Octodad: Dadliest Catch - why is this next-gen???

therightpirate

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Sep 23, 2010
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This is not a complaint about the core game, I have only played a bit of it but I can get where it is a fun 3 hour romp that doesn't overstay its welcome if you don't mind the tricky controls. So please don't think I'm knocking the developers for the game itself. I'm happy to see that it's getting fairly good reviews from the looks of it and that people are having fun with it.

My issue with the game is this: Why is this a next-gen game? It certainly doesn't look like anything a current PS3 or Xbox 360 couldn't handle.

I wouldn't have a problem if, like Lococycle or Contrast for example, it was clearly coming to both current and next-gen platforms. But why does this need to be a PS4 title? Why do I need to own a $500 system to play a game that should be playable on my current system?

I thought the whole idea of next-gen (which I suppose is now current-gen) was to deliver a higher fidelity of graphics and gameplay. Yes I know the whole grab a computer and play it there answer is out there that quashes the Xbox One and PS4 in every way. But I just don't understand the whole principle of releasing games that aren't at all next-gen experiences solely on next-gen platforms.

Is it morally right for developers to release last-gen type games solely on current-gen platforms? I mean a lot of games got knocked during the Xbox 360/PS3 days because they looked or felt like PS2/Xbox experiences. And I get that this is an Indie game and that they probably got a fair bit of money from Sony, not to mention the added exposure of being one of the earliest playable PS4 titles, for making it an exclusive. And perhaps it is just a timed exclusive and we will see it out on other formats. But I think developers need to be fair. When someone buys a $500 machine and then starts buying games for $15 each I think we expect something more, something that actually takes advantage of the machine we've just purchased, especially for a 2-3 hour experience.

I can understand that they didn't like the self-publishing rules on the Xbox 360. But the PS3 is very indie friendly. This game surely could have been a Sony exclusive and released to the PS3 and PS4 - maybe even a Vita version. Making it a PS4 exclusive just seems to be a bad start to this current-gen by saying: we won't make next-gen games but we'll force you to buy a next-gen console just to play things that could easily have been playable on your old system.

If that's the case then I personally want nothing to do with anything from this current-gen. Back to the backlog for me.

Anyways, let me know your thoughts.
 

hazabaza1

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Nov 26, 2008
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I mean you can get it on PC so it's not really "only" next-gen.

And honestly when it comes to publishing Sony probably specifically wanted it only on PS4. Right now around launch they need exclusives, and yeah sure they could get the game released on PS3 and probably get more sales, but not releasing it on PS3 gives them another game to list with a fairly high score on the back of the box as an "EXCLUSIVE!!!".
 

therightpirate

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hazabaza1 said:
I mean you can get it on PC so it's not really "only" next-gen.

And honestly when it comes to publishing Sony probably specifically wanted it only on PS4. Right now around launch they need exclusives, and yeah sure they could get the game released on PS3 and probably get more sales, but not releasing it on PS3 gives them another game to list with a fairly high score on the back of the box as an "EXCLUSIVE!!!".
Yes I get that this gives Sony a bit of clout in saying that we have an EXCLUSIVE. But I'm asking if console gamers feel that that trend of making certain games that could clearly be released on last-gen machines next-gen only just for the sake of saying that it's exclusive annoys you or not. It bugs the hell out of me. No one in their right mind bought a $500 machine to play Octodad: Dadliest Catch. It's not a next-gen experience. It should have been a multiplatform release on PSN so that everyone could experience it. If I actually owned a PS4 I'd be livid that so much energy and money has been put into marketing and promoting a game that essentially would have looked and felt the same on a PS3. Again, Sony and Microsoft need to explain why we should be buying their current consoles and clearly demonstrating how they differ from the last gen. Octodad: Dadliest Catch just doesn't do it for me. In fact it does the opposite. It reminds me of how stupid these new consoles are right now and how they've likely been released about a year or two too early before there are actually any worthwhile next-gen experiences to be played on them and I'm wondering if any one else feels the same.
 

BeeGeenie

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Technically, PS4 is not next gen anymore; it's current gen. But you're right. Good games don't need full HD photorealistic graphics to be good, and last gen technology is still perfectly good for most games.

Which is just one of many reasons that a lot of people thought that this gen's console war was stupid in the first place, if you'll recall.
 

BrotherRool

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therightpirate said:
Because it only took them 4 weeks. That's the whole answer.

Indie teams are small, this is why the simultaneous launch requirement of the Xbox One is a big deal, indie studios don't have the manpower to port games to multiple consoles at once. Octodad were already making the PC version when Sony got in touch with them and asked them to check to out the PS4. They didn't have time to learn something complicated, but it turns out the PS4 is incredibly easy to design for. What would have taken months of work on the PS3 took weeks on the PS4.

EDIT: Just so you know, Octodad haven't signed exclusivity with Sony, the only agreement they made was to launch on the PS4 before the Xbox One and Sony only asked for that after offering them the chance to be part of Sony's launch campaign.

