Episodic games

[Phait]

Whaddya think?

[evanazzo]

yeah I like them when they can actually release on time *cough* Valve *cough*

[Scream]

With playtimes for full-priced titles getting down into the 5-8 hours range these days, it's nice that Valve at least budget prices their "episodes". $60 for 5-8 hours of gameplay is getting to be a bit much.

[LadiesAndGentlemen]

Word.

[Jinroh]

I enjoyed the Strong Bad games and SiN Episodes though there was only one of them. hehe.

;) Also I liked Duke Nukem 3D, DooM, etc. all those games that were broken into episodes. :D

[Kalki]

Apart from HL2's I haven't played any. And their release timelines and pricing don't set them apart much from the regular "expansion pack".

[motionblur]

'Other'
It depends on the title. In case of the Telltale games it works very good for me and the episodes are resonably priced. Games that feel to epic for episodes should no be torn apart. And I repeat the 'resonably priced' ;)

[peoplessi]

Yes, with Telltale they succeeded. Very frequent releases, and they had high quality
No, with Valve, they failed to be blunt and honest. Waiting years between so called "episodes" is bit too much. They tried to explain themselves out of it, but the fact is, that the reason for them going episode route was the fact that they wanted to bring more HL2, more frequently, rather than making HL3 and have a long pause.

[Mountain Man]

I'm a bit "meh" about episodic games. I was excited back in the day when I thought, "Oh boy! A new Half-Life game every six-months!" but we all know how that turned out. And adventure games don't really interest me, so I haven't been able to allow my spirits to be lifted by Telltale's efforts.

So, yeah, meh...

[Damien_Azreal]

So far, I'm unimpressed by episodic releases.

Telltale seem to be doing it right with Sam and Max and their other releases. But my own personal experiences with episodic gaming has been... meh.

SiN: Episodes falling flat on it's face and dying after only one episode, HL2's episodes have managed released... but they release cycle hasn't been any quicker than that of a normal games.
And pricing has not been much if any better. They "justified" the 50 price for Episode Two by packaging it with two (technically four) other games, but not everybody wanted the other games.

[Superczar]

What happened to SiN Episodes is what scares me about episodic games. I like them but I don't want to see that happen again... :(

[Damien_Azreal]

Yep.
I was so hyped for Episode 2, specially with the teaser they left at the end of the first episode. Then we got updates from Ritual, talking about how well it was moving along.

And then, after we're told it's pretty much finished... the project gets canned. :( I know this won't be an issue with HL2's episodes... but it is a problem with the concept.

HL2's episodes have different problems. The extremely long wait in between episodes, specially with lack of information given out.

[Hudson]

I think we should just stick with episodic "mission/expansion packs". Current DLC for games are going back to this method (Fallout 3 for example), and i'm just hoping others follow suit.

[Jiminator]

that's actually a pretty good idea, although I imagine it would work better with a sandbox type of world, which HL is not.

[razgriz]

I'm indifferent.

I enjoyed Sin Episodes Emergence but unfortunatley, no one else noticed.

I do like the Half Life 2 episodes.

[Nihilanth]

I don't know. I prefer to get a game that's complete from the start to the end. I also don't want a game to die after one episode. But I don't mind Half-Life 2 episodes and actually I think that both the ending of E1 and E2 would loose some of their kick if there were immediately followed by the "next level". So it kind of depends.

[evanazzo]

I can't believe some of the SiN devs didn't keep all the work they did on it and just finish and release it themselves even if it was released as freeware or something. :( It makes me sad that there will be no more SiN Eps

[ZuljinRaynor]

Penny Arcade Adventures EP 1 and 2 were released the same year so they did good. Valve failed horrible and Telltale gets what Episodic means. Sin Eps is sadly gone which is a real downer for me since I loved the first Episode. :(

[Jiminator]

I can't believe some of the SiN devs didn't keep all the work they did on it and just finish and release it themselves even if it was released as freeware or something. :( It makes me sad that there will be no more SiN Eps
uh, there is really a lot of time/effort that goes into making a good game, even if it is really short. The devs already felt that they were abused by 'pirates' and not embraced by the gaming community in releasing the first episode, as such it is easy to understand why anything further was just dropped.

[Jinroh]

I can't believe some of the SiN devs didn't keep all the work they did on it and just finish and release it themselves even if it was released as freeware or something. :( It makes me sad that there will be no more SiN Eps

uh, there is really a lot of time/effort that goes into making a good game, even if it is really short. The devs already felt that they were abused by 'pirates' and not embraced by the gaming community in releasing the first episode, as such it is easy to understand why anything further was just dropped.

Yeah, even if it was essentially finished, they'd still have to go through a lot of Legal Red tape to be able to release and whatnot.

