Ever played a game other people would not?

Post Reply New Topic

I'm not keen on playing it. I'm just saying if I had the chance to I would try it out to see what it's like. I don't like rape in real life the same as I don't like murder that I've done thousands of times in Grand Theft Auto.

Feh, having played alot of Just Cause 2, I dont really see it that way. As far as I was concerned, JC2's sandbox wasnt about doing stuff in different ways, it seemed more about exploring and getting around in different ways. A very different concept. The tow thing never seemed all that useful; you could tow one vehicle with another, but that got really same-y really fast, since it was only one single concept merely repeated over and over again. There werent different ways for vehicles to interact much aside from that, and none of them actually involved challenge, so they were just as much the same to each other as Goat Simulator's many ways of headbutting things. I dunno where you get the "engineer" bit with that, as I always found the towing bit easy and without much necessary thought. Ya latch one onto the other, and one of them pulls it. And being that JC2 actually had a goal in mind and such, having a function like that which was not of much practical use diminished it quite a bit. I ended up never really using it myself all that much, found it kinda dull. Might strap enemies to those rocket things, but it seemed silly when there were usually other foes around, and all I REALLY had to do was just get close and wallop them, which was somehow more fun. And strapping cars or whatever to planes just seemed like alot of time spent (and I have zero patience) when I could have been exploring. The game to me just wasnt about messing with different objects and whatnot. Sometimes you shot something explosive, which would.... explode, and that's about it. That's about as much creative interaction with the world as I ever found. To me it was all about movement and transportation. And shooting jerks. Other than that, it never seemed any more of a "sandbox" than something like GTA (which I loathe). Just a huge world to leap and fly around in, which made up for a lack of interacting with stuff.

In other words, not really any more complex. It simply had a much larger area, and jerks to shoot, but less "possible actions" in each area aside from shooting jerks and grabbing collectibles. And while I enjoyed the combat aspect, shooting jerks was still EXTREMELY repetitive.

And hell, I can yank cars into the sky in Goat Simulator, just not in exactly the same way.

Frankly, pretty much ALL sandbox games have the childish and vapid qualities. It's rare that one ever exists where you can do truly complicated things in it.... mostly, it's just exploding things, exploding things, maybe a bit of exploration, and then you shoot some dudes, and then you explode things. Possibly some more dude shooting afterwards.

I loved the hell outta JC2 and have played it to death (console version, sigh... really must just get it on Steam so I need not put up with the PS3), but I'm not going to say that I think it has any true depth, because I'd be lying if I did. I dont see many sandbox games that do. And that's the thing about them: They dont NEED it. The sandboxy elements are ALWAYS shallow and mindless and childish and repetitive. Always knocking stuff about, launching things around, and causing explosions. What matters though is wether they're fun or not. Which'll depend entirely on the player. I dont get bored with Goat Simulator easily, but something like GTA is a cure for insomnia. Same goes for almost all of that sort of game... JC2 was the one exception. I cant think of any others. Still though, I can understand why others might like that sort... it's easy to grasp that much. I'll stick with the goats though, methinks.

I think we both have very different ways of approaching sandbox games, as I truly find nothing inherently fun about Goat Simulator, especially when compared to games that allow you to go far more in depth with their "simulations". Like if I wanted to smash stuff and mess with ragdolls, I would play GMod; if I wanted to blow stuff up and mess with vehicles, I would play GTA V or Just Cause 2; and if I wanted to strap impractical rockets onto something, I would play Kerbal Space Program. I think the key ingredient in those games (GMod not included because it's *quite* different than all of them) that raises them above something like Goat Simulator is the fact that it takes work and time to experiment instead of being supremely un-challenging and ultimately vacuous. Also, you have to give them some credit for adding missions and goals and progression to offer a more complete and more compelling experience.

I suppose I'll just end this by pointing out that perhaps the most stark comparison there is to make is between Kerbal Space Program and Goat Sim. They are almost the inverse to each other. Kerbal Space Program is one of my favorite sandbox games, period, and why? Because it is very, very hard to do anything meaningful in that game. I've put 220 hours into that game with no regrets and I haven't even traveled beyond the planets adjacent to the home planet. It took large amounts planning (I don't actually like plans, but ship design counts as planning, right?) and patience and experience to do even that. Every part of that game is a learning experience and Goat Sim could not be more different.

Being an achievement whore, I will admit that I have played Hannah Montana: The Movie Game on the 360 for the easy gamerscore on one of my previous gamertags.

Why..... why would you put yourself through such a horrible ordeal such as that?

Why..... why would you put yourself through such a horrible ordeal such as that?

I'm never, ever going to understand why anyone goes after those damn Gamerscore points.


Now, I can understand why someone would play something like a shmup purely for score, as I do that myself. It's purely skill-based, as you simply cannot reach a high score if your skill level is too low, and there's usually LOTS of difficulty and complications and whatever.

But Gamerscore? It's like grinding in an RPG.... no skill necessary. Plop a hyper-easy game in, go through it, and bam, you have points. Rinse and repeat, probably while spending downright stupid amounts of real money on games you would never, ever otherwise touch. All to grind.

Yeah, I just dont get it. ....dont really WANT to get it, either.

You get money off XBL purchases based on how much Gamerscore you have.
It's not a huge discount, but still... better than a kick up the arse !


In many ways, and for many people, chasing Gamerscore is no different from chasing after higher scores in a shoot em up.
It can encourage you to play games which you like in new and different ways, or to improve skill in order to play at a higher difficulty level.