'LucasArts Sucks'
Do people still think LucasArts sucks (Not the adventure games, but the company because they canceled several adventure games)? I remember hating it for a few years, though maybe that's just me, but more recently, with MI1&2:SE and TOMI, I haven't really complained much about them anymore.
Sign in to comment in this discussion.
Comments
Well... I wasn't entirely happy with the decision to cancel adventure games and stop making them. On the other hand, they did release as a publisher/developer some great games during that period (most of them Star Wars, though): Armed & Dangerous, Indiana Jones and the Emperor's Tomb, Star Wars: Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Star Wars: Republic Commando, so there really was no reason for me to hate the company or to think it sucked.
I think we can thank Rodriguez for that brief purple patch. Now that he's gone, though, I haven't really got high hopes for the future.
I remember liking Armed and Dangerous, despite it being rushed to release(at least, that's what I heard), and could have been better.
BioWare made Knights of the Old Republic. Lucas Arts was the publisher.
Anyhow, LucasArts sucks because they made not just The Farce Unleashed, but also The Farce Unleashed 2: Gary Stu Harder.
However, they also made Shadows of the Empire, which is one of my top 5 favorite N64 games. Hnnnn.
I was hoping to get both MIs from the same place. I like Telltale, and I would prefer to give them my money but, yes, I figure I'll end up buying them both on steam eventually.
This really.
Sam & Max was cancelled by Mike Nelson, and I have no idea who cancelled Full Throttle 2, possibly Simon Jeffrey.
By the time Ward took over, there were no Adventure Games being developed.
I thought you ment the MST3K Mike Nelson XP
I really do thank him, for that short time he was around he managed to breath new life back into Monkey Island to revamp the original two games, the first outing being rather good but then the company completely smashing it for Monkey Island 2.
Just for that time he was there we now have at least a Trilogy of 2D Point and Click Monkey Island games that feature the same cast in all three!
LucasArts engenders spite from people by foregoing any and all development of adventure games in favor of more Star Wars shovelware *grr*. The recent MI:SE's and ToMI do only enough to slightly lessen the effect, considering that the background art in SOMI:SE is woefully incomplete in places, and that the music in classic mode for LCR:SE sucks.
George Lucas is an idiot who has very little concept of good storytelling anymore, as evidenced by the suckfest that is the Star Wars:SE's and prequel trilogy. Adywan's fan edit of A New Hope (and upcoming Empire Strikes Back) are hands down better than the SE versions.
Yes, same here. That could have been one of the greatest RPGs of all time had the team been given a reasonable amount of time. But no, LucasArts would rather rush an unfinished game out the door in time for Christmas simply so that they could rake in the dollars off of increased sales. That was the perfect indication to show that LucasArts now cares about money more than actually making good games. And when a company prioritizes money over the quality of their product, you know things are operating the wrong way.
What perhaps annoyed me even more, however, was the fact that LucasArts disallowed Obsidian from making a patch for the game when the company was more than willing to do so. So, not only do LucasArts rush the game, causing it to be buggy and incomplete, they also prevent it from being fixed. Do they really care that little about their games and products?
So yeah, LucasArts do suck.
Five years ago I would've been with you on this one. That LucasArts folks were bastards because they haven't let Obsidian to do their job properly. But now that we see Obsidian's other work, WOULD have they done it properly, really? Where's the guarantee?
Not that it would have changed much of anything so far as Obsidian's awesome, award-winning game testing goes... but still. Ouch.
To start, they rarely actually make games anymore. They mostly exist just to loan the Star Wars license out to other developers. I think the only games they've actually developed recently have been the Monkey Island Special Editions (which I don't quite count since they're remakes) and The Force Unleashed games, which are still more damn Star Wars. (I personally hate Star Wars and believe it was never good, so I'm somewhat biased.)
There was a brief hope spot with Rodriguez commissioning Tales of Monkey Island and the special editions. It seemed like they might return to adventure gaming after all, but we know how that worked out.
I'm at least grateful that most of "The Cleverness Division" is still active in gaming. Tim Schafer's done Psychonauts and Brutal Legend with some other projects in the works. Ron Gilbert released Deathspank fairly recently. And Dave Grossman, Chuck Jordan, Michael Stemmle, and a whole bunch of others went on to work for some company you probably haven't heard of.
George Lucas has never had a concept of good story-telling. He has great *ideas*, but it's important to note that he did not write the screenplay for any of the original Star Wars trilogy, Indiana Jones, etc. Sadly, the spirit of creativity and originality that drove Lucasfilm and Lucasarts' biggest successes is now non-existent. They are simply another big publisher.
I didn't like the direction of it's two predecessors, though I have to admit The Emperor's Tomb was something of an improvement. If you're a fan of The Staff Of Kings i'd probably stop reading here because I honesty just need to express my disappointment as to how bad it was. I'm not the sort to make whinge threads but this is an exception, I really hated this game and more than ever, it demands that Lucasarts take the Indy gaming franchise in a new direction - fast.
The first thing I should admit is that the last IJ game I enjoyed was FOA. Yes, I realise that's a typical fan-boy type response, but I just can't dispute how timeless that game was. After playing The Staff of Kings, I was really disgusted by the gameplay experience. The controls were unreasonably awkward, the physics of the combat were the worst i've played on the DS and the graphics were appalling. For a Lucasarts title, I expected so much more.
Since the games went on the third person action/adventure route, at best they've been IJ themed imitations of Tomb Raider. I'd caution Lucasarts in going further down this road in future as it still doesn't work, especially after seeing how perfectly the Unchartered series is doing it.
As a positive, I did actually enjoy the story and the telling of it. The graphic novel was brilliant. While the story lacked some depth, there were some brilliant ideas there. My suggestion to Lucasarts is that they need to go back to the classic style. Already by doing that they would achieve more immersive gameplay, an improved treatment to a well intended story and overall capturing the spirit of the films. Never has IJ been about just action, the action was used to move the plot along to heighten tension. Ever since The Infernal Machine, the action has been the narrator. When there was action in Fate of Atlantis, it was an extention of the player's decision as Indiana Jones as to how events unfolded. With the contemporary games, all the games do is benchmark the player's reaction to AI.