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Post by dfunked on Jan 5, 2022 19:01:18 GMT
Not really... Any studios that I grew up with are probably made up of 99% different staff these days.
I'm holding out hope for Metroid Prime 4 now that Retro are back at the helm, but that still doesn't mean much the end of the day (although admittedly the DKC games have shown they can still craft great games)
Some of the Sony studios like Insomniac, ND and Sucker Punch have released pretty consistently great games and I'll jump on the hype train for any of their games, but I'd still prefer to wait for reviews.
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LTK
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Post by LTK on Jan 5, 2022 19:11:26 GMT
Does Supergiant count or are they too small? Edit- they've been mentioned twice already so I'll take that as a yes If it has to be AAA, I trust Ubisoft for some of their franchises- AssCreed, Far Cry. Not like I'm buying it sight unseen at launch or anything, but I know if they stick to the formula I'll enjoy it whenever I get around to it. Most big triple-A studios are untrustworthy by definition. Successful titles can make management start making unreasonable demands, the parent company may pressure them into milking a franchise instead of trying new ideas (hello Ubisoft), or jump on shitty bandwagons (hello Squeenix). Eventually the developer you trusted becomes unrecognizable. If not for this fear I would have put Arkane on the list. From Software only escapes this by virtue of thriving for decades under the same management, but who knows what the future holds for them? If Elden Ring hits the mainstream, I can imagine dollar signs appearing in the eyes of the wrong people in higher places. |
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Post by Deleted on Jan 5, 2022 19:13:52 GMT
I mean not for nothing, but From has been milking the Souls formula, if that's your argument.
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Post by ToomuchFluffy on Jan 5, 2022 19:20:06 GMT
Troika could be trusted to put out buggy, sometimes unfinished games that were really, really good at what they were trying to do. But they have been dead for a long time.
I guess Obsidian have become a bit uninterested in innovation and clinging a bit too hard to some old RPG-standards. It's telling that everybody is now talking about the Pathfinder-games, Divinity and especially Disco Elysium instead.
Streum-On have recently turned out to be a company that I trust to make the kind of complex FPS-games with strong atmosphere I do quite enjoy. Buggy releases with performance problems perhaps, but a lot of fun nonetheless.
Similar case for Icepick Lodge. They are simply making whatever they want to make and don't care more than necessary what exactly people want from them.
And Frictional are basically just making the kind of game they have long been making and even though I wasn't that big of a fan of Amnesia: Rebirth, I hope they start taking more risks again. At this point they seem to the be the company making a certain type of polished horror experience with puzzles and it's getting quite stale at this point. I guess I trust them not least since Thomas Grip has been pretty vocal about how he thinks about game development and it's also nice that they occasionally put out blog posts about how their games have been selling.
Companies that have disappointed me: I'm honestly unsure if that has ever happened. I'm ususally well informed before I buy anything and I don't get hyped that easily.
Edit: Amanita is one I forgot about.
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Post by killerbee on Jan 5, 2022 20:23:19 GMT
I’ve always kind of believed that any developer - no matter how illustrious their history - is only as good as its last two games.
It only takes two duds, one after the other, to kill any studio’s reputation. BioWare is a clear example of how quickly much lauded developers can fall from grace.
But In terms of reliable, bankable devs, I’d say From Software, Naughty Dog… in fact, most other Sony first party devs (Insomniac, Sucker Punch, Guerrilla) and Nintendo first parties… Playground Games have been consistently great with Forza Horizon, although it’ll be interesting to see how they handle the Fable reboot.
Bluepoint if it comes to technically great remakes, but like Playground, I think we need to see how they do with an original game.
I’d always be excited by a new Bungie game, but I hate how they’ve ruined Destiny with over-aggressive monetisation and catering to grind-happy “hardcore” members of their community at the expense of everyone else. So maybe not then.
Kojima maybe? He’s consistently surprising at least.
Hmm, that’s maybe more than I thought I’d list!
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Post by Aunt Alison on Jan 5, 2022 20:25:24 GMT
The thing about FROM is that people generally mean their Souls output. I believe they made quite a few games before then that the majority of Souls fans aren't even aware of. It'd be interesting to see what would happen if they stepped away from DS/people get bored of the formula
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Post by Deleted on Jan 5, 2022 20:30:07 GMT
Yeah. I miss their Armored Core, Otogi days. They've not made anything truly different since Demon's Souls, though.
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LTK
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Post by LTK on Jan 5, 2022 20:52:51 GMT
I mean not for nothing, but From has been milking the Souls formula, if that's your argument. When I say milking I think of franchises like Far Cry, Assassin's Creed, Call of Duty, GTA, and so on. I'd say the Souls series isn't milked any harder than the Witcher or Mass Effect. Yeah. I miss their Armored Core, Otogi days. They've not made anything truly different since Demon's Souls, though. It's not as different as their very early games but I'd argue Sekiro upended almost every element of the Souls formula while still remaining a third person melee action RPG. |
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zagibu
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Post by zagibu on Jan 5, 2022 21:34:18 GMT
The next Subset game will probably be exceptional again.
