Console Games = 1 Day Play Time

[OldSchoolGamer]

So I buy "Star Wars : The Force Unleashed", I know, I'm automatically a nerd. I have never boughten anything Star Wars before but who could resist after watching the commercial including a shit-ton of murder performed through neat Jedi skills?!

So I play it, and I play it... and then it's done. Maybe twelve stages? Four or five or them being repeated visits to planets you've already been to? I mean, I'm not downing the game itself but I'm downing the gaming industry now-a-days.

For example, Resident Evil : Umbrella Chronicles, also beaten in the same-day. Final Fantasy Fables : Chocobo's Dungeon, also beaten in the same-day, Dragon Quest : Swords, also beaten in the same day...

You get the point by now I'm sure but I could go on.

Anyone remember the days of real gameplay? Final Fantasy 3 took a TREMENDOUS amount of saves and continues. Final Fantasy 7 even wasn't that bad. Chrono Trigger, the original Zelda's, etc. etc. What happened to PLAY TIME?!

/end rant ;3

[Scully]

Dumbed down and shortened for the casual gamers.

[OldSchoolGamer]

Dumbed down and shortened for the casual gamers.

Why Scully!? WHY?!?!? T_T

[alfaroverall]

It shot itself after innovation jumped out of a 20 story building.

[Spk]

Play time is a function of how much each second costs development wise. This cost has increased dramatically over the last decade because of the amount of technology that is expected from any modern game. I'd rather have short and nice (ie: mass effect) than long and boring. But yeah, I'd also prefer to have long and nice :)

[trichlor]

Contra is a one day play. There were plenty of them back then too. I used to beat Zelda: A link to the Past in a day. There's always been both long and short games.

[Killuminati]

I'm a total star wars nerd, and I'm not buying that garbage. Darth Vaders Apprentice? lol wtf were they thinking. Game looked and plays like absolute crap. It was obvious it would be you running around in some linear story doing missions for Mr. Vader. Also, yah, you should have rented it. It obviously was going to be 15 hours of gameplay tops.

[Master25]

Fallout 3 is going to have alot of play time, fable 2 aswell.
MMO's have playtime as long as you don't get bored of playing it.
DF is one of em ;)

And we have spore, there are alot games like CoD4 wich you can play online.

Maybe something happened to playtime to some of those games, you just got to avoid em.

[Everto]

Old school games are 1dayplay too.

But then again, saves didn't really exist for some consoles back then (Ie; sega genesis)

Disgaea is definitely a time consumer, 100 hours clocked.

[ZeaL-]

Star wars is something only losers enjoy anyways.

[LordRolo]

Old school games are 1dayplay too.

But then again, saves didn't really exist for some consoles back then (Ie; sega genesis)

Disgaea is definitely a time consumer, 100 hours clocked.

TBH that's not really true.. only the really crappy ones with shit sprites were 1 dayers

almost all of the old console games were long FPSes or RPGs of some kind... the platformers also seem to have more stages than todays days ones

and PC games back then were epicly long see Tie-fighter, most of the adventure games and pretty much all of the RTS

[Yamamoto]

SW:TFU got really bad reviews. I think it got a 7.3 from IGN.

Best bet is to check out the reviews first or rent it before purchasing, unless you have deep pockets, in which case I'm prompted to ask: Can I have some too?

[IthroZada]

Lost Odyssey has what? 4 discs? That's a pretty long console game.

[Everto]

TBH that's not really true.. only the really crappy ones with shit sprites were 1 dayers

almost all of the old console games were long FPSes or RPGs of some kind... the platformers also seem to have more stages than todays days ones

and PC games back then were epicly long see Tie-fighter, most of the adventure games and pretty much all of the RTS

Almost all sega genesis games were 1-dayers.

Just that most took some time to play, like it really took me an astonishing 8 years to finally beat Shinobi 3: Return of the Ninja Master for Sega Genesis. I'm not quite sure why it took that long.

And I simply couldn't beat Streets of Rage 2 by myself, since I played as Skate [fastest but weakest], it took me awhile to find a partner, but eventually I did.

[Paganini]

It's more cost effective to take budget away from the length of a game and put it into graphics and buying off good reviews from gaming magazines/websites.

[Viranth]

I don't really play games as much as I used to anymore, I get bored so quickly these days. It's been a while since I played a game and thought it was something new and fresh.

