Realism Ruined Cover Shooters | Learn From Dead to Rights

[@TheCrewExpendable]

0:59 Look how clear, crisp, and readable these 3D graphics are! I miss early 3D and arcade 3D. A lot of modern 3D is certainly very, very technically impressive (and I never thought we would ever achieve realtime ray tracing before I was an old, old man) but I fight so much of it unreadable. Between the realistic shading on everything so nothing stands out, high detail making silhouettes non-distinct, and TAA/non-exagerated animation/motion blur/AI up-scalling/etc. making everything fuzzy, I find modern 3D games very hard to visually parse.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yes that s such a great point! Because everything is detailed and "realistic" the gameplay mechanics of a lot of modern stuff becomes more visually muddy because often if you have want certain aspects of the game to be visually readable, they need to be exaggerated and not realistic at all ha. Yeah this era of 3D I really connect with because it forced the devs to have a stylistic approach, since realism was impossible and looked really bland usually. Look at mafia on the Xbox ha, it s kinda a cool game but really bland due to the attempt at realism

[@verygoodfreelancer]

low powered consoles and specs *forced* designers to have to make artistic and stylization choices about everythjng. ended up with a stronger and more considered result with way less clutter and noise.

[@Senumunu]

thats mostly to do with their horrible colors. everything is desaturated, grey and monochromatic. then they clutter everything with assets. no hierarchy, no contrasts, no scale distinctions. just content from the engine library.

[@VuNguyen-fv5jl]

Man for real. That new Wukong Son Goku games is “pretty” but looks so flat and blended in that it’s uninteresting to look at

[@patrickholt8782]

Finally someone else gets it. I was playing fallout 4 and it tries to be super realistic. Problem is the shadows are so harsh I don’t feel like exploring places because it’s sorta hard to tell what’s what.

[@SourClout]

Your channel is criminally underrated, you make me wanna pick up alot of these ganes you discuss!

[@TheElectricUnderground]

That s fantastic to hear! Yeah the channel has been under the radar for a long time, but it s growing slowly and steadily :-)

[@xHanabiran]

Now it’s time for Viewtiful Joe: The Greatest Game Cube Game Ever Released

[@7thsaga662]

2nd best. F Zero GX is 👑 but I feel you.

[@jonathanmartinezlopez1910]

I don't think he will like it, too much puzzle like

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Oh yeah I get the feeling that game will be covered soon, it s been close to winning in the patreon votes :-)

[@Mondoness]

Sorry bro i got on that Phantasy Star Online crack. 😎

[@censoredterminalautism4073]

Super Monkey Ball and F-Zero GX exist, so, it has some tough competition. Amazing games.

[@shadowfoxx14]

I finally understand my problem with the last 2 Splinter Cell games: They went from being third-person stealth with a little bit of action thrown in, to cover shooter with a little stealth that you can choose to ignore most of the time.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yep I m gonna talk about the original splinter cell soon (I really like the first game a lot) and I agree that the series ended up abandoning it s core design by the end and and just becoming a generic cover shooter without the same routing and stakes as the original game

[@shadowfoxx14]

@TheElectricUnderground I subbed with notifications, so I'll be sure to watch it!

[@RuV9999]

6:17 real. this is why i think realism movement ruin game like this. it somehow feels unsatisfying to control when the characters feels slow. its not the good place to implement realistically movement into action game. action game has to be fast pace.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Exactly and it s so noticeably worse if you have a basis of comparison. Dead to rights doesn't have any movement interia, the movement is instant response. So even though Jack kinda moves slow, it doesn't feel as slippery as trying to play a modern cover shooter. And it s pretty cool how at times dead to rights really demands some precise spacing. With inertia the player loses responsiveness and precision and gains nothing but "immersion"

[@RuV9999]

@@TheElectricUnderground its kinda ironic how underrated the game is because this is the first time i found "Dead to Right" game as the Cover based TPS that done right.

[@colbyboucher6391]

"Action game has to be fast pace" literally just isn't true though. It's a _preference_ you have, yet Monster Hunter, a game where people sometimes stand in one spot "charging" a sword for five seconds straight and constantly get tripped by thing they're fighting, keeps getting more popular.

[@M_reapr]

Its interesting the division has more arcady controls and I always found it way more fun then gears of war and last of us and stuff. To be fair though I prefer my third person shooters to be like ghost recon and metal gear. Wildlands and mgs5 are the best feeling 3rd person shooters on the market mean while when it comes to survival horror the evil within 2 and re4r feel so fucking good because of the hit response of actually fighting enemies. I ultimately enjoy milisims the most because when done right the fire fights are the most satisfying. Games like swat 4 and ready or not are S+ tier. Swat 4 is legendary especially with the fan favorite mod elite force first responders mod I will say while realism can make a game feel worse when It comes to shooters the most beneficial way to utilize realism is the hit response and feedback against enemies. Ready or not and red dead 2 do this flawlessly ready or not has some of the most impactful shooting ever while rdr2 has the most realistic peds I think the difference between a good game and bad can come down to how good the rag dolls are or how responsive defeating enemies are. Tldr swat 4 EF first responders mod is one of the greatest games ever. Thank you.

[@lucasLSD]

@@colbyboucher6391 and in that same game you can now walk and shoot at the same time with the bowguns, the insects in rise gave huge mobility to the character and made every weapon faster, there's the dual blades, insect staff, gunlance got a literal boost to cover big distances, etc. Monster Hunter has been speeding up since XX and it is much better for it.

[@VuNguyen-fv5jl]

You really need to give lectures at Game Developers Conferences

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Maybe someday! I'd actually really enjoy doing panels at game conventions and stuff and have discussions with people, that sounds really cool.

[@poonoo87]

Maybe at GDC 15 years ago, now it's full of the worst DEI lectures ever even if the odd presentation from a Japanese dev is ok.

[@tamerxero]

@@poonoo87 Which lecture did you see last time you were there? Last time I was there the best thing I saw for my field was a lecture on emergent gameplay systems architecture, and the worst thing I saw was a 30 minute lecture about building online presence. There's DEI, but I don't see that as a bad thing seeing as how there's so many really talented devs working in the industry from all walks of life. And the best Japanese lectures come out of BitSummit's one-on-ones - indies ftw

[@AJDOLDCHANNELARCHIVE]

Brilliant video mate! As an indie game dev, I love your explanations of why certain mechanics feel good to play and others don't. Hit stun is really a much better way to do things in a shooter. Even Metal Gear Solid (1998) was doing it, and it made the game feel much more realistic whilst still feeling good.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Oh yes absolutely!! One of my fav things about mgs is how much hitstun the jabs have ha!!! You can infinite stun dudes with them and all kinds of fun stuff, great stuff!

[@TranslatingTheName]

3:23.... I automatically thought of Operation Winback. 1999 on the N64.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

That s awesome! Yeah I figured there would be a fair bit of obscure early 3d games out there that have cover systems as well, since time crisis already was well established ha. That's why I made sure to include saying "from my knowledge" in the vid. The wikipedia oversight is pretty wild though considering dead to rights is the same dev as Killswitch and was very popular. And I'll probably remove this little segment about what game did what first anyway, since its a complicated topic and more of a side point anyway ha. Update: fixed ha

[@Csp2900]

Brother, I'm so glad i stumbled onto your channel. The way you talk about games and game design is amazing. Please keep making videos brother!

