What Makes a Good Game?

[Linde]

Sad thing about these "mobile" games is they could have existed (or did) 20 years ago on Amiga but now suddendly they are considered good games because you can play them on your phone.

What's actually sad about that? Phones just happen to be a pretty good platform for this type of casual games. If I had a 15 minute commute I'd rather spend it playing Angry Birds than something heavier like Baldur's Gate or whatever, simply because the latter requires a greater attention span and more time to really indulge in its awesomeness. In my opinion, both are good games, but in many ways for totally different reasons. Whatever I think of the whole weird hype around Angry Birds doesn't really make or break the game in terms of quality.

[Linde]

DON'T ever never ever do enemy re-spawning. It's annoying as hell and unrealistic. It could be done only as a part of a story/level design. Like there's an alien teleport and they keep popping out until you shut it down/destroy it. But re-appearing enemies for no reason is a big no-no.

I think Doom nailed that pretty well (especially compared to Doom 3 . To use your own terminology, it adds to the fear factor and suspense when done right. But I don't see realism in games as an inherently good thing. If it's unrealistic, so what? The whole premise of FPS games since the birth of the genre is unrealistic. You can't run and jump carrying five rifles. You can't restore your health instantly by walking into a white box. I can't think of a single realistic FPS I've spent any relevant amount of time with. Shooters that do aim for complete realism mostly end up having a completely arbitrary level of realism that makes every unrealistic element of the game pop out in a really disenchanting way.

[Linde]

Personally, I think an admirable quality of some games is to really stay games, without making use of excessive cutscenes, written back stories, totally scripted and linear dialogue and explicit milestones, which are all things that more often than not detract from the immersion. If you can make the plot develop through gameplay itself rather than sifting through pages of back story or hours of cutscenes, you are doing a Good Thing.

On the other hand, I enjoy some games that have movie-like qualities, but they mostly get away with it because of some brilliant gameplay element.

[Linde]

Realism... we don't need realism as such. But we do need a game to make sense, to be comprehensible and coherent.

Not necessarily, in my opinion. There are good games built on the idea that comprehensibility is the main challenge of them. Say, Fluxx, where the rules are constantly altered by its players, or Braid, where every level has its own unique space-time gimmick. Especially for puzzle games, both comprehensibility and cohesion might not be given goals.

As for realism, I agree; some of the deepest and most popular strategy games in the world are totally abstract.