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[Keops]

Yeah, not innovating or not "pushing the boundaries" won't hurt the genre at all. It will probably bore you to death if you're an avid consumer of the particular genre, but to a neophyte the games will be as exciting as they once were for you. It's pretty much what happened to me with Zelda, I got bored after Ocarina of Time. Played all of them (except the second one, the sidescroller one) and to me every Zelda game somehow feels the same. It has new characters, new graphics, but the dungeons, items, and puzzles are so similar I kinda grew bored. I don't think they are bad games, but somehow I just stopped playing them for weeks or months on end and never got to finish them.

I still crave a good Metroidvania though

[Graham-]

saturation doesn't hurt a genre a lot but it does hurt it. why do people hate farmville? takes attention away from real games.

besides, fuck the genre. we care about ourselves, and our games.

[aberrantmind]

saturation doesn't hurt a genre a lot but it does hurt it. why do people hate farmville? takes attention away from real games.

besides, fuck the genre. we care about ourselves, and our games.

people hate farmville not because of saturation but because of it's soulsucking gameplay, and annoying notifications.

[gimymblert]

Which is about farmville by the way, none of that in the game it clone when it had clone it.

[Graham-]

people hate farmville not because of saturation but because of it's soulsucking gameplay, and annoying notifications.

right but that doesn't explain why people who don't play it hate it. they don't hate terrorism. they hate farmville.

[aberrantmind]

people hate farmville not because of saturation but because of it's soulsucking gameplay, and annoying notifications.

right but that doesn't explain why people who don't play it hate it. they don't hate terrorism. they hate farmville.

annoying notifications.

[Keops]

Yeah, countless internet memes can attest that people hate Farmville (and pretty much any "social" game/grind that spams notifications) because of the obnoxious push notifications.

[Oskuro]

But then again, rephrasing the question to "Are there too many shitty Metroidvanias?" wouldn't just trivialize the discussion?

Not if we focus on discerning what "shitty" is.

And it is not a matter of elitism. I chose the word "shitty" for effect, but it'd be probably better to have used words like "bland" or "forgettable".

Even a high-production value game can be one of those things if it doesn't find a personality of its own.

My experience with media design, specially game design, is that a lot of people, both amateur and pro, are eager to try their hand at "improving" the things they like, and thus result in imitation with little innovation. Much like fanfiction, you could say (take a look at my project, I'm making a DooM fangame myself).

My major concern is when the resulting blandness is then blamed on factors that didn't really contribute to it. The project's genre (and the oversaturation claim) is a common scapegoat, but quite often you get things like "if we had more money", "if the graphics were better", "the technology just isn't there". Claims that are quickly proven wrong when a genuinely memorable title pops up and takes the audience by storm.


So I guess the thing to consider is whether our projects are really that unique, instead of resorting to scapegoating by blaming the genre for the lack of attention we might be getting.

And also, let's realize that no matter how good a game might be, it also needs some luck to be noticed.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

i still find it hard to believe that the market is crowded with them; there are far more indie puzzle platformers than indie metroidvanias for example

so for illustration purposes, can anyone in this thread name ten metroidvanias which were released this year, in 2013? anyone? i doubt anyone will be able to name that many, because there probably aren't that many

[aberrantmind]

So I guess the thing to consider is whether our projects are really that unique, instead of resorting to scapegoating by blaming the genre for the lack of attention we might be getting.

And also, let's realize that no matter how good a game might be, it also needs some luck to be noticed.

clones are never that unique. There are usually(and at the least should be) personal touches, but usually clones are emulating something that has been done before, so blaming a cloned game's failure on the genre is just a stupid thing to do.

blaming a game's failure on bad luck is borderline legit. it's like, you might have these hunches on different things that occurred which may have been just plain bad luck, but in all likelihood you wouldn't know if it was badluck or you're just looking for a scape goat, because that's how luck works. so borderline legit, depending on how concrete your data is on what you're labeling as being a luck based factor.

i still find it hard to believe that the market is crowded with them; there are far more indie puzzle platformers than indie metroidvanias for example

so for illustration purposes, can anyone in this thread name ten metroidvanias which were released this year, in 2013? anyone? i doubt anyone will be able to name that many, because there probably aren't that many

I can't even name one. Now roguelikes...