But, short games are rarely fun, because they usually try to throw so much at you in a short period of time.

[trichlor]

TBH that's not really true.. only the really crappy ones with shit sprites were 1 dayers

almost all of the old console games were long FPSes or RPGs of some kind... the platformers also seem to have more stages than todays days ones

and PC games back then were epicly long see Tie-fighter, most of the adventure games and pretty much all of the RTS

The majority of old Games were Platformers, Action Adventure games, Fighters, and Arcade games.

Very, very, very few of them had saves, if any at all. Most of them could be played through in a day.

[Pcheez]

I played through Sonic & Knuckles in a day... and through an earthquake.

[alfaroverall]

TBH that's not really true.. only the really crappy ones with shit sprites were 1 dayers

almost all of the old console games were long FPSes or RPGs of some kind... the platformers also seem to have more stages than todays days ones

and PC games back then were epicly long see Tie-fighter, most of the adventure games and pretty much all of the RTS
Platformers improved over time IMO. The introduction of 3D made things more interesting in that genre (if only in that genre and the FPS genre) so there's more variation that they can put in, allowing for more levels (provided the budget and time is present). Yet ironically, things have taken a downturn more recently. Look at Super Mario Galaxy vs. Super Mario Sunshine. I'd claim that Galaxy has more "raw entertainment" value per level, but Sunshine has a lot more there overall, imo.

On the flip side, look at DK64 vs. the original Mario Bros (objectively, neglecting differences in raw technological power wherever possible). There's a lot more to speak of in DK64. The original Mario Bros was amazing for its time, but DK64 is just a better game overall.
Lost Odyssey has what? 4 discs? That's a pretty long console game.
God dammit, yet another intriguing game that I'm going to miss because of not being willing to spend the substantial chunk of change it would take to get a PS3 or 360...

[Lachrymose]

that's why i don't understand when people complain about having to pay monthly MMO fees. a console game that takes 20 hours to beat costs $60 nowadays. that's $3 per hour... if you play an MMO just 2 hours a week you're getting getting an even better value.

[Oniloke]

reason for many bad and short games is just money, (i know you know) like when batman movies game... there's has to be at least 20-40 drifferent short games about batman. it's horrible... But some games stay true to their legacy (talking about main games), like zelda, metal gear solid, mario, final fantasy, ect!

I buy to many of the dumb games, so im looking forward to darkfall so i won't have to buy other entertainment =P

[Nexus]

It was a flawed game design from day one. You can't make physics the focus point for a linear game like that. It'd get tiring quickly, and I knew it would, which is why I never bought it.

I knew it would have no replayability, as its not a true sandbox.
"You can do whatever you want"... with that crate, those storm troopers and that window. How many ways can you add them together?

Fucking yay.

Half-life 2 is good because physics is second to awesome gameplay, setting and sound.

About game length, i'm sure it has something to do with how much they focus on complexity. I'm pretty sure TFU has a lot of clever stuff going on, and a powerful engine to hold it all together, so they wouldn't have had much time to make a compelling story or many missions.

Assassins creed, another complex engine, very pretty, and it would have been a very short game if they didn't ctrl+c -> ctrl+v the missions over and over.

Same deal with Halo 3. Ridiculously short gameplay length.

An obvious exception to my theory is GTA4, which is obviously very complex but then also has a lot of missions. That is only because they'll have some user friendly mission generation wizard, that lets them churn them out without thinking.

An old school JRPG would have been made on a very simple engine, and the amount of content generation tantamounts to 16 bit sprites for a snes and a few 4 channel midi 'choons'.

[Wickfield]

Meh... I didn't see much in tfu. It's fun, but it's very short, not very innovative, and really isn't what it's hyped to be.

When it comes to console games, I find that If I'm buying it, I'm not expecting it to have dozens of hours of entertainment. I mainly use my ps3 for blu-rays for that exact reason, because I don't feel that making a $60 investment in something with limited play time/no replay value is worth it. Renting console games is more cost-effective anyway.

[Wickfield]

It was a flawed game design from day one. You can't make physics the focus point for a linear game like that. It'd get tiring quickly, and I knew it would, which is why I never bought it.

Yep, try telling that to a quarter of the people who own 360's.

[Wreatch]

WoW syndrome.

[Nexus]

Yep, try telling that to a quarter of the people who own 360's.
Do people that own 360s generally make linear physics games?

