different and innovative games that come out pretty regularly on consoles, far more than there are for the PC. Damashii, ICO, Viewtiful Joe, DK Jungle Beat, Mojib Ribbon, Rez, Mark of Kri, Lumines, and the upcoming Wanda and the Colossus just to name a few. And that's just from the last few years.

And as for your simple/complex comment, we've been over about how you can't tell the difference between depth and convolution before. And what complex games are there for the PC? Sims and strategy games. That's it. And for those I give you the Romance of the Three Kingdom series.

PC gaming has remained largely static for more than a decade because of the fact that everything has to be worked around the archaic kb&m control setup. There is a very good reason why consoles have had to have new controllers each generation, and why Nintendo wants to change the way we play games with new types of control devices. Right now all change is restricted by each platform's respective control type, and true innovation won't be seen until that is changed. That's why I hope the revolution turns out to be amazing. The DS, even though it has yet to really prove itself, has an unbelievable amount of potential. The right developer will be able to create a completely new type of gameplay experience with that handheld, and I just hope that that happens sooner rather than later. We've only seen tiny glimpses of what is possible with the hardware.

Are you trying to say analogy? You keep on writing "analog". I do not know what you're trying to say.

But whatever the case is, I think the top 20 lists of PC games shows just how little innovation there is. To suggest that PCs are actually ahead of consoles in that regard is complete and utter stupidity on your part. 7 of the 10 games at the top are Sims expansions! Then you have your standard RTS (Warcraft III) and some bland shooters. Wee!

Great Rumbler

Uh...none.

No.

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A Black Falcon

It's a synonym, OB1... you've never heard analog used that way?

dictionary.com:
First definition, too.

No, it's good for quite a few genres. And some of them are some of the broadest there are... I'd argue that strategy games are the broadest genre around (only comparing to RPGs) and the PC is very strong in wide varities of games in both of those genres. I would certainly not say that the PC has fewer types of games represented than consoles do... it is lacking in some genres consoles do well but is well represented in genres lacking on consoles so overall I'd say it balances out.

The only conclusion I could possibly draw is that you prefer the genres common on consoles, or the way consoles do genres common to both platforms, to the genres common on PCs. Saying 'PCs are very limited in genres' tied to 'and consoles have more variety' (you've said it.) is just not true.

As for the comments about the control options of keyboard/mouse being limited, I could make an equally strong arguement that the control options of gamepads are limited as well. They are both limited in different ways. They both tend themselves to some kind of games. So each platform has different things they are best at. That does not mean one has more things it is better at than the other... you clearly think that consoles have more variety of genres, but I, as being a PC gaming fan before being a console gaming fan, could make a strong arguement in the other direction...

No, because it's a console-styled game. But an equally weird PC game could have a chance at least as a niche title. (and remember, Katamari Damashii wasn't expected to do well because usually weird Japanese games don't sell great here... that is probably more the exception than the rule on that issue)

You keep saying this, but the sales charts that I've posted quite simply do not hold that statement to have any validity. I have posted nine top-seller lists from 1998 and 2001-2004.

-Week ending July 10, 2022 (10): 4 FPS, 3 RTS, 1 flight sim, 1 Sims, 1 MMORPG.
-Week ending June 3, 2022 (10): 4 FPS, 2 RTS, 1 flight sim, 1 Sims, 1 MMORPG, 1 Various Liscenced (Harry Potter).
-Month of February, 2004 (20):6 Sims/SimCity/Tycoon, 5 FPS (inc. Splinter Cell), 5 RTS (inc. MOO3), 2 Various Liscenced (Harry Potter, Spongebob), 1 MMORPG, 1 Racing.
-Year, 2003 (10): 5 Sims/SimCity, 3 RTS, 2 FPS.
Month of December, 2003 (20): 8 Sims/Tycoon (1 MMO-Sims), 4 Backyard Sports (Children's), 3 Various Liscenced (2 Harry Potter, one LOTR action-adventure), 2 RTS, 2 FPS, 1 MMORPG.
-January 10-16, 1999 (10): 3 Hunting (I couldn't bear to call Deer Hunter a FPS...), 2 RTS, 2 flight sims (1 civilian, 1 combat), 1 FPS, 1 RPG, 1 boardgame.
-Year of 1998 (20): 4 Hunting-FPS, 3 various liscenced (2 Barbie, one Lego), 3 adventure (2 of them in the Myst series), 2 RTS, 2 FPS, 2 boardgames, 1 classic collection, 1 RPG, 1 flight sim, 1 platformer.

Is it just me or do I see a distinct lack of utter FPS dominance in sales here? Perhaps there are more FPS titles made, but the RTSes make up for that easily by selling for longer periods of time. Overall, with six different (sometimes overlapping) sales lists, FPS only is ahead of RTS by a slight margin. FPSes show up 20 times on those lists and RTSes 16 times. As for other genres there, RPG/MMORPG shows up 5 times. Casual-focused titles like Sims games, Tycoon games, liscenced junk, boardgame conversions, etc. are the most common when all put in one category, of course. Adventure games and platformers are only on the list in 1998. Microsoft Flight Simulator is a regular. And one racing game broke onto the list.

In conclusion, if you keep saying that FPSes are absolutely dominant it will be in willful disregard of proven facts. FPSes do beat most of the genres handily, but strategy games are close enough to par that the difference isn't hugely significant.

A complex strategy game series to be sure, but I'm sure PC strategy games and wargames are at least as deep to deeper. Yes, we've discussed complexity before and you made it clear that you don't think more complexity is necessarially good. I do not fully agree with that. Sometimes more complexity definitely is good and genres like RPGs and strategy almost always benefit from being more complex. Yes, there is a point of overdoing it, but console games usually don't reach that point... as for convolution, that's just an effect of lacking game design, not more complexity. Good games don't have much of it (or at least don't once you get used to the game) no matter how complex they are.

That is to say, the PC is great at making original titles within existing genres (better than consoles are in many cases), but not as good at making totally unique games that aren't like anything else.

As for original titles, I pretty much agreed with you on the subject of 'totally original in most ways' games, didn't I? My point of disagreement was to say that I believe that within existing genres (and game-design styles) PC games do an overall better job of innovation/original thinking than console games do, though both do it well at times.

Oh yeah, and saying "sims and strategy games, that's it" is insane (even leaving out how you forget RPGs, which should definitely be there as well). Those three genres are massively deep and wide and could hold multiple console genres within them no problem... it's kind of like saying "3d games, that's it" as a response to something about the Gamecube... it makes no sense and ignores reality! Saying that any one series, no matter how good, counters two or three genres? Genres with depth as astounding as strategy games do on PC for instance? Crazy.

PC gaming discovered what worked great and made games that used those techniques. I don't blame them and given what a huge variety of games that results in I don't mind, especially given that they don't just stay static with every game copying the ones before it -- plenty of titles are different and original within existing genres, and that's great. For instance, the FPS genre is among the most common on the PC and has been for years, but there are some that are truly original within it, such as Netstorm or Perimiter. You don't need to create a completely new gameplay experience to create an original and unique game, and PC games periodically prove that.

True, there isn't much at the top, and I said so. I said that many of the more unique and original titles either never crack the top-sales lists or are never released in retail stores at all... the companies that release games are conservative about what they want to sell and something in an established makes them a whole lot happer than something risky.


Oh yeah, as for GR, then you obviously don't know any casual gamers... which is kind of weird given how they are so common...

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OB1

No I've heard the word used that like a few times before, but you often mispell things so I assumed that was the case again.

You can count the number of genres that can be done well on with the keyboard and mouse without any major sacrificing on one hand. You have the strategy genre (as broad as it may be), the graphic adventure genre, the FPS, and uh... maybe one more that I can't think of right now. That's it! And the strategy game is really the only genre that the kb&m does so much better than console controls can. FPSs work wonderfully with a dual-analog stick, for instance. However--and this is important so pay attention--the reverse is not true. Try playing any fighting game, platformer, racing game, music game, non-FPS-like-third-person-action-game, and various types of unique console titles like Katamari Damashii with a kb&m. Not gonna happen. I hope you can at least admit that. Though I seriously doubt you will. And if you can't then this debate is completely pointless.

Really, like what? Name some PC games as unique as Damashii that sold even half as well.

That's because publishers are morons. Nintendo didn't think Animal Crossing would do well either. Or Advance Wars, Fire Emblem, Wario Ware, etc. The list goes on and on. Contrary to these publisher's beliefs there is great audience out there just starving for this stuff.

Which brings me to another topic about how Nintendo wants to change gaming with the Revolution since they think that people want new experiences, yet they're extremely stubborn about releasing unique titles in North America! Something is very wrong with their logic.

You don't even know how to read your own numbers. Look at how many different FPSs there are in the top 10 each month of each year compared to that of RTS's. Like you said you'll see the same RTS game for months but a different FPS practically every week. That's exactly what I'm talking about.

This is how most elitist PC gamers think, and it's a major reason for why the PC market is so incredibly stale. PC Gamers think that a million buttons and stats make a game deeper, when in fact that is all simply artificial depth. A perfect example of that would be the two versions of Mario 64 out there. The N64 version works so simply and so intuitively that literally anyone with two hands and a healthy brain could pick up and play the game and get at least a couple of stars. With the DS version, you have a number of different control options that make controlling Mario much more complicated than it needs to be. So yeah, you could say that Mario 64 DS is a more complicated game than Mario 64 is, but that's the bad kind of complicated. It's regular chess versus Vulcan chess. One is much more complicated to play than the other yet infinitely more shallow.

I'm not saying that there is no depth in these PC games, but they are far too complicated than they need to be. Nintendo's goal of trying to make games easy enough for anyone to play is where everyone should be headed. Games will not become truly mainstream until they are almost as easy to play as it is to read a book or watch a movie. And don't tell me that books and movies cannot contain great depth just because they are easy to "play". But this is a long and very complicated subject that I do not wish to debate with you. Especially since you are usually so narrow-minded in your thinking.


Not any more than consoles are. Look at Street Fighter and then Virtua Fighter 4. Pitfall and Yoshi's Island. Rad Racer and Gran Turismo.

Please, name me some titles as original or innovative as the ones I have listed.

I forgot about RPGs! Even I am forgetful sometimes, believe it or not.

