-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Jonathan Blow plays Breath of the Wild
- Thread starter AuthenticM
- Start date
- Status
Whenever Blow talks about designing games I find myself nodding and agreeing with mostly everything he says. However, when I play his games I'm so unengaged and largely uninterested in what they bring to the table. It's kinda funny how that works out but whatever it is he finds to be fun or engaging is freakin' lightyears away from my tastes. Given this, I'm surprised his experience wasn't more negative.
Tricky I Shadow
Banned
Oh please.
There's a difference between giving constructive criticism and simply being a whiny pretentious baby.
The Hermit
Member
yeah dude, its like another game.
I finished the main story on the WiiU after 80 hours but I couldn't deal with the shit framerate either. I felt like you too (how could anyone give perfect score to this)
The Switch version solves that completely, especially after the patch ( which is useless on the WiiU)
Schnozberry
Member
While I agree it isn't some incontestable masterpiece, it's so far divorced from "Nintendo's take on Far Cry" that i'm struggling to determine what you mean.
When people say that they mean Far Cry 2, not the more recent installments. Far Cry 2 was and is the high watermark for open world, systems-driven gamepaly
Poimandres
Member
It doesn't just describe Neogaf, it actually encapsulates most discussion around reviews/critiques.
Someone says something, drawn from their own experience. Someone replies, with a counter point from their experience. Agree/disagree, move on. It's fine to have a back and forth discussion about mechanics, design decisions etc as long as you stay aware that there is no right or wrong when talking about aspects of a game that are totally shaped by subjective experience. At least with things like bugs, poor hit detection, or a wonky frame rate there is some objective definable truth involved.
I definitely think that BOTW is an important game, and really did try and rethink open world games on a fundamental level. I have tremendous respect for that. I also undertstand what makes the game appealing to so many people. But at the end of the day I also have to be true to how I feel about playing the game. I don't even try to convince myself to love things that are critically acclaimed these days... I'll give it a fair shake, and see if it sticks. If not, well, too bad for me. I'm the one losing out, not people who love the game.
I try to undertstand why people feel differently about different things. Like I love There Will Be Blood, but I know many people who hate that film and find it terminally boring. I don't agree, but I definitely understand their perspective.
lvl99 Pixel
Member
Lionel Richie
Member
Wait, what the fuck? How the flying fuck doesn't he like Japanese games? What is the issue here?
It... just is. It takes the basic structure of a Far Cry game. Everything from the towers, to the enemy camps, to the open world. It does different things with those basic components, it focuses more on puzzles, and it definitely adds some flourishes; however, it is clearly iterating (slightly) on a specific style of open world game that was essentially created by Far Cry.
Yeah, sorry. I should have clarified. I was not specifically referring to the first Far Cry. I can see where the confusion is coming from now...
It's definitely true that some people won't accept any kind of criticism, but nobody should accept that kind of criticism that comes from someone who hasn't and refuses to learn how to play the game.
True, Damn embarrassing for a dev to do this and cant accept japanese kind of games are back, levine take on botw is more real even he starts the game skeptic, and enjoyed it after.
SapientWolf
Trucker Sexologist
Between the video and the backlash I am going to be thoroughly entertained.
To be fair, watching the video, he didn't even know how to light a fire to cook food. He just sort of expected Link to light it just being next to it instead of pressing a button for a context sensitive action (he does eventually figure it out though).
Inventory has plenty of criticisms, even I wish it was better. But Blow's moments in the game and what he talks about is just not very good and a lot of nonsense to wade through to find actual good criticism.
Boards of Canada
Member
His hot take on Link being a child with abs and how kids can't relate to it was the stupidest thing I've heard in quite some time.
Schnozberry
Member
I think you're giving Far Cry far too much credit in order to minimize the differences between them. It didn't innovate open worlds, location towers, or enemy camps either. Those had been staples of other genres, and even other Ubisoft games before it. I think Zelda draws inspiration from a lot of successful RPG and Open World Action games to create it's world. It's hard not to notice elements of Studio Ghibli in it's art direction, Minecraft in it's chemistry, the Elder Scrolls games for it's ambitious scale, Assassin's Creed and Far Cry for it's towers and traversal, and even Shadow of the Colossus with it's giant beasts. Hell, I'd even mention the Arkham Games, for how much the Korok Puzzles remind me of the Riddler Trophy Hunting. There's probably a lot of influence from other Japanese games like the Souls Series and Dragon's Dogma for various gameplay and presentation elements.