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Thank you so much for the kind comment :-) yes I m starting full time this month so I m really excited being able to cover more games from this era :-)

[@ZombieRommel]

I think the most interesting cover shooter ever was Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway. The game had cover but it was destructible, and suppressive fire over the cover could keep enemies pinned down while you or your squad flanked. The bad rep cover shooters get is that the gameplay becomes too passive and the player rarely has to make interesting decisions. That was definitely not the case in BiA.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

That sounds awesome! And yes I agree completely. Deeper cover shooter design is to have cover have certain advantages (like defensive safety) but then have the over reliance on it punished by counter incentives, classic risk reward dynamics that make the cover system deeper. Yes, a lot of Western games use cover as a one size fits all solution with little counter incentives, which is what makes the gameplay feel stale and boring.

[@DIOBrando-ij2bp]

I think Kill.Switch was just the first to do blind fire from cover. I think that’s how it used to get credited, but for some reason over the last, like five or so years that’s morphed from a specific aspect of cover shooting to it being the first to do cover shooting. The first time I ever remember seeing cover shooting outside of a rail-shooter like Time Crisis was in the N64 Metal Gear Solid knockoff WinBack. Metal Gear Solid had cover, but WinBack let you pop out of cover and shoot guys...it was very cool back in ‘99. Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell also came out before Kill.Switch, a year before it, and also had cover shooting. Something Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell always gets over looked on, that was the first third person shooter that had the over-the-shoulder view when you’re aiming that Resident Evil 4 would use a few years later.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

I think you are absolutely right. It s just really funny to point out how vague and imprecise all of this genre documentation over the years has been. Game journalists really should have been paying attention to this stuff instead of yammering on about ludonarrative dissonance ha😂

[@ShrekFhiyona]

​@@TheElectricUnderground speaking of cover shooters there is Video Game which first had a N64 port then PlayStation 2 port. The title of the Video Game is Operation: Win Back

[@DIOBrando-ij2bp]

That first Red Dead Revolver game is interesting. When you look at the original footage of it back when it was still being made under Capcom, it seems like what Capcom wanted, and what Angel Studios (Now Rockstar San Diego) didn’t quite seem to understand when you hear them talk about working with Capcom, is a third person shooter more akin to gallery shooters like Sin and Punishment, but they didn’t want it to be on rails, they wanted the player to be able to freely move forward. Although maybe a bit more like a Wild Guns that you could move around in. Capcom did ultimately end up releasing something like this ahead of Red Dead Revolver, and while they were still doing Revolver, with P.N.03.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

I love the first red dead revolver! That s def gonna be a vid and probably soon. The fact that the series is a rebranded sequel to the gun smoke Shmup by Capcom is INSANE lol.

[@DIOBrando-ij2bp]

​@@TheElectricUnderground ​ It’s kind of hard to believe Capcom hasn’t brought Gun.Smoke back in the years following Red Dead Redemption’s massive success. I know Capcom used to release Rockstar games over in Japan, so maybe that’s partly why they never did, but I’m not sure they do anymore. And speaking of Gun.Smoke, I think the NES version may have a cover system. The arcade version doesn’t, and that’s how I mostly always played it. But I want to say the NES one did. There’s these post set up in the first stage that you and the enemies can’t shoot over, but if you go right up next to them you can shoot over them. I hadn’t ever played the NES version until like the mid 2010s, and remember being pretty surprised to see a type of cover system in a ‘80s shmup...especially since I’d been playing the arcade version since I was like two. Maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise since Akira Yasuda was the character designer, but Revolver still has the best character designs of the Red Dead series.It’s kind of funny that even in the Redemption games you’ll sometimes come across some character that looks like a slightly altered version of a Revolver design.

[@rockhyde7775]

Why do corporations push realism so hard? I never cared for realism in games.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

I have no idea. One really out there theory I have (and this is just a theory) is that maybe by making all games "realistic" they have a single standardized version of game design that they all can use to homogenize the production process. If games have less specific styles than it's much easier to reuse assets and make just one mass standard without things looking recycled.

[@ffmpregffmpreg]

MBAs seem to drive most of a game's developments via spreadsheets, and I think "realism" must be somewhere in their spreadsheets since that's a non-culture specific metric by which the game's appeal can be measured. Also, with larger studios, I imagine more playtesters aren't deep into game analysis, so when they have to make a comment about a gameplay mechanic they're not enjoying, their frame of reference is other AAA games and reality itself.

[@emptyorchestra]

Because of the market interest

[@TheLingo56]

@@TheElectricUnderground I think the other thread mentioning major graphics innovation mostly coming from the west is a potential hint why. When most people in the west are getting sold a game they're typically more excited about what new things are being simulated, different ways a world responds to the player, and what new technology they have access to in the same games they're already playing. Japan seems to appreciate formalism more where it's the pure game mechanics and the systems that are the core interest. One interesting caveat to this theory though is just how popular competitive online games are. It's almost as if in the west people want single player games to be mellow and meditative experiences so they can leave the difficult and tightly designed mechanics for multiplayer. At the same time modern SBMM does kind of stimulate that same droning feeling where the game always feels the same no matter how you improve so you need progression systems or a cash shop to buy some variety.

[@MikoYotsuya292]

"Realism is not necessarily a good thing in games. We like to be able to create experiences that are more interesting than real life. Sometimes, realism can get in the way of that." - Gaben

[@BagofSchmidt]

Never heard of this one. I'll have to check it out. The Human shield mechanic looks really fun. Hope you do PS2 shinobi soon. Been really enjoying my first play through recently.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

I will for sure Schmidt! Lot s of people are recommending it so I'll have to cover it soon :-)

[@SakuragiRed]

I love the original dead to rights, one of my favorite shooters and not much shooters do the disarm combat that this game did

[@TheElectricUnderground]

I know right! I m shocked it s style of design didn't spread outward more. Especially the human shields, they are like beat em grabs ha. I think mgs actually ended up with a similar system in mgs3 where you can grab frontward lol. Until then you could only grab from behind in mgs

[@grdrddd]

Starting 21:00 I really think he also described the general gameplay you find in the first last of us too

[@alanbalan3539]

Damn man, you have a way of making me want to play every game you cover. As for games with cool, bro dogs, this one reminds me of the Shadow Dancer dog. Another game in which you can be stuck ducking behind cover and send it out to deal with an enemy.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Glad to hear it ha! Dead to rights is a fun one for sure, it s one I pop in my Xbox 1x and play at least once a year :-) shadow dancer sounds really cool!

