100°

Caught in the COG: Can Violent Video Games Tell a Story Too? || Guerrilla Geek

Guerrilla Geek's Joey he asks if you can develop plot in between cub stomps as he takes a look at how the violence in the Gears of War affects the overall ability for the franchise to tell a story.

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Dramscus5102d ago

Kind of a rambling article. Not bad though.

OT: Yes they can though I think the violence should not be the core gameplay feature or it becomes boring.

Say do like a monster movie style thing.
A game where about a werewolf.
Your in your village when the wolf starts attacking. Bites someone close to the character to start the game.
Your equipped at various times with a torch a knife an axe and your fists. The werewolf controls regular wolves and sends them at you at points throughout the game. Not constantly, just enough to keep things exciting, like boss fights when you get to close to it.
Each time you fight the wolves it's exceedingly gruesome and realistic. Your axe splits flesh and splatters blood realistically. Proper gore that acts as a deterrent to wanting to kill. A holy crap thats visceral and gory kind of thing.
At the end corner the werewolf at your own house. You chase it inside to discover it turning back into it's human form. It's your wife pleading with you to forgive her and spare her life. Promising to leave and never return. You slowly approach before axing her down, chopping too many times in anguish. Mangling the body in the most horrible fashion.
The intent would be to make the player want to stop the game in horror.

See right there telling a story with violence. Just use it to add to the story instead of using violence as the story.

Violence isn't a good story. Hence why nearly every action movie every has an element of romance.

crwatkins5102d ago

Great point about comparing violence in games to violence in movies.

I think you really need to hit a good balance of plot, action and style when it comes to games. LA Noire had a lot of plot and style, but in my opinion the repetitive nature of the gameplay will keep it from being a game of the year contender.

Where as all the hundreds of generic action games I've played have slipped so far from my mind that I can't think of a good example. Often times they kind of pull an Arnold and all melt together into one giant game filled with blood and gore.

You should bring the discussion to Guerrilla Geek. I'm sure Joey would love to discuss all this with you :)

omi25p5102d ago

I hope it has a good story but i dont expect one.

GunofthePatriots5101d ago

Yes.
GOW just doesnt have a great story

blackburn105101d ago

You see that is the problem with games where violence is the main point of the game. You see it is hard for the character to show any other emotions when he is killing millions of people or creatures in destructive ways. In Gears they constantly chainsaw the creatures heads, stomp on them, shoot them and blow them up. Then they start crying about their love ones or trying to make jokes then go right back to the killing they were doing.

You see it what you do when your not killing that counts.If you show cut scenes that fail to show off any other side of you besides the brutish monster you are acting like then how can I believe that these people are family men or compassionate in any way.I mean please, was anyone convinced by those attempts at drama in the cut scenes. It's like a criminal chopping a man to pieces in front of me while trying to explain to me that it's not his fault he is a killer.That is what made Prototype so stupid.He was murdering people and I was supposed to feel sorry for him because he was just trying to get his memory back.

If you look at God of War Kratos was a Spartan. Like Conan you could excuse his behavior because you already know their barbaric, so you could still tell a story just like the Romans and Greeks did with people like Heracles. But you have modern soldiers ripping away at living things and tearing their heads off and I am supposed to believe that you are really a nice guy who is married and has a child and is compassionate? The shooting I understand but the curb stomping and the head sawing? That's why these attempts at stories fall short.

femshep5101d ago

They can if handled well and with good writers behind it, in the case of Gears of War no becuase the story is god aweful and Unreal Games seems to have 3 year old writers after playing through GOW1,2, bulletstorm, and that sad sad excuse the called an Unreal Tournament

where say Dante's inferno had a great story (due to the fact it was based on a great poem trilogy) hope they make the other two

260°

Gears Of War Creator Urges Devs To Make Single-Player Games Amid EA's Live Service Focus

Gears of War's creator has spoken out against the trend of turning established franchises into live services, urging developers to focus on single-player experiences.

Relientk77129d ago

I agree with Cliff for once.

Single player games > GaaS

JEECE128d ago

Too bad he didn't have this opinion when he chased trends with Lawbreakers. Or when he chased trends with Radical Heights.

