APB should have been (Jet Set Radio Future) x (Lotsa Players)

[tomeoftom]

Straight out.

I just wanted to publicly get that off my chest. It's such a perfect, <i>perfect</i> universe for Cops vs Robbers, customisation, and turf war. Think about it (you shouldn't even have to do <i>that</i>).

Realtime Worlds are idiots. Discuss.

[Lightbulb]

They made a character customisation system which should be have been used for The Sims 4. They also made a game which was no fun to play.

I played the demo - the first proper MMO demo I have ever tried. I didn't want to play all of my (4 hour?) demo time.

Using an existing IP... Might sell a few extra copies but won't keep up subscription numbers.

[Joseph]

Jet Set Radio Future. Christ, I'd forgot about that game

[tomeoftom]

No, I mean the /game/ should have been JSRF. Controlling territory by spraying the piece you've created all over a neighbourhood (and in the most hard-to-reach places); a massive, /intricate/ inner Tokyo to explore (with a true sense of height and depth), no car chases but instead foot-police crackdowns in busy areas, (give the cops little future-Tokyo police mechs and dropships to chase escapees through backstreets and rooftop mazes with), gang chillout spots (gather together old couches and stuff from the game world), amazing music played loudly in the streets, radio stations, block parties (chuck in a kind of Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan! dancing mechanic and have dance-offs), ad-hoc street races on rollerskates, gang-fights using the rocketskates and graffiti-jousting...

MAN. I just don't see how that couldn't get anyone salivating.

[Pew pew LAZORS!]

So why hasn't SEGA made a new Jet Set Radio game? People still talk about them all the time after all these years and if I remember corectly the first one sold quite good.

[tomeoftom]

They've been busy running franchises into the ground with one of Dr. Robotnik's massive robot drills.

[Gentleman Jim Stacey]

I played APB: Reloaded for about 30-40 hours.

There's so much potential in the "MMO GTA" idea but there are so many problems.

Biggest three being:

1. Hacking is rampant and GamersFirst seems unconcerned with solving the problem. How they expect people to shell out $50 for a gun (yes, you read that correctly. EVE eat your heart out.) when its like a pre-VAC Counter-Strike wild west environment is beyond me.

2. Except for about two extremely simple and repetitive activities you do off mission to make extra cash, there's absolutely nothing to do in the game besides contact missions. And the contact missions are formulaic and shitty. Go to some place and press E on something (raid door, break into car, etc.) Pick up item. Go to a different place. Rinse and repeat. About 8 times.

3. The shooting gameplay blows. Not much to say about it. It's just really bad.


Hopefully someday Rockstar themselves will come to try something like it and do it right. Having fun pretending to be Alex Murphy (OCP squad car included) only took me so far.

[Kadayi]

Realtime Worlds are idiots. Discuss.

What everyone of them collectively? Or maybe perhaps a few key people running things?

APB was essential open world team based counter-strike. That's the fundamental concept Dave Jones came up with, and by on large it delivered on that. Is it perfect? no. But in terms of delivering on that promise (and not the MMO GTA fantasies the press concocted) it was kind of there as a game.

[Gentleman Jim Stacey]

What everyone of them collectively? Or maybe perhaps a few key people running things?

APB was essential open world team based counter-strike. That's the fundamental concept Dave Jones came up with, and by on large it delivered on that. Is it perfect? no. But in terms of delivering on that promise (and not the MMO GTA fantasies the press concocted) it was kind of there as a game.

It fails worse at being an open world counter-strike than it does being a MMO GTA.

There's absolutely nothing satisfying or competitive about the shooting gameplay. In fact it has the worst shooting mechanics I've ever seen in a multiplayer game. Horrible hitreg, awful guns that take dozens of hits to kill, and one hitbox...toe shots = head shots. Absolutely wretched.

The only "counter-strike" thing it delivers on is rampant hacking.

[tomeoftom]

No, I really did mean to personally insult every single individual on the team. Just fundamentally nasty people. Haven't met them, but, you know.