[@shazzbutter]

I love this video. I LOVED Dead To Rights, which I played and finished for the first time, just this last year for the PS2. Now I'm curious about the Xbox version. However, everyone forgets the cover shooter WinBack: Covert Operations. *WinBack predates all these games, having been released by KOEI for the N64 and PS2 in 1999 /2000.* Also I just want to shout-out the even older Time Crisis (1995). While it is an on-rails shooter and not 3rd person, the cover mechanics are absolutely the focus of the game; it is impossible to play without using cover.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yeah I had no idea winback existed either ha! I ll have to check it out, it looks really interesting. Also yes def look into the Xbox version for sure

[@shman5000o]

Another awesome/insightful vid as always! Makes me finally take a dip into Dead to Rights after years and years of foolishly writting it off as just another dime a dozen action shooter of that era. Also, btw, you mentioning the cool thing about hitstun in the Goodeneye games got me thinking...you ever play the Timesplitters FPS trilogy series? Some of the folks that worked on Goldeneye/Perfect Dark later formed a dev team named "Free Radical" and would go on to make the Timesplitters series. Those have a very similar hitstun effect that'd you find in the Goldeneye games. Series was super fun(well, 2 and 3 were. Never played the 1st game) and one of the last great console focused FPS games imo

[@futurecoplgf]

Nice vid as usual! I love to play games on the hardest difficulties for the same reasons you described. A lot of the time this can unfortunately turn the game into the same thing it was before only just more of a slog...but other times it really pushes you to utilize the entire toolkit on offer instead of just part of it, making it a completely fresh and engaging experience! Like you say, Dead to Rights is so much more than just slow-mo dives, but you'd never realize that without a harder difficulty to enforce that! As much as it gets slammed on and I can understand why, I recently played Gears of War on Insane difficulty and thought it was a totally different experience than the bland cover shooter I thought it was going to be. The difficulty really forced me to use new tactics like flanking and blindfire because of how deadly enemies were: a far cry from just parking myself and repetitively popping out and shooting that lower difficulties would allow. Another interesting example of difficulty design was Mass Effect 2, which has all enemies become armored on Insanity, meaning you can no longer just immediately wombo-combo them with crowd-control biotics to insta-win an encounter at the very start: instead you need to whittle down their armor first to make them vulnerable, turning encounters into a much more engaging and deadly puzzle to solve!

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yeah I think gears is probably a lot better than it gets credit for when it gets cranked up to higher difficulties, it would be interesting to see how it plays. I think it probably will come down to if the meta involves a lot of waiting around or not ha. I m not sure though, I haven't played gears since it launched and so i ve never experimented in this manner

[@rodneyabrett]

Even before Time Crisis, you can technically trace back the cover shooter mechanics origins to a couple of 2d arcade games like Nam '75 for the Neo Geo, Blood Bros or Wild Guns. I've heard these often called "lane shooters" when they were out. There's actually a really great hidden gem 2d cover shooter called Bot Vice that I think you may like(it's hard) from an indie studio, DYA. It reallly leans into its cover system mechanic but on a fixed screen arcade style way.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yes exactly, the roots for the cover shooter go way further back than the ps2 era and killswitch for sure. I think it's important to recognize the genre's arcade roots because there is so much potential to the style of the design and the more lame conventions that have started to emerge are more a product of reduced creativity than some kind of inherent flaw with the concept. Also bot vice sounds interesting! I've seen it on steam before, maybe I'll have to give it a try!

[@HerbieChuckNorris]

You mentioned Gears of War here (It has problems, for sure) but I encourage anyone who isn't fond of the typical style of of Gears to try out GOW: Judgment. It trims a load of the fat, adds an arcade style of focus and turns the encounter design up to 11. Easily the most fun you can rinse out of the Gear's mechanics and systems - in fact, for a cover shooter I found myself taking cover the least amount out of the entire series, you move around more and the chaos really shows how conservative Epic were when they made the trilogy and how People Can Fly took their Painkiller routes and injected it into the series.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Oh interesting recommendation! It would be interesting to take a look at the gears series as a whole and see which entries are stronger game design wise. I d imagine the series has its own evolution of seeing that would be interesting to look at.

[@JohnVmc2]

@@TheElectricUnderground Gears Judgement is like an arcade game, very influenced by RE's score system implemented on mercenaries mode, it's very engaging, and very different, at the time, it wasn't well received, but, with time, it's starting to get the love it deserves.

[@chozochiefxiii3298]

​​@@JohnVmc2Would you say it's better than gears of war 2 gameplay wise? I've heard things about judgment and after a full 8 hour playthrough of gears 2 in one sitting, gears 3 feels very repetitive. Is judgment that big of a shakeup?

[@HerbieChuckNorris]

@@chozochiefxiii3298 IMO Judgement's encounter design is way more batshit than anything in the OG trilogy. They utilise the enemies in much more interesting ways than the OG game's did and shows off the potential the series combat could have if they went crazier with the design. So personally, I do think it's a good shake-up.

[@marcuskahn3783]

Wallcover was introduced even before era of popular onrails duck n rapid action shooters like Time Crises and the handful of offshoots, one of the earliest examples I can recall was this Rambo arcade game where the character would move n cross fire from right to left while trading uzi fire against oncoming soldiers from one sandbag to the next. I never considered Dead To Rights a wall cover shooter cus I played it in the traditional free movement n shoot w sticky/lock on aim placed on would be goonbars in the same fashion of Syphon Filter which became a common stable for many early console based 3rd person even first person shooters respectively.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yeah cover systems def go all the way back to the arcade era, absolutely. One reason why I think the subgenre has so much potential is its arcade lineage. I do consider dead to rights a cover shooter not only because of the wall cover mechanics, but also the human shield mechanic being so central and core to playing well. What exactly defines a game as a cover shooter is pretty much in the air though, as with many sub genres it has no coherent formal definition ha. Especially since cover shooters are a blended genre in many ways.

[@Satsui_No_Hado]

Your channel is so damn good. Since I've discovered you this week, I've watched a lot of your videos. You can tell you're very passionate about gaming. That said you talk about the mechanics and that's so cool and that's very rare, Love this channel 🔥

[@SylvesterInk]

Just a quick aside about the combat systems in games like Quake, those most definitely have that situational depth that you describe, it's just that that aspect doesn't really get a chance to shine as much in single player. In Quake 3 (particularly in the CPMA mod) weapon selection matters quite a bit depending on the distance from your opponent, their positioning, and their style of movement. Even the older QuakeWorld follows this concept, though (by happy accident) the weapon selection usually sticks to 3-4 of the staple weapons. (And that limitation is more than made up by the faster situational gameplay and more complex isometric movement.) However, you are correct that this complex gameplay isn't as predominant in single player. I suspect that's due to the limited AI in the older games, as compared to the mid-tier AI of the Dead to Rights era of games. (After that point, AI could be made more sophisticated, which feeds into the issue you describe: Realistic AI also ruins cover shooters.) That said, there are modded AI projects that bring this fun to some of these FPSs, like QuakeWorlds Frogbot (variations of which seem to be used in many of the modern source ports, like nQuake.)

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Oh yeah I tried to emphasize in the review that I like the high movement speed quake / devil daggers style of fps as well, it s just recently a lot of players are throwing poor cover shooters under the bus in favor of them ha. I think both are great and have distinctive strengths

[@soratheorangejuicemascot5809]

Have you seen the recent game Capcom made called Kunitsu-gami? People claim that it is very good for people who enjoyed the ps2 era. I do think it looks neat but not sure if my pc can handle it.

