Correlation does not imply causation

Beneath the stylings, Psychonauts is a mediocre, often badly designed platformer with a pretty generic late-90s cartoon storyline at best, like an episode of Ren and Stimpy stretched out forever; at worst it's a typical American summer camp movie littered with predictable web comic jokes and unimaginative dream sequences (it's not a generic war setting like millions of other games, it's a dream of a generic war setting!). Come at me, bro. Well, I'm only half joking - it is one of the most overrated games I've ever encountered, though I did enjoy it quite a bit until the dream novelty wore off.

you are subhuman....

True, but irrelevant since it was a poor word choice on my part because there weren't any implied direct cause-and-effect relationships in my statement. I meant to say that it's pretty easy to recognize how that video could be applied to other, similar situations. Had nothing to do with an X causes Y situation, so it was just a bad word choice. Apologies!

I'm looking forward to play Black Ops 2 in about 10 or 20 years here on gog.

They will probably bundle it as a weekend or holiday special with 70% off.
Most likely the bundle will include all of the disputed titles where nowadays fan boys and girls are waging wars of hatred to show which is the better one.

When that happens I sincerlely hope that all that bullsh*t of those -how did you call them?- subhumans who have written and recorded some hated speeches or propaganda hypes somewhere will still be available - like a historical document - as a solemn reminder of how the dark times of gaming industry were back in 2012.

And while waiting for those times, I'm going to enjoy some good old shooter myself. I think I have postal 2 in my games library somewhere...

Out of curiosity, do you not feel that 'dumbing down' is a valid complaint or concern with video games? Did you happen to play both Dragon Age 1 & 2? How did you feel about the transition between the two games, and how they simplified the second one to appeal to a broader base of players?

I do pay attention when something being 'dumbed down' is a complaint that PC gamers are making. It's a common problem with games these days, since more and more games are being designed for consoles first and ported to the PC second. Now, just because a game has been 'dumbed down' or streamlined to appeal to a larger audience, that doesn't mean that the game isn't still enjoyable or even amazing. But it is something that I personally pay attention to when looking though reviews.

Skyrim is a good example of that. Excellent game with a horrible, horrible PC interface. PC gamers have the luxury of a keyboard and mouse, which is a superior interface setup for many game types, especially RPGs. So when an interface is 'streamlined' with the console controller in mind, it can make for a less-enjoyable or even frustrating PC experience. The mouse and keyboard simply allow for more usable buttons as well as faster and more precise movements both while moving the character and going through inventories or game menus. It can feel like handicap if it's really bad. Luckily, in the case of Skyrim, the game was mod-able so there were ways around that issue.

True, and I'm sure next year's and the year after's are being started. (Vote with Your Wallets) It would be nice if there were more indie first person shooters like Serious Sam or Painkiller, but that genre seems rather untouched by indies (afaik); maybe they feel it's beneath them. ;)

pst - http://www.wrackgame.com/

Haha. I bet they'd still be expensive!

From Steam:

Call of Duty 1, 2003 - 20 bucks
Call of Duty United Offensive (expansion), 2004 - 20 bucks
Call of Duty 2, 2005 - 20 bucks
Call of Duty 4 Modern Warfare, 2007 - 20 bucks
Call of Duty World at War, 2008 - 20 bucks
Call of Duty MW 2, 2009 - 20 bucks
Call of Duty MW 2 Stimulus Pack , 2010 - 15 bucks
Call of Duty MW 2 Resurgence Pack, 2010 - 15 bucks
Call of Duty Black Ops 1, 2010 - 40 bucks
Call of Duty BO First Strike Pack, 2011 - 15 bucks
Call of Duty BO Escalation Pack, 2011 - 15 bucks
Call of Duty BO Annihilation Pack, 2011 - 15 bucks
Call of Duty BO Rezurrection Pack, 2011 - 15 bucks
Call of Duty MW3, 2011 - 60 bucks
Call of Duty MW3 Collection 1, 2012 - 15 bucks
Call of Duty MW3 Collection 2, 2012 - 15 bucks
Call of Duty MW3 Collection 3, 2012 - 15 bucks
Call of Duty MW3 Collection 4, 2012 - 15 bucks

That's hilarious that they still want so much for their games since they usually become obsolete once a new one comes out and nearly everyone switches to the new game.
So if you wanted to play Black Ops 1 (remember 2 is out now), it would cost you 100 bucks for the complete game. Simply stunning. Not sure why anyone would continue to support this franchise but whatever.

