Topic: Unpopular Gaming Opinions

Fortnite stinks.
So I need to vent and I wasn’t really sure where to post this — a search shows we have a couple Fortnite threads that are pretty much dead and I don’t want to start one because it’s more of a rant, and this thread is kind of for ranting about unpopular opinions. Well, it’s part rant and part question for the community.
So Fortnite has risen so high in the public consciousness now that it is growing quite annoying to me. And not because I’m a elitist hardcore gamer snob (Well, maybe partly that but —) but because I legitimately feel like the game is detracting from what console gaming really is and can be. I have friends now who have never shown interest in playing video games who now want to play Fortnite with me. So I play and I absolutely hate playing the game. After 30 minutes it is pretty boring and such a waste of my time when I could be making actual progress in a game that has actual good gameplay and varied immersive settings, an actual narrative that is interesting, and actual legitimate production value with a world that I want to explore and combat that is deep and satisfying. Fortnite has none of these.
So the unpopular opinion is that Fortnite is awful and bad for gaming and I wish it would go away.
Most trends like this explode quickly and then fizzle quickly. Do you think Fortnite will continue to be this huge thing that is on the news, in every home, and the cultural sensation like this?
My opinion is that Fortnite is peaking now and I expect a quick decline over the next year. Battle Royale modes however are probably here to stay, but will only flourish as added modes in other shooter games like Battlefield and COD, but not as a one trick pony again. And I can live with that. What I can’t live with is the most profitable game in the world being such a piece of garbage.

@Th3solution I largely agree, though I only played it for about 20 minutes before I know it really wasn't something that I was interested in.

I'd watched a fair amount of PUBG being played by the EG team and thought that I could get in to Fortnite as a few mates were playing it. My love M.A.G. probably clouded my opinion on what Fortnite was or could be.

There's always a large element of 'bandwagoning' when it comes to entertainment - everyone wants their slice. I do think it will fizzle out though, and even if it doesn't - it will likely keep people penned in and away from multiplayer games I want to play.

@Th3solution I would possibly argue against the idea that it is bad for gaming. Firstly, I think it does free to play very well. Regular content drops and even stories, no pay to win elements, and being free means it is hugely accessible.

Also I think it is a good polished product and if it get consoles bought and young ones into gaming then great.

That said, I agree in that it’s not for me. Firstly because I tried it and got my ass kicked by like a six year old and I can’t be bothered to invest the time to git gud, but also because there is no incentive to keep me playing.

@Rudy_Manchego Perhaps it’s a bit harsh of me to say it’s bad for gaming. It’s more like it’s ...folly to think this is what gaming is. Like it’s not really representative of the craft, and newcomers don’t understand that. Similar to how I felt about the Wii when every grandma and grandpa got one to play Wii Sports with their grandkids. It was good to get people into the hobby who never had interest before, but it didn’t really sell traditional gaming to those people, I don’t think. People came in just to see what all the fuss was about and after a time it failed to be sustainable to the casual market. The competition, Sony and Microsoft, developed their own move controls hoping to get a piece of the pie. The whole thing died out eventually and we were left with basically the same core audience for gaming we had before, albeit Nintendo was a lot richer for it. And props to them, and props to Epic also for making money on Fortnite. I’ve no issue with that. I just foresee many startup Battle Royale games coming in and vying for market share and eventually failing and the genre dying off. I guess it’s not bad for gaming if it brings in revenue, but it’s misleading as to what the gaming community is at its core.

Lol, reading this I’m pretty sure I’m over analyzing it, but that’s my unpopular opinion. 😋

@Th3solution TBF, Sony was developing what became Move before release of the EyeToy on PS2.

I don't think that many additional releases (on console at least) will be trying the milk the Battle Royale teat. Perhaps if Fortnite wasn't FTP they would - but since it has such a console monopoly and with the AAA franchises throwing their own BR modes in with their next releases, I really don't think there's much time for any new contenders to make a mark.

If anything though, it does show that people are still keen for a general type of online gameplay. So for that, I hope that PS3 greats like Warhawk and M.A.G. are revisited.

@KALofKRYPTON Yeah, I never played MAG or Warhawk. Wasn’t MAG just a lot like PUBG? Maybe it was before it’s time because I recall it kind of failed commercially.

@Th3solution Oh yeah - it bombed! Killed off Zipper Interactive too sadly.

MAG was great though, but your team mates really needed a headset (which there was a distinct lack of on PS3 players at the time), or at least to be on message.