But we can dream. ^_^

[FireFly]

At this point if Valve extended their episodes by a couple of hours, they could almost be considered 'sequels' given how short games have become.

Hopefully that's what they're doing with Episode 3.

[alexgk]

Episodic gamong is a great concept, one which sadly has been poorly executed in most cases...

[SonnyBonds]

I'm indifferent. If a game is good, I'll play it.. episodic or not.

The Telltale Sam & Max games are pretty well done episodic games.

And obviously the Valve 'episodic' games have been a complete failure as episodic gaming. They're great games but as episodic games, they've failed.

[0marTheZealot]

Episodic gaming is pretty much fail. HL3 would have been much preferred than Ep 1-3.

Other than Valve, no other big name developer has embraced episodic releases. Sam&Max is doing it right with near monthly releases. I'd rather see what Fallout 3 is doing, that is, periodic DLC that expands the game world.

[Phayzon]

I prefer real episodes, not this cheesy crap like Valve and others are trying to pull.

Real episodes; see Doom, Duke3D, Quake, etc.

[Hudson]

Like I said before, virtual mission/expansion packs should be the future.

DLC should be the "Opposing Force" or the Quake 2 expansions of the past. Once again FO3 is doing a good job of this (despite alienating PS3 users), and Rockstar is failing at it with their GTA4 content (seriously, give me a break.. a biker gang?! That was the best to come up with??)

Imagine now if Diablo 2 just came out and Lord of Destruction was released as DLC, it would be fantastic. Or if Team Arena was DLC. Developers need to know the difference between milking and expanding.

[DerricktheW]

Assualt on Dark Athena started off as a little add on for Escape from Butcher Bay, but then it grew into a full game

I agree about the big expansion thing. 5 bucks for something like a new weapon or some new skins is bullshit. 20 bucks for a whole new set of levels with new content would be something worthwhile.

id Software really knows how to do it, even with Doom 3

RoE, anyone? Damn good expansion.

Now, just don't go overboard like EA and the Sims. Sure, some of the addons are good, but damn, they hardly give you that much per expansion.

[Piano Man]

I enjoyed the Strong Bad games and SiN Episodes though there was only one of them. hehe.

;) Also I liked Duke Nukem 3D, DooM, etc. all those games that were broken into episodes. :D

I don't quite think thats what he meant... I think he meant games where a second episode was released later than the first like HL2 Ep 1 & 2. Duke Nukem could be bought and you could play all 3 episodes once you bought it... I remember buying it 12 years ago....

and I'm still pissed off that Sin episodes isn't going anywhere.

[Jinroh]

I don't quite think thats what he meant... I think he meant games where a second episode was released later than the first like HL2 Ep 1 & 2. Duke Nukem could be bought and you could play all 3 episodes once you bought it... I remember buying it 12 years ago....

and I'm still pissed off that Sin episodes isn't going anywhere.

I knew what he meant. hehe. I was just mentioning them to be humerous since they are also broken into episodes. Though with Shareware one could argue. :D

[KO Gilligan]

I'm indifferent.

I enjoyed Sin Episodes Emergence but unfortunatley, no one else noticed.

I do like the Half Life 2 episodes.

There is some buzz about the lack of good Copy Protection really killing this one because of the way it was torrent-spread across the Internet. Really killed Ritual, who's name got sponged into a puzzle game company. Tom Mustaine was independently working on some groundbreaking project last I heard... wonder what he's up to?

It's all a rather sad story, the game was way too short, even for an episode. Maybe that was just because I really got into it.

[Boo Boo Juice]

I'm pretty indifferent about the whole idea of episodic content. I just care about if what I am buying is fun and worth the money.

[NutWrench]

I guess it depends of what your definition of "episodic" is. I define it as a fairly short period of time (at least a week but a hell of a lot less than 2-3 years).

[Jiminator]

eh, i think dev groups need better tools to make better expansion packs. episodes are really too short. expansions are generally as long as the orginal games, and in some cases can be put out yearly. an expansion would not mean lots of new monsters, weapons, cut-scenes, voice acting and so forth, but instead make use of the existing content. So say a new generation every 3/4 years and an expansion pack every 1-2 years. Differnent groups could work on the different products and I think consumers would go for that.

[CommanderZx2]

If they weren't doing episodic, even if it is slow, we wouldn't have TF2, portal or L4D during this time either.

I'd rather have them continue to release episodes slowing and have the additional games with it than wait many years for one larger single game release.

[vcatkiller]

I'm rather against the episodic thing. Most devs just plain don't know how to do it well, and waiting over a year for the next episode is just silly. Especially when the business suddenly goes bust/changes focus/whatever, and the next ep never appears.

That said, bring on Sam & Max season 3, those folk at Telltale seem to have their heads screwed on right. :)