Favorite game developers

[Armagon]

I haven't seen a thread dedicated for it yet so i thought i'd make one. What are your favorite game developers?

Monolith Soft: Anyone who knows me knows this is no surprise. Monolith Soft is responsible for the Xeno series, my favorite video game series of all time. They have their roots with Square Enix, where they made Xenogears, a game i consider to have the best story in any JRPG. Square Enix wanted more focus on Final Fantasy though so Tetsuya Takahashi and most of the Xenogears development team left Square and founded Monolith Soft (which is why i consider Xenogears to be a Monolith Soft title, at least, unofficially) and since then, they have put forward quality games and ever since Xenoblade Chronicles on the Wii, i feel that Monolith Soft's greatest strength (aside from it's great stories) is in it's world design. Bionis and Mechonis in Xenoblade 1, Alrest in Xenoblade 2 and especially Mira in Xenoblade X is some of the best world design i've seen in any video game, with Mira being Monolith Soft's magnum opus when it comes to world design. Xenoblade Chronicles X and 2 released two years apart and while i haven't played the former, the latter was my favorite game of 2017, which is amazing because the game was only made by 40 people (the rest of Monolith Soft was busy with helping out with Breath of the Wild). And they are still adding in brand new content via DLC. But of course, Xeno isn't the only thing Monolith Soft has (though it certainly looks that way right now) because they've also got a series called Baten Katios, which consists of Eternal Wings and Lost Ocean and the prequel, Origins. I started Eternal Wings and Lost Ocean recently and it's pretty fun and it'd be great to see this series come back (assuming Namco doesn't own it because if they do, then RIP). And they've got that new IP that they are working on which is probably releasing in 2019-2020. Who knows, maybe we'll see it at E3. Plus, you gotta praise their work ethic. Apparently, working overtime isn't paid in most cases in Japan and Monolith Soft is one of the few businesses over there that actually pays it's employees for overtime and before that even happens, they negotiate overtime hours with it's employees to see what works best for everyone.

Inti Creates: The masters of 2D action platformers, Inti Creates is my go-to developers when it comes to the indie game scene. From their flagship Azure Striker Gunvolt series to other titles such as Blaster Master Zero and Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon, you can count on Inti Creates for quality 2D action platformers. They are also responsible for the Mega Man Zero and ZX games, as well as helping Capcom with Mega Man 9 and 10. Inti Creates also has Gal*Gun, which isn't a 2D action platformer but it is a....rather strange type of shooter. It'll totally get you strange looks if you play it in public but i hear it's a legitimately good series and hey, Gal*Gun 2 is on the Switch, so i'll get around to it some day.

They also helped Comcpet on Mighty No.9 but i'm exclusively putting the blame for that on Inafune and Comcept. Because Mighty No.9 does not have that feeling that says "this is an Inti Creates game".

Honorable mention goes to Nihon Falcom: My experience with them is still small but i have greatly enjoyed their Trails series and exclusively Trails because i have yet to play any of Falcom's only games. Which is why it's an honorable mention. But Trails is great and i already feel that Falcom is a company i can trust when it comes to great games. Now if only they actually released their games on Nintendo consoles, because that's what i usually play on (even though i now have a good PC and i'm playing Trails of Cold Steel and Crossbell simultaneously, as that's what happens in the timeline). Hopefully Ys 8 sells well so Falcom is more willing to releases their games on Nintendo Switch.

[smgrinus]

CD Projekt Red:  These folks brought something new and fresh for the RPG genre with the Witcher series. Their publishing wing should be mentioned for their integrity and consumer-friendly focus as well. Cyberpunk 2077 should be something to behold if their prior efforts are any indication. 

Naughty Dog: It is hard to understand how these people keep putting out consistently strong games and stories. Last of Us really stands out in their library. I don't think I have played anything that invokes emotion as this title did.

Team Ico:  I don't know about anyone else but even soulless individuals like myself were brought to tears by Shadow of the Colossus and the Last Guardian. Masterpieces that show games can be more than just entertainment.