[@connormccarthy2745]

I'd say that Gungrave GORE did a great job with a similar human shield mechanic! On GORE difficulty you really need to use it, otherwise youll get shredded.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yeah gore rules! I actually did beat the game on gore difficulty and yeah the human shield system of that game is really cool, especially combined with the grapple ha. So yeah gore is a great example of another game with a human shield system

[@DigitalMoonlight]

I'm surprised you're even able to pick a game to make a video on when there's the long history and sheer volume of excellent games in just the 6th generation of consoles let alone contemporary eras of arcade and PC games. That being said, seeing as you like routing, resource management and quality difficulty, have you played any of the PC classics that get less attention from people that primarily played consoles and arcade like Descent, Blood or Forsaken (pre-difficulty reducing patch)? If you haven't I think you're in for a treat if you play them, especially Blood or Forsaken. If you have I'd love to see your takes on any of them some day since I like how you approach analyzing the gameplay design and you have a different perspective coming from a more arcade and console influence. Look forward to seeing how the channel will evolve once you can devote your full attention.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

These suggestions look interesting, it s wild how many gems like this there are in the early 3d era. What makes analyzing this era of game design so fascinating is how there is not a lot of precident to how games were designed, so there is a ton of variety of approaches to the same concepts which is really fun to evaluate compared to one another. Whereas now most game design has homogenized mechanically

[@DigitalMoonlight]

@@TheElectricUnderground I agree, the level of innovation and experimentation we got to see in all genres was really something special. There was a healthy number of small to mid size studios that would release more experimental games that pushed things forward between the big AAA releases who would refine what worked in those smaller games into a polished, (relatively) big budget release. Now with the barrier to developing games having become much lower, we're seeing a resurgence in many genres that are considered "dead" with the boomer shooter revival being a prime example of a healthy niche that's once again experimenting with the design such as the case with Ultrakill. I get the feeling that other genres are waiting to have their untapped potential released and we'll see more revivals that carve out sustainable niches for small teams which will enable for people to take risks and experiment with design once again.

[@ffmpregffmpreg]

I have to second this, Mark's analysis on arcade-like boomer shooters would be interesting to see. I also find immersive sims to have replayability qualities to them (my favorite example being System Shock 2) which may or may not be arcade-like, would be interesting to hear Mark's thoughts on those too. Given that the moment-to-moment gunplay isn't mechanically deep, and the emphasis on story, I would understand if he's not a fan though. :)

[@Elintasokas]

Another intelligent analysis. Great job. You're absolutely right about low difficulty being a waste. When you don't need to use the mechanics to actually succeed at the game, you won't. It all just turns mindless. The worst offenders are games that don't even have a difficulty selection. You often have games that ostensibly feature an intricate mix of complex mechanics, but then the lack of difficulty means you can just bash your face against the controller and win. So what again is the point of your mechanics when they're not needed? There is no point at all, and no one will care about said mechanics. A lack of challenge is a fundamental problem because it actually undermines the mechanics of a game.

[@lucasLSD]

You have a pretty unique take for Vanquish, since that game subtracts points the longer you stay in cover, it sends a message to refrain from using it.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

That s great balance though. These are the types of systems cover shooters should strive for, where they incentive to use cover for safety, but then punish using cover for performance, so the players has to balance the risk reward of the two systems, that's gameplay depth. What you don't want (which western shooters often struggle with) is having a cover system that is one size fits all and doesn't have counter incentives. It's really important to not confuse balance with mechanical design. Vanquish making using cover punishing in some senses doesn't make it less of a cover shooter (it s full of cover mechanics) it makes it a deeper cover shooter.

[@MerlautJones]

and here I thought Dead to Rights 1 & 2 were the closest to Max Payne-like games. I guess that goes to Stranglehold. I prefer run 'n gun shooters, but I do enjoy cover-shooters too. I really like how you broke it down. What'd you think of Dead to Rights 2, and Retribution?

[@ultimablackmage]

The game was easy to cheese on Gamecube because Shadow's cooldown was really short. I honestly never really used the human shield mechanic since I never played it after beating normal mode as I borrow my mate's copy.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yeah the GC and PS2 versions are way too easy, your basically just strolling through the game ha.

[@Busterbalz]

Id love to hear your thoughts on Urban Reign, i discovered that game recently and its already one of my favorite beat em ups.

[@magicjohnson3121]

I agree about having a mix of memorisation and improvisation. I hate procedural generation gameplay because in theory it's meant to be about pure skill and no memorisation but in reality it feels I only get far because I got an easier generated level.

[@san_nevo]

Same, it waters down the legitimacy of both the survival and optimization aspect. It also feels kinda annoying when the tools/weapons you use are also randomized since it sucks to be forced to use tools you don't enjoy in a run when what you want is to use to same set of tools to tackle new problems. Doesn't help that these games also rely on meta-progression since you don't have access to the tools you might've enjoyed the most right away and be forced to learn tools that you like less, which is a skill that won't be used if you have access to better tools in a run.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Could not agree more magic. Without a reasonably predictable level of rng, this type of design basically makes taking risks no longer reasonable and so instead you just need to play as safe as possible to try to offset the rng.

[@clvr51]

Never heard of this game, but it definitely sounds cool, especially the human shield part. I love when enemies in games are more than just targets, creating strategy and improvisation on the fly. That's why I love Doom Eternal lol

[@lucientaylor98]

Heard of this game but never seen any gameplay until now, much appreciated review! I will say that Gears of War 1-3 are goated games though. While the campaign on harder difficulties does have spongey enemies, the multiplayer is extremely deep. It has a lot of risk/reward, especially with the wallbouncing being complex.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

So I ve never played the multiplayer, but by the looks of the comment section the multiplayer sounds strong ha. It s probably a lot like COD where the single player is kinda lame, but the multiplayer is lit. I ve never played the multiplayer but that makes sense given that era.

[@supernoob17]

You can press a button to get into cover on winback for n64, it's not a "dedicated" button I guess in that it has other context sensitive uses like pushing buttons but so does gears, I would count it. I think headhunter predates dead to rights and has cover mechanics as well

[@TheElectricUnderground]

That s awesome! Yeah I figured there would be a fair bit of obscure early 3d games out there that have cover systems as well, since time crisis already was well established ha. That's why I made sure to include saying "from my knowledge" in the vid. The wikipedia oversight is pretty wild though considering dead to rights is the same dev as Killswitch and was very popular. Update: I went ahead and removed the section, since it is kinda complicated to trace all this back and is more of a side point anyway

[@AshleysBallistics]

Risk & Reward mechanics are desperately missed in modern games. 😢 It's probably why Battle Royal's are popular nowadays.....

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yeah absolutely! I think modern devs are scared to force the players to adapt dynamically, as that is much harder to "teach" (modern games are all about tutorializing) than just showing the player one defined playstyle that never shifts throughout. Especially in modern shooters where long ranged guns are OP, the close quarters options are more just a novelty. A really strong solution which dead to rights has is just make the long range options really demanding to hit on moving targets and basically useless up close, but that would not be "realistic" ha. Another option would be make the rooms small and claustrophobic, but that is undermined completely by open world design (I m looking at you mgs5)

[@angelnobody7137]

It's all about rewards. Mobile games influence

[@retroman3252]

This is not why Battle Royals are popular, even tho its nice to have. There is this game theory on how to make a pvp party game, random- I know. The rules are: no prior experience required, easy to follow rules, randomness. Randomness- this means that it is uncertain if the better player will win. This is used as enticement and ego shield.

[@samael2112]

Isn't Shadow a reference to the dog in Shadow Dancer? Hmmm, were the arcade games Rolling Thunder, Shinobi, and Shadow Dancer side-scrolling cover shooters, then?

[@TheElectricUnderground]

It could be! It s hard to know since we don't have in depth interviews with the devs, but that makes the question pretty interesting of if the reference was baked into the design early, or if they were looking around for mechanics and was inspired to make a dog mechanic. It s interesting how complex design influence in game design actually is, where it s really hard to trace back the exact path of influence in design

[@Csp2900]

Thanks for making this video, I wanna say I was 14 or 15 playing this on the OG xbox and my dad saying, you've been playing the same level for three weeks lol, and that was true, but loved it so much, stuck with and beat it, end boss has line , " the late great slate boys" stuck in my head to this day.