Popsicle128d ago (Edited 128d ago )

He learned from the mistake or he wouldn’t be advocating for more single player experiences. I find this refreshing in a world where we often see people so stubborn that they tend to double down on a mistake which results in making things even worse. Seriously, good for him!

JEECE128d ago

@Popsicle

Oh for sure, better late than never. And better to somewhat own up to your mistakes, rather than just blaming your release window, or advertising partners, or gamers lol.

anast128d ago

@Popsicle

Of course we will never know his intentions, but it's hard to believe he is just a naive agent that is learning from his mistakes.

-Foxtrot129d ago

He could have done one himself after Gears of War but he did Lawbreakers…look how that turned out.

RaidenBlack129d ago

Not converting Jawbreakers into F2P was the final nail in the CliffyB coffin.

Knushwood Butt128d ago

Jawbreakers would have been a better name! Heck, I might just go and trademark that right now.

BISHOP-BRASIL128d ago

@Knushwood

Aren't those a kind of candy already?

coolbeans129d ago

You're missing the point. His studio's short lifespan is what *inspired* him to make this comment in the first place.

-Foxtrot129d ago

Oh I know the point...I'm just stating the obvious and how stupid he was in the beginning to jump on a trend he had no real experience in. A first person hero shooter with heavy GaaS elements is a lot different than the multiplayer in Gears of War.

He'd have been better creating something like Gears of War again, a great single player story and a good online mode.

coolbeans128d ago

-"A first person hero shooter with heavy GaaS elements is a lot different than the multiplayer in Gears of War."

I mean... you're kinda muddying terms when Gears has always had a strong multiplayer component. Even if I grant you that, Cliffy B started cementing himself at Epic with Unreal Tournament, which was among the earliest shooter series to have "proto-GaaS elements" (downloadable maps, cosmetics, special editions that bundle stuff together). Lawbreakers and Radical Heights (were it finished) weren't major career shifts to him like they would be for, say, Fumito Ueda.

Regardless of that, it's still kinda useless to state the obvious when CliffyB himself made his comments with the benefit of hindsight already.

128d ago
CrimsonWing69128d ago (Edited 128d ago )

Look, these a-hole publishers can do this, in fact I want them to, so they can f*ck around and find out and fail hard scaring away everyone else from doing this live service push.

This industry is run by some of the dumbest corporate pieces of sh*t I’ve ever seen. They spend stupid amount of money with literally nothing that stands out from games from the previous generation (look at Arkham Knight to the $200 mill Suicide Squad comparison vids), you’re overpaying devs, and you focus on games as a service to milk consumers that a lot of them grew up off traditional games. We’re not idiots, we sniff this sh*t out and won’t touch it.

So, what’s your answer to not getting a ROI? Raise game prices and double down on GaaS so you can suck your consumers dry. That model only works for some games and even then how in hell do you expect it to work with multiple games!? They’re ruining the damn hobby with this corporate greed.

Cut back on dev budgets, cut back on how much your staff is getting paid, until sales for games bring in a profit. That’s the answer and make some games that feel like there’s passion behind them, not some cookie cut up game that feels like the entire existence behind it is to offer as little as it can with repetitive bullsh*t and selling off all this content throughout its life. It’s gross.

anast128d ago

I agree with every point here.

Redemption-64128d ago

Games do bring in a profit, it's the greed that is killing the industry. Here is a fact, live service games overall make more, significantly more money than single player games

What you should be asking is executives not wanting continuous growth or firing them. Saying devs should be fired when those who are fitting the bills and setting unrealistic expectations would make things worse. What do y9u think would happen if they released say, 30 single player games and over half of them fail? You are going after the wrong crowd.

DankSinatra128d ago

About time he learned. I guess he finally stopped blaming everyone else and took accountability for his mistakes and realized that people really don't care that much for trends or live service.

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850°

Report: Gears of War Trilogy Collection Will Be Multiplatform and Available on PS5 Day One

A new rumor suggests that the Gears of War Trilogy Collection is real, with it launching on the PS5 day one with Xbox and PC.

LG_Fox_Brazil134d ago

Yeah, I can totally see that happening. My only doubt is if they are going to announce that at the same time as the Hallo Collection or if they will try to distance both announcements to try to ease the pain

helicoptergirl134d ago

This same insider was correct about Forza Horizon 5. So this might be true. But I heard rumors are the Halo:MCC is the next big one to be announced. We'll see I guess

DefenderOfDoom2134d ago

I am hoping Halo:MCC comes to PlayStation .

