Topic: Substandard year in gaming--2014--GotY contenders?

[Ymeegod]

Pretty damn weak year in gaming IMO. 

Looking at my GOTY contenders and it's a pretty damn bleak list, hopefully fall/winter titles add some sweats but this year's best titles are a few remakes (the last of us for example).

My list of games that fell short of the hype:
Watchdogs
Bravely Default
TitanFall
Dark Souls 2
Destiny

=================

Right now it looks like GOTY might go to an indie game (Shovel Knight).

[Shaymin]

If the year ended today, Layton v Wright would be in my top 5. In other words, it's a short bench.

Tropical Freeze, Mario Kart, Danganronpa: Goodbye Despair, Shovel Knight and Layton v Wright in some order would be the list as it stands, and I'd second Bravely Default on the disappointment list. I'm playing DR2 right now and it might annoy me out of the top 5.

[Adrock]

Looking at gaming as a whole, it's probably a subpar year so far. The first year of new consoles is typically not great and Wii U is mainly first party. Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze and Mario Kart 8 were solid installments. As someone who doesn't play too many games a year, I've had enough to keep me busy and I've generally liked my purchases.

My Game of the Year pick will most likely be really predictable and boring when all is said and done. I'm thinking it will be Super Smash Bros. for Wii U.

[broodwars]

I dunno...it's been a weak year in terms of AAA releases since most of them were delayed into 2015, but I feel like the smaller publishers have been bringing it this year with games like Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc (Shaymin) and various indie titles (i.e. Rogue Legacy, etc.). I also enjoyed my time with Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2 and Wolfenstein. Until Destiny came out, I really hadn't seen a game that massively disappointed me like Bioshock Infinite did last year. Everything else's just been kind of "OK" or underwhelming, but not really disappointing.

[UncleBob]

I'd bet Destiny will still win several GotYs.  You don't spend that much money in advertising and not.

[BranDonk Kong]

GTAV and The Last of Us Remastered will win all the Game of the Year awards. Mario Kart 8 should get some too.

[Soren]

Mario Kart 8 will win most of the Nintendo categories.


My GOTY contenders include Shovel Knight, MK8 and a game released on December 19, 2013 (Knytt Underground)

[NWR_insanolord]

You really think Mario Kart will beat Smash Bros.? The only way I see that happening is if it gets delayed out of this year, which I think is nearly impossible. As it stands right now I'd give it to Donkey Kong Country, but I get why that's not a popular choice.

[Mop it up]

Right now, I have to say Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze by default, and at the end of the year I'll probably be saying Smash Brothers Wii U by default.

Mario Kart and Smash Brothers were released in the same year on the Wii and I don't recall Mario Kart getting any awards. I doubt MK8 will either, especially since Smash will be fresh in everyone's memory.

[NWR_insanolord]

And Smash came out before Mario Kart on Wii and still dominated in that respect. With Smash being the only major Wii U game in the second half of the year, unless it's somehow awful, I don't see how it doesn't win.

[Mop it up]

SSBBrawl was awful and it still won.

ZING!

[Adrock]

SSBBrawl was awful and it still won.

ZING!

[Luigi Dude]

Smash Bros Wii U alone is going to be worth more then 1 billion AAA games, which by its very presence will make 2014 the greatest year of gaming in the history of the universe.

[Shaymin]

Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc (Shaymin)

I still think I'm on pace to be right, but we'll talk about that later.

[azeke]

Watchdogs
Bravely Default
TitanFall
Dark Souls 2
Destiny

See the similarities?.. Even beside the platform, i am absolutely baffled how anyone was hyped about any of these games to begin with.

Watchdogs was looking sorta cool at first, but as they kept showing more and more it became obvious it's an inferior GTA.

Titanfall looked sorta interesting with Unreal Tournament-like movement but as they kept showing it turned out to be Call of Duty clone. That's beside the fact that combination of words "FPS on a console" is an incredibly hilarious joke to me.

Destiny always looked confusing to me both in how it is actually played and why people think it looks any good.

My top 3 from last year was all games on Wii U (despite my PC preference). This might as well be the same this year, only list will be shorter (because i am skipping most of thi year's Wii U lineup, like Tropical Freeze and Mario Kart and Smash too, most likely).

[NWR_insanolord]

In terms of non-Nintendo games, the runaway favorite to be my game of the year is Sid Meier's Civilization: Beyond Earth, a game I think they made just to get me to stop bugging them on Twitter for a new Alpha Centauri game.

