Pfft...
So I was reading some articles about Super Mario Galaxy and how it's set on beating Ocarina of Time for "best game ever" and I see lots of people commenting about how they like OoT better, and then some nut job comes along and goes on a diatribe about how "SMG and OoT are so completely vastly 100% polar opposites that you can't compare one to the other, and people are dumb when they try."
Oh really? Let's form an example here.
Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
Which is better? I say Oblivion. Am I allowed to say it's better? Apparently, yes, I am, because they're both the same genre. I like both, but Oblivion is my favorite out of the two and I think it's clearly the best, and I'm allowed to compare the two because they're both RPGs.
Example two.
Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Megaman 5
Which is better? I say Oblivion. Am I allowed to say it's better? No, I'm not, because Megaman is a sidescroller and Oblivion is an RPG. Aka, they're "so completely vastly 100% polar opposites that you can't compare one to the other, and people are dumb when they try." I am supposedly not allowed to compare the two because they're not the same type of game.
Example three!
Side Scrolling Platformer
Role Playing Game
Which is better? I say RPG. Am I allowed to say it's better? This is where the stupidity comes into play because, see, they're both games. I'm comparing a game type to a game type. Just like I'm comparing an RPG to an RPG, and yet, at the same time, I'm comparing a Sidescroller to an RPG. Am I not allowed to say which one I think is better because they're not the same?
Example four!
Eating
Gaming
Which is better? I say... Eating. Am I allowed to say it's better? Here, again, is where the stupidity comes into play because, see, they're both "things to fill my time". Am I allowed to compare a "thing to fill my time" with a "thing to fill my time"? Just like I'm allowed to compare an RPG to an RPG? Or am I not allowed to compare them, because they're "eating" and "gaming". If I'm not allowed to compare them, why am I allowed to compare "Morrowind" with "Oblivion"? They're two different titles! But they are the same genre, so I'm allowed to.
Example five!
Living
Dying
Which is better? I say... Living. Am I allowed to say it's better? They're both "states of being", so to speak, but they're vastly different things. Is it the proverbial "Sidescroller vs RPG" or is it "state of being vs state of being"?
How about this. We can say what we like and everyone else can shut up and stop trying to rationalize away the fact that not everyone thinks the same way about everyone else! Case in point:
I prefer living over dying and eating over gaming. RPGs over sidescrollers and Oblivion over Morrowind. If I had a choice between Megaman and Oblivion, I would pick Oblivion, because I think it's better than Megaman on so many levels. That's because I also think that RPGs are better than sidescrollers. But if I had a choice between eating and playing Oblivion, I would say that eating is better than Oblivion, because I prefer eating over playing a game.
In other words?
I like Ocarina of Time over Super Mario 64. Incomparable? No. I'll show you why! Because in the grand scheme of things, you can go up one "flight" and have a list of game types. OoT is... whatever Zelda games are. For simplicity's sake, we'll just call it RPG and we'll call SM64 an adventure game. On this level of things to compare, it goes like this: RPG over Adventure over Sidescroller. I like RPGs. RPGs rank higher than Adventure games. I think Zelda is better than Mario. Are they different? Of course. Apples and oranges? Yes.
But guess what? I prefer oranges over apples. Windows over Linux! Sleeping over eating. Babylon 5 over Monk. Okami Soundtrack over Dragonforce. Chronicles of Narnia over Fahrenheit 451. Get the picture yet?
November 18th, 2007 at 2:09 am
I think you misunderstand. You can certainly prefer something over another, that's reasonable. You can even take two games of different genres and make a legitimate case that one is better. Not many people would disagree that Oblivion is better, than say, Superman 64. It looks, plays, sounds etc. better and is simply superior in over all quality.
Where it breaks down is when you compare things like Twilight Princess to SMG. Which is better? This is just a silly comparison. You can certainly prefer one over the other, but does either have better gameplay? No...because they're both exemplary games in their respective genre. When you have two games of generally equal quality then you can't say one is just better because, as previously stated, they're generally equal in most regards. You can however, say that SMG is better than some other platformer of unequal quality or an RPG of unequal quality, and the same with TP.
