Are platformers dead?

[Silentsnipe1212]

so i was at my best friends house today watching him play banjo kazooie, and i got to thinking about DK 64, mario 64 and other games of the like. and i was thinking, are there any games like this anymore? open world, with levels built in to portals/different areas. bosses etc. what happened to our precious platformers?

[Seasqwaa]

I wouldn't say platformers are "dead," but they're less abundant for sure.

Also, they're usually covered with something else that might sound more attractive to the general public.

As in, most games with platforming elements these days get heavy *action* elements to make it more ... appealing.
Though I don't quite agree, they're usually flooded with stupid things that try too hard.

There are still true platformers out there, but hard to find, and lines are definitely blurred.

Now that I think of it though, I do miss a lot of those old game because the platforming was so much fun and straightforward.
I do long for a nice crash bandicoot game or something of that sort, but the truth is, I'm probably just not looking hard enough, past the guise of ... marketing.

[RConner]

well Mirrors Edge is technically a platformer, as well as the rebirth of Donkey Kong Country Returns. there a few other but they are usually lumped into some other genre of gameplay. I do feel your pain with the lack of them being around(although im terribad at them haha)

[Digglett]

Donkey Kong Country Returns, Mario Galaxy games, still a good amount of platformers around, not to mention those made by independent developers.

[Laughriot]

I'd still love to see the modern consoles put some effort into making excellent 2D side-scrolling platformers. The emphasis on 3D is understandable, because the development of that technology was one of the primary driving forces of the console arms race, so to speak, but... those games have amazing playability, and there is so much that can be done with them.

Imagine taking a game like Super Metroid, or Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and bringing the graphical detail and sheer size that can only be achieved through the current-gen systems to it. Huge, non-linear games with gear and weapon upgrades, tons and tons of secret passages and hidden bonuses, and all with that classic console feel.

/sigh...

[Tigercat]

I'd still love to see the modern consoles put some effort into making excellent 2D side-scrolling platformers. The emphasis on 3D is understandable, because the development of that technology was one of the primary driving forces of the console arms race, so to speak, but... those games have amazing playability, and there is so much that can be done with them.

Imagine taking a game like Super Metroid, or Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and bringing the graphical detail and sheer size that can only be achieved through the current-gen systems to it. Huge, non-linear games with gear and weapon upgrades, tons and tons of secret passages and hidden bonuses, and all with that classic console feel.

/sigh...

An updated super metroid that could be played on the pc(because fuck aiming with some shitty console controller) with these attributes would be amazing.

[mordale]

sly 4, nuff said.
and for 2D, rayman origins.

[Edge-]

Not even close. They've moved mainly to indie games, they've made some awesome games and have done some amazing things with them. They're just not as profitable as they used to be, so big companies won't make large returns (even considering the much cheaper development and shorter development cycle).

[Aertea]

Metrovania games are a platforming sub-genre, and are still somewhat common. They crank out a new 2d Castlevania every year or so.

There were a bunch of good platformers in the last couple years outside Nintendo too. Shadow Complex, Braid, Trine, Limbo and N+ are all pretty solid.

An updated super metroid that could be played on the pc(because fuck aiming with some shitty console controller) with these attributes would be amazing.

Check out Aquaria, if you haven't already. A lot of people haven't heard of it, but it was quite awesome. It mostly takes place underwater, so it blurs the lines of "platforming" a bit, but at it's core it's metrovania through the use of exploration, upgrades and backtracking.

[Laughriot]

Metrovania games are a platforming sub-genre, and are still somewhat common. They crank out a new 2d Castlevania every year or so.

There were a bunch of good ones in the last couple years outside Nintendo too. Shadow Complex, Braid, Trine, Limbo and N+ are all pretty solid.



Check out Aquaria, if you haven't already. A lot of people haven't heard of it, but it was quite awesome.

Shadow Complex looks absolutely fantastic, thank you for that list of games. I'll check them out.

[zoloz]

Unfortunately the video game market has been over saturated by FPS clones. The Nintendo + RARE partnership made some of the best games ever and it was never the same again when Rare went with microsoft and made a hideous banjo kazooie 3 for 360.

[Digglett]

Unfortunately the video game market has been over saturated by FPS clones. The Nintendo + RARE partnership made some of the best games ever and it was never the same again when Rare went with microsoft and made a hideous banjo kazooie 3 for 360.

Donkey Kong Country Returns is amazing, feels like an old Rare game, at least to me it did. Still sad Rare went to Microsoft, but what can ya do. :/

[Shadence]

I wouldn't say dead, but seeing as Alice: Madness Returns was the first platformer I have played in 6 years, I'd say its very unabundant.

[seam]

I just got done playing Alice: Madness Returns, so it's wierd to find this...

But I wouldn't say they are dead. They still pop up here and there, but they aren't as popular as they once were.

It may swing around, at the moment the main(Popular) games are FPS and RPG, but it changes from time to time.


Speaking of which, Alice was pretty good, but frustrating when it would sometimes let me double jump after hitting a jumpy plant, and sometimes it wouldn't. Causing me to die and get thrown back quite a bit.

[PACOX]

There are tons of platformers on PSN/XBL. A lot of game are hybrid platformers (Action Adventure genre).

Ratchet and Clank
Sly
Tomb Raider
Super Meatboy (platformer)
LittleBigPlanet (platformer)
Braid (platformer)

Then you have games with heavy platforming elements

Uncharted
inFamous
Assassins Creed
Enslaved
Darksiders

These are just ones I've played.

[Selastan]

There are some fun platformers out there, but most of them are flash based and on the internet. it would be kind of a waste to take a high powered system and produce a 2-D game for it when the internet can handle it just fine, and for free. But still nothing along the lines of Ray-man or Crash Bandicoot out there

[Silentsnipe1212]

i seriously just want nintendo to put donkey kong 64 on the wii virtual console. ive had a really bad itch to play that game lately, and i cant find my cartridge . now that you guys mention it, there are a lot of games i overlooked. but i still cant help but feel some of them arent as fun as say banjo kazooie or DK 64 was, maybe its nostalgia talking here, but its kinda lame.