[@jump_again]

i've got to assume that shadow dancer was a huge inspiration for the dog mechanic (it's even in the name). making it fetch weapons is a really clever addition, though

[@TheElectricUnderground]

That's a definite possibility! I d love to see more interviews from this time with devs that would ask these types of questions, cuz it is really fascinating where these ideas come from

[@offbeatuser]

Winback on N64 might actually be the first game to have cover shooting

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Fixed! :-) yeah I dropped the whole side discussion about the cover shooter origin ha.

[@retractingblinds]

What a great breakdown, I love this era of games. I've spent the past few years digging into PS1 TPS games like Duke Time to Kill (very good!), Gungage (excellent) and the throughline into titles like MDK/MDK2, Headhunter (another underrated cover shooter) Winback, Winback 2 and 10,000 bullets (insanely good game.) I've had the Dead to Rights games on my radar for some time and this video is a great reason to dig into them. Thanks for the heads up!

[@alexandermckay9521]

Got this game the day it came out on Xbox. Was so excited to play it because it looked like Max Payne and there was a painful lack of similar games. Loved it and still have the disc today haha. I play it regularly still. Those disarms are so awesome.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yeah it's a legit cult classic I think. Where if you came across it back when it came out it has definitely endured over time, it's just not talked about too much and the series ended without much notice sadly.

[@alexandermckay9521]

@@TheElectricUnderground yeah it’s sad. I feel like the “blueprint was lost” as you would say. The sequels felt like they were made by people who didn’t understand what made the original great.

[@travis391]

This is one of the video essays I have ever seen, please release more videos like this! Liked and subscribed, thanks again!!

[@فوازالهذال-ب5ظ]

Literally, when I found his channel I felt most other video essays on video games are not that great and repetitive

[@radio100jogosdeemacs2]

Now it makes sense why I never liked this game that much... I always played the bogged down PS2 version lmao. Gonna pick it up when I get a OG Xbox in my hands.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yes def play it on the xbox! It is much meatier and more challenging.

[@michaelsteiner5203]

Winback came out in 1999 before Dead to Rights

[@cingularovz]

What a great game it was

[@Ronbotnik]

i was just going to bring up Winback. remember renting it from Blockbuster back in the day lol awesome game

[@TheElectricUnderground]

That s awesome! Yeah I figured there would be a fair bit of obscure early 3d games out there that have cover systems as well, since time crisis already was well established ha. That's why I made sure to include saying "from my knowledge" in the vid. The wikipedia oversight is pretty wild though considering dead to rights is the same dev as Killswitch and was very popular. Also i'm probably just gonna remove this little section of the video talking about which game did what mechanic first, since it's more of a side point anyway. Update: fixed :-)

[@electrosphere5581]

Now I wish they made the Escape from New York game which appeared to use a lot of Dead To Rights' mechanics. Could be a good "spiritual sequel" of sorts.

[@Senumunu]

The people that made this game definitely played and liked Syphon Filter

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Ohh I bet! That s a great observation

[@beetheimmortal]

Kind of off-topic, but I really miss Syphon Filter/Splinter Cell-style stealth. Although at this point I can add MGS to that list as well, since that's also a dead series, and classic MGS especially has been dead since MGS3 (but I have to add that 4 and 5 also had really good mechanics).

[@KittenChaos90]

​@@TheElectricUndergroundI played Syphon Filter last year or so because I kinda scoffed at it when I attempted to play it earlier. I came back to it with an open mind and it's actually pretty cool what 989 Studios managed to pull off back in 98. There's a sort of cover system in that game as well. If you go into the aim mode at a wall and then hit like R2 or L2 (depending on what direction you need to aim), you'll pop out and shoot people safely and with increased accuracy. That completely changed the game for me and you can see that system more realized in Dead to Rights. It's pretty damn cool.

[@saxoncook]

Great points about difficulty bringing out the intended gameplay. I just played the Bayonetta games and muddled through having no idea what I was doing. I replayed the first one on the hardest difficulty aiming only for S ranks and everything finally clicked. I had to actually make use of the mechanics and couldn't use health items since you can't take damage. Will definitely check out the Xbox version of Dead to Rights. I played the PS2 version and all I can remember is escaping a prison then getting bored.

[@chozochiefxiii3298]

I swear Japan pioneered everything that wasn't an fps or crpg.

[@todesziege]

It's a bit of a stretch but you could argue FPS was built on top of rail shooters and overhead run'n'guns.

[@ownageDan]

shmups were pioneered by the west (asteroids :D) RTS TBS Roguelikes City Builders (and simulation games in general - think Transport Tycoon, etc.) etc. etc. not to lessen japan's impact on videogames, but nah, you're wrong there. they DID perfect some genres though japanese shmups are godlike, as are beat em ups, character action games (DMC, bayo, etc.) and fighting games a big factor in that is probably how big the arcade scene was over there compared to other places

[@DigitalMoonlight]

@@todesziege Until Doom fleshed out the mechanics a bit with an element of verticality, first person shooters like Hovertank, Catacomb 3D and Wolfenstein 3D were functionally top down arcade dungeon crawls like Gauntlet but the camera was shifted to first person. You have the maze like design, the secrets, the key hunting, etc; Of course there's not just inspiration from arcades in those games but also from the computer game scene which was much more distinct from consoles and arcades in those days.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Pretty much, because the arcade environment really encouraged mechanical innovation in a way console design doesn't. So almost every genre (especially action games) can be traced back to arcade design in some way ha

[@ffmpregffmpreg]

It's pretty much undeniable that Id Software single handedly accelerated practical 3D and lightning effects, at least for FPS purposes, and western studios paid attention and borrowed the engine for their own games right away. I think it was the right move, because the western market at the time preferred "innovation" (e.g. grafix); whereas the Japanese dev studios were more focused on refining the experiences they created on the hardware available at the time, and iterating on the ideas that worked (with staff members often sacrificing their own time to polish individual games until they were proud of them), and the Japanese market was more receptive to that.

[@crawlingamongthestars3736]

Gears of War as a single player game is indeed very boring, but as a multiplayer team vs team game it actually has a ton of depth, and a very high skill ceiling. Movement control in that game is insane ("wall-bouncing") and it generally requires very tight team coordination. Also, you should try out the Max Payne games if you haven't already. Max Payne 3 in particular is amazing. One of the greatest 3rd person shooters ever in my opinion.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

That s fascinating, another comment said the same thing. Sounds like the multiplayer is really fun, sort of like call of duty I suppose where the single player is meh but the multiplayer goes hard ha

[@cloudnine2330]

I guess problem comes from locust barely moving maps made for flanking but locust never tries to flank you at best they throws granades to move you out then sit back theres never a back and forth to combat like doom or halo

[@wonderwonka1774]

Max Payne 3 could have been one of the greatest TPS if it was not held back by the unskipable cutscenes. even the in the so called time attack mode some of the cutscenes still remains which defeats the whole purpose of going through the game faster.

[@crawlingamongthestars3736]

@@wonderwonka1774 I agree, the unskippable cutscenes do hurt the game a lot unfortunately, but aside from that it is an amazing game. Certainly one of the best Rockstar ever made.

[@gavi888]

Mark praising gameplay contextualization is in a roundabout way criticizing ludonarrative dissonance

[@TheCrimsonCat89]

Are you going to discuss how hack n slash character action games are still phenomenal games and that not every action game needs to be soulslike? Citing Devil May Cry, Bayonetta, Metal Gear Rising, Scarlet Nexus as examples.

[@ShrekFhiyona]

As well as Ninja Gaiden hack n slash reboot.