We can make these comparisons for just about every game. What really matters is how well you execute what you borrow, how you integrate it with your own ideas, and if it forms a cohesive package when you're done. There are a few things I would have like to change about BOTW, namely early game stamina and late game enemy AI, but on the whole it's quite a well rounded experience. Inventory could use a revisit for the next one as well.
AndrewDean84xX
Banned
It's pretty obvious who hasn't seen the video and are calling Zelda fans embarrassing. Blow' s only embarrassing himself. I don't imagine this stream will be up long. I doubt his ego can take the legitimate backlash.
Or maybe he shouldn't stream a game he tweeted negatively about its review scores and then not give an honest shot.
So please watch the video and skip around. See his awful fake attempts at playing the game. Listen to him contradict himself.
Or maybe he shouldn't stream a game he tweeted negatively about its review scores and then not give an honest shot.
So please watch the video and skip around. See his awful fake attempts at playing the game. Listen to him contradict himself.
Man, I'm not attacking the game. That isn't what is happening here. I also agree that you can see other design parallels with other major game releases. However, in its DNA, I think it is based off of that Far Cry model. As is Horizon, for that matter. I think both games do very different things with it, and I think both games end up being way better than any of the Far Cry games. However, it ends up being, like, a shared genus. You can trace their DNA back to Far Cry.
Just to reiterate, I like Breath of the Wild. It isn't a shoe-in for my personal GOTY (though I am positive it will win the most GOTY awards), but I think it stands alongside all the best games released this year, which is something to be proud of, as this has been one hell of a year.
ScientificPizza
Banned
It's not embarrassing for a dev to do that. He basically says that he's not interested in the game. Just because you're a video game developer that doesn't mean you need to be open to every game. Everyone has biases and Blow is pretty blatant and honest about his.
This video is *really* a nonissue
I haven't watched that part of the video yet, but a shameful admit is I took few moments to know how to light the pot as well and I did try to just stand next to it, because that's how the torch get lit.
I think some forget that some people didn't see all the trailers and gameplay vids before playing and just went blind into the game which I presume showed some of the game mechanics. However, I didn't watch most trailers and Breath of the Wild is my first Zelda game and I felt that even though the game doesn't hold your hand it shows you the ropes extremely well.
Chaos2Frozen
Member
Actually, why is he doing this in the first place?
I don't know who Jonathon Blow is, but holy moly he is almost insufferable. He better have some serious game development chops if he is going to be that negative.
Now we check the internet to seen what he's created which gives him the right to be so condescending ....eh, not bad! Consider me impressed
Now we check the internet to seen what he's created which gives him the right to be so condescending ....eh, not bad! Consider me impressed
ScientificPizza
Banned
The Hermit
Member
To troll Zelda fans apparently.
I find funny his position since one of the games some reviews compared was The Witness.
no wonder I kinda hate this guy
Raven117
Gold Member
The first thing I thought within the first 4 hours was holy sheet, this is far cry.
Glad to see I'm not the only guy who saw this.
While there is a lot of Nintendo special sauce in BotW it really did feel like Far Cry to me.
Who?
I dunno. I don't think previous gameplay videos matter too much in this contextual situation. When it came to lighting torches in games like OoT, MM and WW, the deku stick was always at the height of the torch making running between them simple and fast. Also helps that child Link was short so holding them up made sense. You never had much of a reason to swing the lit sticks (though you could).
Twilight Princess, you just had the lantern and you always had to press a button to light torches (similar to all the 2D games). Wolf Link had to use some sticks but you had to jump and reach the height required to light the torches.
It just makes sense to try and swing the torch and press a button next to the bonfire to see if it works. Your're an adult Link in BotW, the bonfire is lower than your shins, so a swing probably works and it does.
This also isn't even getting into the 2D games where you always had to perform an action to light a torch or bush etc.
From what I can tell from the thread:
- A lot of people were praising the game
- Some people specifically recommended it to him (particularly citing similarities to the environmental puzzles in The Witness)
- He criticized that the game only recieved praise and good scores simply because it's Zelda
So what I'm getting from this is he was playing through for the specific reason of proving the people praising the game and comparing it to his work wrong. I'd like to say it was to see if the comparisons really were there or if they game really did stand on its own, but given his attitude during the stream, that doesn't really seem like a possible interpretation of the events.
Schnozberry
Member
Blow has made a career out of being insufferable. I wouldn't get too invested in his idiosyncrasies.
If you don't mind me I'll keep discussing the game since there's no real argument presented by that vid.
They're never that challenging and they're the least replayable type of gameplay mechanic this side of QTE.
