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Retro FPS Renaissance

Your favourite throwback shooter so far?

  • Ion Fury

    Votes: 88 38.1%
  • Amid Evil

    Votes: 17 7.4%
  • Dusk

    Votes: 59 25.5%
  • Wrath: Aeon of Ruin

    Votes: 11 4.8%
  • Prodeus

    Votes: 56 24.2%

  • Total voters
    231

Pejo

Gold Member
Raven have always been overrated. Their best games are Black Ops and Singularity, neither of which are top 50 nevermind too 10 😂

I liked Singularity for what it was but it had plenty of issues. Most publishers aren’t taking risks with medium budget shooters anymore. If a game doesn’t have multiplayer, isn’t open world, or can’t be monetized further, they’re not interested.
Sadly everything you said is true. I give indie devs another 5-7 years before they largely hit PS3 fidelity, so maybe I'll get what I'm looking for when that happens.
 
That’s nice and all, but calling retro-style shooters an FPS renaissance is an overreach IMO. Until about 2010 FPS games were the pinnacle of the industry when almost every new game in the genre pushed the tech forwards and one upped each other in every sense. If only that came back… that’s what I would call a renaissance.
 

simpatico

Member
I agree. But also kinda disagree. There's a lot cool stuff coming out, yes. But on the other hand you have:

Halo: Infinite, which was mediocre,
No new Unreal game,
No Titanfall 3,
No Half-Life 3,
Marathon being turned into a shitty PVP extraction shooter,
Monolith Productions being forced to shit out some capeshit game for DC/WB instead of making a cool FPS,
Rainbow Six having been turned into a multiplayer shooter.
AAA FPS games are never coming back. We might get a release from iD every 5 years, and an AA game might slip through the cracks, but I've given up hope. Good SP FPS games are toxic by design, so no multi million dollar pub is ever going to greenlight one (outside of iD). Analyze late 90s early 00s games, and you'll find glorious male toxicity lovingly added at every step of development. If Sherry from HR can't play a game, it's probably not going to get made.
 

Hudo

Member
AAA FPS games are never coming back. We might get a release from iD every 5 years, and an AA game might slip through the cracks, but I've given up hope. Good SP FPS games are toxic by design, so no multi million dollar pub is ever going to greenlight one (outside of iD). Analyze late 90s early 00s games, and you'll find glorious male toxicity lovingly added at every step of development. If Sherry from HR can't play a game, it's probably not going to get made.
Well, then they should fucking stay dead if Sherry is the yard stick. This is depressing...
 

anthraticus

Banned
"Boomer Shooter" is such a fucking shit name. I'd take Boomstick Shooter, I'd even take Boom Boom Shooter. But "Boomer Shooter" is so ridiculously shit.

"Retro Shooter" makes it sound like a renaissance of a gameplay design philosophy rather than some mockable gimmick that a 15 year old on Twitter or Reddit came up with because they only grew up with Call of Duty 9.
How about just.. classic FPS ?

Boomer shooter is a shitty name and sounds like it was made up by some young kids who don't even know that boomers were like my dads age (and I'm about to be 50) so yea, 90s games doesn't really line up with that age group..lol

So it doesn't even make sense AND it sounds dumb.
 
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rofif

Can’t Git Gud
Yea, prob the only ones making fun FPS these days.
yea. These are good games but never as good as quake, doom, half life and other games they copycat. I rarely find these fun to play honestly.
We don't have games like half-life2, halo3, killzone, resistance and so on.
Aside from Doom Eternal. we had that
 

anthraticus

Banned
We don't have games like half-life2, halo3, killzone, resistance and so on.
Aside from Doom Eternal. we had that
Well I'm not a fan of those games, so we def have very different tastes and are looking at it from pretty different perspectives, I would say.

PS3/360 and the rise of AAA is the absolute worst time in gaming for me. Thank god the indies gave us some relief from that total horseshit period of gaming where everybody sold out and everything was dumbed down to high heavens.

Surprised that you would like Resistance or Killzone oand not something like DUSK, say....if your a fan of Quake 1. Doesn't make much sense.
 
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StueyDuck

Member
I don't see any timesplitters games...

More like an fps reLamessance, wake me up when fps gets good again

(I'm joking I love old school twitch shooters but having 100 of them at one time is a bit much, wish we had more varied fps games)
 

Apocryphon

Member
I don't see any timesplitters games...

More like an fps reLamessance, wake me up when fps gets good again

(I'm joking I love old school twitch shooters but having 100 of them at one time is a bit much, wish we had more varied fps games)






There are some, but not enough.

I don’t know how the RoboCop game will turn out but Terminator Resistance was actually a good game too.

