Spielberg & EA
- Thread starter pipo
- Start date
Not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing honestly....
I fear heavily scripted games on the horizon...
I fear heavily scripted games on the horizon...
hupfinsgack said:
The Dig was really cool, but it was one of those "click and watch" type of games that were "cool" for 2 weeks in the 90's...
Here's hoping we'll get a game and not an "interactive movie".
hupfinsgack said:Don't say that word ever again. It's as forbidden as the thing rhymes with "Hillbone".There wasn't a single good game in that genre apart from "Under a Killing Moon" and those things were pretty en vogue in those days.
Personally i loved Voyeur. Not sure anyone remembers... Those were the good days...
mckmas8808
Legend
I thought some of his last movies were pretty good actually. If EA handles this game like they do the main Bond games then it should be great.
mckmas8808
Legend
Wow that was actually one of my favorite movies at that time. Different strokes for different folks I guess.
With graphics improving and the plot aspects of some game platforms, it was only a matter of time that more movie directors start delving more into the gaming industry. Although Lucas Arts (to name one) has been doing games for awhile it seems that gaming will play a bigger role this generation much like an interactive movie in a way.
Im all for it as long as the directors have enough freedom to work with game developers to bring players into a game like never before. Sure its great to go around "guns a blazing" but with top directors contributing deep plot twists and indepth story telling, directors could add a much needed story aspect and cinimatic vision to games like never before. (As long as we dont have 20min cut scenes)
Im not a big EA fan but if they give Spielberg the freedom to create his vision of a game title and give him to time to finish it then this could be a great boost to the gaming industry both creatively and financially. Then again its EA. I think Spielberg (who is part owner of Dreamworks if I remember correctly) would of been better off creating his own gaming division (although doesnt Dreamworks have a video game division or are they just game Producers / Contributors?). Just my opinion though. :/
Im all for it as long as the directors have enough freedom to work with game developers to bring players into a game like never before. Sure its great to go around "guns a blazing" but with top directors contributing deep plot twists and indepth story telling, directors could add a much needed story aspect and cinimatic vision to games like never before. (As long as we dont have 20min cut scenes
) Im not a big EA fan but if they give Spielberg the freedom to create his vision of a game title and give him to time to finish it then this could be a great boost to the gaming industry both creatively and financially. Then again its EA. I think Spielberg (who is part owner of Dreamworks if I remember correctly) would of been better off creating his own gaming division (although doesnt Dreamworks have a video game division or are they just game Producers / Contributors?). Just my opinion though. :/
mckmas8808
Legend
jpr27 said:
I'm right with you jpr27. I think the movie industry is really starting to notice the money that can be made in gaming. Espeically with the next-gen systems. If done right, the next generation of gaming could be the best we've ever seen in history.
Powderkeg said:
Story? There was a story to care about?
You know discussing a person's taste in movies like this isn't at all constructive to console game discussion, unless you want to identify what needs to be carried over from movies to games to make them successful. But this is very subjective. Even though some have said they hate the characters in WOTW, I know a few people who are smart filmgoers (not SFX fiendz) who liked WOTW (haven't seen it myself).Powderkeg said:
If you want to tackle this issue about special effects, story and characters in movies and games, with a Hollywood/Console blend, you can do so more politely than this.
Shifty Geezer said:
OK, if Spielberg is going to have the same weak plots filled with giant gaping holes, the same lame-duck acting, and the same level of graphical impressiveness then the graphics whores of the gaming world will be very impressed, but those wanting some substance beyond just the graphics will be very disappointed.
Even in games, I want the plot to be consistent and coherent, and Spielberg has had a distinct lack of that in his recent movies.
BetterPowderkeg said:
Story has always played a weak walk-on part in most games in my experience. You do your shooting/flying.sword-swishing/magic-casting/whathaveyou and every once in a while a cut scene interrupts with 'so and so evil person is ruining the world, do such and such to stop them' just as an explanation of why the scenery is changing more often than not. The exceptions to me were the LucasArts RPGs of yore, like Monkey Island and that dead people one. Currently those games that add more story tend to be Japanese RPGs and their stories are always too wierd for my liking. I don't imagine bringing in Hollywood will change much in the story worth of gaming.
Not sure I'd blame Spielberg or Hollywood per se though. It's the writers more than anyone who produce naff scripts and weak 1 dimensional characters (and almost always call their American hero 'Jack'). Though maybe it's the producers selection of generic stories that's leaving the good writers behind? Still I don't know how many computer games derived from novels are any good as story-strong games either. There haven't been that many that I know of. And if writers can make a living writing tripe they will do, especially when all their good ideas get rejected for being outside the norm.
Hollywood could bring some much stronger production values to gaming. With proper insight from lighting, photography, costume and set departments, the visual structure of games could be improved a lot I think. After all computers are producing virtual film sets and casts so the same principals of managing these can be applied.
Shifty Geezer said:
Back in the days when not all games actually had graphics, some games had very little *other* than story.
IMHO, text adventures are still the best "interactive fiction" that I've played. Since those days, with the move to graphical adventures, a lot has been lost. RPGs probably have larger and more complex plots, but I don't feel nearly as involved as I'm limited to just wandering around fighting random battles and finding plot trigger points.
However... going back to Hollywood...
The main issue I think is that the level of interactivity in a game is not something your average film producer knows what to do with. To be honest even most game designers these days seem to have issues with it.
With a film, you pour as much effort into each shot as you possibly can, and you know that the viewer will see each scene in turn and all your efforts will be appreciated.
However with games, if you offer the player choices then you make it a certainty that some of your hard work will be completely missed. How many extra chapters/levels/missions do you have the time and inclination to write if the player might never see them? How much does all that effort dilute the overall product?
The usual answer seems to be to cop out and force the player down a relatively linear path so that you can pack more in. At most you get a fork in the plot right before the ending. How many games are there where players ask each other "which ending did you get"?
I'll be honest and say I often don't mind that too much, but I would like to see more effort being made to make it seem less obvious when this is happening. Too often it's just a lazy way of forcing the player to have exactly the experience the designer has planned for them. And to me, that's not an interactive experience any more than it would be if DVD movies automatically paused between each scene and made me press play.
I would love to see people be more experimental though, and allow the player choices right from the start. Gamers back in the day loved playing Elite - I think partly because it was fun, but also because at the time it felt really immersive and gave you an illusion that you could do whatever you wanted and weren't being led around by the nose. It takes someone to think less like a movie producer and a lot more like a game designer to make choices like that.
Which is to say I think the problem with games these days is that the designers are frustrated movie directors or writers. I'm not sure what good replacing them with *real* movie directors or writers will do. I'm all for their involvement but I think it needs to happen alongside a good game designer who can structure the players experience.
mckmas8808
Legend
Powderkeg said:
Ah no. Does Halo have a great story line? Hecks no. But many people still enjoy it though. Yeah the story wasn't the best in life but I now one thing. I left the movies a happy man. The worst thing about WOTW is the ending. It should have been much better. But by all means not a horrible movie as some people like to make it out to be.
And ovbiously a lot of other people agree being that it made over 100 million dollars very very quickly.
mckmas8808 said:
Well i didn't hate the movie, but judging a movie by its first weeks (or month) earning is hardly the right thing to do.
What i can say is that all those involved in the movie have done much better than that. Cruise, Spielberg, even the little kid all did much better than WOTW. That's how i judge movies