Tendo City 2002 Poster's Choice Awards

[OB1]

You know the deal. I'll list several video game categories for the year 2002 and you send your choices to my e-mail address: prancetron2000@yahoo.com .

Just copy and paste the categories onto your e-mail and write in your answers next to them. If you have questions about which games fall into which genres, etc., post them, right here. If you want to add more categories, post them in this forum before you vote. I'll post the results once I get enough votes in. The deadline will be, say, January 12th or around there. Voting begins this saturday.

And another thing, I'm not sure if I should add PC categories. What do you guys think?

The Usual Categories:

Best Action Game (i.e. Splinter Cell)

Best Adventure Game (i.e. Metroid Prime)

Best RPG

Best Racing Game

Best Fighting Game

Best Action-sports Game

Best Sports Game

Best Simulation Game

Best Platformer

Best First-person Shooter (note: Metroid Prime is not a FPS)

Best Strategy Game

Best Online Game

Best PC Game

Best PlayStation 2 Game

Best Gamecube Game

Best X-Box Game

Best Gameboy Advance Game

Best Overall Game



The Other Categories:

Best Graphics

Best Original Soundtrack

Best Soundtrack

Best Sound Effects

Best Art Direction

Best Sequel

Best Commercial

Biggest Headline

Best Hype Job

Most Underrated Game




Teh funney categories:

Best Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen Game

Best Army Men Game

Best Stupid Video Game Rep Quote

Best rumor that never happened

Best Shiggy pic

Best Smilie

Edit by DJ: Sorry OB1, but if you are going to rate all games, you can't exclude PC games. I added 3 more catagories, one for PC games.

Oh, and is Metroid Prime in first person? Do you shoot? Then, by sheer logic, it IS a first person shooter. Of course, with that logic then it's also an RPG, since you play a game in a role, but hey I'm just saying is all :D. Yes, I would call Metroid Prime an Adventure. However, unlike Miyamoto, when a game series has like 5 upgrades dedicated to jumping, including a jump move that is an actual attack, and when you do more jumping than fighting in the game, the Metroid series IS a jumping game series! I'm sorry, but it is. Metroid Prime is more shooty than jumpy, but that's fine because MP rocks anway. Okay, enough posting inside someone else's message.

[A Black Falcon]

Enough categories there? (well, no... no PC ones!)
So... this is console-only I assume? And all consoles? Hmm, that limits it a lot... I can only really include NGC games because I haven't played much of any PS2 or X-Box...

[OB1]

I don't want to include PC categories simply because it would have to cover so much more crap. I'd rather make a whole seperate awards thing for the PC.

[EdenMaster]

The proper name is the TendoCity Awards!!!

[WhiteFleck]

[OB1]

There's a space between "Tendo" and "City".

[Nintendarse]

OB1- not if you want to pronounce it "ten-dos-i-ty" (sorry OB1)

Whitefleck- There's something wrong with your picture. "Weed" and "College" are supposed to be pointing in the same direction.

On the topic at hand, I think we should have some serious awards not only on the games themselves, but also the industry in general. Perhaps something in the vein of "Best Commercial," "Biggest Headline," and "Best Hype Job." You also might want to consider a "Most Underrated Game" award.

[OB1]

Laser Link- not if you want to pronounce it "ten-dos-i-ty"

Just because I have Link as my avatar doesn't mean that I'm Laser Link.

And I'll add your suggestions to the list.

[Laser Link]

Hehehehe.

This is the best shiggy:

[Laser Link]

You know, the more I look at that, the more I see the mistakes. I need to clean it up sometime.

[Weltall]

Couldn't we just PM it to you?

[Private Hudson]

Should I just give you games that were released in my territory this year?

Or games that were released in USA?

[OB1]

I would use the PMs if it weren't for the fact that TC tends to crash every couple of days. :D E-mail is safer.

And I don't know how we're going to handle this multiple territory thing. What do the rest of you think?