[Kadayi]

You need to understand the difference between counter-strike for pubs Vs Counter-strike for teams/clans. The game operates not around the individual, but around group co-ordination (the more organised team will normally always prevail). As regards the hitbox issues, that simply comes down to balance within the game universe. If you introduced localized hit boxes, then player customization goes out the window, because everyone simply min-maxes their character builds so they are all tiny skinny grey figures. Localized hit boxes are not that much of a necessity truth be told. Quake 3 worked perfectly well without them and save a couple of weapons (the sniper rifle, and the ambassador iirc) TF2 manages to get by perfectly well without them. Sure head shots might be a staple of shooters like MW, but when it comes to game design, developers have to take account of the bigger picture with regard to what they want to achieve.

I think it's very easy to write things off and label game designers 'idiots' from the gamers armchair, or make asynchronous comparisons (SP FPS game A does this, so why doesn't 3PS MP game B do it also?), however it's another thing entirely to appreciate the complexities of game design and the reason why things are likely the way they are in a game. Does that make developers beyond reproach? Far from it. I do think it's important to call them out, at times (the medium is ever evolving with new ideas coming to the fore). But if you are going to do so, you need to from a position that appreciates the complexity of the challenges facing them. Where the shoe on the other foot, you'd no doubt expect the same.

[tomeoftom]

Dude, most of us here know making games is hard. Really really fucking hard. The "idiots" jab was completely a joke. I was just pointing out a particular concept (state vs underclass themed MMO) would be conceptually more interesting in a particular universe (future fictionalised graffiti/skate-culture Shibuya) than another (gang warfare in nondescript modern city).

[Dominic Tarason]

So why hasn't SEGA made a new Jet Set Radio game? People still talk about them all the time after all these years and if I remember corectly the first one sold quite good.

The Jet Set Radio team (and most of the other talented groups at Sega) died off during the original Xbox era, when Sega went completely insane and started cannibalizing itself. Now the company is primarily a publisher with a few solid second-party releases each year.

[Gentleman Jim Stacey]

Dude, most of us here know making games is hard. Really really fucking hard. The "idiots" jab was completely a joke. I was just pointing out a particular concept (state vs underclass themed MMO) would be conceptually more interesting in a particular universe (future fictionalised graffiti/skate-culture Shibuya) than another (gang warfare in nondescript modern city).

Sorry bro, jokes are off limits here.

You need to understand the difference between counter-strike for pubs Vs Counter-strike for teams/clans. The game operates not around the individual, but around group co-ordination (the more organised team will normally always prevail). As regards the hitbox issues, that simply comes down to balance within the game universe. If you introduced localized hit boxes, then player customization goes out the window, because everyone simply min-maxes their character builds so they are all tiny skinny grey figures. Localized hit boxes are not that much of a necessity truth be told. Quake 3 worked perfectly well without them and save a couple of weapons (the sniper rifle, and the ambassador iirc) TF2 manages to get by perfectly well without them. Sure head shots might be a staple of shooters like MW, but when it comes to game design, developers have to take account of the bigger picture with regard to what they want to achieve.

You say all this, pointing out that no hitboxes in other games are examples of why its a good idea in APB, and then follow straight up with this....

I think it's very easy to write things off and label game designers 'idiots' from the gamers armchair, or make asynchronous comparisons (SP FPS game A does this, so why doesn't 3PS MP game B do it also?)

Say wha?

It's all preference, man. I feel a game like APB needs a higher skill ceiling with regards to the shooting in order to keep me interested. You do not. Oh well.

But thats my preference, and no amount of understanding the developer's plight (as if anyone was under the illusion that game development is a trivial matter) is going to make me like the gameplay more...I'm sure M. Night Shayamalan and the cast/crew on The Happening all worked very hard on it. Doesn't change the fact that its awful.

As a shooter, APB is horrible. You seem to be arguing that its actually a decent real-time tactical game, and I suppose it is. But make it an entertaining shooter it does not.

