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Have Kojima's games improved/declined over the years?

Posted: Sat Dec 09, 2006 10:21 pm
by Missing
Knowing that everyone here is a fan of Kojima's work, I'd like to get a collective opinion on what you all feel about his most recent games (Metal Gear Solid 2 / Metal Gear Solid 3 / Boktai franchise) and whether he's been steadily improving in the areas of innovation and storytelling. Now I know many fans of Snatcher and Policenauts seem to feel his storytelling has declined since he's been doing all the Metal Gear sequels -- would you say that's the case, or is it simply that expectations are now too high to meet demand? As for innovation, Kojima has always seemed to want to push the limitations of what games are capable of doing, and though he hasn't had much opportunity to do so recently, the Boktai franchise does stand as prime example of his kind of radical thinking. But is gameplay sacrificed for innovation? If the gimmick didn't exist, would Boktai even be noticed? Should games be relying on these kinds of ideas to generate publicity and hype, or is any innovation -- no matter how successfully implemented -- a step in the right direction regardless of its faults? And finally, when you look forward to playing a new Kojima game (forget Metal Gear Solid; imagine something completely different), do you more anticipate the story or the gameplay?

Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2006 4:42 am
by Henry Spencer
The story definitely is the one thing I love most about Kojima's works. I do think however, that his writing skills have indeed deflated as of late. Still, MGS3 is a very good 'game', but not a very good 'experience' if you see what I mean...

Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2006 9:00 am
by 87th
To honest, I don't think Kojima's been able to touch the type of quality he was producing in the ninties, yet (MG2, Snatcher CD ROMantic, Policenauts, MGS, MGS: Integral). I'm very optomistic about MGS4, though.

Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2006 2:09 pm
by Henry Spencer
It looks like to me, he is returning to his roots; for instance that huge Snatcher reference and the darker storyline (in comparison to MGS3's rather light affair).

Posted: Sun Dec 17, 2006 10:59 pm
by Missing
In light of all I now know about Portable Ops, I can only assume Kojima has truly gone off the deep-end. There is simply no excusing all his crazily-convoluted plot twists at this point. Does he honestly think any of this makes for a convincing or engaging narrative? Even if he enjoys just making shit up on the fly, you'd think given how he always wants to do right by his fans, that'd he put more consideration into how they feel about all of this. Volgin's pre-planned double-cross? Sokolov surviving? This is all becoming an insult to anyone who respected the intelligence and -- by Kojima's standards -- minimalism of MGS1, Snatcher, or Policenauts. Maybe that can be attributed to his giving more attention to gameplay now, and less to writing. Maybe having gotten older has softened his touch (even though his stories have always been rather soft). Or maybe Kojima hadn't yet become full of himself and his creations at the time of MGS1. Whatever the reason, I'd have a hard time arguing in favor of anything he's created recently, beyond calling them anything more than good games. He's made it perfectly clear that whatever future ideas he has in store for the Metal Gear franchise, they'll be explained in some of the most asinine ways possible.

Posted: Sun Dec 17, 2006 11:11 pm
by Marc
I agree; I think he's reaching now. That's why I like the self-contained worlds of Snatcher and Policenauts.

Posted: Sun Dec 17, 2006 11:40 pm
by Modnar
With the direction Kojima has been going, I think I can safely say that playing Policenauts in english will top anything he will be able to dish out.

In some way I hope im wrong...I think

Posted: Mon Dec 18, 2006 9:58 am
by Henry Spencer
Modnar wrote:With the direction Kojima has been going, I think I can safely say that playing Policenauts in english will top anything he will be able to dish out.

In some way I hope im wrong...I think
Could not agree more with you there!

Posted: Thu Dec 21, 2006 10:19 pm
by Marc
Henry Spencer wrote:
Modnar wrote:With the direction Kojima has been going, I think I can safely say that playing Policenauts in english will top anything he will be able to dish out.

In some way I hope im wrong...I think
Could not agree more with you there!
Only problem with a port to the PSP or DS as I see it is the fact that Sony requires ports have at least 30% new content, IIRC, while if Snatcher or Policenauts (or both) were ported to the DS, one screen would be blank the entire time; I don't know what happens in that situation. I see no way they could adapt the games for two screens. There's always a port to a console, maybe, or as extras with MGS4's updated version, if there is one.

Posted: Thu Dec 21, 2006 10:25 pm
by Modnar
no no no no...I do not want a port in any way shape or form, Im just waiting for you guys to finish. It just feels as if ports kill the originals(at least the new ones)...tales of phantasia, final fantasy, tales of destiny, suikoden...I say leave them in the pass as the gods they are.

Posted: Fri Dec 22, 2006 8:41 am
by Henry Spencer
^ Twin Snakes anybody? (Meaning I agree).

Posted: Fri Dec 22, 2006 8:45 am
by 87th
Modnar wrote:no no no no...I do not want a port in any way shape or form, Im just waiting for you guys to finish. It just feels as if ports kill the originals(at least the new ones)...tales of phantasia, final fantasy, tales of destiny, suikoden...I say leave them in the pass as the gods they are.
Well, Snatcher and Policenauts have already been ported many times, adding and removing scenes and features. The most feature-filled versions (Mega CD and Saturn) also seem to be the most popular (neither of them are early versions of the games). It seems that it ports can work... sometimes.

Posted: Fri Dec 22, 2006 11:40 am
by Henry Spencer
In those days they could, but it is nowadays we have developers who think non stop action is only what matters. Think about it, look at the remake of MGS; it was more like The Matrix than MGS and that was recent. The only port of a game I can safely say was good was the RE1 for the Cube. That is it really.

Posted: Fri Dec 22, 2006 1:00 pm
by Marc
87th wrote:
Modnar wrote:no no no no...I do not want a port in any way shape or form, Im just waiting for you guys to finish. It just feels as if ports kill the originals(at least the new ones)...tales of phantasia, final fantasy, tales of destiny, suikoden...I say leave them in the pass as the gods they are.
Well, Snatcher and Policenauts have already been ported many times, adding and removing scenes and features. The most feature-filled versions (Mega CD and Saturn) also seem to be the most popular (neither of them are early versions of the games). It seems that it ports can work... sometimes.
I think when he talks about a port, he means going back to a game years and years later. Kojima worked on the different versions of Policenauts back to back, so they're slightly different from ports like Final Fantasy Tactics to the PSP, or turning MGS into TTS. You might say the Policenauts versions are closer to conversions, if it's possible to make such a distinction.

Snatcher is a little different, but there wasn't that much time between the versions he worked on, and he said the team had always wanted to "finish" the game. But the PS and Saturn versions, I think those are more like ports in the traditional sense. Kojima wasn't involved with them in any way, either.