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The quote "A delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad." isn' t exactly true anymore.

01011001

Banned
a rushed game doesn't only refer to bugs and glitches, a rushed game can also be badly designed.
Cyberpunk 2077 happens to be all in one, a buggy shittily put together mess, but also a terribly designed videogame in general due to extremely shallow RPG mechanics and a dead city with awful AI and enemy behaviour design.

a game that is rushed and therefore badly designed can RARELY be patched to be actually good. it's hard to overthrow the existing gamedesign and completely revamp a game to be good. some games can do it, see No Man's Sky, by basically making a completely new game out of it. but many can't.
 

VAVA Mk2

Member
This quote from the legendary Shigeru Miyamoto is often a go back to quote for why games need to be release in their best state and to justify delays. I do think that a game should be released in its best state but in the year 2021 this quote isn't as relevant as it once was considering the on going creation of video games in today. Examples of games that isn't "forever bad"...

ESO
Fortnite
No Mans Sky
Fallout 76
Rainbow 6 siege
The division

and many more.
I Dont Think So No Way GIF by The Steve Wilkos Show
 

JLB

Banned
You are quite right OP. The phrase made a hell more of sense when no updates were possible, or even when digital distribution was not that spread.
Still, a bad release can be a disaster, if not, see what happened to CDPR and CP2077.
 

01011001

Banned
Miyamoto's also the dude who released Super Mario World, a famously rushed launch title that was worse than its last-gen predecessor and put Nintendo behind Sega for the first time ever.

We all like to pretend that game was good for some reason, but it's really not.

See also Super Mario Bros 2J/Lost Levels.

what did you smoke? how did Super Mario World, which is an excellent game, "put Nintendo behind Sega for the first time ever"?
the SNES released almost 2 years AFTER the MegaDrive and STILL sold more units than it.

and the only Sonic game that sold more on the MegaDrive than SMW sold on the SNES was Sonic 1... every other game in the series didn't even sell half the copies of SMW

Sega was defeated even tho they had a head start
 
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SF Kosmo

Al Jazeera Special Reporter
what did you smoke? how did Super Mario World, which is an excellent game, "put Nintendo behind Sega for the first time ever"?
the SNES released 2 years AFTER the MegaDrive and STILL sold more units than it.

Sega was defeated even tho they had a head start
I meant in the mascot game, Sonic was way bigger than Mario in the 16-bit days.

But what you're saying is pretty misleading, Sega stayed in the lead in Western territories for the Genesis' entire life. It was only after they pulled the plug on Genesis that SNES pulled ahead.

SMW is not an excellent game, it's the worst 2D Mario game, not counting the handhelds. Sloppy, unrefined level design, no innovation, inconsistent art design. Bangin' soundtrack, but that's about it.
 

WitchHunter

Banned
This quote from the legendary Shigeru Miyamoto is often a go back to quote for why games need to be release in their best state and to justify delays. I do think that a game should be released in its best state but in the year 2021 this quote isn't as relevant as it once was considering the on going creation of video games in today. Examples of games that isn't "forever bad"...

ESO
Fortnite
No Mans Sky
Fallout 76
Rainbow 6 siege
The division

and many more.
A game's state is considered when you are playing it. You don't know and DON'T CARE how Schrödinger's cat looks like before and after.

Release the game when it is ready to be consumed.

End of story.
 

6502

Member
SMW is not an excellent game, it's the worst 2D Mario game, not counting the handhelds. Sloppy, unrefined level design, no innovation, inconsistent art design. Bangin' soundtrack, but that's about it.
Incorrect. Honestly had to quick check post history to see if you are some type of lunitic. Have to assume this is an honest opinion.

What is so bad about it specifically that is not bad about smb2, lost levels or any of the tiring "new" series?

Graphics aside, it is almost perfect imo
 
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01011001

Banned
I meant in the mascot game, Sonic was way bigger than Mario in the 16-bit days.

But what you're saying is pretty misleading, Sega stayed in the lead in Western territories for the Genesis' entire life. It was only after they pulled the plug on Genesis that SNES pulled ahead.

SMW is not an excellent game, it's the worst 2D Mario game, not counting the handhelds. Sloppy, unrefined level design, no innovation, inconsistent art design. Bangin' soundtrack, but that's about it.

just to name a few 2D mario games that are worse than SMW,
SMB1
SMB2
NSMB
NSMB2
NSMB Wii

the only 2D mario games that are better than SMW are SMB3 and NSMB U

I am not counting SMB USA because it's such a different game, and only the GBA remake is actually good imo.

also, no, the SNES sold better even during the lifetime of the MegaDrive. the SNES sold about 12 to 15 million more systems than the MegaDrive, there is no way that was from 1995 to 1999
and again, the MegaDrive had a 2 year head start.
 
