Semi-Bullfrog related nostalgia thread. I weep every time I think of how awesome their games were. Dungeon Keeper and Syndicate, in particular, are games that have ideas which could be executed to stunning levels of awesomeness now, which in reality have gameplay better and more interesting and above all more origninal than the vast majority of games available now, which were big sellers and were hugely popular, and which inexplicably have disappeared while, as noted above, ‘Generic Shooter 12′ sells 12 billion copies, only bettered by Starcraft 2, who’s excellence (and it is a quality game) still can’t disguise the fact that it’s a game over a decade old, with no originality or innovation or creativity or humour or interesting twists or genuine character (other than the units and buildings themselves, I mean more character in the sense of, EG, Synidicate’s logos or Dungeon Keeper’s awesome desembodied hand).

To be fair, there is no shortage of genuinely awesome, and even awesome and orignal games out there now, games with imagination and polish that would have been impossible not so long ago, but it’s an absolute tragedy how many awesome game ‘styles’, which seemed to be really branching out and showing huge potential in the 90′s, have disappeared completely, with almost every game fitting neatly into a box marked RPG, RTS, FPS, SIM or SPORT.

Sad that it’s considered ‘origninal’ these days when a game, like Fallout say, combines a bit of FPS with a bit of RPG in a very obvious way that was done before, and much better, by Deus Ex anyway, while Dungeon Keeper seamlessly mashed up RPG, RTS, FPS and SIM elements nearly 2 decades ago to create something hugely orignal, almost flawless in gameplay and just awesome in pretty much every respect. Syndicate too – these games were like products of one’s own imagination put on screen in a way that worked – who doesn’t want to be an evil overlord? Or a blade runner style corporation? Or rather, if you didn’t want to be one before – it was only because you hadn’t happened to think about it.

Instead most games now look like the product of a commercial imagination put up on screen to make lots of money, rather than (as IMO all the best games do) mechanically enabling some aspect (or aspects) of our own fantasy lives.

It’s sad that there is no Syndicate equivalent now, it’s pathetic that 20 years after Dungeon Keeper there is no other game that lets you be that kind of character in that kind of setting, or that has hit upon the simple genius of allowing you to inhabit your RTS ish minions – like a starcraft allowing you to ‘become’ a zergling…how awesome would that be?

*sigh*

Instead we have call of duty black ops, which no doubt it a polished and quality game, but really it’s shooting mechanic is essentially doom, as are, STILL, 95% (arbitrary figure that feels correct) of shooters which come out. Thank god for stuff like STALKER, but even then we’re talking about great games, but ones where the ideas, where the good things, were already there on paper years and years ago with a game like Deus Ex.

Just a shame that, while games have become more generic, we actually now have the technology to take those old ideas and really push the boundaries of what they clearly wanted to do – the possibilities for a game like Syndicate, for example, make me drool and cry a little at the same time. Sad that, now that the tech is there to make even the wildest of imaginary games come (almost) true, the imagination component seems to have become overwhelmingly stuffed full of suits, beancounters and those who struggle to conceive of anything fun which doesn’t equate to wielding some kind of enormous weapon.

Oh well. It must be said too that these things often move in cycles – look at Hollywood films. In amongst the generic crap, we’re finally getting some films like ‘Inception’ which have the imagination to match the technology, hopefully we’ll see this happening more and more in games too, though sadly in amongst the generic stuff that is probably here to stay for the forseeable future.

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Soldiers showing up? Just flip to red alert status and watch as your minions EXTERMINATUS everything on the island that doesn’t belong to you.

One thing I hated was the useless sentry guns that wouldn’t fire on anyone untagged, even when being shot. You’d think they’d automatically go into self-defense mode. Maybe use stunners at 100-50% health, and switch to actual bullets when badly damaged?

The ability of investigators/etc. to use magical floor vents was also vexing, since you basically had no chance of protecting items in utterly inaccessible rooms.

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I still love it, but not in a way that made me want to play it forever. I was a sad panda when my hopes of Evil Genius 2 were blown out of the water.

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What are you guys talking about? Desktop Tower Defense and all of the Defense of the Ancients clones are essentially distilled Dungeon Keeper games.

If you’re looking for something similar theme-wise, Mastermind: World Conquerer isn’t far from a flash version of Evil Genius.

Mastermind: World Conquerer

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The best faux-60s videogame soundtrack is without a doubt No One Lives Forever.

I’m not sure about that, Ragnar… I’m having trouble even remembering NOLF music, but the moment someone in this thread mentioned the EG theme, it popped up in my mind like I just played the game yesterday.

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I mean, I seriously would have loved enslaving the galaxy as Darth Vader, force-strangling slow workers(I only got a small taste of that in that misbegotten RTS offspring) and running the Death Star, while blowing up debris as it passes by and swinging in a leather hammock on the weekend.

Or an above-earth DK with castles for a change, or something like Sins Of a Solar Empire with a more sophisticated evil faction like the Advent, religiously enslaving and brainwashing peepz.
Seriously people, there’s a lot to be said playing the next Mel Gibson-Ron Hubbard-HitlerVaderGoldfinger-Esque Superdevil.
And to be quite frank – I wouldn’t mind living out whatever sinister fantasies lurk within after a agonizing workday in a more sophisticated fashion than games like Postal offer.

Either a good evil in strategy/tactical or properly gored up FPS or sim or Adventure or political something…there is just SO MUCH not being done due to fear of repercussions from both the industry and press and political correctness factions…it’s just sad.

There is evil within us, each of us.
I’d rather vent virtually than blow in real life, to be honest. Catharsis :)

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