[Manthony Chopkins]

No Hyrule Warriors love?.....................C'mon guys it's a shoe-in!   

[ShyGuy]

Lesse... Stick it to the Man, Kentucky Router Zero Act III, Mario Kart 8, probably Wolfenstein.

[Shaymin]

No Hyrule Warriors love?.....................C'mon guys it's a shoe-in! 

It has an extreme outside shot at my top 5, depending on whether or not my lightsaber still functions.

[azeke]

As big third-party publishers keep getting bigger and bigger, their budgets explode correspondingly. That kind of money you just can't risk on something new and unproved. It just won't fly against investors.

That's why all the most expensive New IP projects now are nothing but "X meets Y", where "X" is the latest fad, while "Y" is the most popular game right now.

WatchDogs = "Hacking meets GTA"
Titanfall = "Pacific Rim meets CoD"
Destiny = "Halo meets WoW" (i guess)

This calculated approach apparently DOES work (see WD sales) but it creates generic, hollow products.

As these big guys (EA, WB, Activision) keep destroying smaller competition, gaming lineup dries up from a stream of games to several big hyped-up releases where all videogame sales are now concentrated.

And all these big releases are gonna be either yearly rehashes or "new", "X plus Y" IPs.

[Ceric]

...
Destiny = "Halo meets WoW" (i guess)
...

Maybe WoW Vanilla Beta.
With the money and names behind it I think it has a chance to be pressured cooked to WoW BC possibly.

[shingi_70]

Pretty boring year thus far despite saying that about last year as well. Right now maybe Watch_dogs or Azure Striker Gunvolt would be my game of the year.

[broodwars]

That's why all the most expensive New IP projects now are nothing but "X meets Y", where "X" is the latest fad, while "Y" is the most popular game right now.

WatchDogs = "Hacking meets GTA"
Titanfall = "Pacific Rim meets CoD"
Destiny = "Halo meets WoW" (i guess)

This calculated approach apparently DOES work (see WD sales) but it creates generic, hollow products.
...
And all these big releases are gonna be either yearly rehashes or "new", "X plus Y" IPs.

And I can label this exact same complaint against the Indie scene. Good lord, how many "Metroid + X", "Dark Souls + Y", or "Mega Man + Z" Indie games have we seen already at this point? How many Indie games do we see developed as just generic, hollow products created just to cash in on the 8-bit nostalgia craze of our generation? Combining old ideas into new ones is just the way the creative process works when you've had an industry that's run as long as ours has. Laying our industry's problems solely at the feet of the larger publishers is short-sighted in my opinion.  Our industry has always been drawn to trends, for better or worse.  It was just easier in the past to gloss over the worst because the economy was good enough to prevent the untalented companies of that era from bankrupting on one game.

[ObbyDent]

Pacific Rim + CoD isn't even Titanfall. If it was, it would be a far better game than it is. Its more like "Mech thing from Avatar + CoD".

[lolmonade]

That's why all the most expensive New IP projects now are nothing but "X meets Y", where "X" is the latest fad, while "Y" is the most popular game right now.

WatchDogs = "Hacking meets GTA"
Titanfall = "Pacific Rim meets CoD"
Destiny = "Halo meets WoW" (i guess)

This calculated approach apparently DOES work (see WD sales) but it creates generic, hollow products.
...
And all these big releases are gonna be either yearly rehashes or "new", "X plus Y" IPs.

And I can label this exact same complaint against the Indie scene. Good lord, how many "Metroid + X", "Dark Souls + Y", or "Mega Man + Z" Indie games have we seen already at this point? How many Indie games do we see developed as just generic, hollow products created just to cash in on the 8-bit nostalgia craze of our generation? Combining old ideas into new ones is just the way the creative process works when you've had an industry that's run as long as ours has. Laying our industry's problems solely at the feet of the larger publishers is short-sighted in my opinion.  Our industry has always been drawn to trends, for better or worse.  It was just easier in the past to gloss over the worst because the economy was good enough to prevent the untalented companies of that era from bankrupting on one game.

THANK YOU.  Derivitave work is just simply going to happen, just like how movie & TV stories are going to be derivitave.  The important consideration is not whether or not a game concept is novel, as much as it should be "does the developer create a game that produces a novel gaming experience?".
 
It may be arguable whether or not the aforementioned games do so, but Azeke's comment dumbs down the games he derides in a way that can be parodied, just like you did.