DOA series creator: "Hardcore players killed shmups"

[Squire Grooktook]

I personally know a lot of players who would shiver at the thought of playing a 'hardcore' shmup but would still approach Galaga

How many of them would pay 10 or more dollars each for 5 or more sequels/versions of Galaga though? I know a few, but face it, its a very niche genre no matter how you slice it. This is a genre of 30-60 minute games, and that's at odds with all the modern conceptions about value and content among mainstream players.

If shmups play their cards right, maybe they can have a game that barely approaches the popularity of Super Meat Boy or something every once in a while, but that'd still be "dead" in the eyes of someone mainstream or to Itagaki.

Also as I mentioned before, in my personal experience, danmaku/bullet hell has actually added some considerable mystique/interest for more casual players to the genre, but whether that is true or not is irrelevant to my point above.

[Skykid]

The accusation is hardcore players killed shmups

No, the accusation is that developers ignored all markets but the hardcore players.

It doesn't make any difference. The 'hardcore players' were the remnants leftover from the arcade era who wanted to continue playing a particular genre in a particular fashion. Shmups were hardly booming when Cave turned up.

[gray117]

Thread title is misleading and not a quote... Interview is a bit more reasonable.

But it's not the whole truth - choice is what probably saw the decline in the shmup genre. When the most impreasive and engaging vision was no longer space invaders/gradius people moved away from them.

Shmups are not dead but the genre is (by most definitions) not the most engaging format out there and has taken quite a fall... It'd be interesting to see how it'd compare in size to something like strategy games....

Anyway combine that with some challenging/repetitive and seemingly short gameplay and you've got a confluence of factors that drive shmups out of the spotlight and away from that blockbuster position.

Same goes for fighters In general although they still engage and cling to a part of the spotlight by way of their competitive nature and the immediacy of their context - a fight - albeit it often bombastic the concept of some kind of bout is still much easier to relate to and much more common an experience than anything to do with flying...

Same could again could be broadly said for run and jump platformers... But what we're getting here is a list of genres whose place in the spotlight may have fallen but who are increasingly popular as the list goes on because their barrier to entry is generally lower - in perceptual engagement and gameplay mechanics.

Could you make a shmup that was relatable and fun to even just move around?... Or would you simply start to deviate away from the definition of a shmup and edge towards an definition more like an adventure game/3rd person/puzzle game/endless runner?

If the thread title was "more relatable game genres forced shmups out of the limelight and encouraged the development of more hardcore communities' you'd probably have less debate...

What should shmup developers today do is the interesting question. Like many suggest i think you have to serve your hardcore player base a good experience first, but you probably need to also consider how to make the game more appealing to new audiences - even if they're niche. Bridging that gap thematically is pretty tough though...

[tizerist]

I think in recent times Gradius V came the closest to capturing the attention of the mainstream market. It turned a lot of heads, mainly because of the sights and sounds it threw in the players face, the production values were very impressive and it just screamed 'big blockbuster'. 2 player mode helped also. And it's got a 82 rating on metacritic.
In fact I think horizontal shmups have, throughout history, been more accepted by the mainstream. Mentioning the word 'R-Type' to the unenlightened will often bring about a "aah, now I know what you're talking about". There's no such equivalent with verts, perhaps Raiden would be most known outside of the community. The almost universal use of widescreen TV's also gives a boost to the horizontal genre.
There are some concepts in the modern shmup which are relics of a bygone age, as mentioned, having 'continues' made sense when you were putting coins into a machine, but with a home computer / console with save game mechanics, it would probably be better served to give the player a message of "XXX ships used to complete game" and the information is saved which would give you a target, to use below XXX amount next time round. There's a lot of dead wood the genre must shed, or else it will stay in an 'introverted' state which doesn't look at the standards set elsewhere in the games world, but merely at it's own close surroundings.

[S_Fang]

Ironically, the western shoot 'em ups (Euroshmups) are the only possible chance for the genre to spread from its boundaries: they have HPs and you repeat the stage (or part of it if you hit a checkpoint) if you die; there are lots of levels with bits of story; save function and/or a complex power-up system.

