A Grammer of Gameplay - Koster

[Zehn - Vhex]

I made your mom rail a line off my cock. We had great fun. Hoho!

[karisa]

Originally Posted by Gnome Eater

ID has done poorly? Quake 1, 2, 3, all sequels to Doom, etc, I wouldn't call that poor by any stretch of the immagination.

The only game that Ion Storm did that didn't completely suck was Deus Ex, and Romero had absolutely nothing at all to do with it. At the time that Romero got fired from ID, Carmack pretty much said that Romero did absolutely nothing and that he'd look forward to see him fail, and guess what, he was 100% right.

Romero left after Quake, in fact it was Romero who announced Quakes gold status to the faithful on #quake. He also was apart of the teams that produced all of the historic Doom games (including sequels), with the obvious exception of Doom 3.

iD made Quake 2, 3 and Doom 3 since Romero left. All of these games where soulless sellouts of the franchise. Sure, they might have been a financial success, but iD used to be the gods of gaming. iD have been shedding the faithful for release after release as it becomes more apparent that iD doesn’t understand the magic it used to create.
If you think of software development as music, he used to be a composer, using his understanding of players he would construct music that would meet peoples goals and expectations. The problem with Romero is that he started to believe his own hype, and didn’t stick true to what made him great, which was solid design principles.

To many people accept shitty games as success because they turned a buck. Ok, if you are an accountant that is true, but if you are a gamer successful games be games that entertained us? In essence the “oh, but it made a lot of money, so it must be a success” was Star Wars episodes 1-III a success? The vast majority of Star Wars fans seems to suggest, NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!! While George Lucas has essentially said “fuck them”.

So, just because something is a financial success, doesn’t mean it is successful in the eyes of the punters.

[Slide]

whats with this defending of Romero?

he was a jumped up level designer, that level designed on a couple of games that were either shameless ripoffs or jazzed up 3d monster maze. he's a self publicist that couldn't manage his way out of a paper bag or a glass fronted penthouse.

ID were only succesful because Carmack was way ahead of the curve on 3desque graphics, and they only stay in business now because they make tech demos and license all there shit to other people in fucking texas that make derivative 3d fucking shooter number 792.

American fucking Magee also did the same fucking job for iD as Romero and at least the shit he puts out now is sort of fun.*

Commander Keen was shovelware and the only reason Doom and Wolfenstein sold was because Carmack did some wierd hardcore graphics shit. Other than that they (especially wolf) were crap games.

Edit: * it's still pretentious unplayable bollocks

[tad10]

Originally Posted by Nairbog

I think Neric sort of has a point, but he's communicating it horribly. My take

Psuedo-science or not you pretty much kicked Neric in the nuts.

The only thing people do regularly and voluntarily (excluding things like eating, crapping, sleeping - which aren't really voluntary) that many think is not fun is work. People do not play a game 5 hours a day (or more) for 5 days a week (or more) if it isn't fun. There are tedious parts to MMO, and WoW's "innovation" was eliminating a lot of tedium that had existed in previous MMO's and putting in carrots for the tedium it couldn't eliminate (random rares and epics).

The next big MMO (aside: WotC where is my MTG MMO?) will go further, taking out even more downtown, but still leaving in carrots for the downtime they can't eliminate.

Edit:
Things that could have be done in WoW.
1. Mounts earlier.
2. Faster mounts later.
3. Faster transition between zones once you've explored.
4. Design raidzones so that once your farming a higher raid zone, when you need to go back to a prevoius raid zone you can skip trash mobs (e.g. You kill Nef, you get flagged such that you can zone into MC with Domo up and you zone straight to Domo. Kinda like the flag for Mara).
5. Carrot-wise. Blizz could have saved itself years of grief from casuals by putting in more uber-rare epic drops for Baron/Bal/KingG. Tier 1 equivalent armor that takes months of Strath/Scholo/DM grinding to get.

[Slide]

Originally Posted by tad10

The next big MMO (aside: WotC where is my MTG MMO?) will go further, taking out even more downtown, but still leaving in carrots for the downtime they can't eliminate.

That sounds great, some pasty faced shithead says I turn over my swamp and it gives me +1 black swamp power and I unleash the black swampy dragon.

I want a mmo where you can throw axes at peoples heads.