[Agge]

And this is why I mentioned Dark Chronicle befor. Finalfantasy series usualy takes a while aswell, if you can enjoy it al.

I gave FFXIII a second try not to long ago, I gotta admit I enjoyed it quite alot this time but then it does a dick move on me. I didn't allow me to save through some hard shit (some mini boss, then a boss) just to die befor I get back to a save crystal... Fuck that shit. Realy, I lucked out as hell on al my super duper over 9000 mega moves, killed the fucking boss bitch deamon shit, it gets on with the story bla bla bla and that was like 1-1½ houer wasted of my time.

I'm still pissed about that. I'm not sure I will be able to pick it up again, I realy wan't to know how the story will move on after that but I do not care to repeat that shit only to fail again if I'm even able to beat the damn boss again.

...

:bang:

[Suitepee]

Nowadays most games have online gameplay. Every game wants to have online gameplay,because I think the demographic has changed?
Also games are becoming shallower and easier.

I mean I used to spend hours and hours playing Dynasty Warriors and such like on the old PS2. Now that I have a 360 and games like COD4/Gears/GTA4,I don't tend to commit much towards single-player games anymore.

Hell the most I bothered to do lately was getting about 20 hours into Mass Effect,then deciding to play Gears for a few months. I seem to enjoy online FPS more than a well thought-out RPG these days....either that or my adult self lacks commitment time to play them.

[alfaroverall]

I gave FFXIII a second try not to long ago,
Seriously? How?

Sorry, I had to.

Regarding FFXII: I re-stopped after I found an optional boss fight which has something like Lvl 2 sleep, Lvl 3 disable, lvl 4 petrify, and level prime death. By sheer chance, my characters were level 48. All 3 of them. (The others were in their 30s). If you run the numbers, you'll see that at 48, the first three abilities all affect me. (He also uses them in sequence.) If I level up once, none of them affect me, but this requires an obscene amount of grinding. That stopped me playing for the second time (the first time I stopped was before Giruvegan because I just wasn't being pulled towards finishing the story...when I started again I just side quested like mad, with this boss fight being one of them).
I gotta admit I enjoyed it quite alot this time but then it does a dick move on me. I didn't allow me to save through some hard shit (some mini boss, then a boss) just to die befor I get back to a save crystal... Fuck that shit. Realy, I lucked out as hell on al my super duper over 9000 mega moves, killed the fucking boss bitch deamon shit, it gets on with the story bla bla bla and that was like 1-1½ houer wasted of my time.

I'm still pissed about that. I'm not sure I will be able to pick it up again, I realy wan't to know how the story will move on after that but I do not care to repeat that shit only to fail again if I'm even able to beat the damn boss again.

...

:bang:
What part of the game was that?

Your general point, though, is right; FFs are a good example of recent console RPGs that do take several days of playtime (i.e. 60+ hours) to complete.

[Nexus]

Online multiplayer is a nice easy way to bulk out gameplay without making content.

Cough Halo 3 cough.

[Justinian]

Myst/Riven and Syndicate

need I say more?

[The Lost One]

Most of the longer games have been single player only. Still remember playing OOT for ages when it first came out. Good times.

Fallout 3 is looking to be a nice long RPG, Far Cry 2 should supplement my desire for things that go kaplow (randomised story events should also leave some good replayability, not starting a game the same way twice is a good idea), Mirror's Edge has finally dragged Dice away from the BF series, Left 4 Dead for awesome co-op zombie shooting.

Overall the next few months should keep the gaming community fairly busy.

Some games are long some aren't, more of a good thing is always better but games don't necessarily need to be long to be good and long boring games are piles of steaming shit. You win some you lose some.

[Damwa]

Play time is a function of how much each second costs development wise. This cost has increased dramatically over the last decade because of the amount of technology that is expected from any modern game. I'd rather have short and nice (ie: mass effect) than long and boring. But yeah, I'd also prefer to have long and nice :)

This.

[Wickfield]

Do people that own 360s generally make linear physics games?

No, but a good number of the kiddies would insist that "tfu is teh greatest. YOU CAN THROW SHIT WITH THE FORCE!"

[Spinewire]

Myst/Riven and Syndicate

need I say more?
Syndicate was pure win

[Rimayven]

We need a game with actual depth, immersion, and all that kind of shit. Nowadays most games are just.... aging quickly.