 

StueyDuck

Member






There are some, but not enough.

I don’t know how the RoboCop game will turn out but Terminator Resistance was actually a good game too.


I am very excited for agent 64. Void bastards was fine but got a little stale quickly but as for the others I'll check them out.
 
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StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
Game makers realized gamers will funnel only to a handful of AAA kinds of FPS. So no point trying to make a COD or Fortnite clone.

So best alternative is to make games that looks like it came from 1996 and sell them for $15 hoping all the 50 year old gamers go back in time.
 
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Apocryphon

Member
Game makers realized gamers will funnel only to a handful of AAA kinds of FPS. So no point trying to make a COD or Fortnite clone.

So best alternative is to make games that looks like it came from 1996 and sell them for $15 hoping all the 50 year old gamers go back in time.
There are a bunch of reasons. Games without online components or the ability to monetize don’t interest major publishers, but also huge teams making design decisions by committee has led to the likes of Halo Infinite. Indie games have more singular vision, the likes of which you used to see in the genre before the big publishers started acquiring everybody.

Honestly, I’m no longer interested in being fed remixed Assassins Creed drivel or the next instalments of Call of Duty and Battlefield. They launch in broken states, are monetized through the nose, and cater to whatever the popular woke trope is that quarter. Games like Ion Fury or Amid Evil, where you can feel the passion poured into them by the small dev teams, that don’t charge you $80, require 100gb day one patches, or feature adds in the title screen for Fortnite-esque garbage skins… yeah, I’m going to support those hard.

There are plenty of great games to play in other genres, but AAA single player fps games are literally being propped up by id and Machine Games. The indie fps genre is necessary in my opinion.
 

Mobilemofo

Member
It's nice to have some old school shooters updated, makes a change from the " there's no sub surface scattering on his penis, or ray tracing!!! Fuck this shit!!??" Crowd.
 

Mobilemofo

Member
I don't see any timesplitters games...

More like an fps reLamessance, wake me up when fps gets good again

(I'm joking I love old school twitch shooters but having 100 of them at one time is a bit much, wish we had more varied fps games)
Timesplitters is a hidden game in Homefront 2. I bought it just for that. 😄 Homefront 2 itself is severely average.
 
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StueyDuck

Member
Timesplitters is a hidden game in Homefront 2. I bought it just for that. 😄 Homefront 2 itself is severely average.
Yeah I did the same , but at the time if wasn't the full unlock code and just did the first two levels and couldn't be arsed to go back cause of how bland that game was haha.

I rather emulate, still have to and future perfect on PS2 so just pop the disc's in these days and its a way better experience haha.

Next up co-op and parsec
 

Mobilemofo

Member
Yeah I did the same , but at the time if wasn't the full unlock code and just did the first two levels and couldn't be arsed to go back cause of how bland that game was haha.

I rather emulate, still have to and future perfect on PS2 so just pop the disc's in these days and its a way better experience haha.

Next up co-op and parsec
That's entirely reasonable. 👍
 

Ivan

Member
There are a bunch of reasons. Games without online components or the ability to monetize don’t interest major publishers, but also huge teams making design decisions by committee has led to the likes of Halo Infinite. Indie games have more singular vision, the likes of which you used to see in the genre before the big publishers started acquiring everybody.

Honestly, I’m no longer interested in being fed remixed Assassins Creed drivel or the next instalments of Call of Duty and Battlefield. They launch in broken states, are monetized through the nose, and cater to whatever the popular woke trope is that quarter. Games like Ion Fury or Amid Evil, where you can feel the passion poured into them by the small dev teams, that don’t charge you $80, require 100gb day one patches, or feature adds in the title screen for Fortnite-esque garbage skins… yeah, I’m going to support those hard.

There are plenty of great games to play in other genres, but AAA single player fps games are literally being propped up by id and Machine Games. The indie fps genre is necessary in my opinion.
That's all nice, but is that what you really look forward to as a gamer? Do games like Amid Evil or Dusk excite you? I don't think so. It's great that they exist and they are fun to play, but they are a different world as an experience when compared to something truly groundbreaking we used to get.

Indie approach works much better in different areas like music for example. You can offer "AAA" quality :D without compromises, you just cater to a different audience. But you can't make an indie movie like Terminator 2. I think it's the same with gaming industry.

Indie approach sounds much healthier, of course. That AAA bullshit we hear about is pure evil sometimes. But you just CAN'T do some things with few people and without money today. So...I'guess we'll have to wait for different times.

