8 ms·

Gex (1997)

67 points by networked 9y ago

k__ 9y ago
I'm always baffled by the randomness in such productions. I mean, what is even happening there from a business perspective?! Okay, people want to make a game that gets big and sells merch, but then the whole thing gets crazy, like nobody even thought about that they needed a game that was SO good that everybody wants to buy merch for it.
- subwayclub 9y ago
  The problem tends to stem from misplaced feedback, not intentional badness. In this case the scenario is set by copy-pasting the dev cycle of previous games onto a new one. The game gets designed from the surface(marketing, and specifically marketing artifacts like the Gex character and a pitch that dictates the design) inwards and so ends up with huge gaps in what it wants to do versus what it actually does, and tons of stuff that gets thrown out as unusable. And then new technology gets in the way. I am actually finishing up a project that went very similarly, just at a smaller scope.
  - ido 9y ago
    A lot of game studios are also not ran by professional management (especially at the time, it's been slowly getting better in the intervening 20 years). I've worked for many different companies & a lot of stuff is really just decided/made up as they go without much process. Even succesful studios like Rockstar are not necessarily well managed, often success/money just papers over a lot of issues (plus burning out their staff with insane working hours to compensate for lack of planning).
nnfy 9y ago
I think one true measure of a superb game development studio is the ability to make a game enjoyable and interesting within the construct of the chosen setting. It would have probably taken much more than the small team they had initially, but there's no reason in theory that they could have gone with their idea and made an extremely rich game, with different play styles in each thematic genre, for example. Dark Souls does this well. Without modifying the properties of the universe, each area requires modified strategies and this keeps the game fresh, and clever, while staying within the confines of this medieval fantasy world. Point is, you dont have to force platforming onto a game; but these guys were doing this 20 years ago on potato technology with an understaffed team. I didnt understand gex when I played it, but as a hobby game dev, I respect what they accomplished.
jrs95 9y ago
This was one of my favorite games as a kid. Loved the whole style of it.
msarnoff 9y ago
Seems like a good time to mention The Cutting Room Floor, an excellent wiki that catalogs cut/unused content, debug features, and secret messages left in video games. The page for Gex [1] describes a good portion of the cut assets and secrets mentioned in the article. [1] - https://tcrf.net/Gex_(3DO) https://tcrf.net/Gex_(3DO)
AdmiralAsshat 9y ago
>When I was interviewing at Crystal I was told that Gex was to be the next Sonic. It was to be a huge hit, the newest mascot, one of those titles that inspires all kinds of merchandising like toys and cartoons, pens, pencils, notebooks, underroos, ... Gex certainly felt like it was designed by a marketing team rather than a game designer with a vision. You could always tell by the "edgy" renders that would show up on magazine covers and the like. It never really appealed to me. On the upside, the Gex 3 engine was used as the basis for Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver, so at least we got that out of it.
- cavanasm 9y ago
  To be fair, the mascot character was a fad at that point. There were a bunch of stand alone games (because they didn't do well enough to get follow ups) with character designs like that. Never played 3DO, but I played some of the later Gex games on Playstation, and found it enjoyable enough.
  - bitwize 9y ago
    And they were all Sonic ripoffs. Nintendo had Mario, okay fine, but then Sega had to come up with a character to "beat" Mario and that was Sonic. Then all the other companies came out of the woodwork and they had to have mascot (with 'tude!) of their own to represent their brand. So we got GEX and Aero the Acro-Bat and... motherfucking Bubsy... By the mid-90s, even Sega seemed discontent with Sonic headlining their brand, so we also got Ristar, Tempo, Wild Woody, etc. But the lesson the marketroids failed to take away from Mario and Sonic is that this really only works if you have a strong game, not just a strong character. Two mascot platformers from the side-scrolling, Sonic ripoff period that really delivered on their promise, gameplay wise, were Jazz Jackrabbit and Rocket Knight Adventures. Both of those had consistent gameplay, a tight feel, and neat mechanics that made them fun. Hence why I still remember these, but tend to forget all the others...
    - duncan_bayne 9y ago
      Maybe I have the sense of humour of a five year old, but Wild Woody sounds a lot too NSFW for a kids gaming mascot.
ballenf 9y ago
The 6x investment needed to move from 16bit to 32bit, in the author's estimation and experience, makes me understand the trend toward 8-bit retro games a little better. Even if no modern "8-bit" games are that in anything but name and some graphics only. I've been hoping in vain for a couple years that the trend toward faux "8-bit" would pass as a fad, but it seems to really have become a niche with staying power. Is there something I'm missing that's driving this trend? Or am I alone in preferring line art or other styles over "8-bit" graphics?
- tcfunk 9y ago
  The curious thing about this is that vector graphics for 2d games is soooo much easier to make than pixel graphics. It scales better, it's easier to animate, and it's easier to edit. Pixel art requires hand-animating each frame of each sprite. Want to change something about the character? You're now changing 20 frames worth of that same something.
  - yumaikas 9y ago
    It really depends on how you're displaying those vectors. Depending on the game engine, bitmaps are often much easier to display.
  - Narishma 9y ago
    They may be easier to make but I find 2d vector graphics tend to look very bland and generic.
    - virgil_disgr4ce 9y ago
      My thoughts exactly. It's really hard to get any kind of interesting textures with vector graphics.
  - jtolmar 9y ago
    It's been years since I last tried, but I remember vector graphics being much harder to import. Not only do you have to bring in considerations more familiar to 3D like consistent units and origin points, but it's also just not supported by most libraries. Even random tiny game engines that some hobbyist put on github and abandoned support bitmaps.
amatecha 9y ago
Wow, that's an old blog post. At first I thought the comments with datestamps of "16 years ago" were some kind of bug! Pretty surprising this retrospective post was made only a couple years after the game released -- usually people wait a bit longer to "spill the beans" on development of games they worked on. :)
petetnt 9y ago
Thanks for this, never read this before! I still remember how back in '95, after I had had my mind blown with titles like Tekken and after seeing it hyped in so many magazines, being so disappointed at what Gex actually was. Biggest disappointment since Vortex on SNES, heh.
- petetnt 9y ago
  And while the 3d sequels were at least somewhat competent 3d platformers, it's pretty crazy that Gex had a playboy sidekick in the third one. (Somewhat NSFW https://i.pinimg.com/originals/18/20/93/18209312f22639374c84847996a5ce08.jpg https://i.pinimg.com/originals/18/20/93/18209312f22639374c84...)
frik 9y ago
I first though it was about "Gex: Enter the Gecko" 1998 (a Super Mario 64 like early 3D platformer): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gex:_Enter_the_Gecko https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gex:_Enter_the_Gecko But the article was about Gex 1995 (2D platformer): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gex_(video_game) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gex_(video_game) Trivia: "Gex Enter the Gecko" (3D, part 2) used the same 3D engine as Tomb Raider 1 (from CORE Design). Crystal Dynamics improved the engine with every game (like Legacy of Kain) and in the end Crystal Dynamics won over the Tomb Raider franchise with Tomb Raider Legend (2006), where as Core Design's engine fork looked old-school by then and basically killed the company. Even to this day "Rise of the Tomb Raider" is still based on that engine, obviously much improved over those many years. (source: check the Wikipedia pages)
jccalhoun 9y ago
Very interesting read. However, I'm not sure why a game where you do stunts to make money is "a lame concept" but getting sucked into a tv isn't?
- khedoros1 9y ago
  The point was that the second concept is more fantasy-like, so the level designers can get away with using more classic video game design elements. If he's supposed to be a stuntman on a "real" movie set, they'd have to explain why their wild west set has magical floating platforms flying around.

