Half-Life mods - Expecting Too Much?

Very interesting article at Planet HL

http://planethalflife.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Editorials.Detail&id=27

"
This past weekend I tore myself away from my Team Fortress 2 addiction to go
to a party. That's right, I may be a game addict to the point that I got a
job talking about games, but I do still go out for a beer with the guys now
and then. While sitting on the couch with Neil Young blaring in the
background and an illicit type of smoke bellowing through the air (we won't
go into details), my friend Danny and I got into a conversation about how he's
surprised that some Half-Life 2 mods are as popular as they are despite "not
being as good looking as Half-Life [2]."

Danny, you're like a brother to me, so don't get the wrong impression when I
say that you're an idiot and you, and people like you, are why game
modifications and even commercial games are often getting poor reception.
Has it gotten to a point where when a game hits the market featuring
next-generation graphics that it automatically makes all games on older (and
not by much) game engines obsolete? Are the top mods with seemingly endless
resources such as Insurgency or Pirates, Vikings, & Knights II automatically
better because they have a stronger graphics team? What ever happened to
gameplay being the most important aspect of games?"

What do you guys think?

Forgive me, but I think your an idiot. If we all thought like you we would still be playing ZORK.

What happened is we grew up and left games like ZORK in our past. Great as they may of been, people started to need more, and the industry has tried to give more and more.. its called advancement, I for one am all for it. But I do agree, we need to rely less on good looks to cover up bad story and game play.. I don't see why we cant have all in one.

Well, I think the expectations for mods are lower then the expectations of commercial games, thus why an average experience in a mod can be well received and an above average experience in a game can be poorly received.

Half-Life 2 took many years to build with a whole bunch of guys that do this for a living, mods are usually created by a small group of peeps that either go to school or work and don't have hours of free time each day.

So I think that this lower expectation for mods is fair and a lot of people will play mods not expecting much and can be quite surprised.

And game play is most certainly the most important aspect, anybody who disagrees with that probably doesn't know much about games, not to say visuals aren't important though.

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Aaron's Stuff

It's editorials like this that made me leave Planet Halflife for good.

This is so wallowing in obviousness that it would be a lot more interesting to maybe look at it from the opposite POV: Why do people think that HL2 mods do not look as good as the original (a problem you hardly ever had with HL1 mods)?

A thousand or a million polygons? Who cares? What's missing in today's mods is atmosphere. HL1 had a texture palette that shines with diversity, warmth and color.

HL2 takes place in a war-torn, ex-communist city near the polar circle. Of course modders have a harder job building something fun and inviting out of the base material here. If you want to build a Source mod that doesn't look gray and depressing, you basically have to build everything from scratch. And that's the true reason HL2 mods are so obsessed with spending years on creating custom material from scratch.

All good points and each valid.

I disagree that anyone who thinks game play alone is the basis for a good game has no idea about games. Like I said ZORK had great game play, and if you dont know what ZORK is then I suggest you dont know much about games.

The whole thing tied together is what makes a great game experiance. The Story, why am I here and why am I killing all these MEN/MONSTERS/Whatever. Do the graphics make me buy into it? Does the sound help emmerse me into the world? They all work hand in hand these days. If you think all it is is great game play, and nothing else.. then may I suggest MONOPOLY, or WARMACHINE, or any other tabletop board game. DOOM by FantasyFlight Games is damn fun and it does not have any the graphical stuff in it, because its a Board game.

Muhnay said:
I disagree that anyone who thinks game play alone is the basis for a good game has no idea about games.

Yeah, I disagree with that as well. But certainly, gameplay is the foundation of a good game and is the most important aspect of a game, if you could only do one thing well it should be the gameplay.

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Aaron's Stuff

I will never abandon my old games, hell i had a SWAT 4 game with some of the guys from the failreacter and that's prephysics

I also still have a go through of secret of mana on the snes every once in a while

graphics aren't everything, it's all in the play, yeah it may look shiny but that doesn't mean i'm going to play it

there are a few games, like half-life 2 that look quite good and play amazing...go valve

if you discount a game simply b/c it doesn't look like far cry 2 then you sir are an idiot

edit: and btw, storyline is part of gameplay as far as i'm concerned

mods? you mean like :

http://www.moddb.com/downloads/they-hunger-1-2-and-3

I remember being amazed that I got to play that for free! I'd probably give it another go too.

sadly,
http://www.blackwidowgames.com/

a common mod-specific weakness...delivery

I've always been a fan of Half-Life 1. In fact, I almost never played mods for HL2. Only Gmod, and before a bit insurgency.

I like both Goldsrc and Source engines, but i think i still prefer Goldsrc.
Not sure why though, but i like the look of that engine better. And i loved HL1 mods more than HL2 mods.

So yeah I agree, I don't really care about graphics. A good storyline and a good gameplay is enough for me.

aaron_da_killa said:
But certainly, gameplay is the foundation of a good game and is the most important aspect of a game, if you could only do one thing well it should be the gameplay.

Absolutely true, yet this is such a truism nowadays. I don't like how game (or mod) makers now push anything they want to sell into the "gameplay" category, and suddenly story is part of the gameplay, or "accessibility". It's a bit hypocritical.

Gameplay might be the root of a good game, but I don't think it stops here. I have no problem admitting that graphics and atmosphere are one of the main reasons I like HL, for example. It doesn't cancel out the importance of gameplay.

On another note, I always find it important to distinguish between "graphics" and "graphics technology". I still think HL1 had better graphics.

This is not a confrontation.

On another note, I always find it important to distinguish between "graphics" and "graphics technology". I still think HL1 had better graphics.

please explain?

After working on a mod team for 3 years (Eternal-Silence), I do have to say that the community's expectations really are too high that it causes people to leave, and lose interest because it takes too long to produce. What really sets mod teams apart though is how does the team work through the criticism and the poor community. It takes determination and perseverance.

The fact that that mod teams fail because of community interest is in fact natural selection (not the mod, but its a great example of a team that was determined to get a game out, now look where they are at).

One thing I've never really understood the need for mod news sites. I remember at one point there was a mod that released a news piece showing off their new knife model after 2 months of silence... Big fucking deal. About the only news that should be published for mods is content releases. Not hype. Following this thought I guess we could also say this issue of over expectation from the community is in fact due to the mod's own fault for over hype.

I think he means that Half-Life 1 has a more solid and/or desirable visual style to it.

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Aaron's Stuff

aaron_da_killa said:
I think he means that Half-Life 1 has a more solid and/or desirable visual style to it.

Thanks, I probably would have spent 5 paragraphs to say the same.