Tyrian 2000 is the real example of how you make a good shmup for PC and consoles since 20 years by now, by having deep customization option and power-ups; tons of levels and a wide choice of difficulty settings.
Nintendo also nail that with Starfox and Kid Icarus: Uprising, getting a notorious fanbase despite being mere ensemble darkhorses compared to the big names. They have a good balance between being accessible and being hard, despite being soften up in these days in order to being accessible.

The question here is how to make a space for the hardcore players with the glutton of challenge without alienating the avarage and novice players:
1) Having a grade system like the Hack and Slash games: in base at how many points you get; how many times you got hit and how much long was the chain, you get a grade. This will stimolate the players to retry untill they get good at it.
2) A challenge mode with lots of specific condition and gimmicks in order to test the player's abilities, like boss rushes, time attacks, No bombs/special/miss/whatever, 1life, ecc.

[Sinful]

Maybe I thought this at one point? But... Demon/Dark Soul series proved this wrong. Even thought it's not that hard as folks say, it's marketed as super hard. Folks online say it's super hard. And so on. Yet it became a huge hit ip. And thank goodness this is still possible. So yeah. I call BS. Just make a fun game with some challenge, and shut up. All this stupid casual gamer research and catering too is totally doing more harm then good. The Demon Soul team just did what they wanted from beginning till end without any interference, including not altering the difficulty, and thus it became a good, popular and hit game. Creative freedom is the key. Shut out everything else, including the fans.

[Shepardus]

I think Dark/Demon's Souls does show that people (or at least enough people to make a game successful) aren't going to be turned off by difficulty alone as long as it's fair, but at the same time Dark Souls isn't a half-hour experience that makes the typical buyer wonder what they really got for their money. There's a lot more to the design philosophy of a shmup than its raw difficulty that would make someone reluctant to pay for one or see it as more than a small toy.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

Demon's Souls also lets you die as much as you want without preventing you from progressing. It's not like a shmup where people can play for years without seeing a second loop TLB or such, you can't level up to the point where your attributes make up for a lack of player skill. The Souls series are very good for making difficulty more 'mainstream' and accessible, and are legitimately challenging (look at all the naked/fists only runs) but shmups are difficult in a way that can be much more unforgiving and relentless, which is probably why they don't have mass market appeal.

[Elixir]

The Demon Soul team just did what they wanted from beginning till end without any interference, including not altering the difficulty, and thus it became a good, popular and hit game. Creative freedom is the key. Shut out everything else, including the fans.

Actually, every single Souls game has received multiple patches in response to fanbase feedback. Some patches even making the games easier, such as DkS2. FROMSOFT have responded to connectivity issues, issues with framerate and graphics, completely broken weapons/gear/rings, moveset issues, issues with the environment, hacks, various other game-breaking stuff, etc etc. FROMSOFT invaded players who "acquired" DkS before official release day. They made an entire PvP arena in DkS' DLC for the fans (which didn't really work properly, but still). DkS and DkS2's DLC is well thought-out, even story-wise. And, as much as it pains me to admit, the broken "Soul Memory" thing in DkS2 was created to prevent people who have spent huge amounts of hours (at x level) acquiring gear and perfecting their character and invading other, regular players, that are at the same level.

I also should probably point out that the "PREPARE TO DIE" thing is actually Bamco's doing, and none of that is advertised in Japan.

[Squire Grooktook]

Demon's Souls also lets you die as much as you want without preventing you from progressing. It's not like a shmup where people can play for years without seeing a second loop TLB or such, you can't level up to the point where your attributes make up for a lack of player skill. The Souls series are very good for making difficulty more 'mainstream' and accessible, and are legitimately challenging (look at all the naked/fists only runs) but shmups are difficult in a way that can be much more unforgiving and relentless, which is probably why they don't have mass market appeal.

Souls also have length and content. Don't think they would have been nearly so popular if they were 30-60 minutes long. Considering everybody hypes the games difficulty way past what they actually are like, I think it just goes to show that "intimidation" isn't the issue.

