Top 5 influential game programmers/designers

[CubicZirconia]

I've played Balders Gate and Icewind Dale. Neither of which held my attention for longer than a few hours because the stories sucked

Baldur's Gate? The story sucked? Are you crazy? Baldur's Gate is the best RPG made in a long time.

 

[Lonyo]

Chris Saywer
Geoff Crammond (does no one like racing sims?!)

So many good names.
Tim Sweeny too.
Gabe Newell anyone?

 

[Mucman]

Originally posted by: CubicZirconia

I've played Balders Gate and Icewind Dale. Neither of which held my attention for longer than a few hours because the stories sucked

Baldur's Gate? The story sucked? Are you crazy? Baldur's Gate is the best RPG made in a long time.

Compared to the Ultima series, yes the story sucked. I never got the sense of absorbtion into a different world in Balders Gate. Perhaps I'll hunt it down in a bargain bin and give it another try. I don't think I'll give Icewind Dale another try though.

btw, I'm not saying that Balders Gate is a bad game, it's just not an exceptional game to me.

 

[DaveSimmons]

Originally posted by: Mucman
Compared to the Ultima series, yes the story sucked. I never got the sense of absorbtion into a different world in Balders Gate. Perhaps I'll hunt it down in a bargain bin and give it another try. I don't think I'll give Icewind Dale another try though.

btw, I'm not saying that Balders Gate is a bad game, it's just not an exceptional game to me.

Have you played Planescape and Fallout 1-2? As I implied above, they all have stronger stories than BG 1-2.

 

[WobbleWobble]

Shigeru Miyamoto if you're talking games overall has to be the most influential in my opinion.

Lori Cole
Roberta Williams

I'm old school, sue me

 

[Mucman]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons

Originally posted by: Mucman
Compared to the Ultima series, yes the story sucked. I never got the sense of absorbtion into a different world in Balders Gate. Perhaps I'll hunt it down in a bargain bin and give it another try. I don't think I'll give Icewind Dale another try though.

btw, I'm not saying that Balders Gate is a bad game, it's just not an exceptional game to me.

Have you played Planescape and Fallout 1-2? As I implied above, they all have stronger stories than BG 1-2.

I have not played Planetscape, but I have played Fallout 1. I agree that it has a terrific story. What I don't like about it is that it doesn't abstract the stats from the player. This is a major beef that I have with RPGs and why I don't find very many of them much fun. I like there to be more mystery to what kind of damage a weapon does. Again, this is why I like Ultima VII. You knew a two handed sword was better than a cutlas, but you never really knew how much better. I'm the exact opposite when it comes to space orientated games. I think it's safe to assume that you know how many miliKilloCoulombWatt of juice your Dandy Vaporizer can do. The same can be said for strategy games (even RTS).

Now I'm getting a little OT though... I understand lots of people favour the math orientated RPGs out there, it's just that I don't

 

[WobbleWobble]

Originally posted by: fisher
not sure why you put the williamses as console folk? sierra did a ton of pc games (all pc games?!?). and don't forget al lowe!

Sierra games were the games I grew up with.

Quest for Glory
Kings Quest
Space Quest
Police Quest
Leisure Suit Larry
The Incredible Machine
Gabriel Knight

Absolute classics.

 

[Mucman]

Originally posted by: WobbleWobble

Originally posted by: fisher
not sure why you put the williamses as console folk? sierra did a ton of pc games (all pc games?!?). and don't forget al lowe!

Sierra games were the games I grew up with.

Quest for Glory
Kings Quest
Space Quest
Police Quest
Leisure Suit Larry
The Incredible Machine
Gabriel Knight

Absolute classics.

Don't forget Conquest of Camelot, Conquest of Longbow, Rise of the Dragon, Heart of China, and Willy Beamish!

 

[CubicZirconia]

Originally posted by: Mucman

Originally posted by: CubicZirconia

I've played Balders Gate and Icewind Dale. Neither of which held my attention for longer than a few hours because the stories sucked

Baldur's Gate? The story sucked? Are you crazy? Baldur's Gate is the best RPG made in a long time.