November 18th, 2007 at 11:19 am
And who decides if two games are equal? You can think they're equal if you want, but if I or anyone else wants to say otherwise, then they can, and should be able to without everyone else going "APPLEZ AN ORANGEZ LOL". It's all a matter of personal preference and I'm getting tired of people throwing out that stupid phrase when someone disagrees with them. I couldn't care less how many people say a game is good or bad or how "equal" it is to another. If I want to say one game is better than another, no matter how similar or different it is, then I very well can.
Likewise, who decides which game has the better gameplay? The player, of course. If I think the gameplay of Twilight Princess is better than Super Mario Galaxy (which, for the record, I have not played, but this is just hypothetically), then I can compare the two as much as I like. Everything is different and everything can be compared because everyone thinks different things are better.
November 20th, 2007 at 1:59 am
By better I mean obvious overall quality. You can certainly *prefer* a game over another. Super Mario Galaxy is a high caliber game, this is hardly disputable. All of its components are top notch and an objective look would confirm this. The same with Twilight Princess. However, neither are better than the other. If Something A is a 10/10 and Something B is a 10/10, then both are pretty much on par. If Something A is more fun to you, great, but that doesn't make it better. Better to YOU, yes. If you want to think TP is better than SMG personally then of course, I'm just making the argument that for a more objective viewpoint some things become incomparable.
November 20th, 2007 at 11:28 am
Greatness is solely the eye of the beholder. If someone gives something a 10/10, it doesn't mean I'll give it a 10/10. Who's the definitive, official word on how good or bad a game is? The developers? The publishers? IGN? There is no official source for grading a game. If there was a single, perfect way to rate a game, then I would agree with you, but there isn't, because we all like different things. If I think a game deserves a 7/10 and is on par with another 7/10, and someone else thinks it a 10/10 and thinks it's on par with another 10/10, then who's right and what are we "allowed" to compare it to? There is no objective viewpoint because there is nobody who is completely apathetic and unbiased. That fact alone is proven by the fact that barely anyone gives the same game the same rating. All you have to do is look at Gamerankings.com for a single game and you see all the different reviews from people who liked something more or less than someone else. It is all clouded by bias on part of the reviewer, and there is no global standard for games. If someone prefers something over another game, then that's it. It's been compared and the player deemed it not as good as whatever else they compared it to, no matter what other game it is.
November 20th, 2007 at 10:30 pm
I know it's pretty relative on whether a game is "good" or not, but if you can be objective as possible, some games are obviously "better", IE, they look, play, sound etc. etc. better or superior to an obviously inferior game. So, two games who are obviously of high caliber start to become incomparable because..they're both pretty much on par. I know no one can be totally objective and a lot of reviews are biased but I just think that there are certainly some games that are just obviously better than others and comparing these pinnacles of gaming, not by which you prefer but by what is objectively better is an exercise in futility.
November 20th, 2007 at 10:44 pm
Then we agree to disagree. You can (try to) be objective if you want, and I'll just keep doing the easy thing and decide if I personally like a game more than another. I couldn't care less if someone says a game is, say, "as good as" Halo. If it isn't to me, then it's not as good as Halo, and there's no point in saying otherwise. They might think it's as good as Halo, but... Well, I'm happy for them. Go play it and leave alone those of us who disagree, and stop trying to nullify our opinions.
November 21st, 2007 at 1:03 am
I'm not trying to nullify your opinions. I have my own opions on games too y'know. I like some good games way more than other good games. The thing is, when I see a handful of awesome games from different genres, it simply doesn't make sense to me to claim one's the best at of all...they're all great stuff. Oh well....just want to say I wasn't trying to change anyone's mind or say they're wrong about their preferences or opinions, quite the opposite, just making a case for general incomparability in some things.