[Skyknight]

The concern about game length puts me in mind of how apparently, some people WANT to be addicted to their games. Or at least, be able to be engrossed in them to the point they can forget about everything else for a time. It may be that they think that a "short" game just can't supply them with that sort of refuge (not that I can figure out how forgetting the outside world is a good thing...).

That said, there's also a tacit disbelief in replaying a game many times over. Games are effectively regarded as disposable--once you've drawn out every sidequest, achievement, etc., it's fit only to be used as a trade-in, because you've "mastered" it. Apparently, the experience of playing is secondary to the glory of mastery. Not that I think you'll find players in it ONLY for the achievements, but...

Come to think of it, I wonder what such ones would regard as not-disposable, besides family and friends (run for cover if anyone DOES regard them as disposable). It might shed some light on what they'd actually favor in a shmup.

[Doctor Butler]

Casuals love bloat. It's why Skyrim was so popular a while back.

300 hours. Nevermind that they're 300 hours of mindless, subpar combat.

[Skykid]

Maybe I thought this at one point? But... Demon/Dark Soul series proved this wrong. Even thought it's not that hard as folks say, it's marketed as super hard. Folks online say it's super hard. And so on. Yet it became a huge hit ip. And thank goodness this is still possible. So yeah. I call BS.

Demon's Souls is just a reaction to an industry that caters to the lowest possible skill level. It's not that surprising that they used challenge as a selling point - it was a good promotional opportunity.

There is a subset of current players who go nuts for super difficult gaming challenges, whether indie made madness like I Wanna Be The Guy or just creating their own challenges using existing games (speedrunning etc).

I don't think Demon's Souls on its own proved any particular point wrong, per se, but then I'm not sure Itagaki's comments about shmups in particular is accurate when you consider how the industry was shifting as a whole.

[BryanM]

Nah. It's a symptom of the genre life cycle, not a cause. Once again:

A genre is created and begins to take off. It can be crude, simple, and cheap at this point. Profits flow like wine. Ex: Pitfall / Super Mario Brothers.

Clone Phase - Hey that guy made a billion dollars. Maybe we can make a billion dollars, too, by doing exactly what they did? (Protip: You can not.)

Peak - To retain interest of players, the games must offer more than they did before. Bigger. More complicated. More expensive to make, for a dwindling fanbase. Ex: Super Mario Brothers 3/Super Mario World/Sonic.

Niche - All the low hanging fruit has already been plucked. The only remaining players are the hardcore, and to appease them you have to go off into weird, highly specialized places if your game isn't going to ginormous. You can be "More Mario Than Mario" with a bazillion characters and cosplay outfits, or you can make something like Super Meat Boy/Battlekid/Spelunky/VVVVVV.

This isn't isolated to shooters. Gaming in general is in a bit of a malaise right now since everything is in a bit of a homeostasis. 15 years from now, is Grand Theft Auto 8 going to offer us anything 1 through 7 didn't? We were so used to paradigm shifts every few years; I don't think the average gamers kens that it's a mature medium now. Nothing unthinkably magical is going to come out of a tv screen; just like novels won't be more than text and pictures on a page. Well, nothing magical until some really boss cognitive computing comes along.

[Sinful]

Demon's Souls also lets you die as much as you want without preventing you from progressing.

It's a checkpoint game. You mean to tell me there aren't STGs without checkpoints?

Leveling up is actually discouraged in the Demon/Dark Soul series (why devs were forced to add soul memory in DSII). And leveling up doesn't level you up anywhere near as much as other RPGs (also stats hit dimishing return very fast too + combine it with first time inexperience & no hand holding, and your gonna die a lot back to last checkpoint regardless of leveling). It's still at heart & by a very large margin a trial and error videogame. ie. Old school style. Your always going to die a lot the first time..

The only thing that helps casuals a lot in this game in the online help (which is usually for boss help). Folks get really excited when you help them beat a boss in this series, lol. Myself included (that blasted Red Dragon in DS DLC, lol, was I excited when I found some proper help and the tag team went very well + I was able to cut the tail first too). But online is a double edged sword too. With most invaders that know the game way better then you.

Other then that, the other things it had going was the game's theme. Graphics/budget. It's an RPG and that genre is still popular enough. Then word of mouth almost alone turned the game from a dud to a hit. Thus game's quality & enough bells & whistles alone saved this game and made it into a series. Otherwise it was pretty much dead on arrival.


