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Did Elden Ring/Botw put Japan back at the top of game design?

Do those games changed how Japanese are viewed?

  • Yes, both of them

    Votes: 48 24.7%
  • Elden Ring did

    Votes: 31 16.0%
  • Zelda Botw did

    Votes: 14 7.2%
  • Changed how Nintendo games are viewed

    Votes: 9 4.6%
  • Changed how from software games are viewed

    Votes: 14 7.2%
  • No, not really

    Votes: 100 51.5%

  • Total voters
    194

rodrigolfp

Haptic Gamepads 4 Life
Yeah, in the middle of combat the very thing I want to do is pause the game and mess with the menus to select another disposable piece of shit. Such enjoyment, much immersion.
Or you do runes combat. Weapons are not the only options and it's one of the things that differentiate BOTW from other games.
 

tommib

Member
Bullshit. I've heard this argument before. FROM was considered crazy by western gaming press when Demons Souls came out. It was 100% Japanese eccentric design.

Japan caught up on western open world tech after the ps3 crippled then briefly for 1 gen. The west makes great games as well but I hate crediting the west for Japan's accomplishments. Its ridiculous. Japanese games are Japanese, and their accomishments are their own.

Zelda was definitely influenced by Ubisoft and Bethesda but thats a small part of the total package. Everyone has been influenced by Nintendo but we don't call western games " Japanese design."
Thanks man. Demon’s Souls was a small success in Japan at the time and totally catered the Japanese King’s Field audience. Word of mouth brought it to the West. From Software Souls games owe basically nothing to the West in terms of game design. The open world design from Elden Ring is a 3D version of the original Zelda/Zelda 2 NES games.
 
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TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Imo japanese games are just better, more fun and better designed than most games that come from the west, specially if we look at AAA games which are still designed like ps3 games but with better graphics. Press X to awesome, walkie-talkie sections and all that shit still plagues western design, and I wont consider it superior to anything until that boring stuff goes away.

And about the games mentioned in the OP, well I don't know if they changed anything but I really hope for them to start a trend of open worlds that feel like a mysterious place to explore, instead of a theme park full of the usual Ubishit to do.
 
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Not really an accomplishment when the bar of Western Game studios is set so incredibly low.

Western Devs are a reflection of the state of our society. All Western games nowadays are developed by diversity hires and all the stories are written by early 20 something blue haired SJW Karens hired straight out of college gender class.
 

Hugare

Member
I initially had the same thoughts on BOTW but after playing it for the second time and also playing a bit of AssCreed and FarceCry, I think the part about it forcing you to find stuff by yourself is the engaging part.

Also, I came to the conclusion that the land with nothing to see (there is but I'll concede it can be barren at times) offers a nice break from the cities/villages. Actually makes me appreciate the cities more.

Lack of real dungeons yeah true, but I was never a dungeon person anyway so I guess it never bothered me.

Breaking weapons hmmm I did a 180 on this. I originally hated it but then I realized it was a great mechanic to force me to try out all sorts of different weapons.
Forcing you to find what? Korok Seeds? Chests with terribe loot inside?

Exploration is not rewarded at all in BotW. So I never understand this point when someone mentions it.

And "breakable weapons forcing you to try all sorts of weapons" would be ok if every weapon played differently. But they dont, mostly.

But good for you for enjoying the game, its just not for me, I guess
 

64bitmodels

Reverse groomer.
When were they not the top?
Ps3/360 era was a spam of derivative western mainly FPS/TPS games.
the entirety of the 2000s western devs were pumping out their A game and making better games than japan did arguably, both in game design and in budget.
Half Life, Team Fortress, Portal, Prince of Persia, Far Cry, Mass Effect, Dead Space, God of War, TES Morrowind and Oblivion, Fable, Halo 1-3, COD WaW and Black Ops, Splinter cell, timesplitters, Minecraft, GTA, Max Payne
i can go on... you have to admit that at least one of these titles massively innovated and changed game design in the gaming space
Japan had some good stuff too ill admit but that time period from 1998-2011 was the peak of western gaming as a whole. i dont think anyone who lived in that time period or played games since then could deny that, most of the hype was surrounding the western developed games

It wasn't until when the CEOs and Shareholders took over in 2012, compounded by gamergate in the later 2 years making them incorporate woke elements, microtransactions, DLC, etc. While putting actual innovation and uniqueness at the backburner. The innovators like Indies don't really have the budget to create games as big as the old AAA titles, so we're sort of stuck between low budget but exciting indies and high budget, greedy rushed out of the door microtransaction fests. Yes Japan is greedy too, but their greed is mostly left to their shitty gacha mobile games which nobody in the west plays anyways (besides weebs) so people who enjoy bigger stuff like Resident Evil and Final Fantasy are good.
 