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SF Kosmo

Al Jazeera Special Reporter
Incorrect. Honestly had to quick check post history to see if you are some type of lunitic. Have to assume this is an honest opinion.

What is so bad about it specifically that is not bad about smb2, lost levels or any of the tiring "new" series?

Graphics aside, it is almost perfect imo
It adds little to nothing over SMB3, despite appearing on vastly superior hardware, not to mention being way shorter, having less/worse power ups and generally sloppy level design, and as a cherry on top they added the boo houses, which are like black holes for fun.

Super Mario World should have been the biggest and best Mario ever, something for a new gen of hardware, and instead they went with something safe, easy, very similar to what they did before, and worse in every way, and that's obviously because they needed something they could make quickly.

It's obviously still a perfectly playable game that a lot of people like, but my main point is that the game was clearly rushed to meet the deadline. Had they had more time they would have done something more polished but also more ambitious.
 
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Imagine if breath of the wild on switch was a broken mess, they could fix the game via updates, true. But also the switch would've been a mess. Look at cyberpunk and assassin's Creed unity, the games will have bad reputation forever. If horizon zero dawn was a broken mess the franchise would be dead. Look at no man sky, yeah it's fixed now with A LOT of hard work, but that's now after years and not every developer has the determination to do that. Even today that quote is relevant.

Yup. I'm sure Halo Infinite will be an oft sighted result of one that benefitted immensely from the extra time in the cooker. Not that we'll ever know for sure but even among the beta iterations, there have been nice performance improvements. I shudder to think the state that it was actually in, worst case scenario, back when the first gameplay was shown.

A lot of people have the feeling that the single player will still be coming in real hot (not really a wild guess, give the delay of co-op) BUT if it nails the landing, or comes close to it, the decision will look like a genius move that possibly saved a franchise. I don't think Chief could have endured another failure at this point.
 
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Yes and no. The digital landscape of games has completely changed now and almost every single game gets regular updates after launch. We have seen games come out from the brink of death thanks to numerous patches that fixed major issues. However, a bad first impression can still really hurt a game to the point where it can't recover, at least not fully. For example, the last time I played Cyberpunk it was relatively stable but the burn I got at launch was just too bad I have completely lost interest in the game.
 

6502

Member
It adds little to nothing over SMB3, despite appearing on vastly superior hardware, not to mention being way shorter, having less/worse power ups and generally sloppy level design, and as a cherry on top they added the boo houses, which are like black holes for fun.

Super Mario World should have been the biggest and best Mario ever, something for a new gen of hardware, and instead they went with something safe, easy, very similar to what they did before, and worse in every way, and that's obviously because they needed something they could make quickly.

It's obviously still a perfectly playable game that a lot of people like, but my main point is that the game was clearly rushed to meet the deadline. Had they had more time they would have done something more polished but also more ambitious.
Disagree about the level design (boo mansion aside), but yes it did lack ambition considering the shiny new hardware. Playing it safe was not such an issue for the launch as the other titles had the wow factor.

I do agree smb3 was the more impressive game in it's time.

Yoshi island was the true masterpiece.

Thanks for the comprehensive answer :)
 

SF Kosmo

Al Jazeera Special Reporter
Disagree about the level design (boo mansion aside), but yes it did lack ambition considering the shiny new hardware. Playing it safe was not such an issue for the launch as the other titles had the wow factor.

I do agree smb3 was the more impressive game in it's time.
That's another thing though, in the US at least SMB3 was only released about a year before SMW. So these weren't very distant from each other at all, which didn't flatter SMW.

I read that Miyamoto himself was not totally satisfied with the level design, but I can't remember where the interview was.

Yoshi island was the true masterpiece.
No argument there. They took their time with that one though.
 

Mister Wolf

Member
Its going to be true for Halo this year and Elden Ring next year. Dying Light as well. All three well get rave reviews and sell millions of units fast.
 

Ikutachi

Member
When the patches can no longer be installed in the future, the people are left with the rushed state of the games.
 
This quote from the legendary Shigeru Miyamoto is often a go back to quote for why games need to be release in their best state and to justify delays. I do think that a game should be released in its best state but in the year 2021 this quote isn't as relevant as it once was considering the on going creation of video games in today. Examples of games that isn't "forever bad"...

ESO
Fortnite

No Mans Sky
Fallout 76
Rainbow 6 siege
The division


and many more.

How were any of the games highlighted above, "rushed"?

If you're trying to make a coherent point, then at least try to pick examples that actually agree with your point.

That said, the moment devs were able to deliver post-launch updates to games, the popular saying became out of date.

That said, there's still something to be said about the game's perpetual commercial performance based on the initial launch. No matter how good games like NMS is now, it's impossible to ignore the fact that the launch forever tarnished the game in the minds of many gamers who will never go back to give it a second look.

