Gotham City Imposters Vs. Brink

(nephandys) #1

So beta is finally over and the game launched yesterday on PC/PS3 and today on 360. So, I can finally argue this point. We’ve been arguing about this amongst Brink players in GCI beta.

GCI at launch features:
5 Pre Made Classes - Pretty sure it’s five might be four as I haven’t played in a week
Custom Classes - combine movement abilities, skills, weapons, and body type into a class of your choosing
Movement Abilities - it’s more traditional than SMART, but features grappling hooks, gliders, roller skates, spring shoes, etc.
Class Skills - invisibility, etc.
4 Maps
2 Objective based game modes
Character Customization - play dress up to about the same degree as Brink
2 Factions - Batmen(women); Jokers
Much shorter development time than Brink
$15 Price Tag

The only features Brink had over this title at launch were: Challenges (like a tutorial; GCI technically has a tutorial level as well), Audio Logs, player distributed buffs, 4 more maps, and 4x the price. I could also easily agree that maps in Brink are larger.

Anyone else puzzled by this?

(Ruben0s) #2

You’re puzzled about what? The price compared to Brink? The similarities?

Do you think it gives more value for money than Brink?

(nephandys) #3

[QUOTE=Ruben0s;392884]You’re puzzled about what? The price compared to Brink? The similarities?

Do you think it gives more value for money than Brink?[/QUOTE]

I’m sorry I didn’t make myself clear enough. I am puzzled largely due to the price difference. They are extremely similar games with close to the same content, but one cost me 4x the price of the other.

The point of lack of content was brought up shortly after launch. I think this just goes to further pound the point home if for $15 I can get pretty much the same bang for my buck from a newer studio backed by Warner Brothers as $60 gets me from a established developer backed by Bethesda.

(Verticae) #4

GCI has a decent DLC system. Simple.

(nephandys) #5

You think it’s $15 because of built in DLC? That’s a good point. I’m definitely on PC more lately, but this game is potentially paving the beginnings of F2P on the 360 console. For better or for worse.

(Ruben0s) #6

The only features Brink had over this title at launch were: Challenges (like a tutorial; GCI technically has a tutorial level as well), Audio Logs, player distributed buffs, 4 more maps, and 4x the price. I could also easily agree that maps in Brink are larger.

Currently watching a review, but from what I can see it has 3 different kind of challenges ( Basic Challenges, Intermediate Challenges, Expert Challenges)

Skip to 35 min.

//youtu.be/VhVB8kddlhE

I heard about the game before, but I kinda forgot it. I will try it out tomorrow.
I wonder if it will be good because it is PvP.

And GCI has indeed a decent DLC system, so far you can already buy 13 dollars worth of DLC (useless stuff like unlock all costums) .

http://www.gothamcityimpostors.com/forums/showthread.php/3868-The-next-chapter-of-Impostors-yours-for-free
the first DLC will be free.

(zenstar) #7

GCI is download only. Brink was a AAA release. AAA is defined by marketing budget and release price.
GCI has had nowhere near the same advertising and never claimed to be AAA. Thus it comes out at $15.
Brink had mad loads of advertising and was touted as a AAA title. You cannot sell AAA at less than $60 or else people think something is wrong with it. Thus it comes out at $60.

IMO: I’ve only played 3 matches of GCI and already it feels like a better game. The only issue I have is the matchmaking takes forever to get a game going and there’s no server browser option on PC. I believe they’re already working on these things and as more people pick it up the quicker matches will come (and it’s easier to convince friends to try a $15 game than a $60 one).

(tangoliber) #8

I don’t care how much a game cost or how much content it has. I only care about the core mechanics and its best map. Even if there is only one map, I"ll play the game if its good.

Brink seems to have went through development hell which is a money sink. Aside from that, I would guess that most of the budget went into SMART, which seems to have been difficult to get working, and the art as the maps seem pretty labor intensive. Also the sound design (the team chatter)…which is something that impresses me from a casual, pubbing standpoint.

Brink has botmatch, which probably isn’t cheap to implement. Shipyard, Reactor, Aquarium, Founders Tower, Resort, and Labs are actually 2 maps each.

It probably could have sold for 30 as a digital title, but as zenstar said, all AAA releases are priced the same. Which is a unfair to Skyrim, which should be priced at 150 dollars or something.

(Ruben0s) #9

I pre-ordered brink for 26 dollar and paid even less for skyrim. Console games are more expensive but I seriouly wonder how people can spend 60 dollar on the pc version, if you can get the game legal way cheaper.

(nephandys) #10

Thanks for the free DLC info, I didn’t even know about that. So now that I got some games in after launch I saw the Challenge system someone else mentioned, also at least double the maps as beta, TDM added too. IMO pretty damn close to equal Brink content sans bot matches.

(zenstar) #11

Yeah GCI looks to have a lot of promise.
Don’t care about bots. would rather play people. The only issue I have is matchmaking is sloooow, but they’re working on that (more dedi servers going up atm and DLC plans to fix a bunch abround matchmaking and lobbies) so I’m pretty excited about it.

May even pick it up on xbox too (PC player atm).

(amazinglarry) #12

Chalk that up to one of the most asinine things I’ve heard all day.

