1up T:V preview

[ZenTseTse]

That's the uniqueness of Tribes 2. Not of Tribes. :/ That's where so many disagreements seem to come from.

You have 2 groups of people.

One group looks at Tribes and see's something like a sport, or close to it. It's all about speed. Thinking on your feet, but at a quick pace.

The other group looks at Tribes 2 and they see a war-game. Huge maps. Lots of vehicles. Fortresses. In truth, it's probably what the Dev team had in mind when they first made Tribes.. but it certainly was not what it resulted being.

TV has to satisfy both, obviously.

but i think you'd have to be a communist-style ideologue to ignore the fact that most gamers prefer the latter "vision" of tribes and gaming (i said GAMERS, not tribalwar veterans).

ut2k3 tried the sport thing thinking that that was what gamers wanted.

bombing run? last time i checked ut2k3 wasnt doing so hot but there's now excitement over ut2k4 which blatantly rips tribes/halo/planetside.

go figure.

personally, i think the "divide" is false and tribes is the entire range... with the sense of freedom/movement we know and love.

if they get that dynamic right then the gameplay NEEDS to support the expectations of gamers/potential customers - which means reviews like this are a VERY bad indication.

it's just like UT/UT2k3/UT2k4 tensions where the small, vocal self-proclaimed "hard core" community wants it to basically be like old school dm and skill-oriented small teamplay... while even most fans are tired of that and want new stuff and larger scale combat. imo the marketing must focus on the majority of the gamers (who are tired of the past) but also try to satisfy the most loyal customers (if not simply to make them STFU cuz they will tend to run the fan sites).

yea, i said that.

 

[Validuz]

The Reverend Says...
There was one thing that worried me a little after watching Tribes: Vengeance's debut. After sitting through a presentation lasting more than an hour, I leaned over to the guy next to me and said, "You know, they didn't say 'team' or 'teamwork' once."

Maybe it depends on what it is about Tribes you've liked in the past. What Vengeance definitely improves is the mobility aspect. If you want be able to jet around the field like a maniac, completely unfettered, this is the game you should get. But the emphasis on large-scale team warfare seems to be taking a back seat. The new types of games and levels in Vengeance aren't bigger than what we've played before, they're smaller. There are now just four vehicles. The player limit is 32, firmly behind the curve compared to games like Battlefield 1942. And the command system from Tribes 2 is gone -- not just revised and streamlined like it needed to be, but seemingly out of the picture...

I don't know this guy, but I kinda agree (except for the newbie-suonding "large scale" part)

 

[Zoolooman]

The command system is in the game. He is at least misinformed in that particular aspect. I make no implications about the "correctness" of the rest of his post. I will explicity state however, that the majority of his worry seems to come from a conflict of vision. His vision is not the same as the developer's vision. And so we have worry!

 

[Zoolooman]

TV has to satisfy both, obviously.

but i think you'd have to be a communist-style ideologue to ignore the fact that most gamers prefer the latter "vision" of tribes and gaming (i said GAMERS, not tribalwar veterans).

ut2k3 tried the sport thing thinking that that was what gamers wanted.

bombing run? last time i checked ut2k3 wasnt doing so hot but there's now excitement over ut2k4 which blatantly rips tribes/halo/planetside.

go figure.

personally, i think the "divide" is false and tribes is the entire range... with the sense of freedom/movement we know and love.

if they get that dynamic right then the gameplay NEEDS to support the expectations of gamers/potential customers - which means reviews like this are a VERY bad indication.

it's just like UT/UT2k3/UT2k4 tensions where the small, vocal self-proclaimed "hard core" community wants it to basically be like old school dm and skill-oriented small teamplay... while even most fans are tired of that and want new stuff and larger scale combat. imo the marketing must focus on the majority of the gamers (who are tired of the past) but also try to satisfy the most loyal customers (if not simply to make them STFU cuz they will tend to run the fan sites).

yea, i said that.

I agree that Tribes can support both types (strong vehicles and an objective oriented gametype like Siege help a *lot* in this aspect.) Nonetheless, I must respectuflly disagree with your analysis of UT2K3's failure. It wasn't the "sportness" of it that brought about failure. After all, UT and Q3 are still sportlike and still supported communities. While you may consider them "realistic", SOF2 and Raven Shield are also arcadey and ultimately sportlike. Hell, I could even finally say the same about TFC and CS: both highly popular arcade/sport-like style games.

UT2K3 failed because it was badly designed, filled with mediocre sporty maps, and just basically was a mediocre game. Many people who bought it were happy with their purchase, but in the end everything about it felt a little off. This is especially true considering UT was excellent - mostly because UT's weapons were stronger and movement model superior (translocator rocks.)

 

[Creole Ned]

Zooloo, have you played Raven Shield? I've played it quite a bit and "arcadey" is not how I would describe it at all. It doesn't feel remotely sport-like. It's a tactical shooter with a slow, deliberate pace, where one shot is usually lethal. There's no jumping, no balls, no cheerleaders. It just seemed odd that you would classify it that way.

I'm also curious about what you mean by "sporty" maps. I think UT2003's relative lack of success was mainly due to it shipping as a warmed over port of Unreal Championship that brought forward very little that was new to the UT series, so the reaction was largely indifferent. Double Domination is a nifty gametype, though.

On the larger subject, the person previewing T:V simply has his own narrow definition of what makes a Tribes game and he filtered the presentation through that, drawing conclusions that are perhaps predictable but by no means authoritative.

 

[Zoolooman]

I'm working by the sport-like definition of arcade style gameplay, not sport-like as in having actual sports themes.

As for Raven Shield, I should have typed RTCW, which I have played and do consider arcade-like, rather than strategic or tactical.