Comments on: I Hear It Likes The Ghostbusters Videos – Update

By: Scandalon

Scandalon — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 20:29:55 +0000

Del Boy –
Don’t worry, I have seen the ghostbusters films, about 5 years ago. Maybe it’s just I never saw them in their “natural context” (The 80’s?), but I certainly didn’t see what all the fuss was about. I laughed maybe once during the first one.

The internets now hate me…

By: Noc

Noc — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 05:56:10 +0000

Caiman and Garren, “Next Gen” simply means that the level of graphical sophistication is that of the incoming generation as opposed to the outgoing one. For instance, UT2004 had “Next Gen” graphics when it was being developed; after a few years it became “Current Gen,” and when UTIII came out, it had “Next Gen” graphics and UT2004 is now sporting “Last Gen” pretties. When graphical advances come they usually come pretty quickly, and the divisions between generations tend to be pretty obvious in retrospect.

For instance, this sort of thing on the PC falls into certain broad catagories: “2.5 D,” “3D,” “3D with Sort of Dynamic Lights,” “3D with full Dynamic Lighting and Some Shading,” and “Everything’s got bump-maps, Normal-maps, and reflections all over it.” This last stage is the incoming generations, so if everything’s covered in six layers of shaders, it’s got “Next Gen” graphics. (Note: Broad, broad generalization.)

This is even easier to see when you look at console games; their visual evolution tends to run pretty parallel to that of the PC, but the gap between generations of graphics is even easier to see because the consoles themselves define the hardware capabilities of the current generation.

As a selling point it’s slightly redundant, since it’s sort of assumed that the majority of games being published now are using current graphical technology. But what it means is that they’re going for “As pretty as we can get given the technology we’ve got,” as opposed to “We’re going to try and work with a unique artistic style instead of getting the pretty with the ‘technological sledghammer’ route.” It’s sort of one of those things that’s part of the bullet point on the back of the box long with “Thirty Hours of Gameplay” and “Online Multiplayer Co-Op,” because it’s common enough that it’s not really a big deal but it’s worth mentioning since it’s absence would be pretty conspicuous.

By: Noah J.

Noah J. — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 04:26:44 +0000

this worries the hell out of me. grabbing every single line of the movies and slapping it into a game is not a great writing strategy. working in the librarian, sure, but how are they going to resurrect the stay-puft marshmallow man? i know it’s a game, but it’s also ghostbusters.

also: you can’t die? remember how well that worked in bioshock?

By: Caiman

Caiman — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 01:09:56 +0000

garren, exactly – they’ve burned that “superlative” out, so what will they call the next generation? “Next-next-gen” or “next-gen-squared” or perhaps “next-gen-360″?

By: yns88

yns88 — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 00:06:53 +0000

garren: It is my conjecture that by the time the next generation actually arrives, nobody will use the term, and the gaming press will declare it to be “soo last year”

Until then, however, you’ll have to make do replacing all instances of the text “next-gen” with “current-gen”. I suggest using a macro script to make it easier.

By: Masked Dave

Masked Dave — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 19:28:31 +0000

I’ve never seen anyone present a game well in videos like this.

Regardless that looked very good except for one minor quibble… there is going to be co-op right?

I mean, that whole getting-knocked-down-and-getting-picked-up mechanic is pure co-op game play. Without it, you may as well just have death.

By: kevin

kevin — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 18:36:05 +0000

“Ohp. Oh! And he got slimed! Oh man.”
“So theres Elanor Twitty. Oh nooo!”
“Oh wait, whats going on? Uh oh! Yeah you got knocked out by a bookshelf.”

Is this guy pitching his game or talking to a 6 year old?

By: garren

garren — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 18:25:47 +0000

“Next-gen”. God I hate that word. What the hell does that mean anyway, if everyone slaps it on any game?

By: GeorgeR

GeorgeR — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 16:25:28 +0000

That screenshot you have for the article is the saddest marshmallow man ever. You should have just shopped in tears. I mean really. He’s so very very sad.

By: The Guy

The Guy — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 15:44:51 +0000

I can wait for Ghostbusters, but if Brutal Legend isn’t released by fall it’ll be another reason in a long line of reasons to hate Activision AND Blizzard.

By: James T

James T — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 14:22:20 +0000

As long as I get Brutal Legend on my PC, I’m larfin’.

By: sigma83

sigma83 — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 13:00:14 +0000

The gameplay looks kind of flat to me, but that could be just the fact that the guy giving the presentation didn’t really do a spectacular job. I’ll reserve judgment until I have the game in hand, of course, but my initial impressions aren’t great.

I’d ideally want a cooperative (even with just the AI) experience beyond just firing the proton gun at things and yanking them around over a trap. I’d like for there to be strategic options and weapon selections and stuffs.

Just saying.