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Old 09-14-2005, 02:00 PM   #1
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Default Fahrenheit review in PC Zone

The (excellent) english mag PC Zone reviewed fahrenheit, rewarding it 90%, also stating "It's official: Adventure games live again!". The review itself is quite comprehensive and I suggest everybody should have a look.
PC Zone is one of the few mainstream PC mags that still shows interest in adventure games, treating them with respect. I was very happy to see such a high score and I must admit that -possibly- Fahrenheit may be a turning point for the whole adventure game genre. And I truly hope so. The demo was amazing and I can't wait for the original game to be released. Let's all hope that other mainstream mags treat the game in such a rewarding way, showing the whole world, and especially the younger gamers, that adventure games do not only have a past, but a very bright future too. I know that the game is quite controversial among the adventure game community, but the truth is that everybody has high hopes for this one.
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Old 09-14-2005, 02:15 PM   #2
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Quote:
Originally Posted by NikolasFigaro
PC Zone is one of the few mainstream PC mags that still shows interest in adventure games, treating them with respect.
So it's adventures vs. the rest of the world again?

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I was very happy to see such a high score and I must admit that -possibly- Fahrenheit may be a turning point for the whole adventure game genre.
If Fahrenheit sells and more adventure games decide to follow its design principles or just go experimenting on their own, then maybe. But if anyone thinks Fahrenheit's possible success means people will all of a sudden go crazy for traditional adventures, you're in for a big surprise.
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Old 09-14-2005, 02:47 PM   #3
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Show me a traditional adventure and I'll show you a three-legged hippo with one eye and a penchant for ballet.
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Old 09-14-2005, 02:54 PM   #4
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It's not about adventures vs the world (again). It's simply nice to see a major magazine treat adventures in a senseful and respectful manner, since the majority of mags consider the adventure genre to be "dead", only good for a few laughs now and then. So I guess that you think that it's better to go on reading about how adventures are dead etc, instead of recognizing a different and more positive approach.

Like it or not, it's extremely unlikely we are going to see any good traditional adventure games in the future (by the way, please define the term "adventure game" to me, cause maybe I got it all wrong...). Adventure games will simply evolve, because everything else does. The point is that Fahrenheit might be a stimulator for a lot of people who ignore adventure games. And if it sells well, who knows, maybe major publishers will look at upcoming productions with a different point of view.

Anyway, I truly believe that adventure gamers should stop bitchin and complaining about everything, and try -for once- to look at the brighter side of things.
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Old 09-14-2005, 03:59 PM   #5
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Originally Posted by NikolasFigaro
I know that the game is quite controversial among the adventure game community
The whole idea of a game being "controversial" for its gameplay is absurd to me. OK, maybe it it's Super Mario done as a FPS, I could see the point. But what gives people the idea that Fahrenheit has a responsibility to conform to any particular type of gameplay? The game will either be good or bad. It will either be an adventure or something else. We can argue about both. But unless you think every single computer game released should be a 2D, point and click "Quest for Monkey Island," I don't see why there should be controversy over Fahrenheit.
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Old 09-14-2005, 08:40 PM   #6
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Originally Posted by squarejawhero
Show me a traditional adventure and I'll show you a three-legged hippo with one eye and a penchant for ballet.
You know perfectly well what I meant.
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Old 09-14-2005, 08:58 PM   #7
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Show me a traditional adventure and I'll show you a three-legged hippo with one eye and a penchant for ballet.
I might pay good money to see one of those.
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Old 09-14-2005, 09:24 PM   #8
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Originally Posted by Snarky
The whole idea of a game being "controversial" for its gameplay is absurd to me. OK, maybe it it's Super Mario done as a FPS, I could see the point.
I'm confused now. Do you mean as a pure, classic and traditional FPS (get blue keycard, kill baddies, proceed to level exit at 25 fps and a 320 x 200 resolution)?

...
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Old 09-14-2005, 09:41 PM   #9
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Choice quotes from the review:

Quote:
2 Sep 05 So is it a brave new chapter in the lost art of interactive storytelling? An amalgam of filmmaking and gaming in a single package? Is David Cage the games industry's answer to Quentin Tarantino? Are the annual Oscars going to have to open a new category for Best Virtual Screenplay In A Non-First-Person Shooter? And will it lead to games finally being given proper, gravelly-voiced, "In a world..." trailers, red carpet opening night premieres at prestige branches of Game or HMV, and developers being hounded by paparazzi as they revel in their new-found fame and fortune by snorting huge lines of cocaine from penthouse hotel suites packed to the gills with girls and agents?
How often will you hear a cocaine reference when talking about adventure games?

