Best Game Ever!
It feels odd to me that I’d be lifting up my walking stick and whining and complaining about how gaming was in the older days when, being barely out of my teen years, I never was really a part of the older days. I never really touched an Atari, and my main console of choice when I was a wee lad was a Super Nintendo. Back during a time where piracy was something only heard about in history books, and torrents were stuff in sea waters. Back during an era where the only game reviews able to be found were in magazines, and thus were definitive law. Where you could ask your friend about that cool game for the SNES or Playstation, and didn’t have to prowl through reviews and message boards online.
I can’t help but marvel at how things have changed since then. I’m not going to say things were better back then, because they weren’t. And I’m not going to say things are better now, because they sure as hell aren’t, either. But I will say that, as of late, people are more eager to swing around the “Best game ever” title, while few of these “greatest adventures yet” actually last beyond a few months.
I know I’m not the only person who plays the original Doom campaigns, and not just out of nostalgia. Not that I have much nostalgia for it in the first place, I only was introduced to Doom when I was, what, 15? My first “serious” FPS series was Unreal.
Along the same lines, Mario Sunshine and Mario Galaxy have tried to make lightning strike twice in order to bring the Super Mario 64 formula back to life again, but have cut little, basic things that made the legendary N64 epic so charming, so fleshed-out and in-depth. Every Zelda iteration past the legendary Ocarina of Time has never really captured the magic since. Crysis, which was dubbed “best FPS ever” numerous times, is really little more than a memory and “Oh, THAT game!” to people right about now. Unreal Tournament 3 is technically amazing, and was dubbed “best multiplayer FPS ever”, despite the fact that it sacrifices so much in order to achieve this technical amazement. Smash Bros. Brawl is frequently heralded as the “best fighter ever”, and has already had several clones, and yet in the same breath you could easily lambast Brawl for its many shortcomings.
Soon, Soul Calibur 4 will be coming out, and I’ve little doubt that it’ll be given numerous awards as “best game ever”. It’ll likely be a great game, too. So many positives. And yet, it’ll also have numerous flaws, and I highly doubt people will be continuing to play it numerous months after the initial release.
What’s the reason for this? Is it because we’re so drenched in seas of vomit that the game industries constantly regurgitate, that any single piece of quality is treasured like bars of gold?
I’m not sure, really.
Compare this with other games. Say, Gotcha Force, Rez, Killer7. Absolutely amazing games, and yet given barely any formal recognition at all–if you talk to a person who plays it, though, they’ll happily admit it’s not only one of the best games for that system, but they still fire it up regularly. Games that don’t even have a chance of being “best game ever”, and largely suffered horrible reviews from professionals. Cult followings, pretty much no chance for a sequel.
While you’re comparing that, also compare this to many games from the SNES and NES era. Even the licensed games were quite good back then–Duck Tales, Kamen Rider, Michael Jordan’s Chaos in the Windy City, and Power Rangers Tournament Fighters. Not to mention the glorious masterpieces that many claim have never been truly recreated since–Kirby Superstar, Super Mario World, Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy 6, and some even claim Link to the Past though I thought Ocarina of Time did a fine job with that. The good games were truly good games, and the crappy ones were shoved in a rut. Good games got the exposure wanted and needed, and especially nowadays with emulation and downloadable WiiWare/XBox Arcade games, they’re getting a continuing hurrah. Games that truly have stood the test of time, continue to be played, and still provide enjoyment and love.
Are those liable to be counted as the best games ever? Quite likely. They’ve withstood the test of time.
Maybe it’s viewer bias. Maybe some people desperately want to pick nits with these best games, and downplay the quality. Maybe these same people then present the best parts of the underrated games while dismissing their own flaws.
Maybe it came with the development of the internet. A much wider pool of people to meet, a mass number of voices are going to drown out small, tiny voices. We also got introduced to a larger number of jackasses infiltrating daily life. Compare this with just groups of friends back in youth, where you could suggest a game to a friend, let him play it, and he’d be a fan too.
Maybe it’s game developers trying to broaden their appeal to other people, trying to please everyone and just giving a mediocre experience all around.
Games, gaming media, and how we view things have most definitely changed. “Best game ever” is a title just slapped around willy-nilly now, and very rarely carries any weight to it. The golden crown gets handed around left and right.
Halo and Smash Bros., in their original incarnations, got mediocre reviews. People played these games, loved ‘em. They grew famous. Other people tried to imitate them. The sequels got amazing reviews that bragged about “continuing the greatness of the previous title”. Both of those games did things differently, and several people didn’t like them for it. But once they were established and here to stay, said people started changing their tune.
Maybe “best game ever” is just how popular something is, regardless of the quality.
(Halo didn’t do much different, but it did do some things differently, it still sucks, shut up)