I opened IGN's review randomly and told myself, "Let me guess, 9.5."

It was 9.3.

Serious Sam is a blast to play co-op. I hear the new Painkiller has a co-op mode but I haven't checked out the reviews for that one yet. Co-op Painkiller could be fun.

Haha, not at all surprising.

Well here's the thing; I had a worse time with Dragon Age Origins because the voice acting was generally embarrassingly bad, most skill descriptions were wrong, many skills were glitched, you could easily make an auto-attack machine as your character that was literally invincible, it was incredibly glitchy, and there were some horrible, drawn-out and awfully paced sections, like the demon world thing in the mage's tower. Edge gave Dragon Age Origins 5/10, for a whole host of reasons that, bizarrely, internet reviews didn't even briefly mention. I mean, for god's sake, people complain about forcing a voice on Hawke in DA2, but in DAO, your hero still has a voice when given commands (you're commanding yourself?) - and he makes Spiderman references! Talk about immersion breaking.

So, then, the idea that a lot of that being fixed but oh no, the combat is visually more than people wafting swords vaguely towards each other, didn't really bother me. Is it really "dumbing down" to have a better selection range of skills that each have a role to play, rather than dozens of glitched spells that are totally interchangeable? I don't think either game is fantastic (Edge went on to give DA2 6/10) but DAO felt like an awful, awkward, cringeworthy attempt at recreating the magic of Baldur's Gate, whereas DA2 seemed to have got around a lot of the things that made me and my friend literally "lol" while playing DAO.

The tl;dr point being, "dumbing down" is always a point people make in isolation, with no actual reference to the quality of the original's system - e.g. does it really matter than you can't level up by bunny hopping everywhere in Skyrim, like you could in Oblivion and Morrowind? Apparently, because "dumb, retarded console kiddies" can't appreciate the nuances of useless skills and completely broken spell-creation systems. I'll take more believable towns, NPC actions and personality, as seen in Skyrim, over a horrific parade of potato people walking into walls, or neck deep in rivers having disjointed and nonsensical conversations with each other ("How's the weather?" "Haven't seen you for a while!" "So long!" and so on).

Interesting. I'm not sure about the "sci-fi" setting, though.

my best bit is when people equates: Streamlining = Dumbing down. Apparently we are supposed to struggle with controls, quest structures, UI and so on. Who would have thought, the frustration I felt was me enjoying the game.

I guess game designers are not supposed to learn from mistakes and experiment.

Haha, yeah, I can certainly agree with some of that. I think we might be talking about two different things though in reference to dumbing down. I tend to notice the effects of console portitus more in the interface and game menus, and in the specific case of RPG's, character development, more than I do in the actual content of the game. Don't get me wrong, just because a game is made primarily for a console doesn't mean it's a bad game -- not by a long shot, so that's not what I'm driving at. A game can be simplified and still be an excellent experience. But even in situations where a game may have minimal or non-exist settings options on the PC -- it's that kind of stuff that bothers me.

Obviously the face of gaming has and will continue to change over the years, but I still prefer games that, when made or ported to the PC, actually treat PC gamers like we're playing it on the PC, and not as an afterthought to the console crowd. I like to have the option to tweak graphical settings if need be. I like to take full advantage of the mouse and keyboard. I just don't like it when it's obvious that a game you're playing on the PC feels like it's a handicapped version of what it should be, because it was ported from a console. I've actually been strictly a PC gamer since the Nintendo 64, so maybe I'm just too used to using a PC and not yet ready to give it up for a world where only console games remain.

This is just my opinion of course. I know some people actually like the 'dumbing down' or 'streamlining' that's taking place in a lot of video games. Some people actually prefer having less options to worry about and dealing with less complexity, and there's nothing wrong with that. But it's the overall trend of simplifying (and over-simplifying) that's happening to games that I don't like to see. Gaming has definitely turned into an industry where it's more about ensuring profit than transforming someone's vision into a game.