[Tryhard]

CD Projekt Red, FromSoftware, Rockstar Games, Naughty Dog, Blizzard Entertainment (although I hope for more of a return to their previous success strings in 90s/2000s)

[Reality]

@ OP We haven't had a thread like this in a while, although I think that Harvey put up something similiar last year (although it had important differences)

Rareware: When I was young, Rareware was the point of comparison for all other video games - Diddy Kong Racing felt like a more complete game than MK64, Banjo Kazooie than Mario 64, and Goldeneye than every console and arcade shooter. Not exposed to PC gaming att that point. I would never play it on SNES, but the GBA Donkey Kong Country ports blew my mind and almost rivaled pokemon for the amount of playtime I put in them. A lot of people bring up the microsoft taint thing (mostly due to Conker and Kinect), but Viva Pinata and Kameo were actually good, and Banjo:GBA is good given the system limitations (compare to Rayman 3 GBA or Spyro GBA especially). Of their arcade and home computer games - I'm a little less enthustatic about some of them - Knight lore might have been innovative back in the day, but why play it over head and heels / solstice / equiniox?  On the other hand,  Battletoads Arcade resonantes with me a little because my bowling alley actually had a machine installed, so I knew about it even before PC retrogaming ever occured to me.  

Nintendo: Platform games are life. Party Games are love.  Haven't decided if I should credit a sub-division (eg with Sega I prefer Amusement Vision to the others) My console history favors them but I think even now that I've owned consoles for every company I still prefer them a lot. Maybe not for the most open-minded of reasons, but maybe as part of my jerk reflex toward RPGs, I find that an arcade-action oriented brand is helpful... 

Psygnosis: Their logo was like, the European seal of quality for pre-6th gen games (in their role as a publisher) As a developer, well I talk a whole lot more about Colony Wars than it's source material ( Descent and Descent:Freespace). Bottom Line, I consider Descent to be a better game and series, but not as personlly memorable to me. Probbably best known for Wipeout series due to it's cultural imporatnace in England (despite being a F-zero genre clone in the eyes of American Audiences). I find myself drawn to their few puzzle games the most these days. Obviously part of why I like them, is because as a kid I couldn't tell why they had their logo on a lot of boxes and thought they were also responsible for things like (Lemmings, Alundra, Roll Away). Granted that, they were more involved then most publishers at the time and apparently gave the developers under them access to their art assets and such resources but even with only their own developed games I find a lot to like with them.

 Midway: Sometimes Midway Williams - The greatest American arcade cabinent maker. I still play a lot of their games through ccompliation releases, but honestly I think that people are rather harsh to their "non-classic" games that came out later in life. Yes, Defender/NBA Jam/Smash TV, will always be their best, but I think some of the 5th and even 6th gen stuff is fun in it's own right - The old 3D gauntlents (Dark Legacy) and the Rampage series (albeit heavily depedent on playing in multilayer).  I even appreciate Dr. Muto a little (albeit a budget 6th gen platformer is less memorable than a budget 5th gen platformer). One thing I especially appreciate is that the score-scaling in their games is more consistent than Namco/Capcom - it's easy to tell what a "good score" is across the board in Midway games as opposed to Namco inconsistently switching games between (shoot for 1 million and shoot for 100,000). 

Hamumu: An indie developer's company (Mike Hommel) - I reserve him only for favorites lists and not "best of lists" but that doesn't bother me. I first encountered him through a cereal box not as much as prize as Age of Empires or Roller Coaster Tycoon and I fell in love with the charm and quirkiness of his game. I would eventually play his full games, and like the majority of them. What I really like Hamumu for is for his Journal, which is honestly one of my favorite things ever made, was formative in  my pop-culture taste in movies and television shows, and so on. I also like that (until 2-3 years ago) He seemed like onn of the last indie developers to consider Indie companies as 3rd parties, because I get tired of "self-depreciation" pretty easily and this self-confidence was very refreshing. 