The only hope for STG genre is bells and whistle budget merged with actual quality (something STGs always had)... and both these things never fall together these days for the genre. So that's why it's doomed.

The Demon Soul team just did what they wanted from beginning till end without any interference, including not altering the difficulty, and thus it became a good, popular and hit game. Creative freedom is the key. Shut out everything else, including the fans.

Actually, every single Souls game has received multiple patches in response to fanbase feedback. Some patches even making the games easier, such as DkS2. FROMSOFT have responded to connectivity issues, issues with framerate and graphics, completely broken weapons/gear/rings, moveset issues, issues with the environment, hacks, various other game-breaking stuff, etc etc. FROMSOFT invaded players who "acquired" DkS before official release day. They made an entire PvP arena in DkS' DLC for the fans (which didn't really work properly, but still). DkS and DkS2's DLC is well thought-out, even story-wise. And, as much as it pains me to admit, the broken "Soul Memory" thing in DkS2 was created to prevent people who have spent huge amounts of hours (at x level) acquiring gear and perfecting their character and invading other, regular players, that are at the same level.

I also should probably point out that the "PREPARE TO DIE" thing is actually Bamco's doing, and none of that is advertised in Japan.

Yeah, I know. Why DSII is the weakest one. They tried to satisfy both Demon & Dark Soul fans by mixing elements from both games, which actually did more harm. In regards to patches for balancing the game, that's another thing entirely. It's called fans playtesting much deeper & dev's being forced to fix. So anything in response to this is different as in response to "But we need to please both fans of DeS & DS to maximize profits" corporate BS. ... Course it didn't help it that the main guy behind the series sat this last one out, and yeah. DSII lost a lot of soul. Sadly. Thus looking toward that new PS4 ip with the main guy behind it. The day I finally buy the latest gen system.

Maybe I thought this at one point? But... Demon/Dark Soul series proved this wrong. Even thought it's not that hard as folks say, it's marketed as super hard. Folks online say it's super hard. And so on. Yet it became a huge hit ip. And thank goodness this is still possible. So yeah. I call BS.

Demon's Souls is just a reaction to an industry that caters to the lowest possible skill level. It's not that surprising that they used challenge as a selling point - it was a good promotional opportunity.

Wrong. DeS was a game made to please the main guy behind it. Who believed that overcoming great challenges was it's own reward (read a few interviews with him). And he was right. He made a game he thought was good, thus it was good.

The marketing behind it at least proves that hard games can still sell. Thus I call this topic a little BS or not all true.

Souls also have length and content. Don't think they would have been nearly so popular if they were 30-60 minutes long. Considering everybody hypes the games difficulty way past what they actually are like, I think it just goes to show that "intimidation" isn't the issue.

Yes. Length is a big crutch to the STG genre. Most gamers don't care about replaying games. Most play once and back to trade in for a new one regardless of how much they enjoyed it. It's quite sad. DS series thankfully has both length and replay value (fun, over 5 loops, etc.). But still not enough replay it.

To me STGs like Darius series seems like a great solution to replay value for STGs. I'm sure there are more methods out there. But nobody cares about the genre anymore. So who cares... fun enough to talk about, I guess?

[Legendary Hoamaru]

Yes. Length is a big crutch to the STG genre. Most gamers don't care about replaying games. Most play once and back to trade in for a new one regardless of how much they enjoyed it. It's quite sad. DS series thankfully has both length and replay value (fun, over 5 loops, etc.). But still not enough replay it.

To me STGs like Darius series seems like a great solution to replay value for STGs. I'm sure there are more methods out there. But nobody cares about the genre anymore. So who cares... fun enough to talk about, I guess?

I thought Ginga Force did a great job too for length with the Story Mode and its difficulties alongside a grading system. It wasn't something I could get through in a day first playthrough. Qute doesn't have the household name (well...in shmups land) that Treasure and Cave have though, and it being import only also works against it.