[Weltall]

Originally posted by OB1
I would use the PMs if it weren't for the fact that TC tends to crash every couple of days. :D E-mail is safer.

And I don't know how we're going to handle this multiple territory thing. What do the rest of you think?

TC will not crash again. It only crashed because of something I did, and will not try to do again :o

[OB1]

Well okay then. If you honestly think it'll be safe...

Voting starts tomorrow people, so do you want me to add any more categories?

[Private Hudson]

Well the only major games (that I am expecting to love) not released down here are... Metroid Prime, Resident Evil 0 and Mark of Kri..

And I really can't 'assume' what I will think of them..

But if I just do US releases, it'd still be more accurate than if I did Ass-trailen releases.

[OB1]

OK, then just list any games that came out in the U.S. in 2002 that you have played.

[OB1]

Time to vote, people!

[Nintendarse]

So, for clarity, are we just going to put Metroid Prime in the FPS category?

[OB1]

No. It's more of an adventure game.

[OB1]

OK.. only one person has voted so far. Come on, people.

[OB1]

Alrighty then. Nobody wants to vote. Wee.

[Private Hudson]

I was planning on voting next time I saw you online.

But if nobody else is, I won't waste my time.

:)

[OB1]

Be a leader. I don't have to be online in order for you to vote. Just send me a PM.

[Dark Jaguar]

"Be a leader"? Is that like management talk? It's the kind of stuff they say that means nothing, but SOUNDS like it's really important. It's like saying "We need to prioritize the idea of teamwork without sacrificing customer focus!". Noone knows what on Earth it means, aside from it meaning the boss is trying to find a way to sound validated.

Waiting for you is based on his convenience, not trying to obey your orders. Why waste time PMing? It's just easier to send it all at once and know they got it just then.

Come now, dance the dance of the hippy! *writes a poem, because why should we be forced to dance the socially excepted way MAN?*

Okay, cynical mode off :D.

[OB1]

Just vote, smart ass.

[Private Hudson]

You're a bitch.

And I'm a leader.

[Hudson]Fuckin' A [/Hudson]

[OB1]

Actually, you're the second person after nintendarse to vote. Although he didn't fix his vote (he counted Prime as a FPS). Two (sorta) down, many more to go!

[Private Hudson]

I'm still a leader.

Besides, my picks are the best.

[A Black Falcon]

Metroid Prime isn't an adventure game. The NGC has no adventure games. It isn't really a FPS either, but its not an adventure game. Adventure games to me mean graphic adventures in the classic Lucasarts or Sierra style and nothing else... most "adventure" games these days are RPG-Adventure, Action-Adventure (usually), etc. Metroid Prime is probably a FPS-Action-Adventure game... clumsy, but a better description of the genre the game is in...
Of course if you do that there get to be way too many hyphens which makes classifying them for awards hard... but still, "adventure"? No. At least call the genre Action-Adventure.

[Private Hudson]

^
|
| I already had that conversation with OB1 today over MSN.
|
|

[Dark Jaguar]

To me, there are two definitions of "adventure game". The first is Zelda, the second is a game like King's Quest. They both are different games, but both are called "adventure games". To be honest, to me they both feel like a grand adventure. All an adventure game is, in the Zelda sense, is an action/rpg game, which is to say, live fighting with puzzle elements and a single massive world. An adventure in the KQ sense is basically a large quest of puzzle solving in one large world, with almost no combat. Since the console and PC definitions kinda contradict, but are still incredibly popular, both of them, I think it's perfectly fine to say that there are two definitions.

[Private Hudson]

NO!

Zelda is an ACTION/ADVENTURE

Grim Fandango is an ADVENTURE

And I usually hear more people call Zelda an RPG, than an Adventure.

I GUESS THERE ARE TWO DEFINITIONS OF RPG!?!?!? HMMMMM????????????????

Utter Nonsense... LIKE A COW!! ROFL!!!

