OS Fact or Fiction: Gamers Should Remember to Have Fun

[RaychelSnr]

With sports games these days, all you ever hear about is if the game is realistic. Does Rajon Rondo have the correct headband? Is Chris Johnson's face mask the same one he wears on Sundays? Of course every game has their own issues in game play, but aren't video games supposed to be fun before everything else? Gaming is supposed to take you to a world where you can accomplish things a mere mortal could not.

So, OS writing staff, fact or fiction: Gamers need to remember how to have fun.

Read More - OS Fact or Fiction: Gamers Should Remember to Have Fun

[elementz09]

Fiction (mostly). You know that old saying "Art intimidates reality"? Well in my honest opinion, video game developers have the ability to change that to "Art is reality". Generally, the gaming industry isn't really respected on a large scale by other industries (except for the cell phone/computer industry). Gaming allows for us as gamers to live through the storyline of a knight, running back, military soldier, dancing, an angry bird (ha!), etc. I believe that sports games needs to recreate that excitement that real life sports gives us! NCAA Football 07 was great to me because of the risk I would have to deal with if I didn't suspend my players for the proper amount of time! THAT'S REAL LIFE! College Hoops 2k8 is a classic to this day simply because of it's depth. I can start off as a new coach at Tennessee State and either decide to build that school into a powerhouse or gain some notice in a big conference school like Kentucky, Duke, UCLA, etc. THAT'S REAL LIFE! NFL 2K5 was great because of the highlights at halftime and post game. Plus, as tedious as it was, setting up my weekly practice plan was really effective and it allowed me to fully be a coach. THAT'S REAL LIFE! But these examples are also reasons why these games are listed as classics! Take a note please.

[tril]

In the end the only thing developers can do is provide gamers with all types of game options. options similar to the 2k basketball series and MLB the SHOW.

when I was younger all I cared about was highlight/ almost arcde type of gameplay. I didnt care for a true sim experience.
The older I get, the more I want a more sophisticted, sim like experience.
I personally think that gaming companies for the most part have accomplished the blending of the fun factor with sim like qualities.

So far so good, cause it keeps us older gamers playing. only games I still buy are sports and thats becuase of the sim like gameplayqualties, and the management aspects of the game. If they ever got awya form this Id stop buying games.
The same can be said for shooters like Battlefield. Those games attract older gamers because of their more sophisticated game play elements.

[JerseySuave4]

I say FACT. These days everyone is a critic. They know so much information about the game before they even get their hands on it. Then Day 1 with the game it's as if they are investigators just looking for the problems with the game so they can complain. Yes technology has come a long way from where we were 20 years ago but people expect video games to be virtual reality pretty much. There is a reason they are video games and not real. There are things that happen in real life that are hard to account for in a game.

The expectations of consumers or mainly people on this site are that whatever they see on TV should be the way it is in the game. The focus is so much on reality that the fun factor is eliminated. I admit i was guilty of that. When NCAA 12 came out i jumped on the bandwagon of the game being awful because i didn't think the improvements from last year to this year were that much better but when i finally got my dynasty set up and started playing it, i had a lot of fun. So i've learned to back away from this site a little more because of all the people that complain, look for problems and try to impose their opinions on others as fact. Yes NCAA 12 has major flaws, but i'm still able to look past them and have fun because i understand it's a game.

Think about games like Tecmo Super Bowl, WWF No Mercy, Madden, etc. All those games we enjoyed and loved so many years ago had tons of flaws but we were young, technology wasn't as crazy as it is now so people looked past the flaws and just had fun. Now its all about, is this real and what flaws can i find.

[Lukin4]

Fact... best example of this can be found on this very site. Look at the bitching / moaning / nit picking threads for any of the latest versions of madden / ncaa / nba2k, and then compare that to the threads for something like college hoops 2k which has been discontinued. I blame yearly release cycles...

[thbends]

Fact: Im pretty much in tune with Caley Roark. My game time is very limited these days and I have not enjoyed my sports games like I should because I have been trying to play them like I did in my teens / twenties. Im 37... Wow, crazy to type that. Im married and have two kids. I need to stop restarting my franchise because something is wrong and just play/enjoy my games.

Someone wrote in the forums once something I have tried to live by lately.... When asked if they were going to restart their franchise now that a roster and patch were out they simply replied... "Nope. My Maddenverse is already set."

Here's to starting franchises and creating your own Maddenverse. It doesn't have to follow the NFL perfectly. Once it begins it becomes its own thing.

[stlstudios189]

My Maddenverse I love that term!!! I don't understand this whole it has to be exactly like real life stuff just watcht the NFL then. I make trades and sign free agents that make sense in my game universe and just have fun. John Smoltz pitching my Detroit Tigers into the playoffs check, my created self catching the gamewinning TD for the Cleveland Browns check, my players from CH2k8 getting created and now starting for the Knicks, Bulls and Timberwolves check.

[JerseySuave4]

Fact: Im pretty much in tune with Caley Roark. My game time is very limited these days and I have not enjoyed my sports games like I should because I have been trying to play them like I did in my teens / twenties. Im 37... Wow, crazy to type that. Im married and have two kids. I need to stop restarting my franchise because something is wrong and just play/enjoy my games.

Someone wrote in the forums once something I have tried to live by lately.... When asked if they were going to restart their franchise now that a roster and patch were out they simply replied... "Nope. My Maddenverse is already set."

Here's to starting franchises and creating your own Maddenverse. It doesn't have to follow the NFL perfectly. Once it begins it becomes its own thing.

i'm the same way, once i get the rosters the way i want them and start my franchise/dynasty thats it. I don't need to restart everytime there is a roster update. The only reason i'm restarting my NBA 2k12 Association is because the real NBA rosters will be out soon so i'd rather have this years rosters than last years.