I do hope more current and future companies give the PC market a chance for a bit more visibility alongside the consoles. They'll probably never return to the spotlight, but it'll help keep them alive.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

Demon's Souls also lets you die as much as you want without preventing you from progressing.

It's a checkpoint game. You mean to tell me there aren't STGs without checkpoints?

----> the point

you

In an RPG with save points, you can die as much as you like and reload from your save point. It's like having a savestate. The Souls games up the ante slightly by having a penalty for dying, but the penalty frankly is minor and can be negated entirely with the right items.

Shmups, checkpoints or not, force you to a "gameover, restart the game" state if you die too many times. Players don't simply have to reach each save point and learn that specific point to gradually progress through the game, they need to play the entire game from start to finish without losing all their lives. A single loop shmup can easily be 30 minutes. Double that for a looping game. Most shmups have maybe 5 extra lives; 6 mistakes and you get a gameover. You can't simply reach the final boss, savestate, and keep dying until you clear the final boss for a 1CC.

[Obscura]

Demon's Souls also lets you die as much as you want without preventing you from progressing.

It's a checkpoint game. You mean to tell me there aren't STGs without checkpoints?

----> the point

you

In an RPG with save points, you can die as much as you like and reload from your save point. It's like having a savestate. The Souls games up the ante slightly by having a penalty for dying, but the penalty frankly is minor and can be negated entirely with the right items.

Shmups, checkpoints or not, force you to a "gameover, restart the game" state if you die too many times. Players don't simply have to reach each save point and learn that specific point to gradually progress through the game, they need to play the entire game from start to finish without losing all their lives. A single loop shmup can easily be 30 minutes. Double that for a looping game. Most shmups have maybe 5 extra lives; 6 mistakes and you get a gameover. You can't simply reach the final boss, savestate, and keep dying until you clear the final boss for a 1CC.

It's been a while since I've played DeS, but IIRC, a lot of the checkpoints are about as far apart as a short-ish 1-loop clear (DaS tends to have them a bit closer).

In a shmup, as long as you're not putting quarters in an actual machine, you can game over as much as you like and try again.

[mamboFoxtrot]

Slightly off topic, but speaking of fighting games and casual/hardcore appeal, I find it weird how often companies say they're trying to get the casual audience, but they don't get rid of the really hard stuff like 360/720 joystick motions, link combos, or 300 apm chain combos that go on for 15 seconds straight. They instead do shit like repetitive super attack cutscenes, debatably-excessive revenge mechanics, or sometimes overly small/simple movesets. I'm surprised that the end result isn't just both crowds being disappointed.

(But then again, maybe they are. I do often hear people bitching about various aspects of the game as they grind that leaderboard.)

I haven't played too many STGs that try for the mass appeal, but I imagine they have the same strange tendency.

[Shepardus]

Regardless, Dark Souls and Demon's Souls structure their content much more closely to what most gamers nowadays are expecting than shmups do, Dark Souls more so than Demon's Souls. As you play the game over time, you can easily see that you're making progress through the game towards the end and/or towards various subgoals. Of course in any game you might get stuck at a particular section for a while, like I did at Ornstein & Smough on my New Game+ playthrough, but once you're past that the game's state changes to reflect this and you're not expected to defeat Ornstein & Smough every time you start up the game. In a typical shmup, on the other hand, the game's going to be exactly the same the next time you play it, and the only indication that you've gotten any closer to your goal of completing the game is your intangible personal improvement.

People like stats and some sort of persistence (just look at all the stats tracking developers put into multiplayer games nowadays), maybe shmups would be better received if they gave more tools for charting your improvement than a simple highscore table?

[Sinful]

Demon's Souls also lets you die as much as you want without preventing you from progressing.

It's a checkpoint game. You mean to tell me there aren't STGs without checkpoints?

----> the point

you

In an RPG with save points, you can die as much as you like and reload from your save point. It's like having a savestate. The Souls games up the ante slightly by having a penalty for dying, but the penalty frankly is minor and can be negated entirely with the right items.