[@musiccurve9507]

This was such a great game it plays like a third person rail shooter. Maybe take a look at its spiritual successor WET on the xbox 360 I loved that game. WET is one of the most criminally underrated third person shooters ever made.

[@contrabandresearch8409]

Awesome review. I never knew Dead to Rights on the og Xbox was different. Watching your footage shows how the enemies will swarm you as you take cover, something Xbox 360 era enemies rarely did (or one specific enemy would) which made combat in those game very slow, especially since the enemies themselves took cover.

[@cartilagecartilagerds7396]

In case you didn't know, Vanquish was supposed to have a dog as a companion (at one point in it's developpement). As far as I can remember, it could transform into some sort of super weapon & into some barrier where you could take cover...

[@DJ239]

I'm so glad you posted this because I would've never given Dead to Rights a try. I remember back in the day all the reviews said this game sucks so I never bothered. I just bought the Xbox version for like $10 on ebay and wow I can really see why people hated it! Once you get to the prison part it's crazy! I wanted to throw my controller out the window! It's ridiculous how many guys they expect you to beat with barely any health packs. But last night I did finally make it through, I just wanna get back to the diving and shooting parts 😂

[@joshuamarks4425]

I think we all know what this led to when companies learned all the wrong lessons from this game, we got multiple outsourced sequels to Dead to Rights which completely bastardized everything that made the first game on Xbox so great to begin with just to chase those other cover shooters that overtook it in popularity. Goddamn shame.

[@xbox360hurley4]

Finally someone besides me still talking about Dead to Rights and Killswitch lol

[@n2oshotandironman]

I love your videos that cover difficulty and risk vs reward. I'm starving for it. Going to play the Xbox version for the first time (luckily already owned it but just played the Gamecube version until now) Seeing it played right, at the right difficulty, looks so much more compelling.

[@jimmyjohnny5661]

It's nice to have someone atleast talk about the basics of gameplay....

[@UncPhilly88]

Cool video. Would love to see you cover some more of the lesser known cover shooters. Really underrated one IMO is Dirge of Cerberus an interesting hybrid game.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

oh yeah I started to play that a while back ha. I didn't really connect with it though, but a lot of it was more due to the level design than the mechanics necessarily.

[@UncPhilly88]

​ hmm, what about the level design did you dislike if you can recall? I thought it was mostly standard stuff though some stages did kinda drag on. The mechanics of the game more than made up for it. Special variants of guns, deflecting projectiles with melee, utility magic beyond the usual JRPG binary weakness abusing , strong customazation system, the Killchain system rewards smart routing and its in general very challenge run friendly (You can very reasonably clear the hardest setting with a Lvl 1 Vincent so good tactics matter much more than leveling). Mission mode is pretty fun too.

[@Mondoness]

Ngl I thought D2R 3 was one of the most angriest games ever like even up there next to Gears and GOW3 and I absolutely loved it.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Ha I've actually never played Dead to Rights 2 or 3. I plan on doing so though. I didn't play 2 because I legit didn't know it existed for years and I didn't play 3 cuz when it came out I noticed it was by a different dev so I steered clear. I was kind of overly hipster about devs back then lol. I should give it a try now though, it'd be interesting to look at.

[@Mondoness]

@@TheElectricUnderground dude ngl Playing as Shadow addition is awesome. It can be a little repetitive at some points but the plot is fleshed out enough to get invested and the gameplay is balls to wall angry with nonstop gunfire , melee takedowns, and dog kills. I truely miss games such as this. bro u just makin this vid made me wanna replay Retribution on emulate. I definitely have to say Retribution is my guilty fav outta of the D2R series. (I like them all btw.) lol😎

[@squall116]

Wonderful 101 also a flawed gem that deserves more love

[@RavenV2]

dude gears of war horde mode was AMAZING

[@TheElectricUnderground]

When I was discussing gears I was referring to the campaign design, but yeah I could see the game having fun multiplayer and extra modes. Very much like call of duty where the campaigns are often not that well made, but zombies and multiplayer are more fun.

[@TheT3rr0rMask]

DTR is one of my favorites of that gen. Never got to spend a ton of time w/the Xbox version, started on GameCube like you. When the "cover shooter" class clicks with you it becomes an endlessly addictive game to play. Effectively hit as many enemies as you can without taking hits. Games like DTR, Winback, Syphon Filter and Kill Switch add weight to cover as a mechanic. You're vulnerable, can die in a few hits, and you're supposed to effectively use your environment and loadout. There's a reason for the cover system, as much as there's a reason for Mario to jump. What's cool about DTR is cover isn't just a wall to poke out of. It's also the human shields, the slow-mo dive, and you're movement. The game is constantly flowing and is as tactical as it is arcadey. W/modern cover shooters there's just no reason to use cover- there's never any danger. Even on harder modes you're safe as soon as you hit A by cover. In the games I mentioned above enemies will easily flank or find an angle to take you out from no matter what wall or box you're hiding behind.

[@censoredterminalautism4073]

Reality is already more than enough realism for me. It sucks. Terrible walking simulator gameplay, bland graphics, huge load times that put the Neo-Geo CD to shame, and everything good in it is DLC.

[@GameBoyGuru]

Shadow the dog is essentially an iteration of the dog mechanic in Sega's Shadow Dancer arcade and Genesis games (Shinobi sequel). With the dog being named Shadow, one wonders if it was a direct inspiration, especially since it's the same breed of dog.

[@Darkjack-FR]

Realism is the antonym of play. When people understand this, we'll see a real return to fun.

[@san_nevo]

Oh, so hitstun could also be used in single-player shooters. Seems like it's some sort of secret sauce semi-universal to action genres (except stuff like shmups). Having enemies also fulfill the function of the environment sounds like a very good complement to games that heavily depends the environment and serve as a more dynamic variant or the environment. Roguelikes and roguelites opt for randomizing/procedurally generating the environment in addition to enemy spawns to improve replayability and make each runs feel different. But if it's as you said that the dynamic enemy behavior, despite the fixed environment and enemy type/count/spawn location, was enough to make each runs feel different, then randomizing the other aspects listed like the environment is not a necessity. From what I understand, randomizing environment and almost every aspect of the level design along with it like in roguelite/likes shift the main focus of "replayability" one-sidedly to survival, since precise routing requires a certain amount of fixed aspects of the level design and too much randomization will severely hampers the optimization aspects like scoring and speedrunning (this was mentioned in one of Boghog's cohost post, iirc). So if the variability from enemy behavior is enough to capture the feeling of runs being different while still maintaining an aptitude for precise routing and score/speed optimization, then that sounds like a really good deal.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

That s funny your bring up hitstun in shmups because I think it would be a fascinating mechanic to introduce into the genre. I have no idea how it could work, but my gut tells me it could be awesome ha

[@san_nevo]

@@TheElectricUnderground maybe it's the next true innovation in shmup design: long range bullet sealing

[@HeroOfLegend115]

“You can’t just dive in front of six guys in a gunfight they will kill you.” I dunno man that sounds realistic to me.

[@BknMoonStudios]

Good game design in action games is challenging but fair. Something that requires understanding the game mechanics, planning, adaptation and skill, and rewards time invested with gameplay that is both effective and stylish. If all current and future game designers believed in this over "make sure the player always feels powerful and is always moving forward", big-budget modern action games would be in a much better position. Thank you for the review, Mark. Very fascinating deep dive into an underrated gem. 😎👍

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yeah I think the reason why modern action games are less difficult and dynamic (as in requiring the player to adapt quickly) is because modern games are obsessed with games being overly fair and tutorialized and so teaching the player to adapt on the fly constantly is not something they want to do or expect from the player. So it is much simpler to downtune the design for the lowest common denominator.