Anyhow, saying that those three genres are broader than the main console ones is absolute insanity. In the platform genre alone there are a dozen different sub genres, and games within each sub genre that's different enough from the rest. In platforming you have Pitfall (basic platformer), Donkey Kong (platformer-puzzler), Super Mario Bros. (the platformer that all sidescrollers are based off of) Super Mario Bros. 3 (I don't need to count the innovations there, do I?), Sonic (racing-platformer), Yoshi's Island (one of the most innovative platformers ever. brought to the table an inventive "health" dynamic, original and new item and projectile system, among other things), Mario 64 (the standard 3D platformer, aka the collect-a-thon platformer), Sly Cooper (stealth platformer), Ratchet and Clank 1 (shooter platformer), Ratchet and Clank 2 (RPG shooter platformer), etc. I could list many more if you'd like, as well as dozens of examples in many other genres. If you think you can counter that by all means!

Even Deus Ex was just a minor innovation. There hasn't been a new type of gameplay created on the PC since the first FPS, really. Nothing major.

There are usually better games on the console charts than the PC ones. Definitely.

A Black Falcon

I was 2/3rds of the way through a reply when my computer crashed and I lost it all... I hate it when that happens! Lost quite a bit of work... At least I hadn't gotten to responding to those two long replies of yours yet (leaving them for last).

I know how to spell most words, and analog and analogy are among them.

The words I spell wrong I seem to consistently have problems with, but most words I spell just fine.

First, you aren't talking about new subgenres with that list. You're talking about games which are not just purely rehashes of what we've seen before... but I wouldn't say that all of those are in different subgenres. Sonic did not create a new subgenre of platformers, for instance. It had innovations, but didn't found a whole new category... same with SMB 3 -- lots of originality and innovations, but not a new subgenre. Anyway, I said all three, but I primarially think of strategy games as the broadest genre around. Sims might not match that... RPGs? Perhaps, but less than strategy games.

Counter? Making a list of every game that added any kind of innovation into its genre (even if you don't act stupid and then say that every such game created a new subgenre) is pointless. I certainly could make a list that long with strategy games, though, and likely also RPGs, if the standard is as low as yours appears to be... but is it really worth the time?

That doesn't matter that much though... or at least, sales matter equally. And in sales RTSes are a very close second. The difference is just that the big RTSes sell for longer, and their expansions seem to stay on the lists longer as well. But saying that because the FPS genre has more titles it is vastly more important than the RTS genre, which is pretty close in sales, is just silly! And that becomes even more absurd if you include the rest of the strategy genre (lower sales, but many varieties).

Missing many genres for the PC side, misleading, and wrong.

First, genres common on PC (that are better with keyboard/mouse as done on PC). Strategy, building/management simulations, RPGs, adventure games (both graphic adventures and interactive fiction, which are quite alive in freeware circles), wargames (one of the oldest PC genres and still around in online distribution), FPSes... there is one common genre that is different, however -- car, airplane, tank, boat, etc... simulations. These are best with either joysticks (not gamepads!) or wheels. That requirement, along with their typically high system requirements and steep difficulty curves to get into demanding, complex games, limits their commercial success... but it's a very important group of genres (racing games, mech/space combat sims, and realistic flight/tank sims probably are not in the same genre) in the history of PC gaming.

That brings up the issue of peripherals. Both PCs and consoles have them. As it relates consoles come up with lots of new ones while PCs generally just have the same ones as ever (joysticks, gamepads, steering wheels)... but PCs have built in a lot of things add-ons do, or have no good way of doing such things (like connectivity to use a small screen as a controller)... and there's already a mouse so no need for a keypad or touchscreen or something... and the fact that PC gaming companies are not desperately trying to invent new ways of playing games like Nintendo is.

Anyway... if you want games unplayable on consoles, you should add those flight/mech/etc. sims to the list. The realistic ones, anyway... okay, one exception: Steel Battalion. But other than that nothing can compare. Such games NEED lots of buttons. Gamepads only have enough for more action-oriented games, not truly in-depth sims. And gamepad joysticks are pitiful and small and not nearly adaquate for a good flight sim... but even if there was a joystick on consoles, you wouldn't have the keyboard (or throttle controller, for serious flight control systems) to go with it for the dozens of other necessary keys.

The other genres? Management/building sims technically CAN be done on consoles, but the results are a pale imitation. It simply does not work as well. Strategy games and these sims have similar controls so it's not surprising that they translate to consoles similarly poorly... like Civilization, The Sims will never be a great console game. Strategy games designed just for consoles? Sure, they can be fun, like Shining Force or Fire Emblem. But even those games would be better with mouse. Just like how a platformer is playable, but worse, with a keyboard, a strategy game is playable, but worse, with a gamepad. PC-style RPGs and management sims work exactly the same way.

With some genres, it depends on how your game is designed. Adventure games can go either way... from a 'this would be impossible on consoles' text-based, or text-input-with-graphics (and cursor movement) game all the way to a 'this would be very clumsy on keyboard' title like Grim Fandango, that genre works well both ways as long as the game was designed from the ground up for that kind of input.

As for genres better on consoles, most are made to play well on the PC simply by making them work best with gamepads -- see arcadish racing games, action games, action flight sims, platformers, etc. And once you spend a small sum on a decent gamepad it's almost as good as playing a similar game on a console. This flexibility is a great strength of PCs.

However, even without that there are many types of games you can do with a keyboard and mouse. Fewer than you can do well on consoles? Perhaps. Perhaps not. It's not a clearcut issue as you make it seem... there are a bunch of genres that are great on PC and so-so to bad on consoles and a bunch of genres great on consoles and so-so to bad on PCs and I am very far from convinced that either one of those facts is significantly stronger than the other.

If the Japanese played PC games we well might see that. As it is they don't, so most PC games are American. And American designers do much more with putting their innovation into games in existing genres or concepts than they do with going off with random weird ideas... not to mention the fact that PC games sell worse, and the market has far more "average Americans who otherwise don't play games", and thus more games aimed at casual gamers sell... and fewer niche titles aimed at fans of playing weird games.

They (both PC and console publishers) would say that you paint a deceptive picture. For every such success several games fail. This makes them justafiably cautious. Does this annoy gamers? Yes, of course! But they don't care about that, or about releasing the best quality games, they care about sales and profits... and too often they are too cautious.

Your second point is absolutely correct. They talk about innovation and then often we don't get some of their most innovative titles... and it's not like we get extra titles instead! Nope, we just get left out. And it's incredibly stupid... sometimes for no apparent reason either -- tell me even one reason why Kurukuru Kururin (two GBA games and a GC game, none made it here) wouldn't sell in the US! Magical Vacation? Aren't RPGs popular? Same with EarthBound... that big, fervent community is irrelevant? Or Giftpia... and I'm not holding out much hope for the upcoming Homeworld (totally different game from the PC 3d space-based RTS... (which was an innovative game in its time, by the way))...

As I've said so many times before, I just disagree with that whole premise. Simplicity is fine for some games, but complexity for the sake of making a game more detailed, immersive, and, well, complex is NOT a bad thing! I guess it's just a philisophical difference between PC and console gamers, but it's my opinion as well as the opinion of most hardcore PC gamers. And it doesn't lead to creative destruction and needless depth... yes, lots of PC games are very complex, especially in genres like wargaming and military vehicular simulations. And I do not play some of those games because I'm not used to them and they're too complex to make me want to learn. But do I think that they should all dumb down to make me happy? Of course I don't! I admire them, as long as they're well done, for being complex! That should be a goal of some games and console games just don't try for serious gameplay depth nearly as often as PC games do. You call this a good thing, I call it sometimes a problem... I guess it's a matter of opinion (though of course I think I'm more right. ).

Of course, complexity that is implemented poorly, or with flaws, like the controls in Mario 64 DS, isn't a good thing. But equally complex controls in a game where such controls really add to the game? Great idea! That's what I mean by complexity can definitely be good... okay, so we have different ideas of what is good here, but all that really matters for each person is their own personal opinion on it, so that shouldn't matter on the greater issue.

Yeah, as I said consoles are very close. I'd just give PCs the edge (to those I could say 'Empire to Civilization III, Dune II to Warcraft III, Wizardry to Baldur's Gate II, Adventure to Curse of Monkey Island'...). But an arguement the other way could be made, yes.

As I thought I made clear, PC game innovation doesn't have that 'totally weird game unlike anything' factor very often. It has innovative features in games in established genres, or innovative games that use new technology to make new gameplay experiences -- Wolfenstein 3D, Dune II, Homeworld, Netstorm, Perimeter, System Shock perhaps, Ultima Underworld perhaps, Baldur's Gate (you can't say that that game wasn't innovative when it came out.), Descent perhaps... Theif? Meridian 59? Other early online games? Empire... SimCity... MechWarrior II... Civilization? I could list a lot more games.

That list is kind of strange... most of those are not games I woud say created subgenres. Definitely not. It is a list of games that had innovative elements, certainly. I'm sure that if I thought about it I could do that for strategy games... though I'd have to split it up because the strategy genre is really several genres tied together... or for management/building sims (SimCity, Roller Coaster Tycoon, etc)... RPGs? Probably. I see your point... that you are saying that console genres are just as broad. It probably is true that on both platforms most games copy what has come before while possibly adding a few new elements while a few games really change a lot. And that as this continues genres get broader. But still... I will hold to my position that the PC strategy genre is the broadest on any platform. Sure, there might be more titles released in a genre like console platformers, but most of those have absolutely no innovations (especially the 2d ones)... PC strategy games are also numerous and probably have more average change between titles, if just because of how they are more complex games so there are more details to change. 'Any two console genres' is probably an exaggeration, but I would say that the PC strategy genre is the deepest and broadest genre on any platform.

On the subject of RPGs, the question of if PC or console RPGs have more variety or depth is a good one. PC RPGs have a longer history, so there's more ground to build on, and console RPGs were originally inspired by early PC ones (as well as pen & paper games)... but from that point both genres have developed greatly. I'd be tempted to give it to PC games because they have more different types of basic game designs while console RPGs seem to have one main way of doing them, but there are enough console RPGs that don't follow the same formula that that genre has a good amount of variety as well...

Deus Ex was somewhat innovative for its genre. For first-person innovation, though, I'd rather look at Looking Glass than Ion Storm (which, of course, is now dead, as of a few days ago, but had a lot of Looking Glass survivors in the company, including Warren Spector I believe...) -- Theif, System Shock, Ultima Underworld... Looking Glass's death was very sad. Ion Storm's was as well, but they never quite reached LG's level so it wasn't quite as bad.