[Dumar]

i think he means the lore. there are TONS of badass mobs and items you could make with a MTG MMO.

[Slide]

Originally Posted by Dumar

i think he means the lore. there are TONS of badass mobs and items you could make with a MTG MMO.

whatever, it still strikes me as a bunch of pissant 12 year olds turning over swamp cards.

Like I said, give me a MMO where I can throw axes at peoples heads and i'll be happy.

[Dis]

Originally Posted by Slide

whats with this defending of Romero?

he was a jumped up level designer, that level designed on a couple of games that were either shameless ripoffs or jazzed up 3d monster maze. he's a self publicist that couldn't manage his way out of a paper bag or a glass fronted penthouse.

ID were only succesful because Carmack was way ahead of the curve on 3desque graphics, and they only stay in business now because they make tech demos and license all there shit to other people in fucking texas that make derivative 3d fucking shooter number 792.

American fucking Magee also did the same fucking job for iD as Romero and at least the shit he puts out now is sort of fun.*

Commander Keen was shovelware and the only reason Doom and Wolfenstein sold was because Carmack did some wierd hardcore graphics shit. Other than that they (especially wolf) were crap games.

Edit: * it's still pretentious unplayable bollocks

This thread has completely been covered in dogshit, who the fuck is this guy? I cant believe you just said Doom and Wolfenstien were crap games. Next time do me a favor, put that sentence at the beginning of the post instead of the end, so I can stop wasting my time reading your posts. You would be doing us and the world a favor...

[Slide]

Originally Posted by Dis

This thread has completely been covered in dogshit, who the fuck is this guy? I cant believe you just said Doom and Wolfenstien were crap games. Next time do me a favor, put that sentence at the beginning of the post instead of the end, so I can stop wasting my time reading your posts. You would be doing us and the world a favor...

They were crap games, both were fucking tech demos and complete ripoffs of gauntlet. The only innovative thing about doom was the first chapter was free, and thats the only chapter anyone ever played.

[Venjenz]

All this defending of Romero is killing me.

Go to Doomworld and look at who designed the levels for Doom, Ultimate Doom, and Doom II. You'll see that Sandy Petersen and American McGhee designed most of those levels. Of the 68 levels that span those three games, Romero designed 15 of them. He did 9 of the 36 full levels of Quake, and 2 of the smaller hub/boss levels.

-John Carmack writes the engine.
-Mike Abrash and John Carmack optimize the much vaunted Quake engine.
-Adrian Carmack does most of the artwork.
-American McGhee and Sandy Peterson design 75% of the levels for the first three Doom releases.
-American McGhee, Sandy Petersen and Tom Willits design most of Quake's levels.

And Romero gets all the press because he plays the games the most on the Internet, most famously getting beat by Stevie Case, who was the first famous Quake-whore.

Sorry, but long hair, dating the chick with the bit titties, and playing the game a lot in the clans doesn't make him the "reason behind id's success." To whit, Carmack and crew have sold tons of games post-Romero. American McGhee using a licensed Quake III engine made a great game with "Alice." And then count the games that have been built on id engine technology.

Carmack drives a Ferrari because he is brilliant. Romero drives a Ferrari because Eidos Interactive gave him $millions in advance for Dai Katana, which he wasted in no small fashion. I played Dai Katana, and even if you take out the engine, which sucked ass compared to anything id, Valve or the Unreal folks had out, the artwork was lame, the story was lame, and the gameplay sucked. He's a hack who just happened to work at one time with a bunch of wunderkinds, and he got married to a big tittie chick Quake player.

Like Koster, he has all sorts of great theories, but has yet to implement them into anything that resembles a great game.

[Deathwing]

John Romero would have done much better if he had cut his fucking hair a lot sooner than he did, no joke.

[Gnome Eater]

Originally Posted by Venjenz

All this defending of Romero is killing me.

Go to Doomworld and look at who designed the levels for Doom, Ultimate Doom, and Doom II. You'll see that Sandy Petersen and American McGhee designed most of those levels. Of the 68 levels that span those three games, Romero designed 15 of them. He did 9 of the 36 full levels of Quake, and 2 of the smaller hub/boss levels.

