Brink vs Black Ops: inside another community

(xTriXxy) #1

During my little web search i found interesting reactions on Brink.

We can put players into three categories. First category, players they know about SD and Bethesda, second group, players who dont know developer and publisher, but they heard about Brink, and third group, players they dont care, they will decide after game release.

First and second category in general, for some of the players “Brink a much cooler action game than Black Ops” , but they are dividing this games to two categories. For Call of duty players is Brink “simulator” , and COD games are 'action games", But they agree Brink has a better story and more advanced customization.

Another common reactions are, players sees quite a difference between both games, but they think Black ops would give them more playtime. since “Brink is a co-op game and the story ends at some point”
Some of them think SMART isn’t really that great. For them SMART is hit a key system, and it does the free running portion for you.

Next few reactions are almost same. they know Brink is a science fiction FPS heavily based on story and customization. For this group, Brink is a semi-cartoony look to characters and environments, and does not have the typical multiplayer aspect to other FPS games. They know when you play against other players in Brink, you are actually playing a piece of the campaign with the AI enemies replaced with real people. They comparing SMART with Mirror’s Edge…

In compare with Black-Ops, in most common reactions,for them is another modern Call of Duty that is very much the same as previous COD, just with a different developer with new ideas. They like to unlock new weapons,they like emblem editor that will replace the player bars and uploading videos of games they played.

Third group of players have almost same reactions on Brink. For example “ive never even heard of it” , or " its not really my type of game."

(Zarlor) #2

One of the great things about Brink not being released yet is that they don’t have to compete. Our group has already moved on from BFBC2, to MoH, and most recently to CoD:BO. They are already talking about “what’s next” and many have responded positively about Brink. It kind of surprised me a little because I thought the Sci-Fi element, or the hyper-realism might turn them off without even trying it first. Don’t put too many health buff twinkles, or xp damage pop-ups in the game world or I fear you might start to lose some folks who would otherwise get the game.

(Jess Alon) #3

I’ll stick with BFBC2. Black Ops is terrible. I’m excited about all the buffs and the xp stuff.

(Crytiqal) #4

seriously who cares about xp :confused:

I sure hope it’s not too arcade with xp popup with every hit you make.

(Jess Alon) #5

What is this “arcade” crap people speak of?

(Humate) #6

Are these reactions from cod players who have had direct experience with the game?
Or are they simply offering their opinion based on the vids they have seen?
I’m guessing the latter is more prevalent.

Ive read posts from quite a few ‘cod only’ players who have played brink at expos, that stated that the transition from playing cod to brink was very quick, and that they really enjoyed it.

Does that mean Brink = cod + classed based objectives?
Who knows - we’ll have to see for ourselves :wink:

(Rex) #7

I care about xp!

(Jess Alon) #8

I notice there’s a lot of cranky people on boards that want multiplayer to be all about the glorification of themselves. And stripped down. Just frag fest no xp systems or perks or anything. I think that’s pretty boring. I like all the stuff you can balance out and work on.

(SockDog) #9

It seems boring and pointless because you’re using an FPS to drive your RPG/Pokemon needs. A good FPS should be a framework for two teams to fight it out based on their skills and experience (that is real, human, depth). The fact that so many gamers now take the dressing up rather than the framework as being the meat of the game is just pitifully sad and shows how poor their understanding is.

(Jess Alon) #10

So everyone should just have games where all the characters look exactly the same and there’s no customization at all? Don’t choose a gun class or anything. Let’s do that.

(SockDog) #11

I have no issue with customisation of itself and don’t confuse that with a game offering varying classes and abilities. What annoys me is when people take that as their primary reason for playing a multiplayer first person shooter. When those players and customisations end up bastardising the core gameplay. And why do we need this? Largely because the audience needs some numerical and visual cues to show they are progressing and having fun as they’re incapable of just playing and having a good time.

(Jess Alon) #12

It’s just cool to get a reward for what you put into something for some people. I know that I was excited when I unlocked all the stuff on rainbow six vegas 2. And I get excited every time I unlock a gun on BFBC2

(Cankor) #13

The reward thing was addressed in this video I saw about being addicted to gaming. Apparently game studios have discovered that doling out little rewards (upgrades, new weapons, cough hats) occasionaly tends to keep players playing and even provides something of an addictive feedback loop for some. Maybe why XP save servers were so popular on W:ET, once you got your little reward it made you mad to have to give it back and start over at the end of the campaign.