Remember that people who own consoles want to play games while plenty of PC game buyers are people who have PCs who happen to buy a game every once in a long while. And that the PC gaming market is smaller to begin with. This means that weird, unique titles have a much smaller market on the PC than they do on consoles, and more titles that are designed for the mass market (beyond just regular game buyers) will show up on the PC sales lists. If you looked only at hardcore gamer sales (if that was possible) I'm sure the list would look quite different.

__________________
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OB1

The RPG shooter platformer isn't a new subgenre?? How many other games of that type are out there?
None of this is worth the time.
Going by the sales you can deduce that the average "hardcore" PC Gamer buys around 5-10 FPSs a year and 2-4 RTSs a year. That certainly matters.
I knew you were going to say that, and I was hoping that would happen since it would go further to prove my point about you never fully listening to what I say.

I said KEYBOARD AND MOUSE. Games that work well on KEYBOARD AND MOUSE. Joysticks, wheels, gamepad, are all peripherals! My point was that it's nearly impossible for a developer to come up with a new or different type of game for the PC because gamers don't want to have to buy a new peripheral, and most PC gamers do not have good peripherals unless they're really into a certain genre (like flight sims or racing games). So while it is certainly possible for someone to create a nice 3d platformer for the PC, they have to sacrafice a lot in order for it to work relatively well with a kb&m. Or sacrifice nothing and make the kb&m controls suck really hard (like BG&E). Some 3d platformers work better with the kb&m, like the 3d Rayman games which feature simple platforming and a camera that works on its own, but imagine if someone were to port Mario Sunshine to the PC, a game whose camera requires constant attention and features very difficult platforming. It would be possible to do with a good analog gamepad, but virtually impossible with a kb&m, which would cut down the potential audience by a significant percentage. That is the problem that I am talking about.

But you just said that there is as much innovation in the PC world as the console world. Why are you using excuses then? You just proved my point, yet you're trying to make it sound like you're supporting your argument.

Let me get this straight: You say that there is easily as much if not more innovation in PC gaming as console gaming.... yet there isn't as much innovation in PC gaming as console gaming because a) there aren't any Japanese PC devs, and b) the PC gaming market isn't as strong as the console market so devs have to make games that are "safe".

Pick one argument and stick to it!
Really, well then why am I having such a difficult time remembering any risky titles that Nintendo brought over here that sold poorly? All I can think of are the examples I mentioned. If you can think of anything else, please let me know!

It shows that Nintendo does not have a very consistent game plan and are making up shit as they go along. It's very scary.
I'm obviously not going to change your mind so there is no point in further debating this. Think what you want!
It's not "close", it's easily far, far ahead. There is no great leap in PC gaming like Pitfall to Super Mario Sunshine. Pong to Mario Power Tennis. You can argue that consoles have time on their side and you'd be right, but we're not arguing difference relative to years. If you are then you can see things becoming more even. But if you look at the earliest console games and the newest ones, there is simply no comparison whatsoever.

That is because you are a hypocrite who has double-standards. If you think that the Ratchet and Clank series, which is a platformer/shooter/RPG hybrid, is only a standard platformer with "minor innovations" then you are the poorest judge of this kind of thing and have no right to even begin to debate this subject.

R&C is so different from the standard platformer that it's almost in a completely separate genre. Though I'm sure you've never played the game (or most of the other ones I listed) and have no idea what you're talking about, but when has not knowing the facts stopped ABF before?
Ok, well let's look at those games then. Thief is a shooter with sleath elements. That makes it a stealth shooter, no? That's what we call a sub genre. Sly Cooper is to the platformer what Thief is to the FPS, except that Sly is even further removed from the conventions of the platformer than Thief is to the FPS.
Again you are using excuses that only prove my point. Of course there are reasons for that. There are reasons for everything. I'm just stating the fact.

A Black Falcon

This makes absolutely no sense. I know you know something about the history of computers and the history of videogames. You know that computers have existed for longer than home video game consoles. And that computer games have made just as much of a jump as video games have. There is nothing in the PC market like Pong to Mario Tennis or Pitfall to Mario Sunshine??? What the heck? But in the very thing you were replying to I stated some games that are equally big jumps! Adventure to Curse of Monkey Island? Empire to Civ III? Wizardry to Baldur's Gate II? Spacewar to Battlecruiser???

If you actually believe what I thought you said there you are being incredibly ignorant and you are smart enough to know that you should know better.

That's pretty much what I said.

Haven't played Ratchet & Clank, know almost nothing about Ratchet & Clank, and wasn't directly referring to Ratchet & Clank, so I don't know what your problem is... I was just pointing out that many of those games are not ones I would consider to create new subgenres -- I would not say Sonic or Mario Bros. 3 created new subgenres, as I said (I'm not even sure about Super Mario Bros., actually... it was clearly revolutionary, but was it an actually new subgenre? I don't know, it's pretty similar in basic idea to Pitfall...). I obviously have a higher standard for what I'd call a subgenre than you do... Pitfall and Mario 64 definitely did create new subgenres. But anything beyond that? Not major categories, I'd think. Just new takes on what already exists. I consider that a different thing from a totally new game idea... every time a game adds some new idea into a game that mostly follows what has come before I would not say that a new subgenre has been created.

But where do Ratchet & Clank or Sly Cooper fit in? I won't say for sure because I've never played them.

Yes, Theif is sufficiently different from a normal FPS that it is a new subgenre of the field. It plays very little like the rest of the games in the genre. And I haven't played any PS2 platformers, but based on the many I have played you just don't see that very often in platforming games... they mostly seem to be at their core based either on Mario for NES or Mario for N64... yes, with changes that make them somewhat different, but most platformers aren't too original. (Are the ones you mention more original? Quite possible... but without playing them I don't know how much. Like Theif compared to a normal FPS? That's a pretty big difference, if true...)


Oops, I cited the same thing twice...

Anyway, there is one thing to say. It is not an effective counter-arguement to say "one game on my list is truly unique" when I questioned all but two. Fine, maybe one or two more are too, but is only talking about one of them really a good way to refute the point?

That's probably true. They seem to not so much act as react... and then either do something or willfully refuse to do anything and just go off in their own direction. That's not the way to win or even to succeed at all in the long run. Really, when you look at it a lot of their message just doesn't make sense... and they utterly refuse to admit that anything is wrong. Not good.

I was thinking of game publishers in general, and there are many examples of games brought over here from Japan that did not succeed... though yeah, there probably are enough success stories to make their extreme cautiousness in so many cases very strange.

I don't know how you get those numbers, but they don't have much to do with reality. How does one buy 5-10 FPSes and 2-4 RTSes and end up with a ratio where the overall ratio is about 8 RTSes bought for every 10 FPSes bought? Yeah, you don't. You buy 4-8 RTS titles, not 2-4. I'm not quite sure why you said so few RTSes... because of the statements that there are fewer great RTSes? But when the sales of the genre are almost as high that is proof that hardcore gamers are buying the genre in close to the same volume... so the average hardcore gamer could not have four times more FPSes than RTSes if the overall average is three RTSes for every four FPSes. It's simply impossible. And anyway, there aren't that many fewer great AAA RTS titles than there are great AAA FPSes... there are just probably more lower-quality FPS titles.

And I mostly talked about keyboard and mouse games, you know. I listed six genres which I then discussed in more depth. Five of those are keyboard/mouse genres. One requires peripherals. And yet your entire reply is about that last genre and you completely ignore 80% at least of what I said. How nice. Really makes for an effective reply to what I said.

About that subject, though... I'd say that most hardcore PC gamers have at least a basic joystick. Nice, more expensive joysticks (that are better for complex flight sims) are of course much more rare. A gamepad? Rarer than basic joysticks, but many probably do. Wheels? Much less common. Other add-ons? PC gamers are no more reluctant to buy them than console gamers are, OB1. Add-ons always have acceptance problems on both platforms. Complaining about that as if PC gamers are worse is silly. Your problem seems to be that you want to make console-style games and they are less popular on the PC than PC-style games are... so you get bitter about the whole PC industry for some reason. It's not right. I will never agree that PC games and the PC industry are, as you say, far less original and 'stuck with old ideas' than console games are. Sure, PC games don't generate new genres and stuff as often. But they add on stuff to existing genres all the time and that results in a great variety of titles! I know, your arguement is (or should be; I'll ignore the part earlier here where you seem to say something else) that consoles are equal on this matter. I'd like to think PCs are ahead. They're certainly not behind, anyway. Originality shows different ways in different games. Games don't necessarially have to be a totally unique gameplay experience and create new genres or subgenres to be original and innovative in some respects... and most of the time that's all that is really needed. (Of course, sometimes totally unique games are great, and it's nice that some people make them. But the point is that to be admirably unique games don't necessarially have to be a gameplay idea as different from everything else as, say, Wario Ware.

Anyway, controls... Rayman works fine on keyboard? I don't know, I have all three of the main Rayman games for PC and I'd never want to play them on keyboard... even for Rayman, using a gamepad makes a dramatic difference. You are right that keyboard/mouse only really works for simple action/platformer games. Side-scrolling or top-down titles that use only two or three buttons are definitely playable on keyboard... (I know, you disagree, but they are. Is control a bit worse? Probably, yes. But not so much that playing the game is impossible, especially if the game was originally designed for keyboards... (your arguement here, if I recall, was that that requires the designers to make the game a bit slower paced and/or easier. Perhaps. But if the games can still be great, and great fun, and challenging, that doesn't matter all that much...)) but 3d platformers? It's not easy. Only the simplest ones work and those are not nearly as good. The difference between keyboard and gamepad is a lot bigger for 3d titles than it was for 2d games... which is perhaps part of why while there were a lot of 2d platformers on the PC (especially shareware), there are a lot fewer 3d ones... while a bunch of people have gamepads, it's not as many as have keyboards. Tie that to how successful modern consoles are and the result is the fading of the once-strong platformer genre on the PC.

I'm saying that PCs have innovation, but in somewhat different ways... but I think I've explained that in depth several times now in this thread.

__________________
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OB1

Spacewar was not a home computer game!

*sigh*

So dumb, so dumb...
Uh, those were examples of innovation within genres, ABF. Not new subgenres. That was another example.
You know Brian, the most annoying part about arguing with you is that you almost never know anything about the subject you are so passionately arguing. It makes you look like the biggest idiot in the world. And you wonder why I have no patience for you??