-John Carmack writes the engine.
-Mike Abrash and John Carmack optimize the much vaunted Quake engine.
-Adrian Carmack does most of the artwork.
-American McGhee and Sandy Peterson design 75% of the levels for the first three Doom releases.
-American McGhee, Sandy Petersen and Tom Willits design most of Quake's levels.

And Romero gets all the press because he plays the games the most on the Internet, most famously getting beat by Stevie Case, who was the first famous Quake-whore.

Sorry, but long hair, dating the chick with the bit titties, and playing the game a lot in the clans doesn't make him the "reason behind id's success." To whit, Carmack and crew have sold tons of games post-Romero. American McGhee using a licensed Quake III engine made a great game with "Alice." And then count the games that have been built on id engine technology.

Carmack drives a Ferrari because he is brilliant. Romero drives a Ferrari because Eidos Interactive gave him $millions in advance for Dai Katana, which he wasted in no small fashion. I played Dai Katana, and even if you take out the engine, which sucked ass compared to anything id, Valve or the Unreal folks had out, the artwork was lame, the story was lame, and the gameplay sucked. He's a hack who just happened to work at one time with a bunch of wunderkinds, and he got married to a big tittie chick Quake player.

Like Koster, he has all sorts of great theories, but has yet to implement them into anything that resembles a great game.

This says it all really. The proof is in the pudding, ID has continued to do amazingly well without Romero, Romero has done fuck all without ID, and the only decent games that Ion Storm has released were those where he was not involved at all.

[Sheaf]

Originally Posted by Venjenz

All this defending of Romero is killing me.

Before you spout off nonsense as though you actually know anything, you might want to learn how to spell American Mcgee's name. Or at least mention Tom Hall, one the four founders of id who was a key part of making those games.

Trying to spout off "facts" about level design doesn't change the fact that Romero was a big part of the heart and soul of every single great game id made.

The point here is not how many copies of Quake 2, Quake 3, and Doom 3 that id sold. By that point, they were guaranteed to sell a lot even if it was a text adventure just from the franchise name that Romero helped build. The games after Romero was fired by the egotistical, nearly autistic Carmack lacked fun. Period. They had a great engine and good graphics. They just lacked gameplay.

Stop jumping on the internet bandwagon of hating on Romero when you know absolutely nothing about what went on at id.

Oh, and trying to break down an FPS to just an engine, artwork and level design would is pure idiocy. That's the polish that goes on AFTER the actual gameplay.

It's easy to look back on Wolfenstein 3-D, Doom, and Quake and say, "Well, those games don't seem all that great." They were absolutely fucking revolutionary.

[Sheaf]

Originally Posted by Gnome Eater

This says it all really. The proof is in the pudding, ID has continued to do amazingly well without Romero, Romero has done fuck all without ID, and the only decent games that Ion Storm has released were those where he was not involved at all.

What the hell are you talking about? They absolutely dominated the FPS market after Quake1. They invented it. After that, their games had absolutely no innovations and were repetitive and boring.

Despite having great franchise names to work from, they sell fewer than Half-Life and Battlefield both, just edging out Unreal Tournament. Yes, they still sell a lot of games. Does that mean they make great games? No. Anyone involved in game design in the genre will tell you that id just makes good engines, not good games.

P.S. Buy a clue. It's "id," not "ID." Anyone who followed the company at all would know that.

[Gnome Eater]

I hate fuckwits who dismiss commercial success as just reputation. Even the best and greatest designers with the greatest rep make shitty games who flop and their reputation doesn't save them; look at the sequels of black and white, while lots of games that turn out to be amazing but lack hype end up having huge commercial success, like Daggerfall, Thief, etc. It is as bad as a bunch of art majors who go on about how their art doesn't sell because it is beyond people, and they just don't get it.

Romero obviously sucked and made shitty games, while the games that ID churned out continued to be fun, I enjoyed Quake2, Quake 3 tremendously and Quake2 is still my alltime favorite FPS.

What the hell are you talking about? They absolutely dominated the FPS market after Quake1. They invented it. After that, their games had absolutely no innovations and were repetitive and boring.

That's exactly what I said. They continued making good games and selling well, while Ion Storm games all sucked major dick even with all the hyping John Romero did about Dai Katana. Dai Katana had shitty gameplay, shitty story, shitty bugs, the game flat out sucked dick and was more hyped than any title except perhaps Duke Nuke 'em forever.