Compared to the Ultima series, yes the story sucked. I never got the sense of absorbtion into a different world in Balders Gate. Perhaps I'll hunt it down in a bargain bin and give it another try. I don't think I'll give Icewind Dale another try though.

btw, I'm not saying that Balders Gate is a bad game, it's just not an exceptional game to me.

To judge Baldur's Gate after playing it for only "a few hours" is laughable. Baldur's Gate takes hundreds of hours to beat, if you only played a couple of hours you barely scratched the surface. I don't think it's fair to make broad statements about a game and compare it to other games when you barely even played it. Sure, you could say that if you don't like a game in the first few hours you probably are not going to like it at all. But in this case, I disagree. First of all, BG is such a long game that it might be hard to accurately judge it after just a little bit of playtime (like you could probably do with a lot of shooters or action games). There is just so much more to the game then you could possibly pick up in the first hours of gameplay. It's unfortunate you decided to scrap playing BG, because you really missed out.

 

[Mucman]

Originally posted by: CubicZirconia

Originally posted by: Mucman

Originally posted by: CubicZirconia

I've played Balders Gate and Icewind Dale. Neither of which held my attention for longer than a few hours because the stories sucked

Baldur's Gate? The story sucked? Are you crazy? Baldur's Gate is the best RPG made in a long time.

Compared to the Ultima series, yes the story sucked. I never got the sense of absorbtion into a different world in Balders Gate. Perhaps I'll hunt it down in a bargain bin and give it another try. I don't think I'll give Icewind Dale another try though.

btw, I'm not saying that Balders Gate is a bad game, it's just not an exceptional game to me.

To judge Baldur's Gate after playing it for only "a few hours" is laughable. Baldur's Gate takes hundreds of hours to beat, if you only played a couple of hours you barely scratched the surface. I don't think it's fair to make broad statements about a game and compare it to other games when you barely even played it. Sure, you could say that if you don't like a game in the first few hours you probably are not going to like it at all. But in this case, I disagree. First of all, BG is such a long game that it might be hard to accurately judge it after just a little bit of playtime (like you could probably do with a lot of shooters or action games). There is just so much more to the game then you could possibly pick up in the first hours of gameplay. It's unfortunate you decided to scrap playing BG, because you really missed out.

Just a correction, I never said a couple hours . I played Balders Gate, Icewind Dale, and Dungeon Siege for around 10-20 hours each. I wanted to give them a chance to grow on me, but after that amount of time I had no desire to get into the game any further. When I first played Dungeon Siege, I thought it was the greatest RPG I've ever played! Then after the beauty of the engine wore off, it became tedious, and boring. I believe I will give the game another chance, I've seen it retail for $20cdn at my local EB. Don't think I'll be able to dedicate much more than 20 hours to it though, as I grow older my time goes for a much higher premium I'm sad to say .

I realize the many of my opinions are against the popular trends of games/gamers today. So I hope none of you think I am putting down anyone for not liking the games you love so much. I've heard enough Rush bashing in my day that it all just slides off of me now

 

[tinyabs]

In no order:

1. Yu Suzuki (Sega AM2) - popularized 3D in arcades
2. Michael Abrash (graphics guru, now in Microsoft) - popularized graphics programming in 90s
3. Sid Meier (you know him, he's also a programmer u know?) - Microprose in 80s, 90s
4. John Miles aka FatMan (audio guru) - contributes to audio in PC in 90s
5. John Carmack - inventor of FPS games

 

[Schadenfroh]

John Carmack > all

 

[tinyabs]

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
John Carmack > all

And staffs at ID software drive Ferrari after DOOM became a success story.

 

[Mucman]

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
John Carmack > all

That should be John Carmack's programming > all. I don't think he has one bit of game design in his brain.

tinyabs, I think many of the sound producers in the gaming are highly underrated! So many games would be crap if it wasn't for the amazing music, and sound effects. For example: The Quests, Star Control II, Ultima VII, Homeworld...

 

[LucJoe]

Rob Pardo?

 

[ZimZum]

Originally posted by: Mucman

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
John Carmack > all

That should be John Carmack's programming > all. I don't think he has one bit of game design in his brain.
.

 

[clicknext]

Shigeru Miyamoto

Though this is console and you said you didn't want console. I don't know about PC people.