Sly Cooper is a sltealth platformer that's more unlike Mario 64 than Thief is unlike Doom. That is a fact. If you know don't know jack shit about this then you need to shut up before you make yourself look like an even bigger dumbass. If that is possible.
Now you're more confused than ever. I mentioned platformers twice: once in terms of innovation and again in terms of sub genres. And I don't need to address each and every game when I already gave accurate descriptions of each one. If you haven't played them then that's not my problem and arguing this further proves your lack of intelligence.
What examples can you think of?
*sigh*

If you're seeing the same RTSs on the charts month after month, it's pretty obvious that people aren't buying the same games over and over again, right? Yet you see a new FPS or three near the top of the charts each month, usually higher than the same RTS that's been there for ages. If you take that into consideration along with the fact that the FPSs are almost always selling better than the RTSs, it's obvious that people are buying a greater volume of FPSs each year than RTSs.

But I'm done with this. It's an extreme waste of my time to argue this with you.
Good grief, this paragraph of yours is so full of logical errors and a very obvious lack of understanding about a thing that I said that I'm going to have to tackle this idiotic point by idiotic point.

First of all, what the fuck does this first quote have anything to do with what I said? Did you just print out my post, cut it up into a hundred pieces, tape it all together in random order and then read it??
Yeah right, out of everyone at Tendo City who said that they would like to play my game, only you and Derek have gamepads. That's it! And this is a pretty hardcore gaming bunch!
Wow, what a completely again-not-listening-to-me post!

Of COURSE add-on peripherals don't sell better on consoles! I never suggested anything even close to that! I said--and you better listen this time-- that gamers are not willing to buy new peripherals to enjoy different kinds of games, so developers have to design games around the STANDARD control set-up for each respective platform. With PCs that is the KEYBOARD AND MOUSE and with modern consoles that is the DUAL-ANALOG GAMEPAD. That brings me back to my original point that the kb&m is a far less versatile control system than the modern console controller, which severely limits what a PC developer can realistically accomplish.
Rayman relative to something like Mario Sunshine, that is. It's still crap with a keyboard, but not impossible like Mario Sunshine would be.

There's tons of innovation, for certain, but not equal to the kind of innovation possible on consoles.

A Black Falcon

A computer game is a computer game. It was a game that was played on a computer with a keyboard, etc. You're just arguing about irrelevant semantics...

And those other examples are almost as good.

OB1, you said clearly that you were listing subgenres of platform games. Each one got a new title -- "racing-platformer", etc. You essentially said that each of those games had created a new subgenre (or category, or whatever you want to call it) of platformers... seemed pretty clear that that was your message... and my response was that many of those titles did not indeed create new subgenres. A few did, as I said, but not all of them for sure. Now you're saying that those were just examples of innovation within genres? Huh? But you clearly said that you were making a list of games that were innovative and took the subgenres of the genre in what you said were new directions!

So how about insulting me again you actually address the games that I MENTIONED (SMBI, SMBIII, Sonic...), instead of attacking me for supposed slights against games I haven't played and was not directly talking about... I keep trying to get you to but you'd rather attack me for things I haven't said.

SMBI: "The platformer that all sidescrollers are based off". Is this really enough to call this a whole new subgenre? I'm skeptical.
SMBIII:
Donkey Kong: "platformer-puzzler" -- was the original DK really so much a puzzler? And was it innovative enough to create new subgenres of gaming? It was surely a big step up, and definitely did many new things, but like SMB but I'd put high standards on the statement of the creation of a new subgenre...
SMBIII ("I don't need to count the innovations there, do I?") was a super version of SMB, really. Innovative? Uh... it added a lot of new things, was an awesome game, ect, but it was squarely in the SMB mold...
Sonic ("racing-platformer")? Same deal really, except that I would not call it a racing game. It just added a lot more speed to the platformer, not racing game elements.

I know a lot about platformers and have played a great many of them. I just haven't played any on Playstation (the only exceptions would be a few which also came out on PC and I played the demos of -- Pandemonium, Bugs Bunny - Lost in Time, etc), and none on PS2. This isn't really my fault and you can't blame me for it. I'm sure I've played far more older PC platformers than you have and I don't yell at you for not having as much experience with that genre of games. (And here you can't say that I'm talking about things I know nothing about because I have not said things based on games I haven't played! Everything I've said in this thread has been based on titles I HAVE played! Nothing based on Sly Cooper, Ratchet & Clank, etc... why would I? I haven't played them!)

Given some of your earlier responses in the post I'm replying to, you're confused too...

As for your 'point' here, maybe you don't have to address each and every game, but addressing one of the games I mentioned, as opposed to one I didn't say one word about or refer to specifically in any way (the only thing you could see as relating to R&C2 would be the general statement that most platformers aren't that innovative -- which is true, by the way -- and I said that some games are exceptions! So of course some game I haven't played could be one!), might have been advisable.

I'm too lazy to go looking for charts with the American sales of unique Japanese console games... but I know it happens, for sure... and you know it too. Good games, American or Japanese, often don't sell as well as they should.

You only think this because you want it to be true, not because the lists actually bear out your theory. Here, I'll prove it. (again listed oldest to newest)

Week ending July 10, 2004.
http://pc.ign.com/articles/532/532687p1.html?fromint=1

RTS: 2, 3, 6.
FPS: 7, 8, 9, 10.


Week ending June 3, 2004.
http://pc.ign.com/articles/530/530063p1.html

RTS: 3, 4.
FPS: 2, 5, 7, 8.


Year of 2003
http://www.npd.com/press/releases/press_040126a.htm

RTSes: positions 3, 4, & 9.
FPSes: positions 8 & 10.


Month of February, 2003.
http://pc.ign.com/articles/390/390054p1.html

RTS: 1, 8 (really a 4X game, but it is real-time), 15, 16, 17.
FPS: 2, 4, 9, 10 (Splinter Cell, so it's not really a FPS), 13.


Month of December, 2002.
http://pc.ign.com/articles/383/383478p1.html

RTS: 7, 10.
FPS: 11, 14.

First one of these with FPSes having a higher average position.


Week in January, 1999 (10th to 16th)
http://pc.ign.com/articles/066/066660p1.html

RTS: pos. 1, 7.
FPS: pos. 4.


Year of '98.
http://pc.ign.com/articles/066/066602p1.html

RTS: 1, 10.
FPS: 14, 16.


Hmm... looking at it, I made a few mistakes when I totalled the games before. There are indeed 20 FPSes listed, but there are 19 RTSes -- not 16. Oops... (also, I listed February 2003's list as 'February 2004')

However, that just strengthens my case. There is indeed parity between the two genres. In seven lists, sometimes one genre looks stronger and sometimes the other does, looking at both chart position and total number or games in the genre in the list, but neither one makes a clear case to be dominant. Which is really what I should have expected to see here. But it does a pretty good job of disproving your theory that the FPSes consistently place higher, making up for the about-parity in total number of chart positions.

That had to do with the fact that I wrote a long segement of the post, about several issues, and you focused your entire reply one one facet of my writing while not discussing the rest of it at all. That's what you did, plain and simple. Okay, the 'you ignored 80% of it in your reply' is exaggeration, but only a couple of paragraphs of that reply were on the subject of PC games that use accessories... the rest of it was not. And yet you didn't discuss the rest of it at all.

This is a console forum. Not a PC forum. Hardcore console gamers are not necessarially hardcore PC gamers. Most regulars on this forum are hardcore CONSOLE gamers.

Not hardcore PC gamers. There are only a few of those here.

And as far as I know they mostly like to play strategy games and RPGs on the PC. (though I'm not sure if ASM, DJ, or Smoke have a gamepad or a joystick)

I did address that in the very thing you reply to.

That arguement is on pretty much the same issue... slightly different, but it's closely related I think. As I've been trying to show, the keyboard and mouse allows for a wide variety of games. A bunch of genres, all allowing for lots of innovation and originality as well as for just plain great games built on familiar formulas. I think I've shown that. You want to make games and have to make PC games... but you want to make console-style games. So you are frusterated by the attitudes of PC gamers that tend to promote games and themes that are more traditionally PC titles while denigrating (sometimes unfairly) console-styled games. Is this fair? Somewhat yes, somewhat no. There definitely are markets within hardcore PC gaming for console-style titles... at least in the 'online freeware distribution' market... () if those people can find the game. It's certainly not as big as markets on consoles for such games, or markets on PC for the kinds of games that are now popular at retail, but it DOES exist in some fashion, I would say... though I have no idea of how many people actually own gamepads for PC.

Anyway, I think I've shown over and over that there's no validity to your claims that keyboard and mouse greatly limits you and keeps people from doing any forms of innovation or new thinking in game design. As much as it limits for some applications keyboards open doors for others... you should not take this personal irritation you have of the percieved dislike of PC gamers for games like the ones you want to make and translate it into hate of the themes that make PC games what they are, such as designing controls for keyboard and mouse! It leads you down false paths.

It seemed like Rayman 2 and Rayman 3 each used most of the buttons on the gamepad, though... about the only thing they have is the camera (and they both do have movable cameras in some situations...) Rayman 1 would probably be playable on keyboard, by virtue of its simple controls and 2d nature, but the other two? Perhaps, but it wouldn't be anywhere near as much fun...

I'd probably equate it to playing Grim Fandango on keyboard: You could do it, but it'd stink.

Kind of true, kind of not, as I've said before.

__________________
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OB1

Then all video games are computer games, since every console is technically a computer.

Ancient super computers don't count!
Well I mentioned actual sub genre titles (R&C, Sly Cooper, Mario Bros., Donkey Kong [I should have stated GB version]) and then kind of went off on a tangent with simply innovative titles (Yoshi's Island, Sonic, Mario III).
That's precisely my point: you don't have nearly enough experience to actually debate this. Especially since most of the platformer sub genre creations in the past six years has been seen on consoles you've never owned.
Well okay.
Like what? I've already addressed R&C, Sly Cooper, and Donkey Kong [GB and GBA versions]. If you'd like I could name a whole bunch of other platformers that created new sub genres. Jak II ("GTA" platformer), Metroid (shooter/adventure platformer), and Viewtiful Joe (didn't I also mention this one? it's the fighter platformer).
I honestly can't think of too many good, original, "risky" Japanese games that sold poorly here.
Those charts are all over the place. Specific months in different years? Why not show all months and all years?

