|
You guys in the mood for some useless and highly subjective data? I thought so! I pulled numbers from Wikipedia on the number of games published from 1990 to present. I then pulled up lists of 'Notable' releases each year from the same, and applied my infallible critiquing skills to these lists to extract a subset of games that I consider 'pretty good.' Afterwards, I spent way too much time making awful graphs to show everybody: Raw Data  Percentage of Good Games over Time  Total Games vs Good Games by Year  From all this tomfoolery I learned stuff I already knew, such as gaming is sucking more and more and 1998 was the golden year of my childhood, but now I have pseudoscience to back it up. But, it doesn't stop there! Surely my opinion sucks and yours is much better, so I've devised a method for us to pool our collective opinions into a terrible angsty beast: alone we may be ignorant, but in aggregate our idiocy knows no bounds. So do this: Go browse the wiki articles Starting with 1990 and through 2009, check this for the list of total games and this for a list of games wikipedians deem notable. Count up the number of games you'd feel comfortable describing as really freakin' good and proceed to the next step. Fill in the form I made just for you Head here and fill out a badly designed form that will dump your numbers into a database. I've got simple validation things up so you are not being mr clever by typing in -500 or "scrotum" for 1992, and I'll be weeding out any outrageous entries that slip through. Also, nobody is impressed with your retarded script kiddie skills, so please don't screw up my database thanks. What's considered a good game? Unfortunately it comes down to your personal taste, but try to think critically. Just because you had a hilarious time in Perfect Dark Zero with your buds doesn't mean the game deserves a 9.4 out of 10. Consider the total execution of the game, how it has been received by the community, any significant advances in technology, and the influence the game has left on the industry. If at any point your numbers for a year exceed 20ish, you probably aren't being selective enough. What shall come of all your labor? After a while, if there's any interest whatsoever, I'll work some mathematic wizardry and conjure up some more terrible charts and graphs for us all to use in our serious internet gaming debates. Yes, I realize this is all kind of stupid. No, this is not for any kind of homework blah blah.
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:00 |
|
|
|
| # ? Nov 22, 2009 10:55 |
|
|
A minimum 97.2% ball sucking per year, can't argue with that.
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:06 |
|
|
Above Our Own posted:What's considered a good game? I still don't understand why everyone hates on Perfect Dark Zero. That game was great.
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:09 |
|
|
I knew 1998 ruled too hard to just be a normal year. Everyone hates PDZ because it wasn't as good as Perfect Dark. It was alright, but wasn't "HOLY poo poo THIS GUN SEES THROUGH WALLS!"
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:10 |
|
|
Seems kind of neat but I want to know which games you're choosing from each year.
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:11 |
|
|
Interesting stuff. Does this apply to all consoles/PC or are you just doing one or the other? Might be interesting to track them individually.
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:13 |
|
|
fennesz posted:I knew 1998 ruled too hard to just be a normal year. I didn't own the first Perfect Dark when I was a kid, so whenever I would play it with my friends, it would just turn into the person who owned the game grabbing the Farsight because he knew where it was and how to use it and then destroying us all. I can't imagine it was a fun experience for anyone.
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:14 |
|
|
holy poo poo at 98, a good year to have a PSX and a PC, or just about any console at the time, Panzer Dragoon Saga was well worth the money spent on a Saturn
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:15 |
|
|
fleshweasel posted:Seems kind of neat but I want to know which games you're choosing from each year. If you really want I can go back through and write down the ones I picked out. I was hoping a few other nerds would waste some time and do the same with the form thing there, so we can see what kind of consensus we come to. Kid Awesome posted:Does this apply to all consoles/PC or are you just doing one or the other? This is across the board, arcade games excluded. If there's enough interest I'll go waste more time separating them out.
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:17 |
|
|
Greater volume of games leads to much greater opportunity to find one you deem 'good', but at the same time will raise your expectations so that fewer are deemed 'good'. I demand a larger sample size.
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:22 |
|
|
you should also provide your own age
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:40 |
|
|
2004 owned imho, 2010 needs to be more like 2004
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:43 |
|
|
It's pretty clear that 1998-2000 was the high-water mark for gaming. Then George W. Bush was elected and hosed it all up.