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Post by crispyxuk on Jan 5, 2022 23:06:41 GMT
I don’t play aaa games in general, but I trust developers to make the best game they can
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MolarAm🔵
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Post by MolarAm🔵 on Jan 5, 2022 23:32:54 GMT
Stock answer is Nintendo. I don't always like what they put out, but that's usually just down to my taste. Their games are pretty consistently well-polished, the benefit I suppose of being able to spend years polishing them.
I guess you can also trust Ubisoft, in that the things they bring out are pretty samey, but consistently... ok.
Aside from that, I don't really "trust" big developers. Most of the ones I can think of when I think "I will buy any thing that this team puts out", are indie developers.
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rajin
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Post by rajin on Jan 5, 2022 23:46:43 GMT
Stock answer is Nintendo. I don't always like what they put out, but that's usually just down to my taste. Their games are pretty consistently well-polished, the benefit I suppose of being able to spend years polishing them. I guess you can also trust Ubisoft, in that the things they bring out are pretty samey, but consistently... ok. Aside from that, I don't really "trust" big developers. Most of the ones I can think of when I think "I will buy any thing that this team puts out", are indie developers. I'd argue Nintendo has made some mediocre games lately so I definitely dont think its just down to taste (Paper Mario, sport games, Mario Party Switch). I feel the Wii u ports are also hiding the fact that their output number wise been terrible for years now. I do not count Monolith and Mercury Stream studio's (so no metroid dread or Xenoblade games). I once trusted CDPR and fell for cyberpunk because of my love for the Witcher franchise. But honestly lately I only trust FROM to a certain extent. Dark Souls 3 was their biggest disappointment for me personally. |
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Post by Jambowayoh on Jan 5, 2022 23:48:40 GMT
For me, I'll always love a Capcom game. They had a rough time during the 360 days but have been knocking it out of the park I'd say since Monster Hunter World onwards. Nintendo are always damn good for as long as I've been gaming since the late 80s. Back in the day I would have been saying this about Konami, and obviously they just stopped giving a shit for quite a while.
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Post by simple on Jan 5, 2022 23:55:14 GMT
I know they’re a publisher not a developer but where are people here on someone like Devolver? They’ve had a pretty high hit rate with me over the last few years
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Post by Nanocrystal on Jan 6, 2022 0:31:05 GMT
People still trust From after Dark Souls 2???
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Post by Bill in the rain on Jan 6, 2022 0:53:06 GMT
I don't trust or distrust them. They're just collections of people who can have a good day or have a bad day, who can be affected by a myriad of circumstances, who can change.
I agree that Nintendo and people like Supergiant have pretty good track records so far, but that doesn't mean they can't have a bad game. I rarely buy games on release, and never preorder, so it's not really an issue for me anyway, as by the time I'm buying the game I've probably heard a lot about its good and bad points and I can decide if it is likely to appeal to me.
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MolarAm🔵
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Post by MolarAm🔵 on Jan 6, 2022 1:18:47 GMT
Stock answer is Nintendo. I don't always like what they put out, but that's usually just down to my taste. Their games are pretty consistently well-polished, the benefit I suppose of being able to spend years polishing them. I guess you can also trust Ubisoft, in that the things they bring out are pretty samey, but consistently... ok. Aside from that, I don't really "trust" big developers. Most of the ones I can think of when I think "I will buy any thing that this team puts out", are indie developers. I'd argue Nintendo has made some mediocre games lately so I definitely dont think its just down to taste (Paper Mario, sport games, Mario Party Switch). I feel the Wii u ports are also hiding the fact that their output number wise been terrible for years now. I do not count Monolith and Mercury Stream studio's (so no metroid dread or Xenoblade games). I once trusted CDPR and fell for cyberpunk because of my love for the Witcher franchise. But honestly lately I only trust FROM to a certain extent. Dark Souls 3 was their biggest disappointment for me personally. I think most of those (eg. Mario Party, some of the sports games) are only kind of developed by Nintendo? Like it's a second-party thing done by a developer they own, though I guess the line can be pretty hazy. But they own Monolith Soft too, so I don't know how one could include Mario Party as "Nintendo" but exclude Xenoblade. But either way it's not a series that interests me, so I can't really speak to the quality of any of the Mario Parties. |
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Post by Deleted on Jan 6, 2022 1:26:42 GMT
Yeah, if we're including Naughty Dog and Insomniac under Sony, we have to include Monolith and Retro under Nintendo.
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MolarAm🔵
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Post by MolarAm🔵 on Jan 6, 2022 1:56:56 GMT
Fwiw, when I said "Nintendo" I meant "first party things made by the game studio called Nintendo", or at the very least one of their dev teams. Other people can include/exclude what they want, but that's how I interpreted the question. And for me it's pretty hard to think of any big developer with the same level of consistency.