And you made a bunch of mistakes, not counting those ever-popular hunting FPSs.
What on earth are you referring to? Really man, would it hurt to make some sense every once in a while?
All of those people who wanted to play my game are PC gamers.
First of all, that was not a direct reply to my post. It only indirectly had to do with what I said. Secondly, you are sorely misinformed. Ask any decent PC/console developer which platform they would rather develop for if money was out of the equation, and just about all of them would say console. I've talked to many people in the industry about this very topic, as well as students from major game design schools, and they all agree with me. The keyboard and mouse was not meant for playing games and that is very evident in the fact that there are so few genres dominant on the PC. In the PC world, the controls come first. All game design has to work around the control setup. I'm sorry to burst your PC-fanboy bubble, but that results in very limited game design. On the other hand, with consoles, the controls are actually designed around the gameplay. There are new controller standards each gen, and that is because of the ever-evolving gameplay ideas that console developers have. Nintendo is the foremost innovator in the entire gaming world, and their controllers have all been designed around gameplay ideas. That is how it should work, not the other way around. This is very simple logic that cannot be denied, no matter how much of a stubborn fanboy you are. PC developers are very limited by what they can do with the kb&m, that is a fact. You know nothing about this, Brian. You really, truly don't.
This coming from the person that defended BG&E's PC controls! HA!
Finally an honest statement that truly reflects your opinions.

A Black Falcon

Those weren't the OLDEST computers... they were early, but the kind you'd find on large college campuses. Which is why people at colleges were the first ones to create computer games.

Consoles are computers too? Of course they are inside. We base the difference based on what we play the game with, where we play it, and what we watch it on. Those early machines are computers by all those counts, just like Pong is a videogame.

As I said when I first posted these lists, this is all I could find. I remember in PC Gamer seeing sales charts monthly from PC Data, but since NPD bought them several years back the regularity of the charts seems to have dropped off... I'm sure I could find a bunch of charts going up until 1999 or so, but you've already said that you want recent stuff and there just don't seem to be many recent game sales chart lists available. So this is what we've got.

And yes, it is patchy... but they are essentially random. I don't see how I could say that the rest of the time would be dramatically different... we've got the years of 1998 and 2003, a month in 2003, a month in 2002, two weeks in 2004, and a week in 1999... it's not a perfect sample but it should be good enough to get the basic themes of game sales. You only contest it because you don't want to admit that what is there is there.

As for the hunting games... nice try. Really. But how about I use your words against you?

(What you said when I said that one of the first lists I posted was indeed an annual list -- 1998.)

And that is relevant because there are no hunting games in any of the lists from 2002, 2003, or 2004. There are three hunting games in the 1999 week list and four in the 1998 overall list, if you wanted to know their total. But the fact that none of them appear in any of the other five lists from the last three years should suggest that their popularity has faded... they still exist, but in smaller numbers and clearly with smaller sales.

And calling them FPSes, while technically true, is also humorous because they are CASUAL games. Yes, they are first-person games where you shoot things, but they are solely for causal gamers. And you have made a MAJOR point of not discussing casual PC games much.

The reason I would rather leave them out, though, is simply because of how awful they are and how I'd rather expunge the bad memories of how popular that garbage was for a couple of years.

But if you REALLY want add "Hunting FPS: 3" to the 1999-week list and "Hunting-FPS: 4 to the 1998-year lists I had in that post.

It's silly, though, and is mostly a somewhat desperate attempt by you to save a point you've made so strongly but which just does not hold water.

Ah... that makes more sense then (see what I meant by both of us being confused? ). Yeah, Donkey Kong for GB is a decent candidate for new subcategory... not definitely, because it was released in 1994 and I am CERTAIN that there were platformers released before that that had strong puzzle elements, but at some point that subgenre was created and Donkey Kong '94 is one of the best examples of such a game. Which one actually created the subgenre, however, I'm not sure.

Mario Bros.? I know it was utterly essential for the continuation of video gaming, but was it actually revolutionary or was it just evolutionary? I'd probably tend towards the latter... though perhaps the former is true. I'd need proof though.

As I said, Sonic, Mario III, etc (Yoshi's Island too? I've played it... yeah, I guess it's not a new subgenre because it does play a lot like past games in the genre. It probably is more different than Mario III or Sonic, however.) don't qualify. Nice to see that you agree.

It's not very smart to say that someone who has played a lot of games doesn't have the experience to discuss one of the genres they have played most because of not playing two or three titles. It just makes no sense at all.

Metroid, yes. Viewtiful Joe as a fighter/platformer... perhaps, I don't know. Going back all the way there have certainly been lots of side-scrolling games with some jumping along with lots of hitting people, however... I'd be more inclined to call Viewtiful Joe an evolution of sidescrolling beat-em-ups and action-platformers than a true new subgenre. The Speedup/Slowdown superpowers are indeed new in the category, but I don't think that's enough to call it a full new subgenre when it's a kind of game that has a long, long history. (Oh, and you hadn't mentioned VJ before, I think) VJ's contribution to that genre seems more like what Rocket did for 3d platformers, having adding something (in that case the realistic physics engine) in a classicly styled title...

What I was referring to, though, was that you should have been talking about Sonic, Mario 1, and Mario 3, the games I'd discussed, as opposed to R&C2, which I hadn't; you have now, however, in your last post, so it's better now.

It probably depends on how you define "good" sales... selling most of a limited shipment where it probably wouldn't have sold great if it had gotten a huge release? That happened all the time with such games.

But as I said, how many of them have played many action, platform, racing, etc. games on PC? People who do are probably a minority of PC gamers when compared to ones who play mostly strategy, PC RPG, or building or management sims... And as I said I wouldn't say many people at TC are very big PC gamers.

BG&E is like Grim Fandango: playable but less fun on keyboard.

The game is better once I use gamepad emulation (the Saitek software) to map the keys to my gamepad... it's not as good as real gamepad controls (I just have to play Rayman III to prove that), but it's better than the clumsy usage of keyboard and mouse the game uses... it COULD have worked fine on keyboard and mouse, if they had bothered to convert the control scheme to a PC one, but they didn't. They were lazy and just button-mapped without letting you use gamepads. So yes, in that case the controls as implemented had problems... but the game potentially could have not had as large problems as it had even if it hadn't had gamepad controls enabled (though of course it should have) if they hadn't been as lazy.

I was tired of spending paragraphs to say that with a lot of detail, so I didn't... but it really is true.

It wasn't a direct reply to what you said but a reply to what I took your statement to mean...

We've argued about this before. Nothing is different this time. You are still incorrect about so many of those assumptions... that I know nothing, that I have no clue about what I'm talking about, that I'd make no sense even if you did listen to me, etc, etc... but sadly I don't think that you're suddenly going to start listening to me now when you haven't before.

You just are not correct about your "simple logic" that is the basis of your arguement! Yes, on every platform the game needs to be shaped to fit the available controls. Of course. I said so too. Where you go wrong is when you go from there to say that the keyboard and mouse doesn't allow for a great variety of gameplay experiences. This is simply not true! So keyboard and mouse only allow for a very limited number of gameplay design choices? As I've said before I don't see why you can't understand that that arguement can equally be made for consoles.

(presents such an arguement as a point of discussion) You see, gamepads are greatly limited in what they can do. 1)When you are holding a gamepad both hands must be holding the pad. You cannot have one hand free to control another control device. 2)Gamepads are extremely, extremely limited in terms of buttons. They have a small number of them and you must squeeze your controls onto them... very inconvenient and often problematic as it forces you to either reduce your function set and inconvenience the player or make the game a pain to play (forcing you to use menus to access commands, button combonations, etc). This is detrimental to many kinds of games and makes some of those types almost impossible to play. 3) Gamepad controls almost forces direct control of game objects. Indirect controls (cursors) are very clumsy to use with a gamepad and are barely acceptable at best. The same goes for navigating menus with arrow keys and buttons. (especially when compared to PC games that both have mouse control to click the buttons and keyboard hotkeys for each important button!)

See what I mean? Yes, the control schemes are different. But gamepads are not better for all uses or game types and there are lot of kinds of games that do not benefit for being on them. Others do, of course, which is why they use them. But your continued assertions that gamepads are essentially always better and keyboards always worse is FALSE. Always has been and will continue to be. You could try to say something that has a chance at validity like 'more genres are better with gamepads than are better with keyboards', (a definitely debatable question) of course, but you don't, really...

The one such arguement that you do make is that console controllers, by virtue of their constant changes, lead to more innovation than appears on the PC with its mostly static control systems. I don't know how accurate that is for each market as a whole. There are a few points in the console market where a true dramatic change was noticed -- the NES introducing crosspads as opposed to mini-joysticks and the N64 with its analog stick, primarially -- but, say, from N64 to Gamecube? I don't think that that controller change really greatly affected the development of games on the system. Oh, Nintendo stated over and over that the GC controller was different and unique and would lead to different kinds of games, but was that followed up? Not really. The GC didn't do things appreciably differenly from other consoles. The face-button-size thing only changed how you play a little and you quickly get used to it and adjust. It's not a sea change in gameplay. The shoulder buttons are an even more extreme case... remember how the analog-clicks were going to be big? And what, four games have actually used them?

Anyway, as far as console controllers go we're at a plateau. They're dual-analog pads that look pretty similar. Now, Nintendo is saying that the Revolution will be totally different in this. Will it? Perhaps. But a better question is SHOULD it. Will third parties strongly support the Revolution if it has some totally weird controller that makes it very hard to bring games over to the console? Or will we just see games on PS3 and Xbox Next and not Revolution because those consoles are much more conventional and will certainly continue that 'Dual Shock Copy' theme of controller design (that is, the marriage of the SNES and N64 controllers. )... it's too early to say. But it's a good question.

As for the PC, there have admittedly been fewer changes. There was the keyboard. then there was the keyboard and two-button mouse. Now the standard is keyboard (same as ever, complete with the most useless key of all time: 'Scroll Lock'.) and three-button wheel mouse. Next perhaps we'll see the spreading of those wheel mice that also tilt left and right... it's not as much as the addition of the analog stick to consoles, but it is SOMETHING and it has enhanced the PC gaming field in ways that help PC games: easy scrolling of dialogue boxes, quick weapon switching, perhaps looking up and down, etc.

