[General Discussion] Cross Platform: The Industry's Lies

Picked up the August issue of CGW in Houston International, and read through their "A Seperate Piece" article on the relationship between console and PC Gaming. In it, they interviewed career liar Todd Howard about Oblivion's cross-platform release. For the purposes of letting you form an opinion before I debunk the bullshit, I'll present the quotes in question first.

Referring to the lockpicking and persuasion mini-games being used as examples for Oblivion being dumbed down: "They came from the desire to have each skill have some gameplay. Elder Scrolls has a Security Skill and a Speechcraft skill. In Morrowind, you didn't get to actually do anything with them. So it was our goal to make those skills more interactive, as opposed to just clicking 'unlock' and waiting for a random dice roll. That was the whole thought process, to somehow create interactive 'dice rolls.' In other words, not just to provide "thumb candy" for fidgety console gamers."

Referring to Oblivion's Interface: "I think people are reactring to the font size, not the interface mechancis themselves. We talked about having a small-font option, as it's not hard to do with the XML-driven menu system, but we didn't have a nice way of switching between large-font XMLs and small-font XMLs; it was one or the other. So we went with the larger font on the PC, hoping that would work for the majority of users. But I think BTmod is great, and I'm glad someone did it."

Referring to PC players liking first-person and console players liking 3rd-person: "Regardless of platform, people play Oblivion mostly in first-person. We've actualy seen more people try third-person on the PC---people who have been playing a lot of World of Warcraft."

CGW: "In the end, Bethesda found that didn't have to dumb down its games..."

Right. Because Bethesda's first console foray, Morrowind, having 25 skills, down from Daggerfall's 37, to Oblivion's 21 doesn't represent a "dumbing down" of The Elder Scrolls at all. Neither does the attempt at attempting "interactive dice rolls," which negate the entire purpose of a dice roll to begin with, or trivializes the player input.

Sure you could argue that correlation doesn't equal causation, but when it comes to "skills having gameplay" ask yourself if there's any honest-to-God difference between Blunt and Blade skills. Even moreso, they had removed spears and crossbows from Oblivion alltogether, and yet there's no discernable difference at all between using Maces and Axes (both "blunt weapons"). Of course, if there is, it's certainly not documented, and it's never hinted at in the game's load screen "hints" which revealed actual gameplay information that should've been in the manual. Come to think of it, there still wasn't a "use" for the Mercantile skill. Could we "wait" for an instantaneous calculation of a die roll there, Todd?

I suppose having hint windows pop up all the Goddamn time telling you exactly where to go, as well as having fast-travel doesn't mean they've dumbed down the games either. That's making the game more "intuitive."

Sure thing, though, Todd. People didn't like the PC interface because of large text font. That's why the BTmod created map-key functionality, a zoomable map, being able to see more than five menu items at a time, a better journal, etc., etc., etc. Large text font. I suppose you should be happy, though, when somebody corrects your mistakes for free.

I also suppose that the reason that people predominantly play in First-Person, even on console, is a personal preference as opposed to it being mechanically impossible to effectively play the game from a 3rd-Person Perspective. I suppose it is possible that more PC player would play third-person because of WOW. Leave it to Todd, though, to use retards as a defense for his shoddy cross-platform development.

Another interesting fallacy put forth in that article comes from Mathew Guzenda:
"I can't really think of anything long-term that a PC will be able to do that a console won't, or vice versa... I don't think we're very far from the point where every PC user will have a gamepad and every console player will have a keyboard."

It might not have occurred to Guzenda, or this could be exactly what he is implying, but when consoles start to exhibit PC functionality, they will be PCs. That kind of mentality may work in Japan where the Nippons can't think of a Personal Computer as anything other than a workspace and web browser, but nobody in Europe and America is going to buy into that trash when they have fully-functional gaming platforms as it is. The one thing the PC has going for it that consoles will never have is a fluid functionality. The Xbox360 is already falling behind PC capabilities in terms of programming and hardware.

So what are people going to choose, ultimately? An all-in-one machine, or pre-packaged game boxes that will cost them half the price while costing an extra 20 dollars per game?

You can't support a market on ignorant holiday gift giving alone.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

So....the point of this thread. Is it that your concerned about companies catering to the console market more and more by dumbing down their games, making them appeal to a larger audience and therefore making the company more profit? Or maybe this is pointed at Bethesda, who used to be pre-dominantly PC, but is now going cross-platform, while at the same time making their games easier and "less complicated" by letting the system do the work the player should be doing (such as not having to travel the world between towns in Oblivion), while at the same time making stats seem trivial because most of the outcome is up to the player now (such as lock-picking)? Or is this thread a rant about how PCs are superior to consoles, because for only double the price, they are infinitely more functionable, and can do so much more?

Your long-winded post has me a bit confused, but I THINK you're trying to say all of these things aforementioned, while at the same time alluding to the fact that the gamer market is spending more money on less functionality in the form of expensive consoles with expensive hardware, while at the same time the more hardcore sect of the gaming circle is being dumbed down because the gaming industry wants a larger crowd to give them more money by making their games easier. IF that is your point, then I'd have to agree with most of it. It basically trivializes the skills of gamers that took them years to attain. I am a console lover, but I do understand where you're coming from...I think. I'm not positive about what you're trying to say here, so help me out.

Yikes, run-on sentences ahoy.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

I'm with him^.

No, wussifying strong games shoudn't happen, but at the same time if you make things more complicated the audience for said genre will shrink. I think.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Wow, now there's a long winded and nonsensical rant. I'm not even going to touch most of the obvious inaccuracies, but I will say...reducing the skills in a game means dumbing it down for console players? Err, are you aware that most game series end up streamlining (aka cutting down) their features in later games? Fallout 3 was supposed to condense every gun into a single skill and it was a PC-only game (until of course it was canceled and the rights sold to Bethesda). It should also be clear that the "dumbing down" of the Elder Scrolls series happened before they even considered putting it on consoles, since Morrowind was in development long before they had any plans to put it on the Xbox and all of the skill changes were decided on early in development when the game was still going to be exclusively for the PC.

I don't like the idea of games being dumbed down (although in the case of The Elder Scrolls I think they should just scrap the ridiculous skill and leveling system they have and start over with something that works better), but it's pretty foolish how people just blame consoles every time it happens. Yes, anytime a game is dumbed down you must blame it on a console! Even if the game isn't coming out on a console and it's exclusive to the PC, it's still the console's fault! The fact is, most games will try to appeal to a broader audience to attract more sales regardless of the platform they're on. Would Oblivion really have been any different if it was developed exclusively for the PC? Somehow I doubt it, except maybe making a better interface rather than the current one which doesn't function well on either platform.

I did get a laugh from the "The one thing the PC has going for it that consoles will never have is a fluid functionality" line. Bravo, show those console fanboys that PC fanboys won't take having their games stolen from them lying down!

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?