Canadian Gamers – Episode 12
Hope you enjoy another silly, yet incredible podcast! No intro for you! Just listen already.
Ok now that you’re listening, leave us a comment! We need some ideas because otherwise these random podcasts will continue forever!
-
Regarding Mario 3D Land, it’s not exactly a glitch with the 1UP. It’s intentional. Because once you get to a certain point when grinding those 1UPs, you get a crown instead of the numbers which represent infinite lives. The abundance of lives has been a problem since New Super Mario Bros. Wii. 3D Land still has a nice challenge in the special worlds despite the lives.
With the next Mario game on the 3DS, Nintendo has gone on a trend of interchanging development teams depending on the viewpoint. Tokyo Studio’s handling the 3D games while one of their internal teams handles the 2D one. It’s already confirmed that there’s a 2D Mario title for the 3DS on the way.
I’m surprised by the praise I’m hearing from you guys regarding RE: Revelations. I need to get around to play it, but Kid Icarus is just occupying my time. And I’m curious of how the sales are. I’m not hearing much and I just hope that it didn’t bomb.
Nice podcast as usual. I don’t mind to jump right in with you guys, but as usual timezones get in the way…but if you guys can give me your schedule I’ll try to work around it and join in the fun.
-
We’re so random Ahmed it’s crazy. Like Steven said, one day we’ll likely do two podcasts in one day that’s how insane we are lol. I’ll let you know when we’re doing another one, if I have any forewarning that is.
As for Mario 3D Land, yeah I figured it wasn’t a glitch, it’s just that I didn’t plan for this to happen is all.
Steven told me about the new 2D Mario for the 3DS, and that’s actually a bit of a shame because this one felt like a 2D Mario, although I suppose more like a 3D bridge Mario if that makes any sense at all. Either way, I’ll be all over the next one. I just finished the special worlds last night, and am all the way up to world 5-4 with Luigi now. It’s super quick to replay the game with Luigi because I’m not bothering with the star coins or gold flags, I simply need to finish the level and that’s it. I’ll likely die a dozen or so times in the special worlds as those are indeed quite challenging.
As for Kid Icarus, it probably sold near the 300,000 range by now. I checked a few places and no one has any official numbers so it’s really hard to tell. I will be tackling that one at the same time as Mass Effect, or more likely whenever Sarina has the TV ;) The madness begins next Thursday :)
-
-
Heh, Spark Unlimited… I played Turning Point for the site, and it was OK. I also played Legendary, and it was indeed garbage. I would be less than optimistic for Lost Planet then. They seem to know shooter mechanics pretty well, but executing a full game seems to be a different story entirely for them. Oh well, obviously won’t render judgment yet; they could surprise us.
-
-
Hey Guys,
Not sure if I’m replying to the right podcast but I wanted to discuss the interesting topic about games being too easy nowadays.
I find it very interesting because I myself, have always enjoyed puzzle games and still do, but, although I understood exactly what Jarrod and Steven meant by games are too easy now and they give you the answer right away if you can’t find it, There is good in this, and a good reason why it’s happening today.
The benefit in giving hints after you’ve taken too long to figure out the puzzle is to keep the fun flowing. Before I go too far, I agree that games like Mist should remain that way, with no hints and if you can’t figure it out, you can’t. But games like Uncharted (which was used as an example in the podcast) it completely breaks the pacing, the flow, action and story! There are even some games where I’ll try every logical answer but nothing worked until I would give up and find the answer online to realize the answer to the puzzle was completely ilogical. That frustrates me!
Now the good reason why it’s happening today is because back then, they didn’t have the technology to hand out hints only after realizing you’ve been stuck in the same area for too long. (This was pointed out to me by my girlfriend hehe)
And on the same note, games didn’t have much of a story nor were they required to keep the flow going at a good pace. -
Pat I fully agree with what you’re saying about story-driven games and about pacing, because no one can argue or debate that. It’s bang-on 110% correct. The thing that I dislike are the exceptions to that rule, where it’s not about pacing, it’s simply about hand-walking for no other reason than hand-walking itself. Nintendo is the main culprit behind this side of the equation. Look at 90% of their games, where they constantly remind the player what item they’ve collected, even though they’ve already mentioned the same thing 200,000 times earlier. That’s completely unnecessary. Let the player figure out the use of said item. Adventure games are also guilty of this. I was reading a great article the other day from Ron Gilbert, the father of modern adventure games, and he said exactly what the two of us are saying. Where do you draw the line? Do you have a game where the player needs to sleep on it to solve a puzzle, or do you allow them three attempts and then offer up the solution? He said that after all these years he still doesn’t have a solution that really fits all games or all cases.
Technology has certain improved games. I prefer the 16-bit era where I could get stuck for hours trying to figure something out, but the tools were given to me right away. The 8-bit era was simply overboard. Look at the original Zelda, there’s no way anyone could find the final dungeons without going through the entire game five times because of hidden walls, etc. There were no hints, etc. That was simply overlooking these things back in the day. ALttP was the perfect middle ground. They gave just enough hints to help you without becoming like more modern Zelda games where you’re almost hand-walked through different areas.
I’ve always believed that there’s a fine line between the two, and some games manage it better than others. As a whole I still feel we’re treated a little too kind now-a-days with constant reminders and clues where to go next. I like getting lost only to realize my blunder and have a great sense of accomplishment when I overcome something rather obvious in the first place. That feeling is mostly lost today. I fully understand the developer’s point of view too though. Trying to reach the largest audience possible, while keeping a constant pace and ensuring all features of your game are used, while balancing everything else is no easy task.
-
Leave a Reply
- Comment Feed for this Post
Hey, listen!
Looking forward to checking this out after work.