The age-old adage, "You only get one chance to make a first impression", seems relevant here.
 
This isn't even always true in Nintendo's case. I mean, look at Majora's Mask. The game was developed and released in less than two years, and a lot of content was cut and assets (as well as the entire friggin' engine) from OOT were reused because of this. And it's still one of the best Zelda games ever made.
 
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Well, back then there were no such things as updates and patches, so basic whatever you got with a game was all you got. Modern games generally have opportunities to improve certain things with patches and consistent updates now, but I do feel that developers definitely take advantage of this. Rush it out!!! We’ll fix it later seems to be as common and unfortunate trend now.
 
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M1chl

Currently Gif and Meme Champion
It's a stupid quote, because rushed game could ve delayed many times and still be rushed.
 

EDMIX

Member
That original experience, without all the patches and DLC, will forever be bad.

Your examples are interesting, because they are all multiplayer/GaaS type games. Those games should clearly label themselves "work in progress" in order to be judged differently then your typical single player game. The term "Beta" can be used, but then the challenge for publishers would be how to sell full priced betas to consumers... I liked how Subnautica approached the issue by selling the "early unfinished release" at lower MSRP than the finished 1.00 game release.

Games are an interesting medium for having the ability to change incrementally over a long period of time. Most products that we consume don't evolve as much.


Take, for example, movies. Sure you have occasional directors cuts and extended cuts, but most movies don't evolve. A bad movie will stay bad, a good movie will stay good.

I think the advent of "patches" was simultaneously an advantage and disadvantage for gamers : patching can dramatically increase the value of a product during its life span, but can make publishers greedy and basically release unfinished/buggy products to be fixed at a later date.

Maybe, maybe not. I don't think MP titles should need to lable themselves differently, at like "work in progress" as to many gamers, its moot. Its already known that over time new features will come, patches, updates, server fixes etc. I don't buy anyone is confused by that. I do agree with most of your post though.

I don't think they should use Beta either as MP titles are always ever changing dynamic things, beta should be used when indeed the products core design is not done yet, not simply just cause all the maps or weapons are not in the game day 1, would be like saying Smash Bros on Switch should be called beta cause they just got Sora or something.

As for the bolded, I agree completely and I feel the gaming community simply doesn't seem to appreciate this as much and spend so much time bashing developers, they don't realize those fixes wouldn't happen in MOST industries.

In terms of patches, releasing a working playable product is the aim of the majority of publishers. The product working will only increase sales and I don't buy that most are really out here putting out unplayable games just because or something. I think for the most part, out side of shit like CP2077, we haven't come across that to a massive degree.
 

Knightime_X

Member
Bad 1st impressions are just as damaging as a rushed game if not more so.
So in a sense, what Shigeru Miyamoto said still stands.

btw is Cyberpunk still a mess?
I lost all interest playing it.
 
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SomeGit

Member
what did you smoke? how did Super Mario World, which is an excellent game, "put Nintendo behind Sega for the first time ever"?
the SNES released almost 2 years AFTER the MegaDrive and STILL sold more units than it.

and the only Sonic game that sold more on the MegaDrive than SMW sold on the SNES was Sonic 1... every other game in the series didn't even sell half the copies of SMW

Sega was defeated even tho they had a head start
Mega Drive lead the yearly sales, not cumulative sales, everywhere outside of Japan until 1994 then the SNES got a second wind that the Mega Drive didn't. Though one could argue that Japan was THE market in the 90s, so US and Europe probably didn't matter as much.

Both SMW and Sonic 1 sales stats are inflated by being the longest titles to be bundled in with the system. There were also other bundled games, but they were only done so briefly. We don't know how they would have done individually, but the sentiment at the time was that SMW was same old same old while Sonic was "the new shit". With hindsight we know that SMW was a quality title, but that's a more modern perspective.
 
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Men_in_Boxes

Snake Oil Salesman
I don't mind waiting 12 months for patches provided developers don't mind waiting 12 months to get my money.

Underrated comment.

No one's forcing us to buy games on release.

It always confuses me when people do the faux outrage thing at a messy launch. Not playing a game because it's bad at launch feels identical to not playing a game due to a delay.
 

Ballthyrm

Member
Just don't play multiplayer games in general.
That way, you can play games 2 years after they have been released and judge them on their true state.

It's not like I haven't already got a huge backlog or anything.
Sometimes, you even get to play the remaster or the director's cut before getting down to playing it.
 

