The Game Awards 2017

[Indigenously Abled]

Came for autistic game vs game salt. Wasn't disappointed.

Stay fabulous, MMO-C. Your cringe porn is worth every click.

[hellhamster]

I don't understand why people are frothing at the mouth that Zelda won. It's a monumental game that took an open world concept and established a supremely beautiful Hyrule, carried by incredible physics and Link being able to interact completely with that world. No other open world game has ever done this at this level.

I also don't understand people who say it's boring or that there's nothing to do. Is it boring to wander the equivalent of the Himalayas and discover a well hidden cave with a huge dragon skeleton inside? Is it boring to go to the edge of the world and see a huge labyrinth structure, waiting for discovery?

I'm willing to bet those who think that are the same people who, when faced with something naturally beautiful like the Grand Canyon, all they will think of will be "meh, boring".

[Zephyr Storm]

My point is not a matter of opinion, so disagree as much as you like. Plenty of old franchises have been able to innovate on their formulas.

Not saying that older franchises can't innovate as time goes on. But saying that BotW innovated enough to the point to earn GOTY? That's laughable. It copied almost everything from open world games that came before it and slapped a coat of Zelda paint on it. The fact that it also had a lackluster story makes it even worse.

I'm not saying BotW was a terrible game. But it definitely wasn't GOTY material.

- - - Updated - - -

Oh what complete horseshit.

Especially Ocarina of Time setting 3D dungeon puzzle adventures. A game without a jump button leading 3D Dungeon Puzzle adventures? Seriously? Fuking Tomb Raider set that 10x more than anything Ocarina has ever done.

While Link to the Past sits at a great place in my heart, I still can't agree that THAT game set the tone for "Dungeon puzzle adventure" games as, well, there really weren't any post Link to the Past. By then, Final Fantasy VI and VII had established the RPG market. And then, as aforementioned prior, games like Tomb Raider and other games paved the way, which not only came out before Zelda: OoT, but also the same year as Mario 64 - so you can't say that Mario influenced its development as well either.

I for one feel like Zelda never set the tone for anything. It just took tropes and ideas from other games and either improved upon them (sometimes made them worse) and/or put a unique spin on them. Anytime I hear someone lavishing praise on a Zelda game, you can bet nine times out of ten, they are a Nintendo/Zelda fanboy.

I'm not saying Zelda games are bad. They are generally fun to play. But rarely are they deserving of something like GOTY.

[Tech614]

No other open world game has ever done this at this level.

Yea, GTAV which literally has no reused building models anywhere in the game can't hold a candle to the copy pasted world of BoTW

Don't make me laugh so hard this early in the morning bro.

If we're arguing who builds the best open worlds, Rockstar wins that free.

[Faldric]

I also don't understand people who say it's boring or that there's nothing to do. Is it boring to wander the equivalent of the Himalayas and discover a well hidden cave with a huge dragon skeleton inside? Is it boring to go to the edge of the world and see a huge labyrinth structure, waiting for discovery?

I'm willing to bet those who think that are the same people who, when faced with something naturally beautiful like the Grand Canyon, all they will think of will be "meh, boring".

Do I play games just to look at the scenery? Might as well google "Grand Canyon" and have images with higher texture and better draw distance. What good is all that space if everything you find in it is Korok seeds?

[Deleted]

Yea, GTAV which literally has no reused building models anywhere in the game

i didn't play gta5 but i seriously doubt that part here. why? cause models are big, textures are big (as in, disk space, but also development time to an extent) so everyone reuses assets in their games, it's been true for basically every game out there. and i'm not saying that it's a bad thing, just not reusing stuff in your game is not feasible.

at best they've done what CDPR did in the witcher 3 - reused parts of the models, mixing and matching them so that you feel like the buildings are unique (but they're not)

if you have a free hour of time on your hands, here a designer from CDPR explains what they did at GDC (game developers convention), i bet its similar with gta5:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vEfH9SJ9mY

(the part about building models / textures starts at about 24minute mark but i recommend watching the whole thing :P)

[Zephyr Storm]

Do I play games just to look at the scenery? Might as well google "Grand Canyon" and have images with higher texture and better draw distance. What good is all that space if everything you find in it is Korok seeds?

This is a big problem that most people seem to gloss over with BotW because "Zelda".

It's a huge fucking world that looks fairly bland (thanks to being on an underpowered console like the Switch).....I mean seriously, I cringed at how empty and ugly most of the open world looked with the shitty ass graphics. It is also packed full of repetitive and asinine things to do to create an illusion of something to do. It's taking the wrong page from the Ubisoft book of "How to (not) make open world games."

But here we are with people that are crazy enough to claim "It's so innovative and unique! It's never been done before! Best open world game ever!" I hope that fanboyism/nostalgia doesn't hit them so hard that it knocks them out in the process. Actually, I take that back.....it would be be better to let it knock them out.

On a side note: I wonder how long it took Nintendo to clean all the spooge off of the GOTY award for Zelda?

[Tech614]

i didn't play gta5 but i seriously doubt that part here.

You can doubt it all you want but it's true.

You did nothing to prove it wrong. Play the game. No building is the same. Every store, every skyskraper, every fucking trailer is literally unique.

It's even laughable you're comparing it to Witcher 3. GTAV was made on a $500 mil budget(BEFORE MARKETING). Nothing comes close, not even in the same atmosphere.

