Tony Polanco from The Koalition writes:
"Our former home was STFUandPLAY which was founded by industry veteran Torrence Davis. The biggest podcast on that site was The Video Game Warzone which was originally on TheBitBag and which started by Torrence and Gerard Williams a.k.a. HipHopGamer. Since this is (technically) the 100th episode of the Throwdown podcast, we wanted to do something special and have these two guys on the show. For added fun, we also have one of the founders of The Throwdown, Michael Crawford a.k.a. Rikuson1.
This episode is called Video Game Warzone for two reasons. The most obvious is because we have the two men who started the now legendary podcast on the show. The second is that, like the Warzone, this show went off the rails. Originally, we were going to talk about the state of the industry but it devolved into us talking about Driveclub and how video game companies fail to deliver on their promises. Though this part wasn’t part of the plan and went off in several directions, it channeled the spirit of the old Warzones."
In this day and age, it’s rare we experience a warm fuzzy feeling when we boot up X (formerly known as Twitter, of course).
But the past few days have been lovely: our feed is full of people talking about DriveClub again.
The discussion started when someone posted a clip of the game and its infamous rain effects. The caption reads: “Still can’t believe this is a 12 year old game.”
This was one I was hoping would have some kind of boost from the PS5. The devs locked that sucker so tight...
I play the PSVR one even though it doesn't look as good, because that one is 60fps.
I interviewed them twice back in my gaming journalist days... Once at E3 2006 and again on a podcast about a year later. Really nice folks.
The guy we interviewed both times' name was Simon, I can't remember his last name, it was 20 years ago, but he was a really nice guy, and was very passionate about his job. It broke my heart when I saw Sony shuttered Evolution. I do hope they bring some of those folks back, but I remember another studio ended up hiring most of them back in those days, and they've been releasing new games since under that studio... Codemasters, maybe? I forgot which....
But the amount of talent that Sony has shut down over the years, it's disturbing. Psygnosis, Evolution, Zipper... just those three studios produced some of the most innovative games that PlayStation has ever seen... and those games need to be brought back.
If they were to release that game on the PlayStation 5, there would be absolutely no need for a remaster or a remake. The whole appeal of the original game was that it consistently exceeded people's expectations.
Higher rendering res and textures, higher framerate, maybe toss in some global illumination/ray tracing, but other than that, they could keep every polygon the same and it would still look absolutely incredible as a current gen title.
Sony should reassemble the team and make Driveclub 2. Driveclub was so ahead of its time it’s crazy.
This is what I hate about gamers sometimes
There is a segment of gaming communities that always want an old game to come back. But when the game(s) were in their prime, nobody supported them or not enough people supported them. Driveclub, Killzone, Resistance, etc all fit that profile.
I want Driveclub, Killzone, Resistence, and etc all back too. But I say that as someone that bought into, played, and own those games.
Too many people like to talk but not put up the money to support when it's needed. I even lump two of my own personal friends into that. I remember how one of them constantly said "I always wanted to play the Resistance games", yet never made an effort to buy any of them. No way that's an isolated event.
There are certainly games that fit that description, but I'm not sure these are a good fit:
- Driveclub infamously launched in a truly terrible state. It had a central focus on online & social features, and those were broken for about 6+ months before people could reliably play it as intended. It was so bad that the PS Plus Edition was delayed, along with its companion app. It also released less than a year after the PS4 launch, so it had to deal with a smaller total of launch PS4 owners to sell to, and Driveclub's rough launch certainly did it no favors.
- Resistance got 3 main console entries, and one handheld title for the PSP and PS Vita. Killzone got 5 main console entries across 3 generations, and one handheld title for PSP and PS Vita. This was also the era of millions of shooters, especially of the First Person variety, & genre fatigue was getting heavier by the year. So I feel these did pretty good at 5 and 7 titles respectively, pointing to enough people showing up for at least a while.
I'm not saying people don't exist who fit that criteria for these games, but I also don't think they were the primary issue. I think after a solid break from the IPs, as well as a lessening of shooter oversaturation, these titles could find healthy audiences if they came out with new entries at this point.
Killzone on the PS4 had the graphics, but the gameplay was tragic, I only rated Killzone 3, although the first game on the PS2 was decent. The Getaway was another game Sony canned, the sequel was so bad. Plenty of games need a sequel, the likes of Ridge Racer, Wipeout, Project Gotham, Wave Race and F-Zero have been retired. The racing genre these days, I'm sick of Turismo and Forza due to the same tracks and any other clones.
I think the original Motorstorm was the game that convinced me to buy a ps3. Way ahead of its time.
Surprised Sony didn't release a collectio, but all they seem to do these days is release God of War and Uncharted collections. It kills me that I no longer have a PS3, so a collection would be awesome.
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DriveClub, the legendary PS4 racer from shuttered Runcorn studio Evolution, has such an interesting story.
Originally announced alongside the PS4, the game had been intended as a launch title – we even played it in a big London church Sony had rented to showcase the new system prior to its release.
Evolution was done dirty... DC is still the most stunning visual game of its generation. They certainly deserved better in the end.
DriveClub was pretty and I loved the experience of driving in the rain, it was immersive. I had some good races with people from an old forum, but at times I found it to be a bit boring. MotorStorm was such a fun game to play and I loved the controls - it would make sense to remaster that.
I'd give the visual showcase award of the last generation to The Order: 1886. That game was immaculate.
Uncharted 4 was also absolutely insane, and perhaps manages to use the PS4's power in extremely clever ways.
Cause the game was mediocre at best, and surpassed in pretty much every area by Forza Horizon 2.
Apart from visuals, driving model, weather effects, only thing forza had was an open world...
It's multiplayer component was the only thing struggling at launch but the game was still perfectly playable offline. Done dirty is an understatement because how many games after came out with broken online components that got a pass? Now games with an SP and MP get separate reviews for SP and MP smh! SONY shut them down as if Evo had been bleeding money instead of putting out great games. Their fate was undeserved and they were the targets of a media smear campaign due to that one trailer.
Loved it.
Now here's a game that would benefit from a remaster.
4K, 60 FPS
I'd buy it.
See? Another reason why physical is important. Going all digital will have you miss out games like this.
Brilliant game, I really miss it, and it deserved so much better than what Sony did to it.
Most important reason I liked it; It was FUN. That’s it. The actual gameplay,throwing a car around corners, the challenging AI opponents, the entertaining tracks which were peak-design, etc etc, it was above all just FUN to play.
This was by far one of the most entertaining episodes to date. I got respect for the opinions of everyone on the show. The Xbox one will indeed sell very well this holiday season and I expect that to make a difference in numbers heading into the new year.
Great episode. Brain is the perfect representation of a satisfied gamer. PC ftw!