Quote:
DARK DAYS
The adventure game market died a horrible death years ago, trampled to a bloody pulp in the mad rush towards FPS nirvana. If you weren't carrying an oversized gun and mowing down waves of bad guys like an '80s era Arnie in the throes of a heavy LSD-inspired panic attack, you might as well forget your chances at retail, my friends. LucasArts learnt the lesson and learnt it well, entering a grim, yet profitable era of Star Wars exploitation instead.
That seems awfully grim....

Quote:
RHYTHM METHOD
Incredibly, Cage has taken an almost unprecedented step in game character development by exploring each of the main characters' personal lives and private flaws. Hence we have playable domestic arguments, phobias about the dark and heights, tender love scenes, exploration of depression and anxiety, all interactive (even the sex!) and all running alongside the main plot. In that sense alone, Cage is pulling off his goal of creating a near-film quality emotional experience that genuinely makes you care about the fate of these people as they grow and change. A staggering achievement considering that most Hollywood scriptwriters these days seem incapable of producing anything beyond mere ciphers to tie their over-blown action sequences around. For once it seems as though games are maturing while films are going backwards. Hoorah for us!
I'll let the movie aficionados tackle that one...
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Old 09-15-2005, 12:08 AM   #10
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I wonder how you tackle his tackle?
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Old 09-15-2005, 01:32 AM   #11
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Snarky
The whole idea of a game being "controversial" for its gameplay is absurd to me. OK, maybe it it's Super Mario done as a FPS, I could see the point. But what gives people the idea that Fahrenheit has a responsibility to conform to any particular type of gameplay? The game will either be good or bad. It will either be an adventure or something else. We can argue about both. But unless you think every single computer game released should be a 2D, point and click "Quest for Monkey Island," I don't see why there should be controversy over Fahrenheit.
The controversy is about whether it's an adventure game or not, I think.
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Old 09-15-2005, 01:42 AM   #12
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It's say Still Life has generated more controversy here than Fahrenheit...
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Old 09-15-2005, 01:51 AM   #13
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Kolorabi
It's say Still Life has generated more controversy here than Fahrenheit...
Yeah, but in Still Life's case it's more the usual "It sucks!" "No, it's great!" controversy.
In Fahrenheit it's a matter of defining the genre... like the Dreamfall Controversy (TM).
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Old 09-15-2005, 02:11 AM   #14
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OK, Ninth, so what IS an adventure game?

Is it Space Quest 3, where action sequences are the norm and blend with the gameplay?

Is it Bad Mojo, which pretty much remains resolutely undefinable?

Is it Farenheit, which uses specifically limited action as well as sharply integrated "puzzles" to tell a story?

Is it Syberia, where all you do is point and click basic conversations and easy puzzles to continue a narrative?

Is it Uru, where you have to directly control the avatar around the landscape?

Is it Voyage, which includes friendly timed sequences as well as an innovative and rarely-before-seen approach to inventory?

Is it Sam n' Max, with its crazed, haphazard approach to fun gameplay?

Is it Another Code, which allows direct control interaction with the ingame objects to an unprecedented extent in order to solve puzzles?

The only reason there are words like "traditional" is because a bunch of stuffed shirts decided to box in the genre into a tight space, where only games like TLJ, Sherlock or Schizm can exist. Anything else that deviates from that automatically becomes "something else", therefore "not an adventure game", when in all truth adventure games have ALWAYS had action in to various degrees without them becoming an "action/console adventure". It's all to do with comfort zones and less to do with any historically accurate approach. "Traditional" is used to describe what I now see as "the dark ages" of adventures between 2000 and 2004, where only few games were worth playing and the rest just bounced around in the comfy little box people built for them.

Now the genre is expanding, the new "traditionalists" are gripping tightly onto their increasingly daft mode of expression and everyone else is enjoying the newer, wide range of gaming offered by extensions into 3D and even *shock horror* action. The "inaction" subgenre is still important - don't get me wrong, but they're not the only adventures out there and shouldn't be seen as the sole core of what makes the genre.

The way I see it, there are various types of adventures -

new traditional
non-conformist
point and click
direct control
action/console adventures
inventory based
puzzle based
narrative based

blah blah blah and on and on... There IS no traditional adventure game. There's not really a single one anyone can all come together and say "this represents our genre solely" and base it all around that, because there's so many different games within it over the years.

I think it's time we let go of this increasingly outmoded approach to labelling these games and get on enjoying them. Stop restricting everything to a teensy little box that scared AG'ers decided to put together in 1999 when they realised AG's were falling to other genres in terms of success. The adventure is back in a bigger way than it has been since 1999, let's accept it and move on.