If I had to guess, I'd say that your core complaints are that (1) the PC doesn't work as well with a lot of forms of direct character control (first-person or third-person-but-it-controls-like-first-person) while gamepads are perfectly suited for such controls and (2) that keyboard/mouse leads to more keys being used in the control scheme, which leads to unnecessary complexity and confusion. The first of those is true. The second, I agree with less but is sometimes an issue. But my assertion is that not all games are best with direct character control. And sometimes complexity is good. Both of these issues, I'd say, are matters of opinion. That is, if you prefer simpler controls and direct control, play console games; if you like more complex controls and either first-person or indirect controls, play PC games. Neither system is inherently better for every, or most, situations.

And aren't balance and judging things equally traits that you often claim to try to apply?

__________________
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Currently Playing: Guild Wars (with expansions) (PC), Donkey Kong Country series (SNES), Summon Night: Swordcraft Story 1 and 2 (GBA), sometimes Warcraft III or Starcraft (PC) Mega Turrican and Universal Soldier (Genesis), various other stuff

OB1

You're insane. We're talking about PC games here. Do you know what PC stands for? PERSONAL computer! Giant computers that had to have entire rooms to themselves in research labs and colleges are NOT personal computers!
So they don't count because they are "casual games"? Ok, but then you have to discount certain strategy games which sell well to the hardcore but especially the casuals. You have no idea how many people I know that have never touched a video game before but buy each new edition of The Sims and every single Microsoft RTS that gets released.
Have you ever actually played Pitfall before? You do jump, yes, and you do run from left to right, but SMB is so different from that in every way that calling it anything but revolutionary is a huge mistake. It's the most revolutionary game since Pong, pretty much.

Try two or three dozen titles, buddy.
Yes there have been platformer/fighters in the past (created by Treasure, most likely), but VJ is one such example that you might be familiar with. That is definitely a separate sub genre.
I can't think of a single example that would fit that description.
Only hardcore flight sim fans have gaming peripherals, along with the odd person who wants to play Rayman 2 on his computer for whatever reason. YOU are the exception, ABF. These guys at Tendo City are the rule.
The game could never work with a kb&m.
Yes I know it's true.
That doesn't make any sense.
I absolutely mean it when I say that you have NO idea whatsoever about this subject. Your logic is flawed, you have very few true facts, and your bias blinds your every move.

There are VERY few genres on the PC. VERY few. I don't care what you have to say about 'OH but there are ten bajkillion sub genbres OMG!!1111", the fact remains that there are VERY few kb&m genres on the PC. Like THREE of them. And WHY is that, again? That's right, because of the severly limiting control setup! Yay! Everyone clap for ABF!

Let me list some types of games that cannot be done WELL on the kb&m:

-Platformers
-Racing games
-Fighting games
-The music game (i.e. DDR)
-Action games that do NOT control just like a FPS (i.e. Mark of Kri, DMC)
-Adventure games that do NOT control just like a FPS (i.e. ICO, Zelda)
-Any type of game that reguires three-dimensional movement and separate behind-the-character camera control (that includes some of the above examples, as well as a game like Pikmin which requires analog movement for the characters as well as for the camera/selector thingy, or a game like Zone of the Enders)
-Any type of game that requires the use of two analog sticks (like Katamari Damashii, for one)

Those last four examples cover dozens of different genres alone, just so you know. That's a pretty big fucking list considering how many games are included there. And I'm sure I've forgotten some stuff.

Now in order for my point to have a real effect, I'm going to have to list the types of PC games that don't work well with standard console controllers:

-.....

Hmm... There's got to be something. Why can't I think of anything?

Oh wait, strategy games! Right? Wait, no... stuff like Starcraft won't work as well on a gamepad as a kb&m, but it's still perfectly fine. And as Nintendo has shown with the likes of Pikmin and Advance Wars, making console-specific strategy games works extremely well. But we're talking about PC strategy games. So yeah, while they don't work as well as they do on the PC, they work JUST FINE on a console. So what other genres are there? Honestly I can't think of any. There should be at least one type of game, right? Come on, help me out here!


Fight this as much as you want, but it should be very clear to you just how much more versatile the modern gamepad is than the kb&m. One little PC fanboy from Maine does not know more about this than an entire school full of game designers and aspiring game designers. SORRY.


And about the evolution of console controller, you should not go from the N64 to the GC controller. Since the NES it goes NES --> SNES --> N64 --> Dual Shock. Basically. Whether or not the next gen will offer another great leap has yet to be seen. I'm praying that it will, and I believe that it's completely up to Nintendo.

deanna

Theres a lot of words that only you two lovers will ever read ^

A Black Falcon

Actually, PCs and consoles have been around for about the same amount of time. So it stands to reason that they should have similar curves from the early games to the current ones.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_computer

Another flawed attempt to save a failed point, OB1.

First, hunting games didn't sell at all to the hardcore. This is not true for strategy games like the ones you are talking about.

Second, I was not including games like The Sims, SimCity, Roller Coaster Tycoon, or Zoo Tycoon (the casual simulation titles that show up in the four lists from '02 to '04) in the RTS category. As you say, they are casual games, in addition to being sim titles and not strategy games (it's a fine line, but the line can be discovered by looking at each title.).

And third... you say that lots of people buy Microsoft RTSes who don't buy other games. This is equally true for FPSes and flight sims, you know -- look at Halo or Microsoft Flight Simulator! The 'Microsoft' name on the box does seem to draw in more buyers and it probably did help along the Age of Empires/Age of Mythology titles a little bit... but definitely not to the extent where the game could by any definition be called "casual". Age of Empires is quite definitely a deep, complex hardcore strategy title.

Now come on, can't you just admit that RTSes are equal in sales and popularity to FPSes? The lists make it so obvious!

I've played it a little and yes, SMB is a massive improvement in the genre. Really redefined the genre, etc. But it didn't create a new subgenre of platformers... it just redefined and innovated the genre as it existed. So yes, it is revolutionary. But no, it did not create a new subgenre.

I am quite certain that there have not been dozens of platformers on consoles I don't have that created new subgenres, or even made massive innovations that changed the genre for good... there are a few, sure, but "dozens"? No way. Absolutely not.

Yes, it is. But like with Donkey Kong '94 and the puzzle-platformer, Viewtiful Joe didn't create that subgenre... that's what I was saying.

Oh, how about action/platformers like Contra or Metal Slug? They have some platform jumping in between all the gunfire, after all...

You're not thinking. Limited releases of 'niche' titles happen ALL THE TIME. How about Ogre Battle, Ogre Battle 64, Harvest Moon, etc... just about everything Atlus releases...

The PC version of Rayman 2 was dramatically cheaper than the N64 version, had vastly better graphics (especially considering that I didn't have an expansion pack yet), and I had a Sidewinder gamepad so I thought that that would be fine... and indeed it worked quite well, that game didn't have many problems running on a d-pad. (as for Rogue Squadron, I got that a year before I got my N64.)

No, I don't agree with your assessment here. TC does not have many hardcore PC gamers! It just does not! It has hardcore console gamers, some of which also play PC games, with only a few exceptions! So it is NOT a good place to look for a sample of if PC gamers have gamepads or joysticks. Not at all. Go to some PC gaming forum, or a forum with lots of PC gamers... THAT would be an appropriate place. Not one with a bare handful at best of not-all-hardcore PC gamers...

What you are doing is like going to the PC Gamer (magazine) forums, asking who has consoles, and taking the results to be a good sampling of which consoles console gamers own. It's silly.

Oh yeah, and do you really know who at TC has a joystick for their PC? I don't think anyone's ever asked. After all, your game thread was about gamepads, not joysticks, and I really do think that joysticks are more common on PC than gamepads. I know more people with joysticks for their PC than gamepads. As I said, lots of people have at least a basic joystick. Mech games and flight sims are (or were) fairly popular and you NEED a joystick to play any game in either of those genres. Also, some computers have came with joysticks; we got one included with our p90 when we got it in 1995. So yes, joysticks are common.

It could have worked okay. Not perfectly perhaps, but okay. The problem is that they didn't optimize the controls for the PC... the game could work fine with keyboard and mouse. Just redo the entire control scheme and the way the character controls to be more like a FPS... think Heretic 2, Giants: Citizen Kabuto, Jedi Knight (third-person mode), etc. Get rid of idiotic things like how you need the mouse in some menus and the keyboard in others. Don't have places where you have to use the mouse as a single-axis control (where up/down on the mouse does nothing) by redesigning the way those parts work. Etc. If the game had been designed specifically for PC, it could have worked fine. There is nothing about the action/adventure genre that inherently makes it impossible to play on a gamepad if the game is from the beginning designed to run on one.

NES and N64, yes. SNES and Dual Shock? As I said in that reply, I would just consider those enhancements of what already existed. They didn't do nearly as much to dramatically change gaming. One analog stick was the big change... two was just an enhancement of what was already there. So two big changes. Compared to one (the addition of the mouse) to PCs. So yes, it's more. Oh joy.

You repeat yourself over and over but it doesn't make what you are saying any closer to the truth. Also, this is confusing. Why do I keep listing genres and you keep ignoring my lists? It is very strange.


-Strategy, PC -- RTS (Warcraft, C&C), 3d space RTS (Homeworld), TBS grand strategy (HoMM, Civilization, Warlords), turn-based tactical strategy (Jagged Alliance, X-Com), 4X (MOO, Star Control), God Games (Populous, Black & White), etc.

-Strategy, Console -- RTS: Not nearly as good or effective. Playable, but either dramatically simplified or somewhat simplified and resolution issues can be a problem. Exclusives show this -- Ogre Battle 64, WarLocked, etc. TBS: Same as RTS in effectiveness. Only help is that with the slower pace you have more time to work with the system so it works okay -- Advance Wars, etc. 4X, God Games: virtually nonexistant. What consoles do have is their kind of tactical turn-based strategy games -- Shining Force, Final Fantasy Tactics, etc. They work on consoles the same way as Advance Wars and Fire Emblem: by the fact that because they are turn-based, the slower-to-use gamepad interface isn't as big of a problem as it would be if the games were realtime. And by being simpler than comparitive PC games.

-Simulation games -- building/management sims (A-Train, Railroad Tycoon), city-building (SimCity, Caesar, Immortal Cities), business sims (Transport Tycoon, The Corporate Machine), sports management sims (Out Of The Park Baseball, Championship Manager), people management sims (The Sims), etc.

None of these work well on consoles because they are so focused on things that require mice like lots of dialogue boxes and menus... they have been translated to consoles but never with anywhere near the effectiveness of on PC.