Cacabunga134d ago

Someone check on Obscure Observer please

piroh134d ago

They should announce dedicated showcase for all Playstation ports, it would be less painful for their fanbase.

Anyway thank you Team Xbox and Phil i will support the games.

Profchaos134d ago

Phil should wear a crash t shirt to that

Profchaos134d ago

I see them being in the same year but halo coming alongside ns2 and if e day is early next year gears collection could come at Christmas time

The_Blue134d ago

Ease the pain? You do know these people won't even entertain us irl, ironic 😭

1Victor134d ago

NOOOOOOOOOOOO screamed an obscured observer from across the room the street.
Well I’ll check it out DAY 1 🤣 I hope the do a good job porting it and don’t have issues like MCC did when it first launched on s/x🤷🏿

Mr_cheese134d ago (Edited 134d ago )

This will be cool

TheEroica134d ago (Edited 134d ago )

Ease the pain? Pain for who? Lol. More games on more platforms is a gamer friendly approach. Locking games behind hardware is archaic and lame... Let's not turn into corporate stooges.

TheEroica133d ago

4 corporate suits voted me down. Shame. Pro gamer all the way.

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Lightning77134d ago

I remember talking about this with someone on the forums and they made some good points. Like what exactly are these old games doing at the moment? They pushed the hardware and did everything they needed to do for that platform at the time. Now in MS case even their new games are gonna be day and date but if we're taking about old games. Those games are just sitting their not doing anything anymore. When you port the old stuff to another console, that game has life again and move few more units and a new audience.

As I said Xbox is different because their stuff is inching closer and closer to be day and date. Though both Xbox and PS have old games that are just sitting around when they could have new audiences and breathe new life into the older exclusives.

Terry_B134d ago

Just imagine how well collections of older Nintendo games would sell on pc, xbox and playstation...

NotoriousWhiz134d ago

I honestly don't expect Nintendo to gain much from releasing their games on 3rd party consoles. People are conditioned to buy Nintendo games on Nintendo hardware. Once that changes, Nintendo will probably lose out on revenue as people pass on their underpowered console to wait for their game to release on a superior console. Tons of people only have a Switch for exclusives, and those exclusives sell better than most games on the other platforms and Nintendo is able to pocket the bulk of that revenue since it is their game on their console.

Profchaos133d ago

Not very considering rom packs have been eaily accessible for years now it's only really GameCube and above you need to pick and choose because the game size is fairly large and the Wii IMO didn't emulate well considering the motion controls.

So as incredible as they are I doubt they would sell unless they are overhauling them somehow but then again I wouldn't want to see them overhauled but that's just me I still play the NES version of Mario 3 over the SNES all stars version as a example because I think it looks better.

133d ago
Sonic1881134d ago

All you had to say was Microsoft is a third party publisher now

Lightning77134d ago

Huh? They clearly are what are you trying to get at?

rlow1134d ago

That still makes and releases a console…..which knocks them out of the third party club…..nice try

Sonic1881134d ago

@rlow1

A third-party publisher that still releases a console? Sure, whatever makes you sleep at night. It doesn't take a genius to figure out what they're trying to do.

generic-user-name134d ago

The Series X/S backwards compatibility to their old classics was one of the last few selling points for those consoles.

RaidenBlack134d ago

Finally Gears 2 & 3 coming to PC !

neutralgamer1992134d ago (Edited 134d ago )

Exactly I also hope we get a fable collection since fable 2 never came to Pc

I hope we also get gears of war 4 on Pc too since only gears 5 is on steam along with tactics

ninjabutt13134d ago

Gears 4 is already on pc, maybe not in steam but its in xbox app

133d ago
isarai134d ago

Where's the goalposts gonna go now? 😀🫳🍿

helicoptergirl134d ago

Get an obscure person to bend over and then I'll show you :)

Chevalier134d ago

They're too busy crying in a corner and being served crow again though. Pretty sure everything is going to voicemail.

goken134d ago

@helicoptergirl
Normally with articles like this the person you mentioned is usually obscured from observation 🤣

Profchaos134d ago

Revenue same as always Microsoft don't care about community it's reputation and they've never been worried about losing loyal customers if you recall the Kinect era they abandoned the hardcore entirely to pursue the hardcore gamers grandma

Outside_ofthe_Box134d ago

"Where's the goalposts gonna go now?"

