You guys should get this game, it's great and it doesn't have any stupid names in it!
Awesome little puzzle-platformer, one of the best I've played in a while. 

Guess I should link to the game...
http://store.steampowered.com/app/205690/ 

All this chat reminded me of this semi-controversial Gamasutra interview with Todd H. and Andy Chang, titled "Creative Intent"
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/6500/the_creative_intent_of_rage.php

Controversial because many people thought the interviewer was being rude and asking questions he shouldn't. Obviously that's bollocks and the interview is really quite tame. At least he holds the guys lightly to some of the shit they say, and tries to find out if there was any thought behind their creative decisions.

Re: the world: no, it doesn't look like they really thought about that. In fact, while i think they answered the broader gameplay questions okay, Todd and Andy didn't really represent a game with a real artistic direction or intent. It's apocalyptic because the tech can do it. It's orange because pop culture / why not. The bandits make sculptures and art because I don't know. These baddies have a British accent because gosh that's cool. 

Because I feel bad about sounding so negative, just it's a shame because there's some really awesome creative work in the game, for example some of the character designs are fantastic imo. Clearly there were people working on Rage who were passionate and hold degrees in kicking ass, but overall the end result didn't reflect that. 

Dead City in RAGE was more immersive than anything in any previous ID game. 

It sounds like I'm advocating RPG features in all games, or dialog trees or whatever - not at all.

All devs care about their work, even when in a company that doesn't, and there's always a ton of backstories and thought that goes into each game, just almost none of it that those in charge want to let out of the door.

As the big companies turn their focus from AAA to smaller games, episodic content and so on it'd be nice if the creative stranglehold was loosened a bit as well. 

Telling the story through the game is what I was driving at before - immersion.

'Collect 10 goblin pelts' tells me a story about dev laziness / managerial dictatorship, not the world.

Just playing through Bioshock for the first time now, and the theme is precise and well conceived. Everything in the world feels like it belongs there. 

"Dead City in RAGE was more immersive than anything in any previous ID game."

Dead City was definitely cool! It also has a proper name and was built up as a scary place in the game before you went. Immersion doesn't just happen, people. :) 

Dead City is a proper name? :P 

City 17! Gordon! Dog! With names so bland, it's obvious that Valve didn't give a shit about Half Life 2! 

Never mind. I forgot how obstinate this board can be. Fuck.

I apologize for questioning the almighty id. 

Gordon!

It's definitely a lot less bland than, say, Jack, though. When I see that name pop up too often as the main protagonist's name in games (or even film), I just feel sad that they couldn't just flip through a baby name book or do a simple google search to find a more interesting alternative. 

Whether you were kidding or serious, it's still something I just had to mention regarding this subject... 

Indeed. You fit in well here. 

How about that. Immersive enough? 

http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2010/249/1/6/jackie_chan___wtf_by_sailor_capricorn-d2y4lvi.jpg 

I take your point about the realism/immersion factor being a little lacking because of lame ass naming of stuff. And the incoherency of the travel element.

But (IMO) the environments and AI were great! I just mean that the 'shooting sections' seemed fast and fun to play. The guns felt good. 

"Indeed. You fit in well here."

Right. Look, I see now in hindsight that arguing this sort of thing on a message board filled with people who love and adore a 16 year old shooter was probably a mistake. In that design context, yes, names and world cohesion and that sort of thing are basically irrelevant. I get that now, sorry.

Ricky's post sums it up. World was pretty and guns felt good. That's the benchmark, OK. 

But the thing is, on the other hand, if you intend on finding alledged immersion-breakers such as names and start looking around, you can find them everywhere in one way or another.

You do have a point - but it doesn't exclude the possibility that other people may be well immersed regardless of such things, maybe even appreciate the simple, to-the-point hooks that such stereotype names suggest. 

From a personal viewpoint, I enjoyed Rage about as much as I enjoyed Duke Nukem Forever.

Spent 15-20 hours on them roughly.

Skyrim - 130hrs
Battlefeild Bad Company 2 - 200hrs or something.
Left 4 Dead - 150hrs maybe.

UT3 - played that quite a lot too I guess.
GOW (1) - must have spent 60 or 70 hours on that on the 360 when it came out.

But yeah - world was pretty and guns felt good, like Quake (very incoherent immersion but great graphics and gameplay), and Doom (for it's time) - great graphics and gameplay, but not much of a backstory either.

Not to say that the fact that the stories were lacking is a good thing, it isn't, but did I enjoy them - YES!

Metro 2033 is another example. It had all three factors - great graphics, good gameplay and a very cohesive and immersive backstory/theme. But did I play it loads? NO! not really. I dunno, it just seemed a little stressful and dingy.

I fully agree with you about Rage on most levels. TBH the English wasteland punk enemies from Rage were just downright terrible! Fake English accents yelling 'Wankahh!' at me all the time. Felt good to shoot the annoying little bastards in the face, just to shut them up.

But the visuals in Rage were great. Just not when you were up-close. Then they looked pixelated.

I hope Doom 4 is better. From the look of some of those leaked screenshots, it possibly could be. But hopefully they wont fill the game with annoying cockney enemies that yell 'Wankahh!' all the time.

I'd rather go and play dynamic, squad based games of the uber-pretty BFBC2. Now that is fun. And immersive. And the backstory kinda sucks (WWIII - ruskies v yanks). But it's really fun. 

Yeah, it's sort of a top down problem. If they can't even be bothered to come up with decent names for factions, what are the chances the rest of the game is good? Think it over.

I take issue with the logic that 'bland names = designers don't care.' That's just shitty logic. Feel however you want about Rage, I don't think anyone here gives a shit about that, but that kind of thinking just doesn't make sense.

The names may not be interesting (perhaps they were interesting to id) but imo they fit the wasteland extremely well. They are short, to the point, and they accurately describe the faction in question. Sure, that may be less interesting, but it better fits in with a wasteland scenario. When someone says 'the Authority' you can get a pretty good idea right away about who they are - that kind of thing fits in well in a place where danger is around every corner.

So if the names are uninteresting, fine, I'm not arguing that, I'm arguing against your terrible, terrible logic. 

Another highlight of the game for me personally. 

Reviewed Call of Duty 4. Pretty cool game, but a bit overrated with all the "game of the year" awards. Crysis was better.

http://www.etherealhell.com/etherealhell/reviews/2012/call_of_duty4_modern_warfare.php

8.5/10 

Cod4 was developed by infinity ward, not treyarch. 

The best shooter since L4D2 is Serious Sam 3.