Final note - Farenheit DOESN'T redefine the genre, as the definition in the "traditional" sense had very little concrete basis to start with.
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Old 09-15-2005, 02:16 AM   #15
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ninth
Yeah, but in Still Life's case it's more the usual "It sucks!" "No, it's great!" controversy.
I think the controversy surrounding Still Life has more to do with it's extreme linearity and whether that's a good thing or not.
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Old 09-15-2005, 04:04 AM   #16
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Kolorabi
I think the controversy surrounding Still Life has more to do with it's extreme linearity and whether that's a good thing or not.
I don't think so, because almost all ancient AGs were extremely linear, and no one complains about it. (Grim Fandango)
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Old 09-15-2005, 04:10 AM   #17
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Quote:
Originally Posted by squarejawhero
OK, Ninth, so what IS an adventure game?
Traditional in most case mean 3rd person point and click inventory based games, like the Lucas Arts or Sierra games.
Or course, it's not an accurate definition, but that's (I think) what people mean when they say it.

And I can't define what an AG is, I just know when a game is not one. (it's subjective, but it's a wide-spread subjectivity, except in some extreme cases, so I can live with it)
In the case of Fahrenheit's demo, it feels like an AG to me.

Still, that's where the controversy is, and I can understand why.
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Old 09-15-2005, 04:16 AM   #18
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Kolorabi
I think the controversy surrounding Still Life has more to do with it's extreme linearity and whether that's a good thing or not.
Not to meantion its ending...
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Old 09-15-2005, 04:22 AM   #19
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I can see there is quite a debate going on here...That's not the reason I posted the thread, but anyway... Every opinion is respected and useful.

Personally speaking, I am quite fed up with the whole "traditional adventure" thing going on. I've been playing adventures for over 17 years and I trully believe that the genre is simply evolving, just like every other aspect in modern life. There's nothing wrong with that, and even if there is, we can't change it. If some people still believe that adventures are all about 2d graphics and point n click, well, I'm sorry, but you will have to continue playing older classics then, and therefore contribute to the whole "adventure games are dead" trend. If we, the adventure gamers, can't be open minded and accept a few changes, then we shouldn't except other people to be either.

I believe that a good adventure game is like a good book. It has to have an intruiging story to say, with a starting, a middle and an end. It has to "suck me in", offering a very personal and interesting experience. If a game can offer me that, I shall surely play it. And that's why I prefer adventure games to any other genre. Because they offer an intruiging narrative, and also give me the opportunity to try out my mental skills. From what I've seen, Fahrenheit WILL offer an interesting story. That's the reason I'm going to play it. If it's going to have 3d graphics and if I will have to use a gamepad, for example, it's fine by me. I'm surely NOT going to ruin a rich gameplaying experience for me, just because some blokes, who consider themselves the holy protectors of the adventure genre, think that this game is not a "true" adventure game. Wake up guys please.

And, possibly, this game may drive other gamers, younger, who haven't experienced some of the older classics, to explore the adventure game genre. That can't be bad. Sure, I agree, Fahrenheit will NOT define the genre. But it can give it a really good boost.
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Old 09-15-2005, 04:34 AM   #20
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Quote:
Originally Posted by NikolasFigaro
I can see there is quite a debate going on here...That's not the reason I posted the thread, but anyway... Every opinion is respected and useful.

Personally speaking, I am quite fed up with the whole "traditional adventure" thing going on. I've been playing adventures for over 17 years and I trully believe that the genre is simply evolving, just like every other aspect in modern life. There's nothing wrong with that, and even if there is, we can't change it. If some people still believe that adventures are all about 2d graphics and point n click, well, I'm sorry, but you will have to continue playing older classics then, and therefore contribute to the whole "adventure games are dead" trend. If we, the adventure gamers, can't be open minded and accept a few changes, then we shouldn't except other people to be either.

I believe that a good adventure game is like a good book. It has to have an intruiging story to say, with a starting, a middle and an end. It has to "suck me in", offering a very personal and interesting experience. If a game can offer me that, I shall surely play it. And that's why I prefer adventure games to any other genre. Because they offer an intruiging narrative, and also give me the opportunity to try out my mental skills. From what I've seen, Fahrenheit WILL offer an interesting story. That's the reason I'm going to play it. If it's going to have 3d graphics and if I will have to use a gamepad, for example, it's fine by me. I'm surely NOT going to ruin a rich gameplaying experience for me, just because some blokes, who consider themselves the holy protectors of the adventure genre, think that this game is not a "true" adventure game. Wake up guys please.

And, possibly, this game may drive other gamers, younger, who haven't experienced some of the older classics, to explore the adventure game genre. That can't be bad. Sure, I agree, Fahrenheit will NOT define the genre. But it can give it a really good boost.
But see, the thing is that while I do believe that evolution is necessery, I also don't see the harm in continuing to product some old-school adventure games, only up-to-date, the way Kheops or Microids are (were ) doing. Both can co-exist, and I think both need to, to give the genre a real chance a survival. Else it will just slowly drift away...

Which leads me to fight the "traditional" fight here, but would also make me a part of the "evolution" side at a site like Just Adventure.
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