"It's just old games sitting around doing nothing! Might as well get money from it and a new audience you can use to potentially make it exclusive again for next gen for them to be enticed to jump ship!"

~New goalpost

134d ago
Outside_ofthe_Box134d ago (Edited 134d ago )

"Eventually Sony will likely be forced to do the same"

Is that you begging for games that you once bashed in the past? Too funny, things must be dry in your land.

Chevalier134d ago

"aren’t selling as much as Xbox - and the answer will be that they are on less platforms."

No they won't because Xbox doesn't announce sales numbers at all. So how would they compare these sales? What idiotic logic. These shareholders going to pull numbers out their backside?!

thorstein134d ago

Why doesn't he just use the one account. How many N4G tabs does he have open with different accounts?

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neutralgamer1992134d ago

Why do you need goalposts? More gamers will get to play games. Phil said it few days ago again no game has any red line around it. Seriously man it's gaming and your choice of plastic box makes no difference

It's 2025 enjoy gaming on any platform. We should be celebrating how the Biggest gaming publisher is allowing their games to be played on all platforms but how can we get that when some people feel the need to take victory laps

134d ago
Chevalier134d ago

Well hate to say we told you so. But we called this happening as soon as we saw these big purchases and falling sales, but, a whole slew of people said this would NEVER happen. Goalpost keep moving too as if it's some weird flex.

thorstein134d ago (Edited 134d ago )

TBH, Forza, the Indiana Jones game, the next Elder Scrolls, and I hope Fable will make it over. I'm excited about those.

I don't think MS going the Sega route would be a bad thing. Nintendo and Sony are making good hardware. There's no reason to not make profit off of that.

But the goalposts moving is in reference to people who constantly approve and post disingenuous stories that they scream are true.

For instance, "you can build a comparable PC to a PS pro for $700," conveniently leaving off the OS. Or, "Sony delisted HD2 in 170 countries" when in reality, it was 170 regions of which SteamDB lists as having over 3000 regions.

neutralgamer1992134d ago

Chevalier

What is this with we. Yes most of us saw this coming and all I am saying is it's a great thing for gamers on all platforms. We should be celebrating the fact amazing games will be available to all of us instead of taking some victory lap because of a plastic box

Chevalier132d ago

"What is this with we. Yes most of us saw this coming and all I am saying is it's a great thing for gamers on all platforms. We should be celebrating the fact amazing games will be available to all of us instead of taking some victory lap because of a plastic box"

Cool and it should be celebrated. But this idiotic narrative is that it was done for us as consumers needs to die.

Lots of idiots trying to reframe this when they literally argued that this would NEVER happen when we said yes it will because Gamepass isn't profitable and sales losses all round and add in lower hardware sales and it was obvious

+ Show (2) more repliesLast reply 132d ago
1Victor134d ago

@isarai: “ Where's the goalposts gonna go now? 😀🫳🍿”
.
The goal post is going home crawl into the shower open the flow and start crying while rocking back and forward i obscured by the darkness of the room.

+ Show (2) more repliesLast reply 132d ago
helicoptergirl134d ago

I haven't played any oif these games either. Will buy and go through the campgains for sure. They a co-op correct? Hope so

Yui_Suzumiya133d ago

They're amazing. If you ever played Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine then you already have an idea how they play.

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90°

Rumored Gears of War Collection is at the top of my 2024 Xbox wishlist

As the long-rumored Gears of War Collection looks like it may finally materialize on Xbox, the timing could not be better as Gears 6 and movie news swirls.

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1Victor516d ago (Edited 516d ago )

(Insert “It should be multi platform if Microsoft investors wants more money” JK here)
All jokes aside congratulations to all the gears fans it will be a blast I remember having fun on the first one on my 360 elite till got RROD and quit Xbox all together but that’s a story for another day.
Congratulations 🎊 🍾 🎉 🎈 🎉 🙏

Wyesvin516d ago

I'm excited for this just aslong is on the pc also cause I don't have the newest xbox console.

shinoff2183516d ago

I enjoyed the tactical one. I can't remember the actual name but it was fun.