-RPGs -- first-person RPGs (strategic combat) (Wizardry series, Might & Magic series, Dragon Wars), first-person RPGs (action-combat) (The Elder Scrolls series, Ultima Underworld) third-person-isometric RPGs (Fallout, Baldur's Gate, Temple of Elemental Evil), hybrid RPGs (first-person view, isometric or top-down combat) (Eye of the Beholder series, Betrayal at Krondor), console-style (isometric with a seperate menu-based battle screen -- but played, effectively, on keyboard) (Anachronox, Septerra Core), action/RPG (Diablo, Dungeon Siege, etc), MMORPG (WoW, Everquest), etc.

Console RPGs -- Consoles have effective versions of the first-person strategic RPGs (though only older ones (which are most of them); newer ones get more complex and go beyond the limitations of gamepads.), first-person action-combat RPGs (though they also have similar titles that are third-person -- Fable, for instance)), and of course console-style. The other types would not (or do not) translate well at all to consoles. Other types only/mostly on consoles -- action-RPG titles like Secret of Mana. Game structure just like a standard console RPG but with mash-the-buttons combat and those couple of cardgame/RPGs, however they are different from normal console RPGs. Obviously the console RPG genre is very strong.

The question, though, is on which platform RPGs work better overall. I would say that the PC is that platform. Why? RPGs are by nature very complex games. The more complex control systems of the PC benefit a game like most kinds of RPGs. They have lots of menus (easier to navigate with a mouse), simple controls which don't benefit as much as other games from dpads or analog sticks when compared to keyboard movement. Obviously RPGs work on consoles as well, but they work on PC better.

-Wargames -- Classic turn-based (Steel Panthers, Panzer General, The Operational Art of War), real-time (Gettysburg, Waterloo), phased/turnbased (tell units what to do and then watch what they do for a while until you get another turn to make more orders) (Combat Mission: Beyond Overlord), etc.

These exist once in a long while on consoles, in the classic turn-based form usually (from companies like Koei). It doesn't work nearly as well, like with strategy and simulation games.

-Adventure games -- text-based (interactive fiction) (Zork, Adventure), graphical with text input and direct character control (Hugo, King's Quest), mouse-click control with graphical input (Sam & Max, Monkey Island), puzzle-adventure (Myst, Timelapse), modern direct-control adventure titles (this is the one subgenre of adventure games that is designed to run best on gamepads) (Grim Fandango, Broken Sword III, etc), etc.

Other than that last category, again these games do not work well at all. They are either reliant on keyboard input -- irreproducable on consoles -- or on mice, for which a analog stick or dpad is a bad replacement for. Consoles don't have many traditional adventure games. They do have the survival horror subcategory, mixed with more action and less traditional adventure game elements than PC survival horror titles (such as the first survival horror/adventure title, Alone in the Dark), and adapted to console controls to a degree that it definitely works better on gamepad, though.

-Card, board, and puzzle games -- boardgame conversions (Monopoly, Clue, Trivial Pursuit, Chessmaster), card games (Hoyle, online poker places), puzzle games (Bust-A-Move, Tetris), etc.

Card and board games can be made to work on consoles but are simpler and easier on PC with mice. Puzzle games are the opposite -- they can be played on keyboard but are definitely better with a gamepad.

-First-person games -- shooters (Doom, Quake), 'sneaker' (Theif, Theif 2), FPS/RPG (System Shock), etc.

Work on consoles, of course, especially the plain shooters (System Shock is a quite complex game and would be tough to get working on consoles I think). But control is more precice and accurate on PC and works better for the genre (not mentioning complexity, an arguement you wouldn't listen to).

-First/Third-person games -- Action (Jedi Knight, Heretic 2, Armed and Dangerous), beat 'em up (Oni), ... uh i don't know, third-person action/adventure? (Giants: Citizen Kabuto for instance), etc.

These games are often released for consoles as well, and they probably work okay there too. They just work equally well on PC as long as the developer has tried at all (looking at you, BG&E!).

Let's look at those genres then.

-Platformers -- on PC these usually either optimize game mechanics for keyboard (like Commander Keen) or recommend gamepad use. Both approaches work, but the genre has faded with the death of the shareware market and the dominance of 3d platformers. Probably not enough people buy big 3d platformers for PC for publishers to feel it's worth it. A few still are, however, and they recommend gamepads. This genre is better on consoles, though it can be done on PC in some circumstances.

-Racing games -- Arcadish racing games are definitely better with a gamepad. Simulation racing games, however, are best on PC with a racing wheel peripheral. Only the simplest are decent on keyboard.

-Music genre -- it'd work fine on PC if they made a footpad controller for PC. Otherwise it'd be just like playing the genre on a gamepad -- stupid. So if it's gamepad vs. keyboard I'd call them equal here.

-"Action games that do NOT control just like a FPS (i.e. Mark of Kri, DMC)" -- yeah, those control better on gamepads, as I said. This isn't a seperate genre, though, just another part of the same genre that brings us the FPS and the third-person action games which DO control like FPSes. Or side-scrolling titles like Metal Slug. So overall, the genre is one that works well on both control systems depending on which kind of action game the game is.

-"Adventure games that do NOT control just like a FPS (i.e. ICO, Zelda)" -- you mean action-adventures (or probably puzzle-adventure for ICO), of course. 'Adventure' is a different genre. Or action-adventure-RPG, in many cases. But yes, that subgenre does work better on consoles. Of course, there are ways to make third-person action-adventure titles work great on PC (more FPS-like controls), just like there are ways to make them work on consoles, so I'd say that in the action-adventure field it can work both ways. Perhaps it does work a little better on gamepads, but the genre is not totally hopeless on keyboard -- see games like Redguard, Quest for Glory, King's Quest VIII, and probably Tomb Raider... so it's not an utterly dominating victory for the consoles.

"-Any type of game that reguires three-dimensional movement and separate behind-the-character camera control (that includes some of the above examples, as well as a game like Pikmin which requires analog movement for the characters as well as for the camera/selector thingy, or a game like Zone of the Enders)
-Any type of game that requires the use of two analog sticks (like Katamari Damashii, for one)

Those last four examples cover dozens of different genres alone, just so you know. That's a pretty big fucking list considering how many games are included there. And I'm sure I've forgotten some stuff."

Those last two bullet-list items are the same thing -- "Games which use two different analog-stick controls at the same time." That would include games which can be made to work just fine, like FPSes, in addition to games where having analog control on both axes is truly really important... though there is never a case where a game MUST always have analog controls. Digital can always sub in even if it isn't as good... how much that matters depends wholely on the game. For some it matters a lot and for others it doesn't. In many games the added precision on one of the axes, the one decided to be more important for analog controls, makes up for the reduced precision of digital control on the other. That's not always true, of course, and with some kinds of control setups keyboard will never work as well, which is why we have gamepads... but as I've been saying all along there are just as many ways in how controls are used and applied into games in which keyboards are a better choice than gamepads as there are ways that gamepads work better than keyboards!

... okay, so these last two replies combined (it's really one reply) is maybe too long. But once I'd started on it and gotten partway I wasn't going to leave it unfinished... and I was trying to be reasonably complete in the list.

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OB1

You're really stretching. My car also has a computer in it, but I don't consider that another platform. We're talking about personal computers (that's what PC stands for, believe it or not) and home consoles.
Now you're changing your previous point! First it's "RTSs are close to FPSs in terms of sales" and now they're equal?

Amazing.
Right, and I suppose Mario 64 didn't either because Bubsy 3D was released before it, even though the two titles play nothing alike?

With a fundamental change as great as SMB's, a change that is far greater than any two PC games in the same genre that you can mention, to deny that it created a new genre shows incredible bias and ignorance on this subject. I know people who would throw stones at you for making such insanely idiotic comments.
I'm not saying that each game created a new sub genre, genius. I'm saying there are dozens of terrific platformers you never played that either created a new sub genre, took the genre to new heights, or were simply innovative.

And you're very dumb if you think that all innovation "changes the genre for good". Games like Deus Ex are really innovative yet we still see the same crappy shooters. It did not change the genre.
It was just an example that I thought you would be familiar with.
What about them?
Those titles are guaranteed sales because like you said they target a niche market. We were talking about weird Japanese games that publishers have taken risks on that failed to do well, and made them forever cautious about releasing similar titles.
If that was true then why didn't Ubi Soft spend the time and effort into making good dual analog support for the PC port of BG&E? It definitely would have sold better with decent controls, right? I wish you were right, but the numbers don't add up.
Yeah exactly, you can't play a 3d action/adventure game on the PC unless it controls like a damned FPS. That's my point.
SNES: Shoulder buttons. Put to usethe index fingers which were never used before. That was a huge revolution in gameplay design, though you may think nothing of it. Before that gamepads only used the thumbs! That's it! The shoulder buttons opened up many possibilities. One of Nintendo's greatest contributions to gaming, definitely.

Dual Shock: Two analogue sticks. Imagine Pikmin without two analogue sticks. Wouldn't be possible. You'd have to move the cursor with the face buttons, which would have made play very clunky and a pain in the ass to do. It also made the FPS work exceptionally well on a console. Same thing goes for space shooters (Colony Wars for the PSX... only possible with two sticks), games like Katamari Damashii, and camera control for 3D games that much easier to do. It wasn't as revolutionary as the shoulder button, but it made 3d gaming that much easier to do and opened up new gameplay possibilities because of that.
Ok first of all, this isn't about the different kinds of genres on the two different platforms. Again you have failed to understand what I said. I'm talking about how well each platforms' games work on each other's systems.

Strategy: Starcraft worked perfectly fine on the N64. Sorry, but you're wrong about this.


RPGs: Morrowind and KOTOR prove yet another point of yours wrong. Both work exceptionally well on a console, and both are PC RPGs.


Wargames: C&C worked great on even the PSX's non-analog controller.


Adventure games: You nuts? Monkey Island 4 worked wonderfully on the PS2!

Card, board, and puzzle games: Um.... ... you do realize that--never mind. It's probably best to not let you know...

First-person games: All done, really well, on consoles. I don't exactly know what you're trying to say here...

First/Third-person games: PC third-person action games control like FPSs. 'Nuff said.


*sigh* I think you lost track of what you were trying to do here... that or you had no idea what I said. Or both.
Dude... again... I'm talking about playing them with a mouse and keyboard!
Yes! That's exactly right!