Soodanim

Gold Member
This isn't even always true in Nintendo's case. I mean, look at Majora's Mask. The game was developed and released in less than two years, and a lot of content was cut and assets (as well as the entire friggin' engine) from OOT were reused because of this. And it's still one of the best Zelda games ever made.
I get your point, I don't think that counts because the same characters reappearing serves to add to the strange alternate world atmosphere the game has. Seeing two late-game boss witches running an early game potion shop and selling boat rides is surreal if you came from OOT. From a development standpoint that made their lives easier and dev time shorter which probably helped a fair bit, but I don't think it was out of rushed desperation but as a deliberate design choice. Both in terms of story, NPCs, and gameplay, it's like one big expanded remix of OOT and I think that's part of its appeal.
 

Shut0wen

Member
This quote from the legendary Shigeru Miyamoto is often a go back to quote for why games need to be release in their best state and to justify delays. I do think that a game should be released in its best state but in the year 2021 this quote isn't as relevant as it once was considering the on going creation of video games in today. Examples of games that isn't "forever bad"...

ESO
Fortnite
No Mans Sky
Fallout 76
Rainbow 6 siege
The division

and many more.
What a shit list for examples, rainbow six, fortnite eso and the division were in development for way over 3 years, all solid releases, fallout 76 even after the patches is a terrible game regardless, no man sky isnt a good example either, it was never rushed and when it first released it was in a good state they just added content along the way mainly because theyre an indie developer... a good example would of been dark souls, a game where from software had no idea what they were doing until near completion and halo 2 a game that was developed in 7 months
 

Shut0wen

Member
Plus this quote still stands, there are way more bad rushed games then good ones, its a fact even ubi who rushed ac series once a year while seeing a decline in every game since after black flag rushed to fuck had to stop and go back to the drawing board and ended up giving the series a 3 year cycle which produced a better quality game and a huge increase in sales
 

mortal

Gold Member
That philosophy was during a different time. A lot has changed about the industry since then, with respect to how players have access to games.
The spirit of it mostly still applies, although it's no longer as definitive imo.
 

Narasumas

Member
I still love that a lot of Nintendo’s releases are still V 1.0.0 releases today. A few have been patched here or there, but they still lead the charge on releasing “complete” games more or less.
 

Alebrije

Member
When Miyamoyo said it there were not online networks that let developers patch a game...basically if you made a mistake on game there was not chance to fix it. So better delay a game and be sure it runs fine than release it.
 
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I get your point, I don't think that counts because the same characters reappearing serves to add to the strange alternate world atmosphere the game has. Seeing two late-game boss witches running an early game potion shop and selling boat rides is surreal if you came from OOT. From a development standpoint that made their lives easier and dev time shorter which probably helped a fair bit, but I don't think it was out of rushed desperation but as a deliberate design choice. Both in terms of story, NPCs, and gameplay, it's like one big expanded remix of OOT and I think that's part of its appeal.
Oh, no doubt. MM was like a bizarro psychedelic OOT, and that's part of why I love it so much. I'm definitely one of those people who prefers MM over OOT, and the parallel world was a big part of that. But I do feel like the whole parallel world thing was a way for the devs to justify the reused assets and not the other way around. And huge credit to them, it was a very creative way to explain this so it didn't feel recycled, and they nailed it for sure. But I wonder if they had more time to develop the game if they would have went that route at all, or if it would have been built from the ground up, so to speak. I could be wrong, so please correct me if I am.

I do know for sure that content was cut due to the time constraints. For example, it was originally supposed to have a 7 day cycle instead of the 3 days we got, and there were gonna be more dungeons and all that. I'd love to see a director's cut with all the stuff they originally intended someday.

Either way, I freaking love Majora's Mask! That and A Link To The Past are my favorite Zelda games, with OOT rounding out my top 3.
 

deathsaber

Member
You are absolutely correct with the statement. That said, those devs that lean too hard into that statement will face consequences. See CDPR- after Witcher 3, countless people automatically preordered Cyberpunk, despite it being something "all new" from them.

After Cyberpunk (even if they do fix a lot of it in coming months/years), I think a whole lot less people are going to preorder or "automatic day one" whatever CDPR's next big release will be, even if they can fix it post launch.
 
I don't completely disagree with the OP's sentiment, but the adage "you never get a second chance to make a first impression" is as true as ever.
 

Cyborg

Member
First impressions are important. Taking a year or even longer to make the game as it is supposed to be is lame.
Personally I have zero interest in No mans Sky, Cyberpunk or Fallout 76.

Its always better to deliver quality
 

Bragr

Banned
I can't believe how some of you seem to take this quote as some weird thing that should be true in all circumstances, and that it's wrong if not.

The idea is that if you rush it, it will be forever bad. It doesn't mean that all games should be delayed. It also doesn't mean that all delayed games are good.
 

BlackTron

Member
Miyamoto said this back when games shipped the way they shipped on the cart or CD and that was it. The game is done and no changes can be made.

While it's true that first impressions and shipping a decent game are still important, it's no longer true that a bad game must remain always bad. The inverse is also true, they can mess up a good thing with their meddling...look at poor Overwatch.
 
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