Ah, the days when Lucas Arts gave us games like Monkey Island, DotT and Tie Fighter. Before they sold out and decided that Star Wars themed FPS was the only viable IP. Bah. When was the last time Lucas Arts did something creative that wasn't 'Star Wars'? Maybe around the time Tim Schafer left?
Anyway, back to Tie Fighter. Potentially the greatest PC game ever. Forget the genre; Tie Fighter was an amazing piece of work, both from the story aspect and from the execution aspect. Of course, best played in DOS and with a joystick, it was still an incredible bit of programming for that day and age to say the least. It definitely did for Space Sims what Half Life did for the FPS genre. As much as I think the FPS genre is an overdone mix of gristle and fat. With a dash of creativity sometimes (HL series has at least a dash).
I don't think that the 'Space Sim' genre is dead, I just don't think anyone has taken the time to do it right. The X series, specifically X3-Reunion (and if "Wolverine" comes to mind, stop reading now, please), was an incredibly rich game, full of content (I spent 80 hours on it at least), but was also incredibly buggy and the story, IMO, lacked. For a space sim buff like myself, it was a lot of fun to play, and even when it was boring, it was still engrossing, if that makes any sense at all?
PC games today are either: FPS/Semi-RPG (Oblivion and the upcoming Fallout 3), FPS (HL, COD, Halo, etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc., Prey), or some form of isometric garbage. Like SimCity Crap-cieties, Civilization, or prettified Diablo (Neverwinter Nights).
I mean, seriously, did anyone think 'Bioshock' was earth shattering? Yet it won numerous game of the year awards. Why? Because it was 'pretty', or 'underwater', or somewhat creative (though not very).
I think Game companies and publishers just like to follow the pack. Keep releasing endless numbers of games like Half Life, ports to PC like Gears of War, FPS like COD and Unreal, etc. etc. Forget taking a chance on a Space Sim game, kids these days don't have the attention span to stare out of a cockpit for 80 hours of game time. They want to be fragging aliens on foot with literally a half dozen different kinds of machine guns. Or pretending they are playing an RPG that?s simply an FPS with Charisma points. How easily we?re all duped.
I'm hoping that the new X3, Terran Conflict, can finally do that series justice and put space sims back on the map.
And why the hell doesn't Lucas Arts start putting together a game like X-Wing or Tie Fighter instead of games like "Empire at War", "Star Fighter" and, *vomit*, Rogue Squadron.
If they took X3, spun it into the Star Wars universe, they?d have absolute gold.
And finally, as if this wasn?t long enough, I find the ?spending money on peripherals? argument bunk. If Guitar Hero can dupe people into paying $70 for a junky plastic guitar, or the Wii can dupe people into buying stupid little snap-in holders for the Wii-mote (I?m talking to you, Link?s Crossbow Training), someone will shell out $30 for a force feedback joystick.