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Esppiral

Member
Japanese game design is still stuck in the mids 2000, can't believe anyone says they are at the top of game design just because they copied Ubisoft's 15+ years old formula.....
 
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cireza

Banned
Did they do anything new ? They are open-worlds filled with copy/pasted stuff, is this peak game-design ?

I have actually yet to see an open-world game that embraces what a huge open-would should be : mainly empty. And where the challenge and satisfaction would come from managing to navigate this world and find places of interest.

The best Japanese games definitely aren't open-worlds.
 
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supernova8

Banned
Forcing you to find what? Korok Seeds? Chests with terribe loot inside?
Fair comment on the chests with shit loot - totally agree. On the korok seeds, I dunno it gives me a dopamine boost when I spot something that looks weird and manage to follow it through. It's a bunch of mini puzzles and the korok seed is just the (small) carrot to push you to actually do the puzzles. Same with the shrines. A lot of the time I remember the process/puzzle I had to solve to find the shrine more than the shrine itself. I suppose it's down to preference whether that's good or bad.
Exploration is not rewarded at all in BotW. So I never understand this point when someone mentions it.
I suppose refer to the point above.
And "breakable weapons forcing you to try all sorts of weapons" would be ok if every weapon played differently. But they dont, mostly.
Generally the swords are all the same, spears are all the same etc. However, I got to find out about being able to use the flamesword to keep me warm in the winter zone and the icesword to keep me cool in the volcano word in the first place because I was on the hunt for more weapons. I don't think I'd ever find that stuff if I just found one powerful sword and stuck with it until the end.
But good for you for enjoying the game, its just not for me, I guess
Yeah for sure. Like I said, I hated it at first so I guess there is a tiny chance it might "click" with you. Same thing happened for me with Witcher 3 once I got the hang of the combat and made my peace with the dumbass movement animations.
 
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I wouldn't say Elden Ring did on it's own but From Software have been putting out top tier games for years now with Souls, Sekiro, and Bloodborne.

BOTW whether you like it or not set a new standard for games. In my mind there is pre BOTW and post BOTW games. BOTW ruined so many games for me. I'm not saying it's perfect but it's damn close.
 

TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Did they do anything new ? They are open-worlds filled with copy/pasted stuff, is this peak game-design ?
For me the cool thing in both BOTW and Elden Ring is goimg back to the Morrowind-esque kind of open world design: exploration, having to find and discover stuff on your own, and almost no map markers.

It's nothing genius since it was already invented 20 years ago, but at least it was bold on their part to do so. I find those open worlds much more cool to explore than the likes of The Witcher 3 or any Ubi game, since those are filled with map markers that tell you where all the cool stuff is, which imo takes away a lot of the fun.

In fact, I replayed Skyrim not long ago, but modded so the compass wouldn't show undiscovered locations. It was a much more fun experience, even considering the world isn't designed for it.
 

NeoIkaruGAF

Gold Member
Absolutely not.
Zelda was an outlier that‘s been as hated as it’s been loved for the last 5 years.
Elden Ring would never achieve the same success if it didn’t come off a 13-year streak of Souls games that warmed people up to the formula. You can bet there’s an alternate universe where there was no Souls before ER, where everything negative you read about the game has been stressed in just every review, the game is sitting in the low 80s, and people proposing it for GOTY are being laughed into the ground.

Even in our universe you can easily see that games like God of War and its ilk are still the hottest shit in this medium, and will be for a long time still.
 

TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Even in our universe you can easily see that games like God of War and its ilk are still the hottest shit in this medium, and will be for a long time still.
They may be the most popular, but imo that doesn't mean they are the best by any means.
 