[Dark Jaguar]

*in indian accent*

Yes whatever...

[A Black Falcon]

I'd call Zelda a RPG-Action-Adventure... it has elements of all three genres...

Adventure means Graphic Adventure. In 2002, only one graphic adventure that matters came out -- Syberia, for the PC. The PC also had several other not too good adventure games. Thats it for the genre. It really annoys me how so many places call games that are NOT adventure games like Zelda or Metroid Prime adventure games... they ARENT!

Oh, and there are a couple of classic adventure games on consoles. Not many... but a few. I know Lucasarts ported Maniac Mansion to the NES and Monkey Island 4 to the PS2... there may be a few more. I think there was this one PS2 Adventure game ported to PC this year.

Oh... Adventure doesn't necessarially mean no combat. Monkey Island 3, Full Throttle, and Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis (all Lucasarts adventure games) have some action parts, yet are undeniably adventure games. ... it just means you've got to have the puzzles and stuff. It is this that makes the genre so easily expanded by some... if Full Throttle is (mostly) a adventure game, why isn't Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine, Tomb Raider, or even Zelda or Metroid? But, I guess, you have to draw the line somewhere and I guess it has to be drawn at the puzzles... and Zelda, Metroid, Tomb Raider, etc really don't have adventure-style puzzles. Just 'shoot the thing', 'push the block', and 'get the key-item'. Not really what a real adventure game has.

[Dark Jaguar]

Ya see, about that, there's the definition aspect of it all. You define it that way, and another defines it another way. The way I define adventure in the Zelda sense is any game that's both RPG and Action. Adventure then is purely the mix of the two. A game then is not to be called action/RPG, since that's what an Adventure game is. Then there's the other adventure, the PC style adventure. To be honest, since two people claim to have invented the genre, but have defined it differently, we could just go with whoever did it first. Miyamoto's Zelda was in 198..5 or 6 I forget which. However, Mystery House, the first "graphic adventure", came out years earlier, as did the later King's Quest. I think the first Monkey Island came after Zelda 1, but my point stands. If we go for cronology, then I'm afraid that the PC style definition stands.

However, English is not a static language, or something. The other definition, any game with both action and RPG aspects, with the Zelda style puzzles, has become even more popular a definition. Since words are defined based on popular usage, I'm afraid that the Zelda game definition is JUST as valid.

In other words, two different kinds of games have the same genre name. However, to be honest maybe us gamers get WAY too caught up in genre definitions. We might get to the point where we start calling stuff "adventure adventure", like some movie rental outlet. Sorry, I don't wanna get like that. Let's just use what we will and let the definitions sort themselves out, mmkay?

[A Black Falcon]

But if you don't pay attention to genre definitions, it makes awards like these pretty hard to qualify in categories...

Anyway, to me adventure and graphic adventure are the same thing. Zelda is in no way an adventure game. Adventure-RPG, probably. Action-Adventure-RPG if you want to be specific.

As for age, Mystery House was before Zelda, no question. It came out in 1980.
http://www.cyberflix.com/timelapse/speci...st8090.htm
Text adventure games existed before that, too...

[Private Hudson]

Yes, but Zelda wasn't the first Action/Adventure game, "Adventure", released in 1978 was.

Of course, standard style "Adventure" games are based on the old text parser adventure games.

And Zelda hardly has any RPG elements in it. It has lots of action, and a little adventure. In fact, I don't think there are any strict RPG elements in the game.

[Laser Link]

Adventure games to me mean graphic adventures in the classic Lucasarts or Sierra style and nothing else...

Then bury the term Adventure because there will never be another game like that. Unfortunately.

Zelda is an adventure game and really is more of an adventure than a Monkey Island game, which really should be classified as a graphic adventure. That's how you described it yourself. Gotcha. :)

[EdenMaster]

Now you see why the TC Awards never worked, nobody wants to vote :).