[Kelron]

I disagree that APB is horrible as a shooter. I don't think you can dismiss the tactical aspect and say the shooting's bad as if they're separate games, they play off each other. You don't win Counter Strike by having a cowboy duel in an open street any more than you win APB by doing so, both games require map knowledge and tactics. Players might not die as fast in APB as they do in Counter Strike, which puts more emphasis on tactics over straight shooting, but I don't see how that makes the shooting objectively bad, as you seem to be stating. There's certainly elements that need work, but imo the core design of APB works as a fun shooter, and the skill gap between an average player and a really good player is huge so I'm not sure what your comment about the skill ceiling is getting at.

[sendmark]

It made me really want a properly done GTA mmo that's for sure. Was great fun driving around in a team and chasing down robbers.

[Gentleman Jim Stacey]

I disagree that APB is horrible as a shooter. I don't think you can dismiss the tactical aspect and say the shooting's bad as if they're separate games, they play off each other. You don't win Counter Strike by having a cowboy duel in an open street any more than you win APB by doing so, both games require map knowledge and tactics. Players might not die as fast in APB as they do in Counter Strike, which puts more emphasis on tactics over straight shooting, but I don't see how that makes the shooting objectively bad, as you seem to be stating. There's certainly elements that need work, but imo the core design of APB works as a fun shooter, and the skill gap between an average player and a really good player is huge so I'm not sure what your comment about the skill ceiling is getting at.

How am I presenting my opinion about APB's combat as objective fact?

If you're referring to nonchalant uses of the phrases "in fact" and "doesn't change the fact" that are interchangeable with dozens of other phrases...no.

When we're talking about art and entertainment, its all subjective and that's a given, or so though I thought.

[tomeoftom]

At this juncture I would just like to point out that I love your name/location.

[Kadayi]

Sorry bro, jokes are off limits here.

Beating on a dead developer was passé 6 months ago.

You say all this, pointing out that no hitboxes in other games are examples of why its a good idea in APB, and then follow straight up with this....

But that's not what said at all. Firstly I explained why locational hitboxes would of broken the character customisation aspect of the game (which was a core feature) by encouraging min maxxing. End of point. I then went onto explain that location hitboxes are not necessarily an essential ingredient of shooting mechanics, citing a couple of examples where locational hit boxes aren't employed (the perspective is moot). I'm not drawing direct comparisons, I'm merely pointing out that locational damage should not be presumed to be a fundamental requirement for a shooter to operate successfully.

As a shooter, APB is horrible. You seem to be arguing that its actually a decent real-time tactical game, and I suppose it is. But make it an entertaining shooter it does not.

I don't disagree that APB lacked for a bit of Aesthetic/Kinetic 'oomph' to the combat, in terms of the sound and camera movement (and for me personally I've always felt that there needed to be a bit more granularity to the environments) but at the base level of being a team focused tactical shooter it does work.

When we're talking about art and entertainment, its all subjective and that's a given, or so I thought.

That all opinions are subjective doesn't mean all opinions are of equal worth. Someone saying for example that: -

'GTA IV is shit'

doesn't really carry as much information value to the reader as someone saying that: -

'the part where Nicco beats up the mafiosi's Daughter really broke my personal investment in GTAIV as a game. I was really liking the story up until that point and it seemed to me that given his past, that just wasn't the sort of thing Nicco would stoop to given his desire to better himself, regardless of the circumstances. There was a real disconnect going on between the narrative and the action there that undid the experience for me'

Unless someone is able to evaluate an opinion by putting themselves into the eyes of the poster, it might as well not be said at all truth be told. What truly matters in a dialogue is the not the position so much, as to the weight of the 'why' behind it.

[Tei]

GTA IV is shit to me. In sandbox games I want some freedom to ignore the man history, and explore, do quest, etc. The whole new york city seems empty of fun, with only a main quest. The main quest is unfair, and make the game feel linear. So to me, GTA IV is like a bad and boring sandbox + linear and boring sandbox.

Games like APB and Saint and Rows 2 are great fun.