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:51 |
|
|
George Bush doesn't care about Half Life.
|
| # ? Nov 02, 2009 23:55 |
|
|
Every year is my new favorite year of gaming except for the year Assassin's Creed came out
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:01 |
|
|
you shouldn't include 2009 in the stats, the year isn't over and game releases are hugely biased to the holiday period, with many publishers holding back major releases which may score as disproportionately "good" compared to the rest of the year. also, have you included DLC games like Braid, Flower and World of Goo? those games are enormously well loved
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:06 |
|
|
* January 28 - Final Fantasy Tactics (PS) * March 31 StarCraft (Win) * April 30 - Might and Magic VI: The Mandate of Heaven (Win) * April 30 - Panzer Dragoon Saga (Sat) * May 22 Unreal (Win) * June 29 - Banjo-Kazooie (Nintendo 64) * August 21 Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six (Win) * September 30 Fallout 2 (Win) * September 30 Pokιmon Red and Blue (GB) * October 21 - Metal Gear Solid (PS) * October 30 Grim Fandango (Win) * November 20 Half-Life (Win) * November 21 The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64) * November 30 StarCraft: Brood War (Win) * November 30 Thief: The Dark Project (Win) * November 30 Baldur's Gate (Win) Wow, 1998 did own pretty hard. 1996 has it beat however * January 29 Duke Nukem 3D * May 13 Super Mario RPG * May 31 Quake * June 23 Super Mario 64 * August 31 The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall * August 31 The rebirth of the Sega Scream. * October 31 Command & Conquer: Red Alert * October 31 Master of Orion II * November 15 Tomb Raider * November 30 Diablo * Crusader: No Regret * Final Doom * The first console emulators appear.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:06 |
|
AxeManiac
|
Blarticus posted:A minimum 97.2% ball sucking per year, can't argue with that. Yeah that's higher than my estimate of 95%. Edit: Though Above Our Own's taste in games sucks if he thinks so few of the notable releases were good. I don't like most of the games listed but very few of them actually sucked BattleMaster fucked around with this message at Nov 03, 2009 around 00:13 |
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:08 |
|
|
I hope you didn't include Far Cry in 2004. What a failed experiment that was.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:28 |
|
|
AxeManiac posted:* January 28 - Final Fantasy Tactics (PS) Ya know I specifically remember my freshman year in HS being awesome for gaming and you confirmed it. '96 all the way!
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:29 |
|
|
How scientific can this be since the results are based off of what you thought are good games?
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:31 |
|
|
Even if you went off a pure scale of games with an overall reviewer rating of >8.0, there's still the underrated games, the cult hits, etc.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:35 |
|
|
Joe Don Baker posted:How scientific can this be since the results are based off of what you thought are good games? Completely and utterly scientific. Do not question it.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:35 |
|
|
SpazmasterX posted:Even if you went off a pure scale of games with an overall reviewer rating of >8.0, there's still the underrated games, the cult hits, etc. And games where the developer bribed lots of people like Black and White.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:36 |
|
|
BattleMaster posted:And games where the developer bribed lots of people like Black and White. I've heard this a few times. Any reading I can do on this?
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:37 |
|
|
BattleMaster posted:And games where the developer bribed lots of people like Black and White. I liked Black and White. 
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:38 |
|
|
This is awesome and goes to prove that whilst everything else was on the decline in the 90s video games were being more and more awesome.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:38 |
|
|
Joe Don Baker posted:How scientific can this be since the results are based off of what you thought are good games? It's science you loving Church-Loving retard.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:39 |
|
|
I completely agree with your chart. The 90s, specifically the late 90s were gaming's Golden Age. I'd put the last five years in the negative good game category, though.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:40 |
|
|
Joe Don Baker posted:I've heard this a few times. Any reading I can do on this? I don't have any sources but it's a fairly well-known phenomenon that the more free stuff reviewers get from developers and publishers the more likely they are to give their games good reviews so they don't cut off the flow of free stuff. That's why previews can't really be trusted, since the reviewers generally wish to continue to receive free advance review copies from that company. I seem to remember Kane and Lynch having that problem, Black and White is the classic example, and more recently that rotten turd Operation Flashpoint 2 received lots of 80+ scores before it hit stores only to disappoint many players.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:41 |
|
|
Dr. Video Games 0050 posted:It's science you loving Church-Loving retard. What?!