Shmups, checkpoints or not, force you to a "gameover, restart the game" state if you die too many times. Players don't simply have to reach each save point and learn that specific point to gradually progress through the game, they need to play the entire game from start to finish without losing all their lives. A single loop shmup can easily be 30 minutes. Double that for a looping game. Most shmups have maybe 5 extra lives; 6 mistakes and you get a gameover. You can't simply reach the final boss, savestate, and keep dying until you clear the final boss for a 1CC.

Hmm. Yeah. But 1cc'ing is not most folks first goal. First is to beat the game via credit feeding if possible. Then if you like the game enough, folks naturally go for the 1cc (I did this back in the day for my fave games before I even heard of 1cc). Why most folks nowadays say STGs genre's biggest flaw is lenght.

Even for me now. A guy still new to the STG genre. I don't go in with the intention of 1cc ing every STG I play. ie. R-Type Delta. Loved it. But still only beat it via credit feeding first (still took quite some time until I unlocked unlimited creds on the second last stage). Next time I come back to it I think I'll make it my first R-Type 1cc?


But yeah. You ain't going to sell the STG genre if you expect everyone to understand 1cc from the get go. No way. It has to be fun enough for them to come back to it naturally for the 1cc.

[Squire Grooktook]

It's been a while since I've played DeS, but IIRC, a lot of the checkpoints are about as far apart as a short-ish 1-loop clear (DaS tends to have them a bit closer).

Tellingly, a lot of the more hardcore Souls fans note an inexplicable preference to Demon's Souls...

More penalty = more excitement.

[Pretas]

Slightly off topic, but speaking of fighting games and casual/hardcore appeal, I find it weird how often companies say they're trying to get the casual audience, but they don't get rid of the really hard stuff like 360/720 joystick motions, link combos, or 300 apm chain combos that go on for 15 seconds straight. They instead do shit like repetitive super attack cutscenes, debatably-excessive revenge mechanics, or sometimes overly small/simple movesets. I'm surprised that the end result isn't just both crowds being disappointed.

(But then again, maybe they are. I do often hear people bitching about various aspects of the game as they grind that leaderboard.)

Minus the 15-second combos, you just described SFIV down to the letter. A large portion of the game's community will not hesitate to express their misgivings with its design choices, but they've continued to play it year after year because everyone else is doing it, and it's the most widely and consistently supported fighter on the tournament circuit.

I haven't played too many STGs that try for the mass appeal, but I imagine they have the same strange tendency.

Modern mass-appeal STGs like Jets & Guns and Jamestown always run in the complete opposite direction, because the competitive/hardcore aspects of the genre are nowhere near as understood and respected as they are in fighting games.

[Pteriforever]

I think we should be careful what we wish for, personally. Whenever small genres suddenly go big or get returned to their former glory or whatever, it's generally not good for the veterans.

I experienced this firsthand with roguelikes, which were for decades just as niche as we are. Then, in 2011, they kind of went mainstream again, and everyone who was there beforehand hated it. The new kids didn't turn into dedicated DCSS players or anything like that; instead, they became obnoxious fanboys of a bunch of new weird shit (DoD, BoI, FTL, and so on and so on) which existing players thought were ominous and threatening to their close communities.

Basically, if shmups became popular again, I reckon we'd be overrun with hundreds of crazy people yelling "HEY EVERYONE, <insert hypothetical crappy future game> IS THE BEST THING EVER, HIGUDHSGUJDJSNKL"

[Shepardus]

Isn't that what much of the Touhou fanbase is already like anyway?

Besides, games like DCSS are still doing fine as far as I know, I don't think the rising popularity of roguelikes/"roguelites" has really hurt it or its community in any way.

[Lilium]

I'd be surprised to learn that those modern roguelikes have more fans of the games' derivative works than the games themselves. I don't think its a comparable situation. Most Touhou fans aren't actually Touhou players but I'd imagine that the fans of those games you mention actually do play them.

[JBC]

I don't really want them to become popular again. The thought seems terrible.

Over the last couple of years I've found myself embarrassed to tell people I'm a gamer, & I'm 33. I've never been that way about it until now. I use careful wording when I do, "I play old video games" (even though I play old & new). This is so they'll picture Sonic or Pac-Man or something & not lump me in with the CoD/Halo assholes.

