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Why has no one bothered to ripoff Shadow of the Colossus?

B

bakedpony

Member
I don't mean merely having huge bosses in games (such as in God of war, Lords of Shadows etc..)

I mean a game where the focus is on beating huge bosses that require thinking, strategizing and eventually climbing to beat them. Not like in some games where the large boss fights are split into different phases.

I'm talking about really figuring out what to do in order to get to the boss's weak point. How come we haven't gotten a SOTC ripoff yet since it was widely praised by critics and gamers alike?
 
R

Retro

Member
Edit: That'll teach me to read.

It's much easier to make a game where you just wail on crowds of copypasta'd baddies until they fall over and then farm out the boss fights to "Epic" QTEs. At least that seems to be the trend, as the number of games where "What works on enemies" and "What works on bosses" are completely different. Having gameplay mechanics that can handle both small and large-scale combat doesn't strike me as being that difficult, and honestly, I'm more surprised SotC didn't have non-colossus enemies you had to fight. It seems like combining the two wouldn't be terribly hard, but... /shrug.
 
A

Aeana

Member
I did a double-take when I read this thread title, because we went through a period where every game being released with large bosses was being accused of ripping off SotC.
 
S

Silky

Banned
I mean a game where the focus is on beating huge bosses that require thinking, strategizing and eventually climbing to beat them.
Click to expand...

Not gonna lie, Dragon's Dogma had a few of those moments.

Aeana said:
I did a double-take when I read this thread title, because we went through a period where every game being released with large bosses was being accused of ripping off SotC.
Click to expand...

weren't the majority of those 'huge' bosses just static setpieces that you could barely interact with unlike SOTC?
 
U

UnluckyKate

Member
bakedpony said:
I don't mean merely having huge bosses in games (such as in God of war, Lords of Shadows etc..)

I mean a game where the focus is on beating huge bosses that require thinking, strategizing and eventually climbing to beat them. Not like in some games where the large boss fights are split into different phases.

I'm talking about really figuring out what to do in order to get to the boss's weak point. How come we haven't gotten a SOTC ripoff yet since it was widely praised by critics and gamers alike?
Click to expand...

That would require actual... good gameplay mecanics and though through game design, and long and complex boss fight mecanics to design and... tons of stuff to program and levels and arena to design too...

Why would you do that when you can make boss stand there, take the hit in their feet and go down to die in a spectacular viseral cinematic experience QTE ?
 
Garcia

Garcia

Member
LOL! Scary timing dude. I just finished SotC 10 minutes ago, what the fuck.

On topic: It has clearly influenced a lot of games. Gigantonormous boss battles weren't that common before it got released.

I don't think a clone or a ripoff is likely to happen anytime soon. The scope of storytelling and the settings required to execute such behemoth aren't easily found these days (and I don't mean this as something negative).
 
M

Mechazawa

Member
Did SotC blow up sales charts?

It's probably a combination of being a hard concept to pull off properly, being something a lot of designers aren't interested in making and being something that's a hard sell to the general public. Easier to just pick bits and pieces from SotC instead of wholesale using the template.
 
S

sn00zer

Member
Agreed...large bossess always follow the exact same pattern.....
Dodge, Dodge, Dodge, Block, Stun, Wack, Wack, Wack x3
 
J

Jack cw

Member
bakedpony said:
I'm talking about really figuring out what to do in order to get to the boss's weak point. How come we haven't gotten a SOTC ripoff yet since it was widely praised by critics and gamers alike?
Click to expand...

Technically, even Zelda or MGS do this with their bosses. Its a design choice though. SotC is unique because the plain and barren environment works with the overall art direction and the games concept of travelling to giant bosses, climbing and find their weak spot. It worked but this wasnt a game for the masses. The pace is rather slow and the world is shallow and it could have easily turned out to be the most boring game ever. But great design is, when minimalistic things work functional to deliver a great experience and I cant imagine another director or game that could improve this formula.
 
N

NinjaCatfish

Member
Dark Souls requires thinking and strategizing for it's bosses. It doesn't require actual climbing though.

Also Dragon's Dogma lets you climb enemies and that is great.
 
S

Silky

Banned
Mechazawa said:
Did SotC blow up sales charts?
Click to expand...

Considering that it hit Greatest Hits status within it's timeframe of 9 months yeah it did pretty well in it's time. 500K copies is pretty good for a mid-life PS2 title.

Why do people think SotC was a flop? lol come on
 
B

bakedpony

Member
If an evil company wanted to make easy money, they could make a bad SOTC clone where you fight giant robots instead. One small man (bald American soldier) versus huge evil giant robots. I think that's pretty marketable.

Of course it being a good game is another matter altogether.
 
A

atr0cious

Member
My dream StarFox game, by Platinum, would be classic onrails shooter, and then bosses would be giant mechas in open arena areas, that you could hookshot out of your ship to the bosses and use grav boots to scale them looking for weak spots, which you could mark for team strikes, or attach bombs yourself. Imagine scaling a giant mech, attaching a bomb, and then skydiving back to your arwing as it explodes.
 
