Tormodino
Posts: 107
Joined: 3/27/2010 Status: offline
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Slight rant incoming! I wanna derail this a tiny bit to say that strategy gamers are far too concerned with the idea of what these games should be. Most of us, I assume, are looking for some broadly scoped sandbox with sufficiently interesting tools and a competent AI that allows us to build our little power fantasies. Zero, for all the sillyness going on there, is building 4x products. The social element is not actually a part of the product itself. That is a function of the community. Being hard done by when you attempt to build and improve said community is annoying as all hell, but the fact that Stardrive is a boring and functional product where too much was promised is not actually cause for the amount of grief being poured out on those boards, The shoe fits. I do the same thing here by bitching about wanting all manner of features and changes to Distant Worlds, but this is a calmer crowd talking about a better product where the developers are not antagonistic because people want their blood. The roof is taller and the glasshouse is less fragile. What has stuck with me after many years testing out many products like Stardrive is a sense of disappointment. The 4x genre has a common theme of not developing and building on the core ideas to create a solid finalized product that can stand the test of time without inviting negative comparisons. The only 4x games I know that have really worked their model to near perfection is the original Master of Orion (a towering achievement in game design), Moo2 and Sword of the Stars numero uno. GalCiv2 should probably be added, but personally I find that game to be bland to the point of being uninteresting. Stars and other more hardcore products could also bementioned, but many people haven't played these so beyond reference they don't really apply any longer. Perhaps this is a quite artificial limitation stemming from the less social nature of the games and the people who enjoy them? I don't know how far I should go with this, but I would suggest that the communitys projected desire to have developers deliver their dream product, and the devs always falling short of this unrealistic goal (it's not possible to tickle everyone the same way)cause a very high stress environment that can bring people into a conflict over what they wanted, rather than what is actually there. 4x developers are often far more limited in their vision than is immediately apparent, simply because the scope of the genre is promoted as "unlimited". Every 4x is a management sim at heart. In most cases, the community sees it differently, developer failures notwithstanding. The often solitary nature of developing and playing these simulations often create, and stem from, personal expectations that can not realistically be completely fulfilled. Armchair generals always want the finest armies to play with, and "smart" gamers often fall into arguments that are every bit as silly as those taking place on the Dota2 forums. The games are what they are, and having purchased Legend of Pegasus I feel vindicated in saying these things :D
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