If shmups became popular again they would be featured right alongside all the garbage that comes out today & I would hang it up. We're getting a new Raiden. We'll probably eventually get a new Gradius. We don't really need popularity for our age-old favorites to continue receiving new entries. Nor is it required for us to see a slew of indy shmups.

There's no threat of it though. There isn't much room for muscular raspy voiced bald professional killers, gratuitous sex, or 13 hours of cutscenes in the shoot-em'-up genre.

[Sinful]

I think we should be careful what we wish for, personally. Whenever small genres suddenly go big or get returned to their former glory or whatever, it's generally not good for the veterans.

Yes. Very true. I noticed this for quite some time too. Heck, videogame genre as a whole got worse with too much popularity (it was only gold when it was a gamers genre, then it got poisened when everyone and their mother started getting into it). Rock bands take a dive with more popularity, among other things in life. It's the sad way of life.

Videogame wise, I noticed the RPG/SRPG genre take a dive too with FF7/FFT releases. Gamers don't always choose the best influences, then the dev's follow with what's selling due to money, money, money + the ever harder to stay in videogame business due to the ever increase in budget.

Too many heads needed to make top of the line budget games also kills the game industry. Especially when you have to respond to the head guys which are only good for laying down the cash & telling you they know what they're talking about with zero gaming experience just because of market research (which I can't believe how BS market research is yet nobody notices still? ie. Seinfeld & South Park shows both bombed with testing audiance/market research. Yet networks still follow it religiously... outside of HBO, of course).



But all this said. We all this want another big budget STG a la Gradius V & R-Type Final (hey, R-Type Final had a great enough solution for STG replay issue).

[Skykid]

Demon's Souls is just a reaction to an industry that caters to the lowest possible skill level. It's not that surprising that they used challenge as a selling point - it was a good promotional opportunity.

Wrong. DeS was a game made to please the main guy behind it. Who believed that overcoming great challenges was it's own reward (read a few interviews with him). And he was right. He made a game he thought was good, thus it was good.

The marketing behind it at least proves that hard games can still sell. Thus I call this topic a little BS or not all true.

I agree that the topic - well not the topic, but the quote on which the topic is based - is probably BS, but I don't appreciate someone answering a statement with "wrong" and then going off on a completely unrelated point.

I was in journalism when Soul's first broke, and you better believe me when I say it could have easily gone the way of similar solid, niche games in unrepresented genres. It was very much a sleeper hit, and much credit goes to the press for actually being bold enough to play it and pay it its dues, and more importantly identify its uncommon level of challenge as a high point and encourage people to see it as such.

So yes, what you say is true (despite being part of your unrelated tangent): It is a good game, I'm sure it was made to 'please' its creator and designed around his personal preferences. But don't think for a moment that's the reason for its unlikely success: it's an exception to the rule under such circumstances. It could have just as easily been buried.

[Skyknight]

I think we should be careful what we wish for, personally. Whenever small genres suddenly go big or get returned to their former glory or whatever, it's generally not good for the veterans.

I experienced this firsthand with roguelikes, which were for decades just as niche as we are. Then, in 2011, they kind of went mainstream again, and everyone who was there beforehand hated it. The new kids didn't turn into dedicated DCSS players or anything like that; instead, they became obnoxious fanboys of a bunch of new weird shit (DoD, BoI, FTL, and so on and so on) which existing players thought were ominous and threatening to their close communities.

Basically, if shmups became popular again, I reckon we'd be overrun with hundreds of crazy people yelling "HEY EVERYONE, <insert hypothetical crappy future game> IS THE BEST THING EVER, HIGUDHSGUJDJSNKL"

You make it sound like popularity and quality are doomed to always vary inversely. Is there a particular reason for this?

Besides, I like Dredmor, NPPAngband, and Tales of Maj'Eyal alike (Stone Soup didn't really pull me in). Gaslamp itself was going for making roguelikes more accessible to the mainstream with Dredmor, much like Clockwork Empires is in part a more mainstream-accessible version of Dwarf Fortress (and before you ask, the DF community seems to be VERY happy with the endeavor). I really don't see how placing a mainstream/niche divide is any more merited than placing a casual/hardcore divide. They both keen of elitism to me.