I'm not following how someone can "misunderstand" a poorly made game camera. someone please explain it to me. IT sounds like hes saying that his game is allowed to have a crappy camera because it falls into multiple genres, that makes no sense.
Spector Says Critics "Misunderstand" Epic Mickey
- Thread starter Andy Chalk
- Start date
This is Brütal Legend all over again.
Famous Designer -> Hyped Game -> Great concepts but disappointing execution -> Designer says the public is playing it wrong.
Famous Designer -> Hyped Game -> Great concepts but disappointing execution -> Designer says the public is playing it wrong.
I respect Mr Spector's abilities and opinions, but he's pretty much wrong.
If a few people get something incorrect then that's a user error. If everyone gets it incorrect, that's a design issue. It's really that simple.
Now I don't doubt the camera is insanely difficult to get right-and it's been a source of complaint since the late 90's-but I think that the issues with Epic Mickey probably have more to do with 'getting it out by Xmas' than with 'it's hard and nobody understands what we did'.
If nobody gets it, it probably ain't art, pal and it certainly ain't right.
If a few people get something incorrect then that's a user error. If everyone gets it incorrect, that's a design issue. It's really that simple.
Now I don't doubt the camera is insanely difficult to get right-and it's been a source of complaint since the late 90's-but I think that the issues with Epic Mickey probably have more to do with 'getting it out by Xmas' than with 'it's hard and nobody understands what we did'.
If nobody gets it, it probably ain't art, pal and it certainly ain't right.
Ok, if the reviews didn't know what they are reviewing is a 7 year old going to really understand it? The answer is no. We purchased this because my 7 year old son is a big Micky fan, and traded it 2 days later for Super Mario Galaxy 2. He said flat out that it sucked.
Why does he focus on the negative reviews (or to be accurate, mixed), I mean you look at metacritic and it has 29 GOOD reviews as opposed to 9 MIXED reviews, so all in all I would say the game has done well critically. as far as the camera, it's a Wii game, unless it's an FPS or a 2d Platformer the camera will be your worst enemy.
I love the "your doing it wrong" argument. Didn't extra credits just do an ep where they talk about how as a developer you can't hide behind the "you just don't understand it" argument? It guys like this that anger me the most, if Tim Schafer had made Epic Mickey it would had been EPIC.
Really if a game isn't fun it's not going to get a good reviews, and if the camera is not friendly, the fix the damn camera; no one cares where the camera is "supposed" to be for that genre; if there is something in the way then it's in the wrong spot period.
Really, the weakest argument I've heard in a couple months.
Really if a game isn't fun it's not going to get a good reviews, and if the camera is not friendly, the fix the damn camera; no one cares where the camera is "supposed" to be for that genre; if there is something in the way then it's in the wrong spot period.
Really, the weakest argument I've heard in a couple months.
Too be fair, that game really was just Schafer intellectually masturbating, and I found it like a lot of people to be enjoyable. The bad part was the hackneyed RTS battles, really needed work, but the story and the rest of the game was enjoyable.tautologico said:
Ultimately, your game is judged based on public reception, not based on how you intended it to play. Simply stating that the public "doesn't get it" in the face of criticism smacks of the stench of a terrible artist futilely trying recover from the fallout.
Never ever question reviews or reviewers. You can say "we achieved what I wanted, and my idea of perfect isn't necessarily everyone else's" but if every reviewer points out something the think is a flaw then it's probably best to take note and at least not challenge it openly. A flaw doesn't mean a game is bad by any means. I think most of everyone loves some game that got overall bad reviews when they first came out.
I think that I'll reserve judgement about the game play mechanics until I play it.
In the mean time, I'll just comment on why he is all defensive. Sure creative pride is a part of it, but the main concern is sales. Right now, we live in an age where most people do not buy games on a whim. A lot of them wait until the reviewers have played the game to say if its good or not because, like a few people on forums told me, they do not have the time or the 60 dollars to see if they like the game or not. Instead, they got to places like metacritic, or wait until their favorite reviewers say this game is awesome before deciding to buy it.
What this means is that bad reviews can kill potential game sales. If enough critics says a game is terrible, then you are more than likely to give it a pass and try something else. That is why game makers go on the defensive with their games. Spoony realized this when he gave the Deadliest Warrior a negative review.
Yes, I know there are a lot of people that buys certain games without waiting for the reviews. I am pretty sure some are already writing things like, "I bought this game without looking at reviews," or "A friend told me about this game, so I bought it as well." Please understand that you are only doing this for certain games. You are only doing this for games that have earned your loyalty or because a trusted friend told you about it. With everything else, you are waiting for the reviews to come in.