[@greytoeimp]

it seems like you're talking about game essence, which is a term i first heard from masahiro sakurai; it's what makes a game unique and it is often dialed down with quite bad results, as you describe in the difficulty section where, when the game is easier, the need for the mechanics becomes lessened to a degree that the game almost lapses into 'realism' but i would argue that realism there is more of an indistinct and pointless blob. when we strip away mechanics, we are left with basically nothing, which people mistakenly call 'reality'.

[@theconsolekiller7113]

Gonna have to boot this one up again. I own it , but got it cheap (Dead To Rights). Only sampled it briefly but it seemed very cool. This was during the Xbox 360/PS3 death phase where I horded a bunch of games for cheap. Some of them I never tried. Weapon sway and things like that can definately fuck up aiming in games. RE 4 remake couldve been a little tighter with hit detection too. Missing head shots on the hardest mode when the reticle was clearly lined up, or stun animations only working sometimes was very inconsistant when trying to move quickly and precisely. I felt like they almost FUCKIN nailed it with the remake. I even liked the parry mechanic quite a bit. They just needed to lock down that consistancy like the OG game had with aiming and shooting, stun animations. They shouldve kept or remixed the OG music too, it didnt feel the same without it. Wanted Dead Or Alive is solid so far. Appreciate the reccomend. Challenging. I gotta learn the mechanics a little better, ha ha. My OG Xbox took a shit but maybe I can try the originial DTR on emulation, collected the full set. Xbox emu is hit or miss. Keep KILLIN THAT SHIT !!

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yeah I don't even know why they added gunsway to remake4 ha. It basically serves no purpose because it doesn't stop the player from just running away and popping headshots, it just makes that playstyle clunky ha. It s one of those stupid compromises that actually accomplishes nothing but making the game feel awkward. Same with the movement interia. WHY CAPCOM WHY??!! ha. Glad you are enjoying wanted dead!!!

[@theconsolekiller7113]

@@TheElectricUnderground Right, ha ha. Someone must think they are being clever and really innovating or improving on these older games, with some of these decisions. They must really not have a good understanding of core mechanics. Awesome breakdowns as always. Super entertaining as I dont really see anyone else covering this type of thing, and its always been very important to me. Yea, Wanted Dead reminds me of the types of games we used to get from the PS2 era up until the 7th gen, before they really started die out. I can see how it hooked you. It definately makes me want to dive into the mechanics a little deeper to get an edge.

[@JoeRadOfficial]

I never knew the xbox version was different. I love the PS2 game. I definitely have to try that version. Fascinating video as always Mark!

[@tamerxero]

Great critique, and you bring up some excellent points with cover-shooters, how the general public and critics view the genre, and what it can learn from this game. I'm going to have to go out and see if I can pick it up, do my own studying!

[@coreybladzinski158]

Mark, you have forgotten about WinBack which predates dead to rights using "cover shooter mechanics" either way love both these games

[@TheElectricUnderground]

yeah I've noticed this ha. I'll just remove that little bit of the vid here shortly, since I was more concerned with demonstrating that dead to rights is a cover shooter, rather than tracking the exact origin of the cover mechanic. Update: fixed :-)

[@Reaching8]

I find it weird that in this video you're saying Gears isn't a very good cover shooter, or is excessively watered down. The singleplayer, especially on higher difficulties, absolutely is, as a lot of it revolves around bullet sponge enemies where your only option is to camp and empty tons of ammunition into them, but the multiplayer of the early Gears games is actually pretty deep, especially in regards to spacing, risk/reward decision making, rewarding players who can input fairly complex actions quickly etc. If only the SP was more like this, maybe the game wouldn't be so maligned. The way you showed the twin nature of the modern shooter makes a lot of sense, I always would say Winback x Splinter Cell to show the lineage, but it's the same general idea. I don't think it's necessarily realism or immersion that made the west's games fail, though, I think it's more just a willingness to cheapen the experience. They see something like Metal Gear Solid or Splinter Cell, and think "Oh this game is good, how can we make players *feel* like they're playing this game superficially/cheaply?" Instead of "What can we learn from the philosophy of the systems in this game that inspired us, and how can we implement the same design philosophy in our game?" As a result, you get minless sit-and-do-nothing cover shooting, followed by mindless "what was that?" rock throwing stealth, maybe with some white arrows, and a bunch of preachy, unearned cutscenes in between. Compared to something like MGS3, which exists well down the "3rd person movie game" fork, to the point where it even had the subsistence re-release, and it's night and day different. Compare the stealth in an AAA movie game to Chaos Theory or Thief II and it's not even a fraction of a percent the same experience. A western movie game just wants to say you're sneaking, or make it look like you're sneaking, not actually implement sneaking. In the same way, they also want to make it look like you're having an action packed battle, more than actually implementing one.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

I'm personally not as laser focused on gears of war as a lot of critics of the game, but I do think there are some very fair critiques of its style of design that has contributed to the out of fashion status of the genre. The larger point I am making though is that gears of war is not the ultimate pinnacle of what cover shooter design can be (which it is often viewed as, due to its popularity) and that cover shooters can still be very active and dynamic if the devs take measures to limit the effectiveness of camping behind cover and killing stuff at a distance with long range weapons. Dead to Rights is a great counter example to this issue since it has limited range, limited ammo, smaller rooms, and more active enemy design that will move around the environment and rush the player if you camp too long. Gears is a huge series so for all I know it might address these issues in the later games, but these tend to be the problems a lot of xbox 360 era cover shooters start to have.

[@Reaching8]

@@TheElectricUnderground Certainly true, and yes, the most popular game often ends up being held up as a pinnacle example, whereas often the games that inspired it were better. I've even seen this going so far as reviewers regarding Bioshock more highly than System Shock 2, and I'm sure that as time progresses, Gears will seem like the apex form of the now-dead cover shooter, and the best that the genre had to offer, which absolutely isn't and was never the case, it just sold a bunch of copies and is well known. I wasn't trying to contradict anything in the video, what I was trying to highlight is that, while the gears campaigns(which improved *slightly* as the series went on but not that much) can devolve into mindless camping, which only gets worse on higher difficulties, the multiplayer of GoW tends to be a frenetic and extremely intense, active game. The weapon design doesn't suit the spongy nature of high-difficulty campaign, but against other human players as mortal as you, and on maps with very carefully spaced cover to bounce between, suddenly the whole sandbox makes sense, and you're actually pushed to learn to blindfire, the high damage weapons, cover bounce, memorize timings, do the risk-reward of getting in close to land a shotgun hit etc. Somewhere in the design of Gears there's a good cover shooter, but with 360 on the way out, that part won't be remembered.

[@AnguishXA]

I know you aren’t really talking about multiplayer but Gears 3 is really interesting when it comes to its multiplayer. Wallbouncing turned the game from low risk medium reward cover shooting to using cover as a movement tool to dodge opponents close range shotgun and punishing with your own. The best part is if you ask westerners what the worst thing about gears multiplayer is they’ll say wallbouncing. They’ll say it’s too hard to get into gears multiplayer and that it’s not what the game should be about lol. I definitely recommend watching some wallbouncing videos.