(Darksider) #13

Well Team Fortress 2 was like only $20 bucks when it first came out, I think the difference between GCI and BRINK, that GCI is multiplayer only and Brink is Single Player/Co-OP/ and Multiplayer, If I am not mistaken a lot of dev time went into the single player/Co-OP portion of Brink which was still a bust in the final product with the bots and all.

Clocked in about 3 hours now in GCI, Matchmaking is wonky they need that fix pronto, overall gameplay is fun and wacky “Niight Niight!” lol

(nephandys) #14

[QUOTE=Darksider;392950]Well Team Fortress 2 was like only $20 bucks when it first came out, I think the difference between GCI and BRINK, that GCI is multiplayer only and Brink is Single Player/Co-OP/ and Multiplayer, If I am not mistaken a lot of dev time went into the single player/Co-OP portion of Brink which was still a bust in the final product with the bots and all.

Clocked in about 3 hours now in GCI, Matchmaking is wonky they need that fix pronto, overall gameplay is fun and wacky “Niight Niight!” lol[/QUOTE]
I can’t see how a bunch of money went towards SP and Co-Op play in particular when the “blurring of the lines” was to basically make a SP campaign of all the MP maps strung together through cutscenes (also used in the MP). IMO this seems like it would’ve/should’ve cut development cost because in reality there’s only a single game mode; MP, SP, and Co-Op are all the same thing. It’s either against bots or with people.

(amazinglarry) #15

Yeah but developing AI that is smart enough to do all the crap there is to do in Brink doesn’t come cheap, I’d imagine.

(Ruben0s) #16

I just played GCI for 2 hours and I have to say that the game is kinda bad. Well, I just suck at it. No matter what I do I keep getting randomly killed (probably because of peer to peer). Apart from that I kinda have the feeling that people with a higher LVL or DLC content ,like double XP and stuff like that, are in favour (some people have the double amount of health than I have). The game itself also feels kinda sluggish and not polished(console port). Getting into a game takes between 5/10 minuts because of the poor matchmaking. And the game is peer to peer which doesn’t work really well, because everyone is flying through the maps (grapling hooks, ramps, flying shizzle, kick down animations, etc) and it is almost impossible to get a normal hit registration. Compared to Brink the maps are really small, even with 7 people it kinda feels chaotic. I will check it out a few times, but for me it will probably have the same fate as Brink.

(nephandys) #17

Lag ingame blows and there’s definitely host advantage when it’s going on. You’re right about those other higher lvl players. Until you are approximately lvl 7 or 8 you cannot have a fully decked out custom class. At this point you can choose primary and secondary w/ mods, body type, support item, movement/gadget, and your 2 fun facts. You still can’t have a Rampage until lvl 10 or the last one (I can’t remember the name) until lvl 30+, but those 2 are less important.

*Health, which you point out in particular, is directly related to body type and then to one of the Fun Facts (horse healthy). The Mighty body type with Horse Healthy is like 322 HP. The Striker (medium assault class) base class is like 180HP for comparison. You can also add body armor as a support item and there’s a Fun Fact 2 that can reduce bullet damage, but these can be countered by the Penetrator Ammo mod. All this together makes you a tanking machine and happens to be my favorite play style atm. This is all unlocked by lvl 7 or 8. It’s up to you to have used your unlocks on these items though or you’ll have to wait until you get some more.

(Ruben0s) #18

I just had the first playable game.The deep freezer gun is pretty amazing, just a dot and if you hit someone fully charged he is either dead or frozen, so you can kill him with your secondary weapon.

(Nail) #19

I find it remarkable that people will put up with a piece of crap for $15 and say things like matchmaking is “wonky” (ie: non-existent) when for Brink, every little fault was “FAIL”

They both have major faults, but Brink is FAR more developed, and being published by "Meh"thesda, it has it’s obvious flaws and inherent price tag

(Zekariah) #20

I was waiting for a thread to made for this, you beat me to it Neph.

The fact that there is already a comparison like this with an Arcade title and a AAA title speaks volumes I think. GCI is in no way perfect (mind you I’ve only played the beta and only JUST downloaded the full game last night), but this game feels like it’s what Brink should have been released as. And as far as advertising goes, Brink could have been an arcade release as far as the Australian market went since there was little to no advertising here for it anyway!

But balancing, customization and movement have received just as much focus on GCI, without the premium costs or the high expectations. What’s more, DLC is far more appetizing and a free DLC package is on it’s way…without the limit of a 2 week download period!

As far as what Brink has over GCI mentioned in your first post Neph, the only one that makes even the slightest difference is AI. The opportunity to play without waiting for a filled up game is the thing Brink had going for it, and Bots lost their appeal quickly when they ended up being your only opponents! As far as maps are concerned, what use is a large and interesting map if you can only do 1 set of objectives on it. Matches were all the same in the end, and a lot of unused ground went to waste since it was pointless to head in any other direction. Team work really just turned into a timed bull rush .

Also, the tutorial levels were really just mini matches, and you couldn’t vs friends so they became redundant very quickly.

I never thought I would put Brink down as much as I have recently, but the fact that an arcade title has put it to shame has made me lose my Brink enthusiasm.

Can’t wait for more GCI DLC!