Option 1: consumer can buy game jam packed full of DRM

Option 2: consumer can buy game with none of that horrible DRM

Which option would you choose when buying? I'm just guessing here, but I think they're DRMing the hell out of Steam stuff so that the Steam stuff isn't preferable to retail. Why? I don't know, but I think avoiding preferential treatment is the motivator.

SS2 is not more significantly varied than L4D? K, if you say so._Memento_

No, and neither are most other games.

So Fallout is mostly the same experience each time because however you play, all you're doing is stopping the master and the mutant army, right? How you do it and how you handle everyting before that is "not significant", is it?_Memento_

You have a different experience, but you're still performing the same set of tasks. Rather like Left 4 Dead. Each round is different to the last, but you're performing a limited set of tasks.

Different weapons work differently and are used in different situations. Using a machine gun is a different experience from using a rocket launcher, because you wouldn't a machine gun the same way you would use a rocket launcher (i.e use ammo more freely and not worry about splash damage for example). Similarly, different enemies require different tactics. _Memento_

...and there are different weapon and enemy types in Left 4 Dead. Comparing L4D with a singleplayer game is kind of pointless seeing as how the gameis made with coop in mind. So, it's not about killing enemy type 1 with weapon type 3, then enemy type 4 with weapon type 1, then enemy type 2 with weapon type 5, it's about working as a team to overcome an obstacle which cannot be overcome without teamwork. The very concept is fundamentally different; direct juxtaposition is pointless.

No, your argument is basically "x-com is just as repetitive as pong because in both cases, all you're doing is pressing buttons" . I never used such asinine arguments to point out L4D's repetitiveness._Memento_

No, my argument is that reducing a game to its base elements when describing it misrepresents it. That it can easily be done for any game simply shows how ridiculous it is to reduce a game to its base elements when describing it. It would be like describing Lord of the Rings as hobbits + orks + war + ring.

So L4D is repetitive and shallow but that still makes it a great game because you think it's fun? Too bad PC fanboys don't offer the same reprieve to games like Halo and Gears of War (which, for the record, have more substance than L4D)and argue that they're bad because they're not revoluationary and shallow compared to PC games like Deus Ex and System Shock 2._Memento_

I agree with you, but who takes fanboys seriously? Whether they're console fanboys or PC fanboys, they're all idiots. As for Gears, that game is overly constricting. You're forced into a particular styIe of play and you're given very limited options on how you play the game. Your only options are to advance to the cover ahead or retreat to the cover behind. PC gamers value freedom quite highly. Mass Effect does combat so, so much better that, the coop notwithstanding, I already consider Gears 2 utterly redundant unless it's making some very major improvements.

Yep, trying to relate L4D to sex is a totally valid way to prove that its good._Memento_

And arguing the example rather than the point is a totally valid way to prove... nothing.

It doesn't matter how many hours of enjoyment YOU had with it, the fact is that a game like Fallout or SS2 still offers significantly more and higher quality content than L4D._Memento_

Your opinion is a fact? I guess I read the sign wrong, we're in System Wars here!

So how does Valve justify making me pay full price for it? It doesn't matter if someone finds thousands of hours of entertainment with Tetris, if a dev decides to release Tetris for 50 bucks, it's still a rip-off._Memento_

Not when Tetris was first released it wasn't. Tetris was something new and awesome, and I've spent a hell of a long time playing Tetris over the years. In fact, it's the only Gameboy game I ever bought. I can see L4D being similar.

Objectively speaking, L4D is a shallow, repetitive game. More so than most other games. If you find that fun, good for you, but don't try to pretend that L4D is a great game because you'll spend 100s of hours with it._Memento_

You've got it backwards. It won't be a great game because I'll spend hundreds of hours with it. I'll spend hundreds of hours with it because it'll be a great game. A great game that I'll spend hundreds of hours wirth? Worth the price tag.

Games like UT2004 atleast offer a greater variety of game modes, weapons, vehicles and a huge selection of maps. Sure it's not a hugely varied and interesting game either, but it still offers a lot more than L4D._Memento_

You do realise that the game will have new weapons and maps/campaigns added after release, right? Probably game modes, too. TF2 is twicw the game now that it was at release - Valve has indicated that L4D will get the same treatment. It's part of their anti-piracy treatment. Even if there is too little right out of the box, they're going to add a lot over the coming year(s).

The upcoming GoW2 offers a mode that is similar to L4D's entire game, on top of a campain, campaign in coop, and versus modes. Maybe it's the lack of coop games on the PC that makes L4D so appealing to PC gamers, but for me, it's hard to find it significant._Memento_

Gears of War 2 is offering a game mode where players have to gun down endless swarms of enemies coming at the player in random numbers from random directions? Because that's the real appeal of L4D. It's not (especially) the coop and it's certainly not that they're zombies. It's the swarm. I love killing. I love killing, and very few games let me kill huge swarms of things - and most of those that do are bad. The original Doom games are really the only ones that ever got it right.

But it really, really does look like L4D is getting it right. It may seem like an easy concept to get right, but it isn't. Serious Sam, Starship Troopers, Painkiller. All tried and failed. Valve looks like they're getting it right and I haven't seen a game like it on any platform since 1996. The (four player) coop is just the cherry on top.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure the PC version isn't up yet only because it hasn't been leaked yet. It will be cracked as soon as it's out.