[Wondercrab]

Breath of the Wild is a game that has moments of excellence when all of its systems are working in tandem and it is a magical experience. It is also a game that has many confusing and outright bad design choices. Overall it is a very flawed masterpiece.

Then you have Persona 5. A game that has basically no flaws. Characters, story, art style, combat, etc. all top notch.

Which do you think should have won GotY? Because it sure as hell isn't Breath of the Wild. This was bias incarnate. I don't know anyone who's played both Persona 5 and Breath of the Wild that would say that Breath of the Wild is better.

You have to keep in mind that it's a dumb awards show, though. Persona, even with P5 being the most successful entry in the series, is still a relatively niche franchise compared to something like Zelda. They're gonna get more claps from the audience if they give their big award to something that's not only good, but also popular and well-loved. Awards shows are never good places to find fair critique, they're there to put on an entertaining show. The Game Awards especially is still trying to get itself firmly established, so they don't want to rock the boat too much. The most phenomenal game I played this year was Hollow Knight, and all that got was a tiny sniff at one of the indie awards because what's a hollow knight?

Do I play games just to look at the scenery? Might as well google "Grand Canyon" and have images with higher texture and better draw distance. What good is all that space if everything you find in it is Korok seeds?

It's important not to dismiss a game's visuals out of hand just because you don't place much value upon them personally. As someone who values tone and immersion very highly, a game's art style can sometimes make or break the experience for me. BotW's art direction is absolutely fantastic, and it's hard to argue that it's not an amazingly good looking game. For a title based on exploration that's pretty important, and it definitely plays a major part in why someone like me enjoys it so much.

[Frozen Death Knight]

Oh what complete horseshit.

Especially Ocarina of Time setting 3D dungeon puzzle adventures. A game without a jump button leading 3D Dungeon Puzzle adventures? Seriously? Fuking Tomb Raider set that 10x more than anything Ocarina has ever done.

While Link to the Past sits at a great place in my heart, I still can't agree that THAT game set the tone for "Dungeon puzzle adventure" games as, well, there really weren't any post Link to the Past. By then, Final Fantasy VI and VII had established the RPG market. And then, as aforementioned prior, games like Tomb Raider and other games paved the way, which not only came out before Zelda: OoT, but also the same year as Mario 64 - so you can't say that Mario influenced its development as well either.

It is not. It is in fact a widely held view that Ocarina of Time was a revolutionary game at the time of its release. Also, what the heck does not having a jump button have to do with anything? Link has not been able to jump in the vast majority of the games he has been in, yet the series has still had a large impact on gaming. You are just being a contrarian for the sake of it. Also, of course Mario 64 had an influence. Doesn't really change anything of what I said at all.

A Link to the Past is a 1991/1992 release (depending on the region). How in the world are Final Fantasy 6 and 7 at all relevant to the discussion when they got released in 1994 and 1997 respectively? Work on your sentence structuring, because you are making zero sense right now.

[Faldric]

It's important not to dismiss a game's visuals out of hand just because you don't place much value upon them personally. As someone who values tone and immersion very highly, a game's art style can sometimes make or break the experience for me. BotW's art direction is absolutely fantastic, and it's hard to argue that it's not an amazingly good looking game. For a title based on exploration that's pretty important, and it definitely plays a major part in why someone like me enjoys it so much.

I can agree that its impressive what they could achieve with such underpowered hardware (despite FPS problems). I just don't consider it worthwile on its own. For me, A fitting art direction is important to support a good plot. I don't consider graphics that important, I am currently replaying my PS2 game collection and some of those games really didn't age well graphically. I was just trying to make a point that climbing a mountain like the himalaja is not really good game design if all I have to do for it is walking straight for 30 minutes and my reward is a Korok Seed. The game is a nice sandbox to play around a few hours. But calling it GOTY for its "innovative" game design is a long shot.

Awards shows are never good places to find fair critique, they're there to put on an entertaining show. The Game Awards especially is still trying to get itself firmly established, so they don't want to rock the boat too much. The most phenomenal game I played this year was Hollow Knight, and all that got was a tiny sniff at one of the indie awards because what's a hollow knight?

I can agree on that. I personally have a hard time figuring out how BOTW won this over the other contenders (especially Super Mario Odyssey) but I am not losing sleep over it. For a show that took a dump on the oscars they were awfully quick to became exactly like them.

[Wondercrab]

I can agree on that. I personally have a hard time figuring out how BOTW won this over the other contenders (especially Super Mario Odyssey) but I am not losing sleep over it. For a show that took a dump on the oscars they were awfully quick to became exactly like them.

The best thing about that whole segment was that Geoff Keighley has said in the past that he wants the game awards to be this industry's Oscars. His discomfort while Josef Fares ranted on was so palpable. Those human moments are the really fun parts of the game awards (and the awkward sponsorship segments), not the arbitrary award choices.

[Jester Joe]

Do I play games just to look at the scenery? Might as well google "Grand Canyon" and have images with higher texture and better draw distance. What good is all that space if everything you find in it is Korok seeds?

There's more than just Korok seeds, let's not exaggerate.

The issue wasn't ever that there was nothing to do, its that there was nothing worth doing.
The mazes tucked in the corners of the map were absolutely great.

The other spots having just a giant boss that doesn't really have anything I need? Eh.
The giant flying dragons that seem amazing but end up just leading to a single orb shrine? And NOT some sort of special armor set? Meh.

There's very much things to do, its just the average player didn't care for what was there.