[Qb]

I'm also creeping towards the "just enjoy the game" crowd as I attempt to squeeze a few hours of gaming time into my day. Long gone are the days of all-nighters, hours of roster editing, and digging through forums to find the latest sliders/settings/workarounds/etc to improve the game. It's not necessarily by choice, but I'm finding that if I want to enjoy gaming now, I need to let go of my old ways.

[solo killa boi]

well i'm just going to say this.... i don't like to be suckered into something, and that is exactly what both football franchises did. i'll admit i'm a graphics freak and will expect nothing less. all the flaws that ncaa fb 12 had i would had over looked if the 3d grass was throughout the entire game not the replays. i was disappointed about that. maybe they will get it right on a future console "via xbox 720 or ps4". i have to learn its not about that sometimes and just play and try to enjoy it while i can and get some air. one thing i learned is if u don't have time to play video games it will always be fun when you do play them. LET'S ALL WAKE UP!!!!!

[Retropyro]

Re: OS Fact or Fiction: Gamers Should Remember to Have Fun

Fact: Im pretty much in tune with Caley Roark. My game time is very limited these days and I have not enjoyed my sports games like I should because I have been trying to play them like I did in my teens / twenties. Im 37... Wow, crazy to type that. Im married and have two kids. I need to stop restarting my franchise because something is wrong and just play/enjoy my games.

Someone wrote in the forums once something I have tried to live by lately.... When asked if they were going to restart their franchise now that a roster and patch were out they simply replied... "Nope. My Maddenverse is already set."

Here's to starting franchises and creating your own Maddenverse. It doesn't have to follow the NFL perfectly. Once it begins it becomes its own thing.

I'll just quote this as it's exactly what I was going to say, except I got 3 kids.

[CujoMatty]

I feel in the middle. I want a game to be fun first and foremost. My biggest frustration however is buying a game and then having to wait 2 months for a patch to come out before I can have the fun I wanted.

[PFellah]

Re: OS Fact or Fiction: Gamers Should Remember to Have Fun

Fact. I think it's good to strive for realism and the closer you can get, the better. And I think the game company has some responsibility to try and make the game better each year so they're not charging $60 for a roster and uniform update. But at some point, you as the player have to throw your hands up, realize it's never TOTALLY going to get there, and enjoy a game for what it is rather than what it isn't. Maybe it's because I'm old enough to remember days when the NFLPA and the league weren't in sync, so one game would have real teams with players' numbers instead of names, and another would have real players, but the teams would be generic cities and the colors might not even match (why's Pittsburgh green again?). To say nothing of the fact that you could pretty much run certain plays and players for automatic scores every time. (Tim Smith of the Redskins the year after he won the Super Bowl MVP, sweep right... gone.) By comparison, we're in the salad days.

[tical2399]

complete and utter fiction. Sports games are supposed to mimic the real thing as accurately as possible. The stuff we put up with back in the day was ok because the systems simply could not produce even a semi accurate imitation of real life sports.

I can only speak for football games since thats all I really play. While I do go on much about guys wearing the wrong facemasks I do care that you can create a 160 o-lineman and have him manhandle Suh as the famous youtube video showed us.

I do care that 175 pound Dexter Mccluster can run over Patrick Willis about as often as 260 pound Brandon Jacobs could. I do care that 260 pound Brandon Jacobs can put together a juke/spin combo that would make Barry Sanders proud without tripping all over himself.

I expect in 2011 to have trajectory in passes. If I got a receiver wide open and the only defender is 10 yards in front of him, I should be able to lop it over him without the LB jumping like I threw the ball at a height of like 7 feet .

For those of us who watch football (seems those who voted fact dont) we hear week in and week out how certain WR/TE as matchup nightmare because they too big for the average DB to cover and too fast for the average safety. But this doesnt exist in football games. Size means nothing. You cant have your 6-4 215 pound WR wall off that 5-9 CB and out muscle him for the ball.

You can draft that rare TE with true WR speed and have him constantly shake and our move LBs and safeties in coverage. I dont know about you all but i've never seen a D-lineman try to do a move on an o-lineman and magically bounce 2-3 yards backward .

I've never seen or heard of a QB being drafted in the first round 2 years in a row by the same team. (seen it happen with Ponder in MN and Locker in Tenn) . I've never seen a team with 3 starting caliber CBs (85+) draft another CB in the first round when they had high 60s and low 70s starting at all LB spots.

Last time I checked there was offensive pass interference, defensive holding, late hits out of bounds, hands to the face, ineligible receiver down field and illegal shift penalties. I'm also sure teams can send more than one person in motion.

I don't know if you've fact voters know, but sometimes teams go out of their way to draft local players to get the fans in the seats, but we cant do that cause there is not even an owner mode. I can go on an one. The truth the game is not for those who actually care about football, its for those who want something quick and disposable.

I think this attitude is best shown during one of the loading screen. It talks about legends or something and it says "every wonder what it would be like to play as Barry Sanders.

That shows me that they make this game for those who are young and don't know/care about football, cause of us who do played as Barry for years back when we were putting madden on the map back in the late 80s and 90s.

[SHAKYR]

I hate when so-called sports fans settle for anything a game company puts out. It hurts the betterment of a company trying harder to capture the sport they are try to produce.
Companies should put sim or realistic on their games if they don't want their customers to complain able how realistic it is and what's wrong in it's production.
Fun for a sports fan (mostly hardcore) is enjoying the game realistically and trying to create the outcomes you want. Customization and detailed options are the future of sports and gaming in general.