And the SecuROM isn't doing well because it has nothing to do with preventing internet piracy.

And are you seriously trying to argue that SS2 is no more varied than L4D?_Memento_

Of course it's more varied, but not significantly so.

The game offers several significantly different playstyles_Memento_

But you're doing the same few things, regardless of how you play. Finding keys, opening containers and killing enemies.

a big selection of weapons, enemies, and environments_Memento_

But most of those weapons don't really affect the game, or how the player plays the game. Your point and shoot. Same with the enemies, they look and sound different, but you're still performing the same task over and over. You're shooting them with your guns or clobbering them with your wrench.

If you want to reduce a game to its base elements, which is what you're trying to do with Left 4 Dead, you seriously misrepresent the game and I'm just trying to explain to you that it can be done for all games. All games have a basic set of actions that are repeated. Having sex is just a basic set of actions that are repeated. No one ever reduces a game (or anything else) to its basic elements unless they're trying to argue that it's bad, but this is totally fruitless. Some games/things are more repetitive than others, but it's not even slightly a convincing argument as to why something is bad. How repetitive things are is tempered by how fun it is. Like, say, sex. Having sex can easily be reduced to a basic set of repetitive tasks.

You heard it here first, guys. Sex is repetitive, therefore, sex is bad.

a story and well-crafted atmosphere. There's a real sense of exploration in SS2, that alone should tell you the game doesn't feel repetitive and dull._Memento_

Sure, there are those, but they last a few plays, then they're gone. I love that stuff, and if a game's got it, great. But then there are multiplayer shooters. I've got around 340 hours of Team Fortress 2 under my belt. It's a pretty repetitive game. There's no story. There's no exploration. But it's a lot of fun and it's lasted me a long time. I don't see why it should cost less than a linear, ten hour game.It doesn't give the same experience, but it gives an equally excellent experience and for much, much longer than your ten hour game. So why should it cost half as much?

You can pretend that I'm oversimplifying L4D's gameplay for the sake of my argument, or you can actually provide an argument as to how L4D is supposedly varied and not entirely derivative. The only example indicating that the game has any sense of variety is the level-scaling feature, that's it.

_Memento_

I think you've been missing my point the whole time. I'm not arguing that it's not repetitive, I agree entirely that it is repetitive. I'm saying two things additionally, though. The first is that all games are repetitive, and you can reduce any game to a simple set of repetitive tasks, and secondly that it really doesn't matter if the player enjoys the game, does it?

L4D looks like a hell of a lot of fun to me. I'm gonna load up the game with a few friends, hook up Teamspeak and just blast the hell out of some zombies with my friends while chatting. How is that basic concept any different than Quake 3 or Unreal Tournament or Counter-Strike or Quake Wars or Team Fortress 2? Friends + chat + teamwork + repetitive tasks is what all of the above, L4D included, amount to.

Which brings me to my question - are you a fan of multiplayer shooters? I mean, you seem to be taking L4D personally. Have you ever played a multiplayer shooter? Quake 3? Unreal Tournament? Team Fortress 2? Left 4 Dead is not outside the realm of established genre convention. Do you hold a personal bias against L4D or do you hate the whole genre? I know you're a Halo guy, and Halo guys often tend to have an irrational dislike of Valve. Is that all it is?

You hate Valve? You hate the genre as a whole? Either way, the hate you're pouring on L4D seems unreasonable and almost personal. And another question, do you even have friends? Not to be a jerk, but you seem like the type of guy who doesn't. I can understand why someone with no one to play with wouldn't be interested in Left 4 Dead, but try and think of the game from other people's perspective.

My shortlist for GOTY is:

World of Goo
Sins of a Solar Empire
Crysis Warhead
Left 4 Dead (I suspect)
Grand Theft Auto 4 (I suspect)

Oooh, I know why you're mentioning this game! You're in love with JnWycliffe! Right? Right??

JnWycliffe and crazymaghie123 sitting in a tree....

[QUOTE="fatshodan"]

Why should it cost half as much as some linear ten hour game?

_Memento_

Because, regardless of whether or not you'll find 100+ hours of enjoyment with the game, the game essentially amounts to killing wave after wave of zombies. Why should a game that basically rehashes the same one hour of gameplay (which isn't particularly exciting to begin with) cost the same as much as a game that offers an interesting, compelling and varied 10 hour experience?

Other people seem to have picked up the argument while I was sleeping, but I may as well reply anyway.

Killing zombies over and over? Blah blah blah. Almost all games are the same thing over and over. Whether it's PacMan or System Shock 2 or Fallout or Halo. Same thing over and over. In System Shock 2, you perform go fetch tasks over and over while killing hybrids over and over. System Shock 2 is the greatest game of all time, easily. But it's still just a small set of repetitive tasks performed over and over. Any game, regardless of how brilliant, can easily be reduced to a set of repetitive tasks. Any game.

We don't reduce games to their basic elements (unless we're trying to argue how bad they are, of course...) because how much enjoyment these games give us is so much more than these constituent elements suggest. And, of course, because almost all games are simply a small number of actions repeated over and over, so trying to single out one particular game is kind of... wrong.

I don't see why a game that will give me hundreds of hours of pleasure should be half the price of a game that's over in ten hours.