[Graham-]

yes, there are lots of indie platformers, but those don't bother me. they just go in the bin. I don't even acknowledge their existence.

maybe there's just a hunger for metroidvanias? I don't know. I don't know what's going on. someone tell me what's going on. so when we see a bunch of boring ones we're like "uuggggg, I want something better than _that_; I can do better than _that_... ugggggggggggghhhhh."

[melos]

this is like the zelda-like effect too, some people will say there are a lot of them, but when they try to name full releases this year, well...the same deal for metroidvanias



the thing is there aren't a lot of metroidvanias coming out.

this year, stuff that came out

-Guacamelee

uhhhhhhhhhh

smaller -
- barbarium http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/613383
-Rico (for mobile, trailer looks..eh - crystal collecting)


planned -
-A.N.N.E.
-chasm
-Ghost song
-environmental station alpha
-axiom verge
-chroma


-------


So..

Unsurprisingly there are not a lot of metroidvanias despite our intuitions.
Even less metroidvanias that end up being finished, or even less that profit.

Why? Well they're hard to make, that's probably why.

So go make metroidvanias.

---------

[Graham-]

or maybe they are just more recognizable. when I see one I think, "oh, a metroidvania." or I just think, "oh." but a "puzzle platformer" with little inspiration? I just think, "oh, a game."

[melos]

or maybe they are just more recognizable. when I see one I think, "oh, a metroidvania." or I just think, "oh." but a "puzzle platformer" with little inspiration? I just think, "oh, a game."

I think that generally, they tend to require more groundwork to get started and so that automatically helps to distinguish the game - your personal touches end up in the game, for one. It's also something that for some reason, larger teams don't seem to bother with..

Like, with puzzle platformers it's really easy to make a pile of shit, very formulaic, so it's easy to just not bother with those things.

But it's not like the genre is stale (look at Starseed Pilgrim), it just requires a lot of work.

[melos]

For anyone making a metroidvania:


There may be a lot of in-development ones, but you will really distinguish yourself if you manage to finish yours. To the point where you don't need to worry about saturation or anything.

[Graham-]

maybe this is about unsaturation. too many aborted babies or whatever?

[gimymblert]

saturation is not about how many will be make, but how great the offering is, and how formulaic it has devolve (ie no excitation).
Ie dead genre can be over saturated because there is barely any improvement over kings and old offerings. I mean street of rage is still fun, modern brawler are not half that fun, barely improve, struggle to have half the identity and depth. 3D brawler are at a point where they start to decline after the god of war and arkham wake up.

When a genre is dead/over saturated the shift goes to the "world" building. Or the genre became a "gameplay" brick. Remember me and last of us are very generic in their gameplay, the world or the story is what suck you. And then this is a genre that is slowly strengthening itself, the genre that reverse gameplay and "cutscene" where you wish gameplay where skipable. BY cutscene I mean all story delivery tactics (trigger, ambiant banter, cinematics, ambiant gameplay, etc...).

[Graham-]

the shooting in gta fucking sucks. what is wrong with those guys? gta 5 rocks. just sayin'

[aberrantmind]

saturation is not about how many will be make, but how great the offering is, and how formulaic it has devolve (ie no excitation).

yeah, I think I can see this in a way. as in a sea of "inferior" offerings can give the appearance of saturation. but it's not a bad thing really. competition is most often the catalyst for innovation. if there are a bunch of shitty offerings, someone will come along and make something good to raise the bar.

Judging purely on the fact that everyone has a hard time listing any recent metroidvanias, I'd say there isn't enough.

[Keops]

And then this is a genre that is slowly strengthening itself, the genre that reverse gameplay and "cutscene" where you wish gameplay where skipable. BY cutscene I mean all story delivery tactics (trigger, ambiant banter, cinematics, ambiant gameplay, etc...).

Bingo! That's a term I like. I've always thought about that. Some games where gameplay is not that great or is extremely derivative, but you still want to finish them due to being immersed in the world/story so much. Reverse gameplay.

Kinda makes you want to watch a movie instead of playing a game.

Gimym, is this term yours or is there more information on the web about it?