It’s sad but true (who can argue that a temporary unlock system isn’t better than progressivly more powerful permamnat unlocks)? I guess you can’t fight human nature, so now we get permanant unlocks in brink.

The good news for me is that at least now I have a chance to get some of them I was never able to on ETQW!

Here’s the link to first part:

(SockDog) #14

I’m not saying it’s not exciting, or fun in itself. But surely you should be playing an online multiplayer game to enjoy the multiplayer, not unlock a gun. Shouldn’t the fun be in playing with others rather than earning what is essentially an empty reward? I’ve played online FPS for 10+ years and I’ll say with 100% honesty that I have very fond memories of games I played, not because I got a new gun or earned an achievement. I remember the times when I scraped a win in the last second, or lost in the same way the next day. The cohesive moments when your team just knew what to do and did it well. The laughs you had in and out of the game because you became a part of a community.

I’ll just concede that I know I’m in a minority here. I rant because frankly it saddens me that games are becoming less and less about playing and more about charting a virtual progress. I think this is why I like Super Meat Boy so much. It’s tough, probably tougher than me, but damn it, when I beat a level I beat it and that is enough reward. That seems very rare in games these days.

(SockDog) #15

[quote=Cankor;254136]Here’s the link to first part:

Thanks, I’d forgotten about this Panorama special despite some tweets. Will give it a watch, must email more tweets back to my PC. :slight_smile:

I guess the other, trendy, example of NOT needing rewards is Minecraft. There is a game which relies entirely on your own narrative and imagination to be fun and it is hugely twinned to a RPG style of game.

I guess we just need to accept that when gaming moved into mainstream so did the need to appeal to a larger, less play oriented audience. Frankly I’m thankful this gives indie and PC developers room to shine because that’s where I’ll be putting most of my gaming money.

(hellreturn) #16

All this new games are at some point crap. BC2 and Black Ops have lag issues. No server files makes it hard to host server yourself for your clan. All you can do is rent from GSP.

W:ET is still popular because each clan was able to host there server where ever they liked i.e. PC, GSP and there own dedicated servers. More or less, there where modders, mappers, skinners, etc who provided new things to keep game alive.

BC2 and Black Ops is all about stats. No ingame functionality to administrate your servers and no demo recording tools to deal with cheaters. Day by day, cheat community get’s new features in there cheats and all these new console ported games give less functionality for PC gamers.

We used to run BC2 server for few months and then closed it. EA, gives more concern for stats while lag issues are still there. Even CS series have more server then BC2 and Black Ops server. :slight_smile: MOH is like Ghost Town.

Most of the PC gamers are looking forward for Brink. :slight_smile:

(H0RSE) #17

I notice there’s a lot of cranky people on boards that want multiplayer to be all about the glorification of themselves. And stripped down. Just frag fest no xp systems or perks or anything.

Oh, you mean the competitive crowd…

I have no issue with customisation of itself and don’t confuse that with a game offering varying classes and abilities. What annoys me is when people take that as their primary reason for playing a multiplayer first person shooter.

like all the people who are butt hurt over no female characters?

(BioSnark) #18

Cute :rolleyes: I think he means as the motivation to play.

(Crytiqal) #19

+1 for this comment about XP

I still get frustrated in ETQW when for 20 minutes some douchebag flies off in the anansi shooting base deployables of the enemy from the other side of the map, for 3 maps straight just to get his *****ing XP needs

(Apples) #20

I’m in love with SockDog, is that a pathology?

I’m gonna do my badass ol’fart here but yes, XP is a giant pile of crap which is just there to appeal noobs and kiddo all over because its what the market is now… An FPS’s first goal should be gameplay / netcode / hit reg, even the graphical part I dont really care that much if it breaks my latency.

I think its a generation problem, (dang I’m not even 30 and I start to hate the kiddos, I’m gonna be an old moron o_O), the kidz (most of them) want everything in a snap nowadays, and they are so fat and slow that they need the games to tell them when they did good and when they didnt. Just play for the win ffs. I would even go without a K/D and accuracy, and the game would be 10 times funnier IMO, cuz the only goal would be to do incredible stuffs (ala trickjump during a firefight etc) and to win at the end, no matter how. Dang I wish every stat related stuff could be disabled via Cvar just for a test server, I bet an arm it would be funnier… and empty sadly.

Aaaaahhhhhh It’s freakingly good to yell in the morning (I didnt capslock’raged but you guyz get the point)

/rant