K2D

Banned
This thread looks to be as polarized the best of them. BotW and Elden Ring are great. FROMsoft had already done it with Soulsborne, and BotW borrows a lot from other games. All of this is true.
 

cortadew

Member
the entirety of the 2000s western devs were pumping out their A game and making better games than japan did arguably, both in game design and in budget.
Half Life, Team Fortress, Portal, Prince of Persia, Far Cry, Mass Effect, Dead Space, God of War, TES Morrowind and Oblivion, Fable, Halo 1-3, COD WaW and Black Ops, Splinter cell, timesplitters, Minecraft, GTA, Max Payne
i can go on... you have to admit that at least one of these titles massively innovated and changed game design in the gaming space
Japan had some good stuff too ill admit but that time period from 1998-2011 was the peak of western gaming as a whole. i dont think anyone who lived in that time period or played games since then could deny that, most of the hype was surrounding the western developed games

It wasn't until when the CEOs and Shareholders took over in 2012, compounded by gamergate in the later 2 years making them incorporate woke elements, microtransactions, DLC, etc. While putting actual innovation and uniqueness at the backburner. The innovators like Indies don't really have the budget to create games as big as the old AAA titles, so we're sort of stuck between low budget but exciting indies and high budget, greedy rushed out of the door microtransaction fests. Yes Japan is greedy too, but their greed is mostly left to their shitty gacha mobile games which nobody in the west plays anyways (besides weebs) so people who enjoy bigger stuff like Resident Evil and Final Fantasy are good.
And Resident Evil 4 is still more revolutionary than all of thise games
 

Amiga

Member
Mass Effect trilogy. RDR. Assasins Creed 2. Bioshock. Skyrim. Fallout 3 + NV. Portal 2.

I dunno man.

other than Portal 2 non of those are achievements in game design. the PS3/360 era achievement was the improvement in narrative and scale. combat was the worst part of Bethesda games.
"Souls" was born in that era and it came from Japan. Nintendo was still around and had the consistent quality.
 

Madflavor

Member
Not across all video games no, but I would argue when it comes to AAA Games specifically, Japan are far more diverse than the west.

bx7lgrfc2j401.jpg


I love Sony games btw, but I'm not gonna act like the vast majority of western AAA games don't all look the same. They're either your annual FPS, or a 3rd Person cinematic open world game. I would say as far as being given a cinematic story driven experience, western game devs are better in that department. Japan's arsenal of games are far more diverse in what they have to offer, and focus mainly on fun. In the past decade when it comes to replaying games I've already completed, I find myself revisiting Japanese games a lot more than Western. I love Horizon Zero Dawn, but I have no desire to ever replay it. Same goes for GoW 2018, or Uncharted 4. All great games, but I experienced the story and now I'm good. But games like RE2 Remake, Nioh 2, any From Software game, DmC5, Zelda, I can see myself continue to revising those games for a long time.
 
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cortadew

Member
They never left the spot IMO.
Western devs have become better at graphics, production values and arguably story. But I've always enjoyed the actual gameplay and game design of Japanese games more.
This is what I've always said.
 

GymWolf

Member
Nah, people love to say that to look more elitist.

If the combat and puzzles in botw are the pinnacle of gameplay we are fucking screwed.

Elden ring is a much better game than botw, they don't deserve to be listed together.
 
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A matter of tastes, I don't understand what many see in most popular western games, to me Japanese games play and feel way better, they're even more artistically sensible, which to me western games need that urgently
Yeah all those half naked, oversized breasts and oversexualized underage looking girls. Female-Men with furry shit to top it all off.

Sorry was a huge Anime and JRPG Fan in my youth but nowadays this shit is so fucking tedious. Growing up, having a wife and kids ruined all that for me.

Also never been an huge fan of Mecha stuff.

And this obsession about all sort of crystals is also very boring.

Okay enough rambling. They still do offer good stuff now and then. But some of these aforementioned things can ruin a good anime/game for me immediatly.

In that sense Easter Media never grew out of their disturbingly weird fantasies.

Despite all that One Piece is still the fucking best thing i've ever read.
 
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GymWolf

Member
The pinnacle of combat is Sekiro and Devil May Cry 5
And i can go behind that, i love sekiro and always said that it is fromsoft game with the best combat system by far, and even if i don't play pure action games anymore i can see the quality of dmc5 combat or bayo combat.


On the other hand, ranged combat\shooters are better made by the western developers so it is a tie, unless we only consider melee combat as combat.
 
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tommib

Member
And i can go behind that, i love sekiro and even if i don't playe pure action games anymore i can see the quality of dmc5 combat.

On the other hand, ranged combat\shooters are better made by the western developers so it is a tie, unless we only consider melee combat as combat.
Vanquish says hello.
 