And don't underestimate the hardware intensity of indie games, nor how weak the last generation was. It would actually probably take a considerable effort to squeeze it down onto a last-gen console. I have a laptop that can run Fallout: New Vegas fine, but absolutely melts if I try to play Gone Home. Indie games don't have highly fine-tuned game engines and something like this with lots of individual movable objects and physics is probably surprisingly hardware intensive.

In many ways it's smart business for indie's to focus on the new-gen too. There's much less competition and people are desperate for buying games. The software sales of the PS3 are going to start drying up soon and they're competing with years and years of games on the market. The PS4 is virgin ground with a lot of potential for reaching new audiences
 

Agayek

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Oct 23, 2008
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therightpirate said:
My issue with the game is this: Why is this a next-gen game? It certainly doesn't look like anything a current PS3 or Xbox 360 couldn't handle.
Honestly?

This is why:

There's really no other reason. Sony wants to encourage people to buy their consoles, so they pay developers to make exclusives. That's all there is to it, there's no magic or conspiracies or whatever else. It's a retarded move on the developers part, in my opinion, because limiting your user base never helps anything, but if the money offered outweighs the projected profit from the lost sales, there's no real reason not to take the offer.
 

Branindain

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I don't have a problem with it at all, I don't see why it keeps getting painted as a moral issue. These are not great works of art that belong to humanity, they're products that people made professionally and can leverage in any way they see fit in order to turn a profit. In most cases, making it available to the maximum amount of people would be a positive way to do that, but if it isn't, it isn't. Besides, it's just Octodad. If you don't have a PS4, play something else, there's a million games out there.

Btw, I say that even though this has affected me too. I play Peggle with my 4-year-old and I was disappointed to discover that Peggle 2 is exclusive to Xbone. I'm not buying an Xbone, so no Peggle 2 for us. C'est la EA.
 

The_Echo

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Mar 18, 2009
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To put Octodad on PS3 would mean porting it to work with CELL.

And, for an indie game... that's just a lot of work. It's also (perhaps primarily) on PC, so the console port job to PS4 is pretty easy.
 

Braedan

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Sep 14, 2010
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Your big complaint is that a 15 dollar indie game doesn't look like kill zone?

There are lots of reasons to not buy current generation consoles, but I think you're blowing this out of proportion.
Does this game on the ps4 make it a worse game? Are they abusing consumers? You can't get mad when consoles stop being supported. That's one of the inherent downsides of buying a console.
Indie developers don't have the funds to multi platform for every system. These guys had to use kickstarter because they didn't have enough funds to develop for even one platform.
 

Smooth Operator

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Oct 5, 2010
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Well usually it's because MS and Sony want to force you into a new console purchase, but in this case the devs just ran with the popular platforms, hey if you find enough people over on Xbox I'm sure they would be perfectly fine with porting it.
 

TheEvilCheese

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Dec 16, 2008
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By this logic every game should be available on every platform it could feasibly be ported to. When you take the question to it's logical extreme you quickly see how that doesn't work with the model of the games industry.

I would love to have more games on my Vita and 3DS though.
 

Lazy Kitty

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May 1, 2009
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Why shouldn't it be released on the new consoles?

For that matter, why shouldn't they rerelease pong on the new consoles?
Ooh, imagine pong played with a Kinect.

Here's a question, why release a new game on last gen consoles when their successors are already here?
Other than for all the people who don't want to buy a new console. (Which includes me, because my room isn't big enough for kinect. Actually, I just read they shrunk the space requirements... Maybe I can get one now.)
 

Dryk

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Lead platform is the PC and the new consoles have the same architecture so porting is easier. They probably didn't have the time/money/will to bother with porting them.
 

Kilo24

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It's on the PS4 because they had a friendly relationship [http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/209516/how_octodad_turned_a_group_of_.php] with Sony, who sent the development team PS4 developer kits for free. Sony wanted to be indie-friendly with the PS4, and the people who developed Octodad were high-profile indies.
 

Keith K

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Oct 29, 2009
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It is a game. It is on a game console.

Is there some arbitrary set of standards that a game must pass before it is allowed on any game console? Who sets these standards, I wonder.
 

Maxtro

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Feb 13, 2011
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Yup, this is something I'm seeing more and more of.

Games that are exclusive to PS4/Xbone that could easily run on the PS3/360. It's simply nothing more Sony and Microsoft wanting you to buy their new systems.
 

Someone Depressing

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Jan 16, 2011
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Money, my dear boy.


No. Seriously. they want your $500 dollars because they're a business. That's just how it works. Sad, but true.
 

TehCookie

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Sep 16, 2008
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Just because it can run on an older console doesn't mean you should make it for it. If it could run on PS2 would you want to have to play it on that console? I think it's easier to have games made during the 8th gen to go on 8th gen consoles, even if they don't use all the specs then having to break out older consoles (and I miss backwards compatibility). Besides if no one made games for consoles what's the point of them?