The gameplay was largely objective based over a few different modes. The biggest was Dominion. 256 players, 128 per side but split down to squads of 8. You'd have a squad leader and another player in charge of 4 squads up to a command role for the whole 128 side.
You'd complete your squad objectives which drew you ever-closer to the centre of the map. Honestly, when M.A.G. clicked - it really was brilliant. When it didn't, it was usually because you'd have half of the players trying to do a run & gun and ignore objectives or the squad leaders.

It picked up a bit again when it was released in Japan, but it became pretty much impossible to get a dominion game going in way too short a time.

@Th3solution What you describe reminds me of whenever you talk to non-gamers about being a gamer, and they automatically assume it means you stay up until 3am shooting American kids on Call of Duty (I've been fighting misconceptions all my life, so I'm used to it, but it's not exactly where I expceted to be waging that particular war).

In the 90s, non-gamers called every single games console "the Nintendo" because it was the most popular, most immediately-recognisable brand at the time.

There's a danger that whenever something becomes so incredibly popular, it eclipses everything else. It's quite unique to gaming because it's the least-accessible form of entertainment nowadays. Consoles are still a couple hundred quid and there's a level of skill required that many don't have. No book slams shut after the fifth chapter and tests you before you can read the rest; no movie pauses halfway through and forces you to pay extra to see the second half. Because of this, many people don't understand gaming, yet they'll see their favourite footballers do a Fortnite emote dance after scoring a goal, wonder what it is and boom, Fortnite's got another potential player. Not gaming in general, just Fortnite.

Everything on this planet is cyclical. First it was Nintendo, then it was Call of Duty, now it's Fortnite. Give it a couple years and it'll be something else. The landscape may have changed a little by then, sure, but whilst games like Tomb Raider, Spider-Man, Horizon and God of War are still breaking records and making millions, our kinds of games will be just fine. After all, it's up to you what to play, not your friends.

Last week, I had 68 friends on PSN. Many of them were just folks who liked a screencap I'd posted in a community, or who I'd randomly bumped into in Star Trek Online. In the past couple months, many of them had messaged me with "get Fortnite" or "play Fortnite with me". Not even a question, "Do you happen to play Fortnite?", nothing like that. They were straight-up orders, demands that I take part. I'd always politely reply with "no thanks, I don't play Fortnite" and they'd often reply with "but it's free, everybody plays it now" (like those are factors in whether you enjoy a game or not). The other day, it happened once too many times, so I went through my PSN friends list and deleted anybody who'd messaged me similar or who, according to their profile, had played nothing but Fortnite for several months. I now have 28 friends on PSN.

Gaming is huge, diverse and intricate. Play your way. There's plenty of room.

@RogerRoger I always appreciate your gift for articulating things in the most perfect way. 😁 I completely agree and your comment is right in line with my thinking and experience.

Fortnite is not for me personally, but if people genuinely enjoy it and it makes them happy then good for them. I do agree that the creep into mainstream consciousness - to the point that people assume you must be a Fortnite player - is a little annoying, but like most gaming fads it will probably pass. Funny thing is, for some years many publishers (cough EA cough) have been saying that traditional single player games are dead, yet those experiences are stronger than ever. If Fortnite happens to be a thing, I don't care if I can still play what I enjoy.

@Th3solution Not perfect; I just noticed a typo.

Seriously, there's always somebody out there who'll agree with you. Push Square seems to be a pretty decent magnet for the likes of us.

Although I should clarify that my PSN friends cull wasn't against people who simply play Fortnite, but rather the ones who had been rude to me about it and / or who were doing it to the detriment of everything else. I still have friends on my profile who play it, and would never judge anybody for playing it.

My point was that, unfortunately, it just seems to be turning the vast majority of its players into obsessive jerks at the moment. To me, that says a lot about the game itself.

@RogerRoger I think that's just a reflection of society and what's popular. You dress up as anime and video game characters? That's weird man. You paint your body blue with the numbers of your favorite football player, wear a silly hat, and scream at the game until you can't even talk the next day? That's some team spirit!

@Jaz007 Well said. Excellent example!

As I mentioned, I've been fighting misconceptions all my life, and it can be incredibly tiring when every level of modern life is infected with such reactions and judgement.

I think some folks here have posted before about how gaming used to be a relatively-exclusive pursuit of like-minded people, and that they're upset about how mainstream it's become in recent years, thanks to games like Fortnite. Whilst I perhaps don't fully agree with such sentiment, I do understand it, very much so. Gaming is going through an important transition at the moment, from "kid's toy" to "acceptable passtime", and I guess these are just some of the growing pains.