[Dark Jaguar]

Well these are mostly game awards, very little poster awards. OB1's acting like he can trick us into thinking that voting on best games has always been a part of it :D.

[Private Hudson]

Originally posted by Laser Link
Then bury the term Adventure because there will never be another game like that. Unfortunately.

[A Black Falcon]

Adventure = Graphic Adventure. The two words mean exactly the same thing... well, except Graphic Adventure means its got to have graphics, while Adventure also include text-based ones.

Adventure games aren't dead. They are FAR less common than they used to be, true, but they are NOT dead... if you think they are, tell that to the companies still making them. It'd surprise them to hear that the genre doesnt exist anymore. :)

2002 had one real good adventure game: Syberia for the PC. I played the demo... its pretty good. Not the best graphic adventure ever, by far, but good. There were others (most published by the aptly named The Adventure Company, par of DreamCatcher, a company that mainly seems to publish European adventure games here in the US). Syberia is one of their games... and one of the best they've published. Most of their games eem to not have been noticed at all and got pretty average reviews at best... but Syberia is good.
http://www.adventurecompanygames.com/tac/pc.html

[OB1]

There are two different kinds of Adventure games. There's the Zelda kind on consoles and then there's the Monkey Island kind on PCs. The console style Adventure game came out before the PC style Adventure game, so when I say Adventure game I'm referring to games like Zelda, not Monkey Island. Also, we're not counting PC games in this "awards" thing! So forget about what you think is an Adventure game and just use the console definition, okay? Let's just call those PC Adventure games Graphic Adventures like LL suggested, or "Point and Click Games" :P

Well these are mostly game awards, very little poster awards. OB1's acting like he can trick us into thinking that voting on best games has always been a part of it .

What? I'mk tricking you into what??

[A Black Falcon]

You didn't read the thread, did you OB1? I have already proved quite conclusively that graphic adventures existed years before console-style ones. Just read that link I posted when I discussed that... you'd see Mystery House came out in 1980, more than 5 years before Zelda, which really created the console Action-RPG-Adventure genre that it was the founding member of.

Edit:
http://www.if-legends.org/~adventure/timeline.html
Oh, and Adventure (aka Colossal Cave), the first text adventure game (the other half of the adventure genre... though mostly dead for years now), was finished in 1972 for a mainframe. Somehow I bet that predates Zelda, or any other console action-adventure-rpg (or whatever combo) game.

Edit 2: So this is consoles-only. I know. Consoles get a few graphic adventures too... the Gamecube has none, but I know PS2 has a couple of them.

[Dark Jaguar]

Mystery House created "graphic adventure" genre indeed, but you have to realize that it's only called that because it has graphics. Before that, they were all text adventures. Don't overthink what I'm saying, they were LITERALY just text. You would type in something and it would just post some text on the screen describing what happened. It would be like this.

]look

"Be more specific"

]look around

"Does not understand "around""

]look forest

"you are in a forest with many thickly packed trees facing north. There is a small stream to the west."

]go west

"cannot go a west"

]go left

"cannot go a left"

]west

"You are in a forest with many thickly packed trees facing west. There is a small stream here."

And that's pretty much how it would play. Not a single graphic would ever appear. These were called "text adventures". They were actually quite fun at the time, but then Mystery House changed everything, with actual graphics. It's been officially made public domain now, so if you have an apple 2 emulator, Sierra gives you free rights to play it whenever you want and pass it to whoever, so long as it's unmodified.