Gex (1997)

67 points by networked 9y ago

k__ 9y ago

I'm always baffled by the randomness in such productions. I mean, what is even happening there from a business perspective?! Okay, people want to make a game that gets big and sells merch, but then the whole thing gets crazy, like nobody even thought about that they needed a game that was SO good that everybody wants to buy merch for it.

subwayclub 9y ago
The problem tends to stem from misplaced feedback, not intentional badness. In this case the scenario is set by copy-pasting the dev cycle of previous games onto a new one. The game gets designed from the surface(marketing, and specifically marketing artifacts like the Gex character and a pitch that dictates the design) inwards and so ends up with huge gaps in what it wants to do versus what it actually does, and tons of stuff that gets thrown out as unusable. And then new technology gets in the way. I am actually finishing up a project that went very similarly, just at a smaller scope.
- ido 9y ago
  A lot of game studios are also not ran by professional management (especially at the time, it's been slowly getting better in the intervening 20 years). I've worked for many different companies & a lot of stuff is really just decided/made up as they go without much process. Even succesful studios like Rockstar are not necessarily well managed, often success/money just papers over a lot of issues (plus burning out their staff with insane working hours to compensate for lack of planning).

nnfy 9y ago

I think one true measure of a superb game development studio is the ability to make a game enjoyable and interesting within the construct of the chosen setting. It would have probably taken much more than the small team they had initially, but there's no reason in theory that they could have gone with their idea and made an extremely rich game, with different play styles in each thematic genre, for example. Dark Souls does this well. Without modifying the properties of the universe, each area requires modified strategies and this keeps the game fresh, and clever, while staying within the confines of this medieval fantasy world. Point is, you dont have to force platforming onto a game; but these guys were doing this 20 years ago on potato technology with an understaffed team. I didnt understand gex when I played it, but as a hobby game dev, I respect what they accomplished.

jrs95 9y ago

This was one of my favorite games as a kid. Loved the whole style of it.

msarnoff 9y ago

Seems like a good time to mention The Cutting Room Floor, an excellent wiki that catalogs cut/unused content, debug features, and secret messages left in video games. The page for Gex [1] describes a good portion of the cut assets and secrets mentioned in the article. [1] - https://tcrf.net/Gex_(3DO) https://tcrf.net/Gex_(3DO)