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Lizard
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Post by Lizard on Jan 6, 2022 2:16:39 GMT
Fwiw, when I said "Nintendo" I meant "first party things made by the game studio called Nintendo", or at the very least one of their dev teams. Other people can include/exclude what they want, but that's how I interpreted the question. And for me it's pretty hard to think of any big developer with the same level of consistency. I would agree. In terms of hardware it's almost the inverse. |
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MolarAm🔵
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Post by MolarAm🔵 on Jan 6, 2022 3:03:13 GMT
They're pretty consistent hardware-wise, in the sense that (at least recently) they consistently take a different path in differentiating themselves to other console manufacturers, and often try to develop them on the cheap.
Ymmv on whether they're any good or not, of course.
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Lizard
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Post by Lizard on Jan 6, 2022 4:31:08 GMT
They're pretty consistent hardware-wise, in the sense that (at least recently) they consistently take a different path in differentiating themselves to other console manufacturers, and often try to develop them on the cheap. Ymmv on whether they're any good or not, of course. That's true, I guess. I just think that 'on the cheap' sometimes equates to corner-cutting and shoddyness. |
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MolarAm🔵
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Post by MolarAm🔵 on Jan 6, 2022 4:37:11 GMT
They're pretty consistent hardware-wise, in the sense that (at least recently) they consistently take a different path in differentiating themselves to other console manufacturers, and often try to develop them on the cheap. Ymmv on whether they're any good or not, of course. That's true, I guess. I just think that 'on the cheap' sometimes equates to corner-cutting and shoddyness. I meant it more in the sense that they don't seem to have as much investment in the cutting edge graphics tech and the like. At least not as much as the other major players. It's largely true that, whatever you think about Nintendo consoles, they're usually pretty sturdy pieces of kit. |
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Post by Lizard on Jan 6, 2022 5:23:03 GMT
That's true, I guess. I just think that 'on the cheap' sometimes equates to corner-cutting and shoddyness. I meant it more in the sense that they don't seem to have as much investment in the cutting edge graphics tech and the like. At least not as much as the other major players. It's largely true that, whatever you think about Nintendo consoles, they're usually pretty sturdy pieces of kit. I can't disagree with that. Perhaps the flaws/shortcomings of Nintendo's hardware stand out a little more because of it. A crappy controller seems less noteworthy when your console has a 10 million-bit CPU with ray-tracing spraying cyber nipples. |
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EMarkM
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Post by EMarkM on Jan 6, 2022 7:07:16 GMT
I haven’t felt that way about a game developer in a long time. A long time…
You see, in the 1980s, the one dev whom you could absolutely 100% rely upon for a full-on five star product every single time was Ultimate (ACG).
Until you couldn’t.
Suddenly it became apparent that they’d had one really good, groundbreaking idea, but quite quickly had run out of ideas when it came to moving on.
In the end, they became Rare, of course, and did achieve many more great things, but you couldn’t guarantee it anymore before you saw the next game for yourself.
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Post by dominalien on Jan 6, 2022 8:18:25 GMT
Origin (EA really) broke my wide-eyed innocence with Ultima IX and I haven’t been the same since. I’ll enthusiastically wait for a game, but will not rush in blindly.
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Post by Aunt Alison on Jan 6, 2022 9:02:57 GMT
Nintendo cheap?
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Post by Psiloc on Jan 6, 2022 10:31:59 GMT
Bioware? And you cite ME: A? That's a weird choice OP. So anyway I'm going with CDPR kind of funny to mock someone's choice for one game, then go with another studio's whose last game was controversially not up to par. fwiw, I enjoyed both Andromeda and Cyberpunk, but that just stood out to me. Poe’s law strikes again |
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Post by suicida on Jan 6, 2022 10:43:58 GMT
I'm not sure "trust" is the right word, but there's one publisher/developer that my default position is "interested" before I know anything else about the game, and that's Atlus.
I don't end up liking everything they put out, but over the last few years they've consistently pushed my buttons more than anyone else.
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Post by britesparc on Jan 6, 2022 11:07:22 GMT
I don't know if anyone - an individual or a company of any size - can be relied upon to produce masterpiece after masterpiece. And not just in games; look at Pixar. For, what, twenty years? They were held up as this pinnacle of animation. Then after a couple of ropey sequels and underperforming original films (and presumably John Lasseter chasing away all the talented women), the narrative became "Pixar are on a downward trend, they've lost it" etc. Really, neither image was true; it's all a question of talent plus management plus luck.
Also, I think there's a tendency, especially in gaming, for people to expect an insane level of quality. How many games get lambasted as being "terrible" when they're basically fine? Or even very good? When people talk about 343's Halo games as being awful, I honestly don't know what they're on about; how can someone like the mechanics of Halo but not like 343's games? I'm not saying they're "as good as" Halo 3 or Reach, but they're fine, they're entirely enjoyable, 3-4 star experiences. I've played bad games, I've played unplayable games; just because a series has slipped from being an average "essential" (in EG-speak) to being an average "recommended" isn't a disaster.
So, there are developers who I like a lot, and I'm always interested in what they're doing; there are franchises I like to follow through thick and thin. But I never expect anyone to never make a mistake. It's not a question of trust, it's a question of probability.
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