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:42 |
|
|
I looked at your lowest rated year (1991) in which you said only 4 good games were released and here's a list of awesome games from that year. I'm not even listing games which I suspect are awesome but which I haven't played myself, only those I know first hand. I didn't even include arcade games. Your method is flawed, possibly due to your own lack of taste but mostly because the "notable" releases defined by Wikipedia users is arbitrary and stupid. Adventures of Lolo 3 Another World Bomberman 2 Bonk's Revenge Civilization Duke Nukem Final Fantasy IV Final Fantasy Legend 3 Final Fantasy Adventure Golden Axe 2 King of Dragons Legend of Zelda: Link to the past Legend of the Mystical Ninja Lemmings M.C. Kids Metroid 2 Puyo Puyo Scorched Earth SimAnt Smash TV Sonic the Hedgehog Super Castlevania IV Super Ghouls N Ghosts Tecmo Super Bowl I tried to leave out any that I thought might be controversial - like Turtles in Time, I think it's awesome but I guess you could argue it wasn't. If you would argue that games like M.C. Kids or Adventures of Lolo 3 were anything but awesome, your opinion is wrong. Your overall point is still correct though, most games are crap.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:42 |
|
|
I think a big part of the late 90s is that that was when 3d gaming had been around long enough for designers to be getting a handle on it and make games that didn't look like crap, yet was still new enough that it had some novelty and could do things that had never been done before.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:42 |
|
|
More importantly, has anyone ever made a game that is playable entirely in Excel? Using Excel spreadsheet functions? I'm not talking about that weirdo devil 666 game that Bill Gates put in Excel '93 or whatever.  I want to like fight graphs and friggin blow up fuckin sorted tables of data but inside Excel so I can do it at work.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:42 |
|
|
Joe Don Baker posted:I've heard this a few times. Any reading I can do on this? Yeah, it's called any review of Black and White. 96 was the birth of 3D, from Quake to Mario, it's surprising how well those two that started it respectively got it so right and so many others got it so wrong for a good long time. I remember it being the first year I learned what a floating point processor was and why I needed one and the first time I was amazed at a game (Mario 64) breaking all concepts of what I thought gameplay was. I must have spent hours like a little melon head running around in front of the castle marveling at 3D movement and how well it was pulled off with analog sticks. You can't use science to prove how great these things are, you gotta use your heart man. You just feel it. For every Hylide or ET or Hellgate London, you remember and love the greats even more.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:44 |
|
|
AxeManiac posted:Yeah, it's called any review of Black and White. I've read reviews of it. I subscribed to PC Gamer when it came out, and I remember the good review it received. I never played the game, so I can't say either way if it is good or bad. I'm guessing it's pretty horrible.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:45 |
|
|
AxeManiac posted:96 was the birth of 3D, from Quake to Mario, it's surprising how well those two that started it respectively got it so right and so many others got it so wrong for a good long time. I remember it being the first year I learned what a floating point processor was and why I needed one and the first time I was amazed at a game (Mario 64) breaking all concepts of what I thought gameplay was. I must have spent hours like a little melon head running around in front of the castle marveling at 3D movement and how well it was pulled off with analog sticks. 96 was my first year of high school and my friends and I used to skip school to go to Toys 'r Us and play the demo of Mario 64 for hours. They'd come and kick you out after an hour or two so you'd have to figure out when you were overstaying your welcome and then leave and wait for the next shift. I think it reset automatically after a while, and it only had a limited amount of levels even available, but everything about the game was just so mind blowing at the time that I never got bored. There was also a Saturn on display next to it and if I remember correctly the game they had on demo was Nights. It was a good time to be alive.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:49 |
|
|
Joe Don Baker posted:I've read reviews of it. I subscribed to PC Gamer when it came out, and I remember the good review it received. I never played the game, so I can't say either way if it is good or bad. I'm guessing it's pretty horrible. Great game, up until level 3, where most reviewers stopped to started guzzling the cum of Molyneux and not check out all the critical flaws in the title, design and game flow. They all had to rush out and give it BEST GAME EVER AWARDS and nobody bothered to look at all the glaring, huge bugs and flaws with the title. Suffice to say, EA was leaning hard on everyone. Molyneux was pumping the game up like crazy and everyone wanted it to be much more then it was. If you ignored all that and casually played the game, I guess it wouldn't be much of a footnote, it had some good points, but the road to getting to that point, like with all Molyneux games was a rough one.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:50 |
|
|
Man, I always knew Clinton's second term was the best years for game releases. Now I got a graph to prove it.
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 00:52 |
|
|
I just went through 2005 and it had way more than 6 good games I think you made a cranky old man nostalgia chart by mistake
|
| # ? Nov 03, 2009 01:03 |
|
Rate Thread:
