- Black Eagle X99
- |
- Intrepid Legendary Member
I don't see you doing anything to help our country.
Except sitting at home, naked, eating twinkies, rubbing your hands together going "Heh. Target Destroyed. Mission Accomplished." Oh wait. that's not helping.
Game after game after game comes out, each progressively less complete than its predecessor. Think back to when the original Xbox was around, no game would ever release an unfinished version of itself. Everything would be fleshed out to be as good as it could get. Even Halo 2, which is considered the father of online console gaming, was fleshed out fairly well. Of course there were a fair amount of glitches and towards the end modding became prevalent, but for a mode that was almost cut it turned out pretty well. Then came the next gen of consoles.
The games that were out remained popular, until of course the big dogs came around. Halo 3 and COD 4. The rise of online multiplayer. Halo 3 had a beta, as did COD 4. Sadly I don't know many details of the COD 4 beta, but I know a fair about about Halo 3. It was used to flesh out online for lag, glitches, and of course balance the weapon sandbox. Equipment was redone as a result, as were vehicles, and even graphic changes. They used it to fine tune the game and make sure it would play well. There were no updates for Halo 3 or COD 4 that rebalanced the core game, just the addition of modes and of course new maps. We then have the next generation of these games.
MW2, Halo 3: ODST and Battlefield Bad Company were the next generation. Halo 3 of course was still the multplayer game for Halo, and still stayed at the top of the leaderboards. MW2 was considered largely unbalanced by most, and due to multiple exploits found was updated numerous times. While no key features were missing from the game, the prominence of glitching and of course the occasional mod detracted from the overall game. Battlefield Bad Company, balanced, fun, not the most popular game out, but it catered to it's playerbase well. This generation marked the start of the decline.
Black Ops, Halo Reach, and Bad Company 2. Black Ops was largely unbalanced, while there were no server issues it had a large modding problem and was highly exploited. I have heard mixed things, and it did very well despite these problems. This told developers they can now ship out an unfinished game. Halo Reach was considered a farce by many, though it had a beta many comments such as vehicle health were ignored. It changed the fundamentals of Halo and while making a high profit at launch ended up largely failing in the end. In an effort to cater to all audiences the game was unbalanced, had a strange gameplay, and of course left vehicle combat mostly out of question. It was updated many times to attempt to fix it, altering the game at it's core. After release major changes are now okay. Bad Company 2, really I heard no complaints from anyone. It was a fun game, it was balanced, and online worked very well. A good finished product. The next generation is where it all went downhill.
MW3, Battlefield 3, Halo 4, Black Ops 2, and damn near every game out that now has it's own contrived multiplayer mode. MW3 is considered the worst in the series, unbalanced, glitchy, still very hackable. It received rebalancing updates multiple times and still was not anywhere near fleshed out. Battlefield 3 of course had a beta, but not one in which many features were shown off. The removal of almost all destruction from the game was saddening. The game itself was largely unflawed, though the rent-a-server update killed online for most. Halo 4 is, unfinished. No file browser, issues from Reach that still aren't fixed, and a further restructure of Halo. The removal of many modes from the game is further detrimental to the game. I will say only this, while this is the first 343i game they have industry pros making them up. There is no excuse for releasing an unfinished game. The server issues a month into launch are really inexcusable. The same goes for Black Ops 2, while the game itself plays fine, theater mode is apparently not working for many, and there were of course server issues during launch week. It is plagued with an unbalanced sandbox, and obvious glitches that should never have been shipped.
So why are we letting this continue? With each generation the games are being released in less finished states. Oh and don't think I forgot about Assassins Creed, it doesn't even need to be discusses. Glitches in the game that shouldn't be. The same goes for Mas Effect. Each release more buggy, less finished, and overall worse. This needs to end. The attitude of finishing the game after release is ridiculous. No game gets a free pass, no dev gets a free pass. With AAA titles they should be finished. You either make it well or you don't. Why is this still going on then? Should developers not be getting better? It really is a sad thing to see, the decline of quality.
tldr; Game developers cut more corners in each generation of games, releasing games now that play about as well as a beta build. It is sad and inexcusable, so why is it allowed to continue?