AdmiralAsshat 9y ago

>When I was interviewing at Crystal I was told that Gex was to be the next Sonic. It was to be a huge hit, the newest mascot, one of those titles that inspires all kinds of merchandising like toys and cartoons, pens, pencils, notebooks, underroos, ... Gex certainly felt like it was designed by a marketing team rather than a game designer with a vision. You could always tell by the "edgy" renders that would show up on magazine covers and the like. It never really appealed to me. On the upside, the Gex 3 engine was used as the basis for Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver, so at least we got that out of it.

cavanasm 9y ago
To be fair, the mascot character was a fad at that point. There were a bunch of stand alone games (because they didn't do well enough to get follow ups) with character designs like that. Never played 3DO, but I played some of the later Gex games on Playstation, and found it enjoyable enough.
- bitwize 9y ago
  And they were all Sonic ripoffs. Nintendo had Mario, okay fine, but then Sega had to come up with a character to "beat" Mario and that was Sonic. Then all the other companies came out of the woodwork and they had to have mascot (with 'tude!) of their own to represent their brand. So we got GEX and Aero the Acro-Bat and... motherfucking Bubsy... By the mid-90s, even Sega seemed discontent with Sonic headlining their brand, so we also got Ristar, Tempo, Wild Woody, etc. But the lesson the marketroids failed to take away from Mario and Sonic is that this really only works if you have a strong game, not just a strong character. Two mascot platformers from the side-scrolling, Sonic ripoff period that really delivered on their promise, gameplay wise, were Jazz Jackrabbit and Rocket Knight Adventures. Both of those had consistent gameplay, a tight feel, and neat mechanics that made them fun. Hence why I still remember these, but tend to forget all the others...
  - duncan_bayne 9y ago
    Maybe I have the sense of humour of a five year old, but Wild Woody sounds a lot too NSFW for a kids gaming mascot.

ballenf 9y ago

The 6x investment needed to move from 16bit to 32bit, in the author's estimation and experience, makes me understand the trend toward 8-bit retro games a little better. Even if no modern "8-bit" games are that in anything but name and some graphics only. I've been hoping in vain for a couple years that the trend toward faux "8-bit" would pass as a fad, but it seems to really have become a niche with staying power. Is there something I'm missing that's driving this trend? Or am I alone in preferring line art or other styles over "8-bit" graphics?

tcfunk 9y ago
The curious thing about this is that vector graphics for 2d games is soooo much easier to make than pixel graphics. It scales better, it's easier to animate, and it's easier to edit. Pixel art requires hand-animating each frame of each sprite. Want to change something about the character? You're now changing 20 frames worth of that same something.
- yumaikas 9y ago
  It really depends on how you're displaying those vectors. Depending on the game engine, bitmaps are often much easier to display.
- Narishma 9y ago
  They may be easier to make but I find 2d vector graphics tend to look very bland and generic.
  - virgil_disgr4ce 9y ago
    My thoughts exactly. It's really hard to get any kind of interesting textures with vector graphics.
- jtolmar 9y ago
  It's been years since I last tried, but I remember vector graphics being much harder to import. Not only do you have to bring in considerations more familiar to 3D like consistent units and origin points, but it's also just not supported by most libraries. Even random tiny game engines that some hobbyist put on github and abandoned support bitmaps.

amatecha 9y ago

Wow, that's an old blog post. At first I thought the comments with datestamps of "16 years ago" were some kind of bug! Pretty surprising this retrospective post was made only a couple years after the game released -- usually people wait a bit longer to "spill the beans" on development of games they worked on. :)

petetnt 9y ago

Thanks for this, never read this before! I still remember how back in '95, after I had had my mind blown with titles like Tekken and after seeing it hyped in so many magazines, being so disappointed at what Gex actually was. Biggest disappointment since Vortex on SNES, heh.

petetnt 9y ago
And while the 3d sequels were at least somewhat competent 3d platformers, it's pretty crazy that Gex had a playboy sidekick in the third one. (Somewhat NSFW https://i.pinimg.com/originals/18/20/93/18209312f22639374c84847996a5ce08.jpg https://i.pinimg.com/originals/18/20/93/18209312f22639374c84...)

frik 9y ago

I first though it was about "Gex: Enter the Gecko" 1998 (a Super Mario 64 like early 3D platformer): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gex:_Enter_the_Gecko https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gex:_Enter_the_Gecko But the article was about Gex 1995 (2D platformer): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gex_(video_game) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gex_(video_game) Trivia: "Gex Enter the Gecko" (3D, part 2) used the same 3D engine as Tomb Raider 1 (from CORE Design). Crystal Dynamics improved the engine with every game (like Legacy of Kain) and in the end Crystal Dynamics won over the Tomb Raider franchise with Tomb Raider Legend (2006), where as Core Design's engine fork looked old-school by then and basically killed the company. Even to this day "Rise of the Tomb Raider" is still based on that engine, obviously much improved over those many years. (source: check the Wikipedia pages)

jccalhoun 9y ago

Very interesting read. However, I'm not sure why a game where you do stunts to make money is "a lame concept" but getting sucked into a tv isn't?

khedoros1 9y ago
The point was that the second concept is more fantasy-like, so the level designers can get away with using more classic video game design elements. If he's supposed to be a stuntman on a "real" movie set, they'd have to explain why their wild west set has magical floating platforms flying around.