So, basically they are both still adventure games in the original meaning of the genre, and they were all very adventury to play. Zelda was a totally different kind of adventure game. Technically, it should get it's own genre name (action/RPG does work, but so many are out now that it deserves more than a combo name by far, oh and Metroid is a lot more action than adventure, what with it's corridor shooting, so it's like an action/adventure). Adventure was the only title that worked, so it was picked, even though adventure genre already exists on PC (and I explained why calling them all graphic adventures doesn't really work, since "graphic adventure" was just a buzz word advertising that the adventures now have sprites and such, which means Zelda games qualify). Console Adventure and PC adventure work, except that they are bleeding into each other. King's Quest 8 (which really wasn't that good at all and was likely the death of the series, that or the Seirra massacres) tried to imitate Zelda a lot but couldn't do that nearly as well, so it was very much a console style adventure on PC, while Escape from Monkey Island went to PS2, a PC style adventure on a console.

In the end, I think that maybe we should come up with a new genre name. Since King's Quest, Space Quest, Police Quest, and what some think is the best of Seirra's 'Quest games, Quest for Glory, all had the word Quest in it, and because it really sounds right, I think that perhaps all "graphic adventures" should be called quests. This solves the problem neatly I think. Technically, quest genre could also go to Zelda style games, leaving the original kind of adventure game to keep it. However, I think that since it was the PC adventure that was named "quest" so often, maybe it should go to that. It is time to reflect net-wide change. We shall cast a vote to which type of game should henceforth be called a "quest game", and then whatever wins, we shall spread it throughout the land. This should end this lovely yet stupid debate once and for all.

Edit: Oh don't worry ABF, I added PC to the list, plus a few other games. Just amalgomate both kinda of adventure games into one genre for now. I figure if it's not going to be Nintendo only, it shouldn't be leaving out anything else. Hmm, well maybe Mac can be left out, but that's like leaving out cel phone games. No one cares :D.

[A Black Falcon]

I hope that explanation of text adventure games was for OB1... if not, er, I think I know that already... :)

Oh, and what do you mean by that comment added in the edit? List of what? TC awards?

Also, as for the 'death' of the adventure genre. In the late '90s, the adventure genre really decayed... far fewer games came out and the genre fell apart. By 1998, it was in full decline... and Sierra's infamous (well, in certain circles...) Massacres in '98 and '99 only made matters worse... given how they did create the graphic adventure genre, and all... if they said they couldn't make it in the market anymore, who could? Not many stayed... Lucasarts made a few more, but FAR less than before. Now, Lucasarts seems to have moved most of their adventure-type games strongly in the Action-Adventure direction... not good...

I think the genre is pretty well described already... "Quest" genre? Only Sierra really used that label to distinguish its Adventure games, not others, so its not really appropriate given how a Sierra Quest game hasn't come out in several years now... (Oh, and my favorite Sierra Quest series is in fact the Adventure-RPG QFG series... :) ) The genre doesn't need a new name. The console "adventure" games just need to be better at remembering their hyphens.

[Dark Jaguar]

Yes that was indeed for OB1, and anyone else who didn't play the really old PC games.

Yep, that's what the edit is for. Check the first post in this thread.

I was actually addressing just the death of Sierra's adventure games.

To be honest, I don't think such a massive genre should ALL use a combination of two other genres to define itself. They do play differently enough, and have enough of a number, to warrent their own genre title.

[A Black Falcon]

Then what do you want to call the Action-Adventure genre? It is pretty vauge, sure, but generally recently Action-Adventure usually refers to games with similarities to Tomb Raider... there are a LOT of those games yet its a hyphenated genre... so the Zelda-type genre really is hyphenated. Oh well... some are like that...

Oh, and it doesn't matter much anyway. Genre names are hardly going to change at this point so its really a pointless discussion...

As for text adventure games (or graphical ones with a textbar interface), I prefer graphical ones because text ones can get really frusterating with how you must guess what words to use next... graphical ones, with buttons, are a huge improvemement over text input, IMO.

[Dark Jaguar]

Did ya notice my example of the pure text style of text adventure game? I too know the annoyance of trying to find out what to say.

Yeah, I know what you mean, but if I have a vote it at least feels like I'm doing something, even if I'm not.

Anyway, let's just all agree that both games are adventure games (since both sides already agreed on that anyway) and end it then.