I swear, if your mother isn't an alcoholic then I don't know what the deal is!
Wrong, because dance games come with dance pads on consoles, which does not make them add-on peripherals.
Mark of Kri would literally be impossible to do with a kb&m. Same goes for DMC.
There is no genre simply called the "Adventure genre". There are different types of adventure games. Zelda is an action-adventure, ICO is a puzzle-adventure, and Grim Fandango is a graphic-adventure.
You've obviously never played KD or ZOE if you think they could be played on a kb&m.



And on that note, I am finished with this thread! It is not worth all of the time that I put into these replies, especially when I cannot teach you anything. So just continue to believe all of the falsities that you cling to so hard. You are only hurting youself by not wanting to know the actual truth. You can reply to this, but know that I will not look at your reply.

Happy valentine's day, btw. Expect to share all future valentine's days the same exact way that you do now. Unless, of course, you learn to stop being such a douche bag. Just a suggestion.

A Black Falcon

I think that this is going much better than usual for us, actually. It hasn't gotten into a pure arguement-fest... I'm right on some things and you on others... where is the big problem?

I hope you don't leave, it seems to me like we're definitely getting somewhere... but if you want we could break the arguement into several parts, it is kind of like three or four discussions merged into one which is a big part of why the posts are so long.

If you do insist in not replying again, though, at least get ion MSN sometime...

First really popular personal computer: Apple II, released in 1977.

First really popular console: Atari 2600, released in 1977.

Yeah, because before I was basing it off my bad addition (16 RTS, 20 FPS) while now that I know it's 19 RTS and 20 FPS, essentially equal numbers, 'equal' seems like a fine label. I said 'equal' back in page 2 when I first cited some sales lists, if you look back, and looking at that data again I realize that I was right then and wrong to say that FPSes had a noticable advantage. I clearly stated this several times in my last reply so I'm not sure why you're so confused... other than to desperately try to find some ground where you can say you weren't wrong on the issue when you obviously were.

If you really get that angry over a statement that was almost repeating what you had said back at you, then you really need to rethink how you go about being at a place like Tendo City. It makes no sense and helps no one.

My fundamental question is this. "If the platformer existed before SMB, and it existed (in changed form) after SMB, and SMB did not branch off and create a new subgenre of platform games, then how did SMB CREATE a genre or subgenre"?

The answer, I believe, is that it did not. It just changed the direction that all future platformers would follow... but like, say, with Doom in the FPS genre (though to a greater extent, of course; Doom is closer to Wolf 3D than SMB to Pitfall) that fact did not also mean that the game created a new genre.

Here's a question. After SMB came out were there some 'SMB-like' platformers and other 'Pitfall-like' platformers?

As for Bubsy 3D, it came out after Mario 64!

http://www.mobygames.com/game/sheet/p,9/gameId,3533/

http://www.mobygames.com/game/sheet/p,6/gameId,4948/

It was also awful, and forgotten, and no one cared, so even if it HAD come out before Mario 64 it wouldn't have done what Mario 64 did to the genre because of the total lack of quality and interest, but... it came out afterwards.

Of course innovation doesn't always change the whole genre! I didn't imply that! I meant the innovations that DO do that...the most important innovative games aren't the ones that were just solo titles that no one ever tried to do again but the ones that truly changed gaming, after all.

And if we want to talk about games we've played that the other hasn't I'm sure that there are just as many games at least I've played that you haven't so you shouldn't be the one to talk oh so often about it.

Yes, because I have such a limited knowledge of gaming that I'd never recognize a more obscure or earlier example.

What would you say would have been the first games in those two subgenres?

As in is it a subgenre of platform games or a subgenre of action games or both...

The point is that those were only successes by releasing numbers that fit the market. Release those in full American release by a big publisher and you have a failure at the same number of unit sales that a limited release company would call a success. That's often how the 'weird' games that come out here get released... by publishers that know they won't sell huge numbers of units so they only ship small numbers. Usually that caution is justified.

As I've said every time we discuss this game, it's because they were lazy. Pretty simple. That fact is also borne out in the fact that they left out gamepad controls as well. They should have either included gamepad controls or redone it to fit the keyboard. They did neither so of course it was messed up.

So? Seriously, why is that a bad thing? If it works...

And if you have to use keyboard for BG&E, FPS controls almost certainly would have worked better than what we got.


Shoulder buttons... yeah, I thought of that. That's what the SNES added, you are right. But I just wouldn't call that a big enough change to make a massive impact on the gamepad and how games are played with them. Yes, it allowed for more buttons and was a nice improvement, I guess, (I've never loved shoulder buttons, really... I much prefer triggers...) but just adding more buttons isn't really a revolution worthy of this list... Same with dual analog.

As for uses for your other fingers, PCs of course used them all along... both on keyboard/mouse and on joysticks...

Pikmin with single analog? It'd be like an N64 game: one of the controls is on the digital controls of the C-buttons. A bit clumsier but still usable... (I'd recommend making the analog stick for the circle movement and the c-buttons for movement, probably, though have it as a choice). You just have to have some diamond-shaped key layout on the right side (which is why Smash TV on NGC is unplayable with the face buttons and must be played with dual analog -- it doesn't have a diamond key layout so you can't hit all of the button combonations like you have to be able to!), but given that you have that or some approximation then it can be done, if with less precision.

I tried to do that too...

Sure, SC worked fine on N64. Without the movies. Without the voiceovers. Without most of the unit speech. With extremely blurry units that were very hard to distinguish from eachother. With a harder to use interface. With four unit hotkey sets instead of nine. With a dramatically less precise control (analog stick, not mouse). Etc. Yeah, I think you get the picture... look. If SC64 was REALLY such a success, why is it that it was that very product that convinced Blizzard that console ports of its PC games was a waste of time that resulted in unsatisfactory products that did not live up to the games they were supposed to be ports of?

Yeah, because it had major problems that are unavoidable on consoles until everyone has HDTVs and mice and keyboards for their consoles.

That proves nothing, you know. Console RPGs almost always can translate over just as well if a bit of effort is put into it... as for those games, though Morrowind works because the game concept always had a strong base of simplicity that was simplified even more for consoles(button-mash combat). The game has massive amounts of depth, but the series didn't have as complex an interface as some RPGs and what it did have could be simplified with only some gameplay possibilities lost... (see: the removal of swing-mouse-to-attack). So yes that series translated over well. As for KotOR, I've described how they did that many times... simplify the controls, consoleize the interface, reduce some of the functionality, and simplify the game system. It works great, once you accept that it doesn't (and probably cannot) have all of the depth of a true PC RPG.

But as I said, console RPGs aren't much harder to translate to keyboard and mouse than PC ones are to translate to gamepads... FFVII and FFVIII were only better with gamepads because Square didn't want to spend the time to fully make them PC-ized.

Uh, so? C&C is an RTS, not a wargame... have you ever played a wargame, actually?

As I said, Koei released a few on SNES (P.T.O., Operation Europe, War 2410, etc) and perhaps PSX. Those are the only ones I know of on consoles.

I know. I said so. Twice. In the very thing that that was a reply to. Unless you didn't know that Monkey Island 4 used the Grim Fandango control system? (problems like that is why I gave game examples for every single category... not my fault if you don't know the references. )

I was including all genres, not just hardcore ones. And those are genres. (You know, it's kind of unfair to rule out some PC genres because of their popularity while no console genres, which are as a rule more popular than PC games and genres, don't get anything eliminated because of "too much popularity"... yes, I would put casual titles in a somewhat different category, but I wouldn't leave them out totally. Yes, some are bad, but not all... SimCity is a great series with lots of depth for hardcore gamers to love, for instance.)

I said that it's a debatable one but that there are good arguements to say why the genre is better on PC.

True. Why is this a big problem?

The former is kind of true... I noticed it well before posting (or finishing it, as I said in the last paragraph), but didn't want to waste all that work... and it was kind of related.

Uh, yeah, I know... why do you think I talked about older shareware platformers like Commander Keen? That's a keyboard game through and through.

Racing, platform, and action games are the reasons that I buy PC gamepads...


Yes, of course, OB1. Because this is CLEARLY saying that I think that those games would control well on keyboard! Yup!

When I essentially agree with you about something why must your reply be so confrontational as if I was argueing with you about the matter?

Irrelevant to the issue of what I was saying. I just threw in that line or two on the top to say that I consider graphic adventures "true" adventure games. But sure, call them graphic adventures, I don't care... as I said it doesn't have much to do with what the substance of my arguement was. Which I see you didn't reply to. Do you agree then?

Pay more attention to what I say. I said that it varies greatly from game to game. And it does. I'd need to play a game before I'd make a judgement about how much analog matters for the title. I guess you saw me say 'digital can always replace analog' and thought I meant 'digital can always be a good replacement for analog'... but look more closely. I did not mean that.

I meant what I said. It depends on the game. For some familiar examples, I'll use Rayman 2 and Rogue Squadron 3D. Rayman 2 adapts decently to digital-only controls. There are no major issues with playing the game that way. Rogue Squadron 3D does not. It makes the game significantly more challenging, as aiming is a major pain without true analog control. (For a third example, Starshot: Space Circus. It's a platformer, released for N64 and PC at least. I played the PC demo. Same Sidewinder I played Rayman 2 on. Unlike Rayman 2, I found digital controls awful for this game. You see, the level had lots of floating diagonal platforms which were really hard to maneuver the character along with digital controls... it was clearly designed for an analog stick and did not adapt well. Rayman 2 didn't have huge problems like that, thankfully.)

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A Black Falcon

February 2005 PC sales. The most interesting thing here is that Sid Meier's Pirates! showed up... great to see, it's a fantastic game.

http://pc.ign.com/articles/588/588350p1.html

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Great Rumbler

2 version of The Sims 2 showed up. How surprising.

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A Black Falcon

I think it's a law or something... you must have at least two Sims games and two various Tycoon games on every PC sales chart (the code word other companies use for such titles as the Tycoon name isn't trademarked like Sim is...)...

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Great Rumbler

At least HL2 made it close to the top.

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A Black Falcon

HL2, bah... at least Rome: Total War and Pirates! are on it, now those are good games.

__________________
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Currently Playing: Guild Wars (with expansions) (PC), Donkey Kong Country series (SNES), Summon Night: Swordcraft Story 1 and 2 (GBA), sometimes Warcraft III or Starcraft (PC) Mega Turrican and Universal Soldier (Genesis), various other stuff