All the games listed here are cool games, nothing wrong with them. But I don't think you'll be talking about them in a few years. Just a quick look at Quake 2 remaster made me realize what we were getting back in the day, a true pc focused fps games made for mouse and keyboard, pushing tech to new heights. And every famous FPS did that in a certain way, we all have our favourites.

Kids who grew up with Half-life, Quake, Unreal are in their 30s/40s now. Where are new John Carmacks and Gabe Newells of this industry? We should be getting something completely new and groundbreaking from new generation of developers, but we're not. Things have changed way too much and it really bugs me when someone says we're in golden age, renaissance or anything similar.
 
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Apocryphon

Member
That's all nice, but is that what you really look forward to as a gamer? Do games like Amid Evil or Dusk excite you? I don't think so. It's great that they exist and they are fun to play, but they are a different world as an experience when compared to something truly groundbreaking we used to get.

Indie approach works much better in different areas like music for example. You can offer "AAA" quality :D without compromises, you just cater to a different audience. But you can't make an indie movie like Terminator 2. I think it's the same with gaming industry.

Indie approach sounds much healthier, of course. That AAA bullshit we hear about is pure evil sometimes. But you just CAN'T do some things with few people and without money today. So...I'guess we'll have to wait for different times.

All the games listed here are cool games, nothing wrong with them. But I don't think you'll be talking about them in a few years. Just a quick look at Quake 2 remaster made me realize what we were getting back in the day, a true pc focused fps games made for mouse and keyboard, pushing tech to new heights. And every famous FPS did that in a certain way, we all have our favourites.

Kids who grew up with Half-life, Quake, Unreal are in their 30s/40s now. Where are new John Carmacks and Gabe Newells of this industry? We should be getting something completely new and groundbreaking from new generation of developers, but we're not. Things have changed way too much and it really bugs me when someone says we're in golden age, renaissance or anything similar.
I was super hyped for Amid Evil from the second I saw it. The game is fucking gorgeous and has one of the best implementations of ray tracing I have seen in any game.

Dusk less so… but then I played it and didn’t care because it’s so fucking tightly designed.

I understand what you’re saying. Something has definitely been lost. Outside of id there really is no other big studio pushing technology in this space. Maybe that’s what Ascendent Studios are trying with Immortals or Aveum.. but while it is visually impressive from a technology standpoint, I think it looks mid as fuck otherwise:



I can get far more excited about indie shooters than I can about the AAA trash in this genre. That’s not to say that I think the only good current FPS games are 100% indie, but it’s seemingly true for single player games. The teams that made Six Days in Fallujah, Ready or Not, Escape From Tarkov, and Hunt Showdown aren’t indie, but while I love all of them, what I want is more single player games that aren’t dogshit.
 

VN1X

Banned
You all need to give Voidborn a look. It just came out in early access and the demo that I played of it was sublime. Ultrakill meets Dark Souls would be an apt description.






(no idea who these people are but they got videos up)
 
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coffinbirth

Member
Raven have always been overrated. Their best games are Black Ops and Singularity, neither of which are top 50 nevermind too 10 😂

I liked Singularity for what it was but it had plenty of issues. Most publishers aren’t taking risks with medium budget shooters anymore. If a game doesn’t have multiplayer, isn’t open world, or can’t be monetized further, they’re not interested.
LMAO, what?

Heretic
Hexen
Hexen 2
Soldier of Fortune

All certified boomer shooter classics...and you bring up Black Ops, a game they just made DLC for and Singularity?!?

Their Jedi Knight games?

200w.gif
 

Apocryphon

Member
LMAO, what?

Heretic
Hexen
Hexen 2
Soldier of Fortune

All certified boomer shooter classics...and you bring up Black Ops, a game they just made DLC for and Singularity?!?

Their Jedi Knight games?

200w.gif

Heretic was fine. Hexen had interesting aesthetics but was a clusterfuck of level design.. basically switch hunt the game. Hexen 2 was mid as fuck. People legitimately love Heretic and Hexen has a cult following, but outside of the dismemberment, Soldier of Fortune was awful. Nobody is calling for remasters of Hexen 2 or SoF. I’m sure some love the idea of a Heretic or Hexen remaster, but I don’t.

Heretic 2 and their Star Wars games were trash. Soldier of Fortune 2, Quake 4, Wolfenstein 2009, and Singularity…. all mid with the exception of Singularity, which they fucked up so badly they were relegated to the CoD support studio for an entire decade…

The newest Black Ops is their best work in what.. 25 years? 😂 Yeah, top tier studio..
 
Amid Evil: The Black Labyrinth is great. Only a few levels in so far, but I think the level design actually out does the main campaign. I also feel like the Voidsplitter is more interesting and matches the gameplay better than the Aeturnum.
 
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