W

Woenix Phright

Neo Member
I would like this to happen, but I think most people, developers and players, seem content with killing giant things by hacking their ankles and shins.
 
G

Gxgear

Member
The game is one big boss rush mode. The experience would be difficult to replicate without coming off as a rip-off.
 
S

Sapphire Dreams

Member
Like some said, it is a hard concept to pull off right, and no one wants to take that risk in this day an age where games are so freaking expensive to make.

Aeana said:
Honestly, the way people reacted to Kizuna made it seem like people were disgusted at the idea of a SotC clone. And then there was the screenshot thread...

Note that this game actually turned out to be terrible, but still.
Click to expand...

I am still bummed that this game was never released outside of Japan :(
 
RiccochetJ

RiccochetJ

Gold Member
What's the point? You'll just get shit on by the fans of SotC.

You could do an "inspired by: shtick I suppose. Won't change much. It's pointless.
 
Haunted

Haunted

Member
Most of the games who attempted something like it (at least for boss fights) don't have the freeclimbing mechanics to back this up, having to resort to their automated platforming with highlighted ledged (Lords of Shadow) or making them QTE-events (God of War).

And while it's informed quite a few games like that, yeah, I haven't seen many games that really copy it so such an extent except for some 2D tributes (small online games).

Aeana said:
Honestly, the way people reacted to Kizuna made it seem like people were disgusted at the idea of a SotC clone. And then there was the screenshot thread...
Click to expand...
I'm looking at the first page, and (graphics complaints aside), the reception seems positive.
 
A

Aeana

Member
Haunted said:
Most of the games who attempted something like it (at least for boss fights) don't have the freeclimbing mechanics to back this up, having to resort to their automated platforming with highlighted ledged (Lords of Shadow) or making them QTE-events (God of War).

And while it's informed quite a few games like that, yeah, I haven't seen many games that really copy it so such an extent except for some 2D tributes (small online games).


I'm looking at the first page, and (graphics complaints aside), the reception seems positive.
Click to expand...
I think I linked the wrong thread. I'll double check in a sec.
 
M

MormaPope

Banned
Attack on Titan would work extremely well when it comes to combating giant beings/monsters. You either damage the monster enough so it's easier to slash its weak point, or get good enough at traversal to slash its weak point right away. Don't know about world traversal. Actually if you played as a character that joins the scouts traversal would be covered that way.

The design and format for SotC is something that shouldn't be ripped off entirely. There's a lot someone could do with that formula to make a better game. Towns or even cities littered throughout the world, temples with puzzles that reflect what the monster is and why it acts a certain way, more tools and gadgets to allow for more varied ways of killing giant monsters.

The format itself is something that should be experimented with. The only enemies or antagonists for the player are giant monsters, traveling is required to reach said monster, 1v1 battle, each monster requires different methods of play to beat.
 
F

Fancykong

Member
bakedpony said:
I mean a game where the focus is on beating huge bosses that require thinking, strategizing and eventually climbing to beat them. Not like in some games where the large boss fights are split into different phases.

I'm talking about really figuring out what to do in order to get to the boss's weak point.
Click to expand...

Sounds like Monster Hunter to me. 4 even more so since they added the climbing mechanics.
 
N

NewGame

Banned
bakedpony said:
I mean a game where the focus is on beating huge bosses that require thinking, strategizing and eventually climbing to beat them. Not like in some games where the large boss fights are split into different phases.
Click to expand...

Because it requires a specialized system of platforming interactions. There's also other extremely polished and core assets in SOTC like the camera, the persuasive art design informing players about how to approach monsters and generally the extremely clever mind of Ueda.
 
V

Vecks

Member
Probably for the same reason a lot of great games don't get ripoffed--people would just rather ripoff easier to design or insanely popular types of games.
 
T

thunder_snail

Member
Games like SotC needs to have the engine designed around boss fights. Most game engines won't allow full control when climbing moving things and thus will have to rely on scripts and give an illusion of control via QTE.

It's always a gamble to create a new engine for a single game.
 
D

dinopoke

Member
Not exactly on topic but I'd love to play a Dark Souls-esque game with some large open areas to ride around on horseback and massive bosses to climb on a take down.
 
L

Lupin the Third

Member
bakedpony said:
I'm talking about really figuring out what to do in order to get to the boss's weak point. How come we haven't gotten a SOTC ripoff yet since it was widely praised by critics and gamers alike?
Click to expand...

0d02WpV.jpg

Punch-Out!!
 
O

Oni Link 666

Member
The way SOTC does the weak point thing is very specific. Your random developer is not going to come up with monsters that are almost dungeons onto themselves. Bosses that really require you to think to figure them out. They're too worried about the game not selling or people not being able to beat the game. It takes a developer who does not give a fuck about anything but making the game they want to make to do that. Who else would even do something like that? Who else would be so bold to think they could do that and do it better? Who else would even give the go ahead to make a game like that? Maybe Nintendo would, but they probably wouldn't, because it's been done.
 
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