1 thing for sure, the game only offers 4 big puzzles that use the kind of spatial awareness the best Zelda dungeons are known for. I'd argue that the Water one is the best of the bunch. Outside of that all the shrines are similar to what you would find in games like WW , ALBW or the DS games : single room bite sized puzzles that are solved on their own term but are disconnected between them.
The big plus BotW offers over all the other puzzle centric Zelda games we had to suffer through is that there is usually more than 1 solution to each puzzles.
That alone is the only way to make an engaging puzzle that doesn't rely on finding what the hell the developer was thinking at the time.
Also unlike ALBW, despite giving all the tools at the start and being pretty open in the progression it doesn't devolve into a shitty easy mess like on 3ds where every dungeon is as hard as the 1st one because the devs couldn't think challenging players was conducive to a better experience.
They are of course hilariously easier than anything you would find in a bona fide puzzle game but then again ALL Zelda games are like that.
So yeah no, I don't agree at all. The puzzles aren't particularly shit as far as Zelda goes.
Since they're not over emphasized, they allowed the designers to focus on more important parts of the games that are conducive to a better experience.
I'm sorry to say that you're liking the worst part of the games by quite a bit.
They're never that challenging and they're the least replayable type of gameplay mechanic this side of QTE.
I've finished the game and did all the shrines (still not done with the koroks because seriously who is? and I'm not gonna use a guide, I like being paid when I work).
1 thing for sure, the game only offers 4 big puzzles that use the kind of spatial awareness the best Zelda dungeons are known for. I'd argue that the Water one is the best of the bunch. Outside of that all the shrines are similar to what you would find in games like WW , ALBW or the DS games : single room bite sized puzzles that are solved on their own term but are disconnected between them.
The big plus BotW offers over all the other puzzle centric Zelda games we had to suffer through is that there is usually more than 1 solution to each puzzles.
That alone is the only way to make an engaging puzzle that doesn't rely on finding what the hell the developer was thinking at the time.
Also unlike ALBW, despite giving all the tools at the start and being pretty open in the progression it doesn't devolve into a shitty easy mess like on 3ds where every dungeon is as hard as the 1st one because the devs couldn't think challenging players was conducive to a better experience.
They are of course hilariously easier than anything you would find in a bona fide puzzle game but then again ALL Zelda games are like that.
So yeah no, I don't agree at all. The puzzles aren't particularly shit as far as Zelda goes.
Since they're not over emphasized, they allowed the designers to focus on more important parts of the games that are conducive to a better experience.
some people were a bit too bothered by the high praise it got, for some reason. videos like this provide relief to their suffering. even if the person playing wasn't exactly being fair toward the game. so of course anyone pointing that out will be seen a "nintard" who can't accept criticism by this crowd.
SolicitorPirate
Member
This thread made me go back and read up about some of Blow's ideas and theories about game design, and it just frustrated me. I believe he is correct in describing the ennui in the game industry. Game developers are rewarded for producing shallow and addictive entertainment rather than trying to progress the medium as an artform.
The problem comes from the fact that while Blow is good at identifying macro issues in game design, he tends to only have a surface level understanding of specific games he critiques, thereby robbing his overall point of their persuasiveness.
The problem comes from the fact that while Blow is good at identifying macro issues in game design, he tends to only have a surface level understanding of specific games he critiques, thereby robbing his overall point of their persuasiveness.
Yikes, I enjoyed both BOTW and The Witness (though Stephen's Sausage Roll is a superior puzzler to The Witness), and I would never compare the two. The solution to most of the shrines puzzles is readily apparent, whereas the Witness makes you work just to understand the rules of the puzzles.
thisisneogaf.gif
Maybe outside GAF, but debating it here, it sometimes sounds like it's the low point of the franchise to quite a few people. I'm more interested discussing specific issues with the game rather than be told "the game reviewed well, just let it go and let us complain all we want".
We do have a lot of very good critiques from gaffer with good reasoning and well writing which is good to read
But we also have a lot of non sense complain which don't deserve time to even read
lvl99 Pixel
Member
what ive seen, especially on gaf, the poster right under yours for example will defend anything negative with something like "you're playing it wrong".
Theres also this weird kind of retroactive loathing toward the Zelda series prior to BOTW now that its out, and one poster even told me that Wind Waker was a "bad game with a bad ending" *shrug*
edit: why is he calling apples lemons?
clarknova156
Member
Jonathan Blow dislikes a popular game. People have different opinions. Not a big deal.
Moving on.
Moving on.
And you think you can see this life long game developer being "pretentious" from this video?
Yep that's childish as fuck.
- Status