[@onethousandmousetraps9704]

Mark, I've noticed that you've mentioned MGSV a few times on your channel. And I'm begging you: take a look at new Hitman trilogy and Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory. Those are peak of stealth gameplay imho, especially Hitman World of Assassination (new trilogy).

[@MrIamcrusty]

When people would say gears is the first to do this. I’d always say. Kill switch. Did not know dead to rights was the first. An I owned both games

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yeah and that's just on the PS2. And then it sounds like (judging by the comments) there was an N64 game with a cover button (sort of) and then of course you go back further there is the arcade era with timecrisis. But i do think it's pretty funny no one noticed that dead to rights has cover mechanics because it is the same dev as killswitch and came out right before it.

[@darkchild130]

Operation Winback predates both.

[@onceyougozach2607]

So you don't recommend ps2/gamecube version? I can play whichever one Id like so I'll just go with what's best

[@TheElectricUnderground]

they're not terrible in the sense that they can give you a taste for the gameplay, but ultimately you are gonna wanna play the xbox version for the definitive experience.

[@angelnobody7137]

Realism ruined pretty much everything but drive games simulation

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yeah because it s a never ending hole of game design problems because game play (especially combat) needs a high level of abstraction to function in a compelling manner. So the level of "realism" isn't achieved anyway since it would be insane to start adding gun jam mechanics, mis fires, water damage, and all kinds of real problems that would actually emerge. Plus combat would probably be hours and hours of waiting then a few minutes of intensity and then back to hours of waiting ha. So the level of realism these games draw the line at is arbitrary anyway

[@smackmmk]

​@@TheElectricUndergroundI've been going through your channel recently, as I've recently become a subscriber, and not only have you put words to the thoughts I have about a lot of modern gaming, you have also fully cemented my problem with gaming journalist of the past and of today. The overwhelming prevailing theme is, Western game journalist ruined video games and the awesome design that we could have gotten and has ultimately stunted the industry as a whole. The only groups of people that are still pushing the industry forward or Japanese developers, and because of the western game journals influence, even their designs have become stunted.

[@nimbylive]

I played through this back in the day. All I remember is that it had the best dog in gaming.

[@TheElectricUnderground]

Yes shadow is awesome ha! Def watch the section of the vid about shadow, the dog mechanic is really interesting

[@BrentCox2B]

Hey Mark, not sure if you will see this, but Im trying to learn how to make more interesting youtube videos, Im curious, do you fully script out your videos and read it during v/o recording or do you like bullet points and just freestyle it? Also, do you have any tips for the creative process and thinking of unique ideas?

[@liamconverse8950]

You can still buy and play this on a modern Xbox, it looks like the footage was captured from that since the Xbox emulator on Series X up scales the resolution

[@TheElectricUnderground]

It was! I played it on my Xbox 1x :-) it s my dead to rights and ninja gaiden machine ha

[@Criss7771]

I would love to hear your thoughts on The Suffering games from Midway

[@فوازالهذال-ب5ظ]

If you think about it most Western games are just good visuals with barebones gameplay and they didn't innovate anything other than fps and computer games like RTS and c/w RPGs, I don't play CRPG and RTS so I can't give my opinion on them but for fps and WRPGs I played a good number of them I noticed that they suffer from what I call static gameplay they are hardly any improvement to their gameplay that's not even the main problem is that these games at their core are weak and get repetitive fast, and for third-person shooter games Western developers took from Japanese games and made them for casuals with less interesting gameplay but they hide it with good graphics and a supposedly good story (I don't believe any of them have a good story other than red dead redemption 1 not 2 if you want to count it as tps game)

[@ffmpregffmpreg]

Great review, when I saw this game for the first time I thought it was standard western shooter fare and not some arcade hidden gem. It just felt weird seeing this footage of this game without Slowbeef and Diabetus voices commenting over it :) I think "realism" does not fully describe the problem with western first or third person shooter philosophy. In my opinion, immersive simulator design philosophy of the late 90's rivalled Japanese arcade philosophy in terms of how brilliant they were. Then the Call of Duties, Haloes, and Gears of Wars came out, and I think that's when the western philosophy, of making the game appealing to teens and adults plus cinematic graphics to wow the wider audience, got established. Gears of War in particular, I never thought it was the west's response to Japanese cover shooters, but just a tech demo for Unreal for the Xbox 360 that got really popular with teens due to its grittiness. That's not to say I blame teens for liking lame western cover shooters (that was me when I didn't know any better :)), but while great arcade games were still getting released in early 2000's, the 6th console generation was when the west started abandoning the design philosophies that worked during the 90's and games started losing their edge.

[@commandershepard9920]

28:36 what movie is that from?! I also agree that some old school 90s boomer shooters (ie like DOOM) feel a bit like bullet hell games. Lots of slower moving, and therefore completely dodge-able, projectiles that you can find yourself sort of 'bobbing and weaving and stepping' around. DOOM is more of a 2D game anyway (no jumping, no 3D aiming) and if you imagine that game from a top down perspective, it really does kind of resemble a bullet hell game. As for the argument against realism, boy do I feel that. I'm playing SELACO right now and it's okish. But the amount of dust, particles, smoke, etc that instantly clutters the screen and it makes it difficult to see the enemies is obnoxious. Not sure if its realistic, but it sure is annoying. Not that it's all bad, I like the AI in this game (reminds me of FEAR).

[@TheElectricUnderground]

That is from the Ariana grande music video "the boy is mine" (great song). Also yes the movement heavy boomer shooter style is really cool as well, my fav in this style is devil daggers, highly recommend it if you haven't tried it!

[@fazares]

Cool analysis...never played any game of this series..i'll give it a try..that Shadow dog...what a nod to Shadow Dancer...similiar dog mechanics too!

[@sprubby9220]

To anyone who loves deep action games and somehow hasn't played vanquish yet, please do

[@TheElectricUnderground]

absolutely! Couldn't agree more.

[@shia8938]

I can't believe they nerfed human shield to the ground in the sequel. 😂

[@SpecShadow]

This game was build on the remains of Escape from the New York game. I will never forget that, nor forgive it.

[@kuma-wamu]

I never liked the look of the game, so I never tried it. Your enthusiasm certainly makes it sound interesting. I’ve been enjoying re-playing Vanquish; I had forgotten how sick it is.

[@drogba6487]

Is that shirt for sale? I never clocked the hit stun in Golden Eye. It's a huge miss in modern shooters. I remember specifically playing Wolfenstein: New Colossus easy bc the enemies could take a whole clip to the face without even flinching.

[@brightmamba889]

Do you have any vids on games in stealth genre?

[@MitchGleco]

Great video. Love dead to rights. At least the first game anyways, didn't like the sequel. I just wanted to say that you're making the ps2 and gamecube versions sound like they're baby mode. Coming from someone who's played the ps2 version, it's not easy as you make it seem. It's still pretty difficult in it's own right even on normal mode. Still though, great video.

[@notnoaintno5134]

I like Red Dead Revolver, way more than the boring sequels that everyone seems to like for some reason

[@TheElectricUnderground]

I agree completely. I ve played that game so many times, fun fact it was actually supposed to be a sequel to the Shmup gun smoke :-) I m def gonna talk about it soon on the channel, early Rockstar games are favs of mine

[@MisterNoah]

Revolver is a gem

[@jknifgijdfui]

because people like games for other reasons than pure action also call of juarez gunslinger is better arcadey cowboy game

[@Piizzachuu]

Speaking of skipping the mini games and shadow being faster. What did you think of DTR2??