GymWolf

Member
Vanquish says hello.
One short game with a a couple of nice mechanics? Not nearly enough, and you know that.

Returnal alone obliterate any japanese shooter from the past 10 years or more, and we are talking one game against sea of excellent western shooters.

Even binary domain that i liked well enough wasn't really that great except for the nice robot real time destruction.
 
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Tg89

Member
I have actually yet to see an open-world game that embraces what a huge open-would should be : mainly empty. And where the challenge and satisfaction would come from managing to navigate this world and find places of interest.

That's literally what BOTW did though, and Elden Ring followed. They're the antithesis of the streamlined, terrible Ubisoft open world design that's somehow caught on in the past decade+.


Zelda was an outlier that‘s been as hated as it’s been loved for the last 5 years.
Elden Ring would never achieve the same success if it didn’t come off a 13-year streak of Souls games that warmed people up to the formula. You can bet there’s an alternate universe where there was no Souls before ER, where everything negative you read about the game has been stressed in just every review, the game is sitting in the low 80s, and people proposing it for GOTY are being laughed into the ground.

Even in our universe you can easily see that games like God of War and its ilk are still the hottest shit in this medium, and will be for a long time still.

Lol the fucking hyperbole. "As hated as it's been loved". Fuck outta here, like it or not - the game was UNIVERSALLY praised both critically and by the public. There's a small vocal minority of dorks that pop up in online threads crying about their weapons breaking and how they didn't get the hype.

And similarly the Elden Ring praise exceeded GoW and will continue to do so. GoW is definitely on the better end of the "Trying to be Hollywood, overdesigned and focus tested to oblivion" spectrum, but it's still on that spectrum.
 

BennyBlanco

aka IMurRIVAL69
other than Portal 2 non of those are achievements in game design. the PS3/360 era achievement was the improvement in narrative and scale. combat was the worst part of Bethesda games.
"Souls" was born in that era and it came from Japan. Nintendo was still around and had the consistent quality.

I disagree. Now it is all played out and tired game design, but at the time it was fresh.
 

Hugare

Member
Not across all video games no, but I would argue when it comes to AAA Games specifically, Japan are far more diverse than the west.

bx7lgrfc2j401.jpg


I love Sony games btw, but I'm not gonna act like the vast majority of western AAA games don't all look the same. They're either your annual FPS, or a 3rd Person cinematic open world game. I would say as far as being given a cinematic story driven experience, western game devs are better in that department. Japan's arsenal of games are far more diverse in what they have to offer, and focus mainly on fun. In the past decade when it comes to replaying games I've already completed, I find myself revisiting Japanese games a lot more than Western. I love Horizon Zero Dawn, but I have no desire to ever replay it. Same goes for GoW 2018, or Uncharted 4. All great games, but I experienced the story and now I'm good. But games like RE2 Remake, Nioh 2, any From Software game, DmC5, Zelda, I can see myself continue to revising those games for a long time.

Calling it "Playstation template" for them being third person and having trees while praising the variety in japanese games is just disingenuous

With the exception of Nintendo games, they all have the same anime looking designs with girls fighting in dresses or skirts . And they are either character action games, JRPGs or visual novels.
 

64bitmodels

Reverse groomer.
Returnal alone obliterate any japanese shooter from the past 10 years or more, and we are talking one game against sea of excellent western shooters.
yeah returnal totally obliterates all those japanese shooters made in the past 10 years.... all 5 of them
OFC returnals gonna look good when you pair it up against a country that has a genuine aversion to FPS games. Now.... let's see you do the same for platformers.
 

Amiga

Member
I disagree. Now it is all played out and tired game design, but at the time it was fresh.
Maybe on consoles. The precursors to those games like System Shock and Deus Ex came years before on PC. Mass Effect was a downgrade in game design from Baldur's Gate. So they wasn't something new in the PS360 era.
 

Madflavor

Member
Calling it "Playstation template" for them being third person and having trees while praising the variety in japanese games is just disingenuous

With the exception of Nintendo games, they all have the same anime looking designs with girls fighting in dresses or skirts . And they are either character action games, JRPGs or visual novels.

Just Nintendo games? You know that I and pretty much everyone else on NeoGaf can list you a metric shit ton of examples that don't fit your description. Games that range from all measures of studios and genres out of Japan. You're punching way above your weight if you honestly believe what you just said.
 
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