In the mean time, I'll just comment on why he is all defensive. Sure creative pride is a part of it, but the main concern is sales. Right now, we live in an age where most people do not buy games on a whim. A lot of them wait until the reviewers have played the game to say if its good or not because, like a few people on forums told me, they do not have the time or the 60 dollars to see if they like the game or not. Instead, they got to places like metacritic, or wait until their favorite reviewers say this game is awesome before deciding to buy it.
What this means is that bad reviews can kill potential game sales. If enough critics says a game is terrible, then you are more than likely to give it a pass and try something else. That is why game makers go on the defensive with their games. Spoony realized this when he gave the Deadliest Warrior a negative review.
Yes, I know there are a lot of people that buys certain games without waiting for the reviews. I am pretty sure some are already writing things like, "I bought this game without looking at reviews," or "A friend told me about this game, so I bought it as well." Please understand that you are only doing this for certain games. You are only doing this for games that have earned your loyalty or because a trusted friend told you about it. With everything else, you are waiting for the reviews to come in.
Jak and Daxter for the PS2 never gave me any camera trouble, and that was back in the very early 00's.
There are also ways to mitigate the harm a clumsily-integrated/limited camera can cause; remember the coin trails in Super Mario World that would show you just where you're supposed to jump, to compensate for the fact that the camera couldn't possibly show you where you're supposed to go next? Remember how Assassin's Creed II had "might wanna look over here" warnings pop up on screen when something consequential was happening out of view of the dramatically-angled camera? Remember in Gears of War, how pretty much all firefights were head-on confrontations (unless the designers felt like planning a cheeky ambush, a la several points in the Locust Hive) because taking cover would constrict the camera in such a way that makes fighting two adjacent groups at once unfairly difficult? Gears even had a feature where the game would prompt you to hold down a button to make the camera lock onto meaningful events, because there's a good chance the camera would keep you from ever noticing otherwise.
Hell, even the HUD in FPS games qualifies, since there aren't many ergonomic ways of using a first-person camera to assess ammo count and player health, and the little "you got shot from the right" hit markers in games of the same genre compensate for your limited field of vision, along with the deprivation of the senses that would compensate for this, such as touch ("ow, I just got shot in the right shoulder") or Doppler hearing ("hey, I heard gunfire come specifically from the right, in the distance"), peripheral vision ("hey, I quickly glanced to my right and saw something, instead of tracking my gun all the way over there to look"), and perhaps most importantly, the fact that nine times out of ten, you'll never see the tracers of rounds being fired at you, making it impossible to know where to take cover and where to lay down suppressing fire. I know the latter part is realistic, but this is one of those instances where "real" equates to "cater to the camper".
Point is, just because you can't design the be-all-end-all of cameras doesn't mean that you can't find ways to keep it from hampering the game.
There are also ways to mitigate the harm a clumsily-integrated/limited camera can cause; remember the coin trails in Super Mario World that would show you just where you're supposed to jump, to compensate for the fact that the camera couldn't possibly show you where you're supposed to go next? Remember how Assassin's Creed II had "might wanna look over here" warnings pop up on screen when something consequential was happening out of view of the dramatically-angled camera? Remember in Gears of War, how pretty much all firefights were head-on confrontations (unless the designers felt like planning a cheeky ambush, a la several points in the Locust Hive) because taking cover would constrict the camera in such a way that makes fighting two adjacent groups at once unfairly difficult? Gears even had a feature where the game would prompt you to hold down a button to make the camera lock onto meaningful events, because there's a good chance the camera would keep you from ever noticing otherwise.
Hell, even the HUD in FPS games qualifies, since there aren't many ergonomic ways of using a first-person camera to assess ammo count and player health, and the little "you got shot from the right" hit markers in games of the same genre compensate for your limited field of vision, along with the deprivation of the senses that would compensate for this, such as touch ("ow, I just got shot in the right shoulder") or Doppler hearing ("hey, I heard gunfire come specifically from the right, in the distance"), peripheral vision ("hey, I quickly glanced to my right and saw something, instead of tracking my gun all the way over there to look"), and perhaps most importantly, the fact that nine times out of ten, you'll never see the tracers of rounds being fired at you, making it impossible to know where to take cover and where to lay down suppressing fire. I know the latter part is realistic, but this is one of those instances where "real" equates to "cater to the camper".
Point is, just because you can't design the be-all-end-all of cameras doesn't mean that you can't find ways to keep it from hampering the game.
Can people please reserve judgment until they actually play it. What if you made something and everyone else refuses and flat out says it sucks without even trying it. Wouldn't feel too good would it?
I don't get why people are calling this game "Bad", from everything I am hearing, only the Camera is bad and the Controls are just a little iffy. This shows that only Gamespot has given it a mixed review (The Escapist also has but whatever) [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_Mickey#Reception].
I am buying this game no matter what, because from what I saw, I can definitely say it looks awesome!
I am buying this game no matter what, because from what I saw, I can definitely say it looks awesome!