Here's to the day cosplay isn't weird. Then I might finally get over myself and give it a try.

@Jaz007 One of my favourite tweets from the last few days:

"American sports fans: De-fense! De-fense!
British sports fans: All right lads, I’ve just worked up a song to the tune of Debussy’s Clair de Lune about an opposing player’s drink driving charge, ill count us off:"

Here’s one: a games primary purpose does not have to to be fun. It’s needs to be engaging and quality, but not necessarily fun. Being artistic or telling a story can come first. Movies don’t need to be fun, songs don’t need to fun, books don’t need to be fun, and if we want games to be considered on the same level artistically as them, we need to remove the notion that’s all that matters in a game. Don’t get me wrong, it’s fine to have Just Cause that’s nothing but fun, but not all games need to have that main objective.
Persona 5 helped me understand this better. The artistic depth of the game is nuts, as well as the quality of the story and characters. There was definitely fun to be had, but that didn’t drive the games quality as the main part. Fun didn’t make it the greatest game ever made, the art and story did. I think games that just aren’t fun to be play should be made.

@Jaz007 seems fair. Sounds like Flower or Journey or most walking simulators. They're all about the art and story, not much fun in those games. I don't tend to enjoy them but I respect what they're about and what they represent.

@Th3solution I don't get the Fortnite love either. I played it a little bit a few months ago and found it a bit dull. But a lot of its popularity seems to be with school kids and these things just snowball with them as people don't want to miss out on it.

Epic have kind of tapped into that as well with the emotes and dance moves which have become just as much of a thing. Then footballers play/stream the game and do the dance moves to celebrate goals and it just keeps going.

I'm not sure CoD sticking in a BR mode will make a huge difference. As people have said, being FTP (but then cleverly making you pay every couple of months for the passes) is a big selling point, plus the cartoony graphics seem to help rather than some gritty mix of brown and grey.

I blame Drake for the popularity of Fortnite.

Played it for a couple of hours earlier in the year which was enough for me.

These things come and go. I'm sure people will still play it just like they still do in World Of Warcraft, Dota, League of Legends and Overwatch. But it just won't be crazy popular as it is now and you won't hear about as much.

DOOM wasn't a good game, it was repetitive, the controls were floaty and it was kind of bland to look at, kind of generic

@FullbringIchigo Which Doom? I wasn't overly impressed with the latest Doom and it felt so old-school with no 'real' story to it. The only thing that kept me going to the end was the desire to complete the game. The glory kills, whilst cool to begin with, got repetitive really quickly. I know its on the other side of the spectrum of FPS games to Wolfenstein but I much prefer that to Doom. I wouldn't say it was a 'bad' game - more 'average' at best as it at least 'worked' as intended - well if you don't count the MP which was really poor by modern FPS standards - at least when I played it near to launch...

Both franchises were very similar with Doom taking the Wolfenstein format but with a different setting and enemy type. However, modern day Wolfenstein is now very different with a emphasis on Story. Its also a great example of a game that still embraces its roots whilst also bringing it up to date. Doom to me felt much more like the Original Doom with fancier graphics and the Glory kills - the map maybe a bit more varied, less 'boxy' with better verticality but the principal is still very similar - even the 'locked' room until you slay everything crops up a lot in this. The Glory kill reward, ie Ammo, health etc seem out of place - these demons sprouting out Ammo etc despite not having 'weapons'. There was a fair few levels that required back tracking too so once 'cleared' of demons, they were very empty.

I may be in a minority, but I actually think Doom 3 was better. It still had the 'classic' Doom thing of hidden rooms, demons and the BFG of course but also wove a narrative into the game - much in the same way that Wolfenstein has done. I do think that Doom has a great potential for Story too rather just be a 'mindless' shooter.

Maybe it is 'refreshing' for some to have a mindless shooter that's old school, with no 'story' as story can be subjective and often requires much more of scripted journey, character development, side characters, cut-scene etc. Its much easier to strip that out and go back to basics, have a 'vague' progression using 'environmental' design to allude to progression but really its the same 'level' with increasingly difficult or more enemies but better guns to deal with them with a different backdrop and occasional 'boss' room thrown in.

The new Doom looks like it will be more of the same in essence and whilst I will probably end up buying it as I have been playing Doom since the original released on PC, its not a game I am willing to buy on Day 1 or at full price either. A new Wolfenstein is a 'pre-order' for me by comparison...