[Zapp Branniglenn]

Capcom - See here's the weirdness in naming a large, old company like Capcom, there's a wild difference between their best and worst products, and no shortage of examples for each. The same Capcom that produced Mega Man X pulled the plug on Mega Man Legends 3. The same Capcom that produced Resident Evil 4 made Resident Evil 6. Capcom in the twenty first century is a punching bag. Everybody carrying an old grudge and ready to pounce on them when a new game flops. Mighty No.9 was funded entirely on "Hate Money". And frankly we got scammed. Guess the talent was still owned by Capcom. And I do mean to say they've got some serious talent. I bet you didn't know Capcom developed three zelda games. Why, because they're as good as Nintendo developed Zelda games, that's why. Go play Okami, it's another great Zelda game. Capcom has revolutionized entire genres with titles like Mega Man while building entirely new ones with titles like Resident Evil and Street Fighter. But what makes Capcom stand out against other old names is their focus on legacy. They're the king of crossovers. Super Smash Bros? Try Streetfighter versus X Men and Marvel vs Capcom. Both predating Super Trash Bros. The compilations have always been great too. People had to beg Sega for decades to release Shenmue 1 and 2 on modern systems. Capcom has been king of compilations for decades, though we have to pay shoutout to Namco as well. My most played PS2 game these days are the Capcom Arcade Classics compilations. I shouldn't reasonably have access to games like these but I do. I think Capcom is my favorite because that relationship I think we all have with them is the closest to a real sense of love. We're there for the best of days and worst of days.

WayForward - Not much to say. I haven't played most of their catalogue but their unique IP and retro revival games for existing franchises are all consistent quality from what I've seen. Their Double Dragon game was great. Contra 4 is great. I really like Shantae. Good games.

Obsidian - Helping keep CRPGs alive and also making incredible followups to franchises like KOTOR 2 and Fallout New Vegas. Even the South Park games are better than they have any right to be. These guys know RPGs.

Retro Studios - Another studio where I can't point to any game they've made and say it's sub par. I think Prime 3 has aged poorly, but I also know enough about it's development that Nintendo broke the game's combat by requesting Hyper Mode as an instant win button. My only real hesitation is that I feel like these guys are going to have their first bad game sooner or later. A lot of their talent has left since the Prime series. Maybe I'll be proven wrong and they're still the "Rareware that lived" but I don't believe in prophecy.

Honorable mentions 

• Rare, but I haven't played a Rare game past Star Fox Adventures and it's clear all their talent bailed. It's just notable how they produced so many quality games and historically proved to Nintendo that western game developers can make games as good as Donkey Kong Country. It's true, this was actually something Nintendo of Japan lost a bet on.
• Insomniac, but they really need to let the Ratchet and Clank series go, it's been too derivative for years. I think they had something good with Sunset Overdrive, it was just on an unpopular platform. A lot of their games still hold up today and are well worth experiencing.

Edited June 9, 2018 by Glennstavos

[saisymbolic]

Level-5: All their games have a certain charm to them. It's hard for me to describe it completely, but there's always the feeling that they put their all into games they develop. Like, you can tell they had fun. Not that other game companies don't, but there's just something. Or, at the very least, they make some pretty interesting RPGs. The ones I've played over the years (Rogue Galaxy, both Dark Cloud games, Dragon Quest 8 and Ni No Kuni) are the ones that I remember with a distinct clarity and happiness.

Tri-Ace: All their games have really interesting game mechanics and a distinct tone I know on sight. Well, they used to. Pre-2011, that is. Like, Radiata Stories, Star Ocean and Valkyrie Profile: Silmeria all have this presentation that you know they're from the same company. It's kind of a weird thing to notice and appreciate, but I have fond memories of their older games.

And both an honorable and dishonorable mention would be Konami. It hurts, honestly. Iconic games like Castlevania, Suikoden, Metal Gear and Silent Hill are the ones I remember with fondess. I remember a simpler time. And, even though those times are gone, they're the only ones that matter to me. So, I hold the Konami that gave me those games close to my heart and happily ignore the current one of today.

[smgrinus]

@saisymbolic You are being very kind to Konami. Kudos to you. They destroyed all of my goodwills towards them after turning Silent Hill into a pachinko machine, firing Kojima and calling it a planned vacation. Let's not even get into what they did to the gem that was Suikoden. And then there is the horrid treatment of their employees. Pretty inexcusable.

Edited June 9, 2018 by grinus

[saisymbolic]

23 hours ago, grinus said:

@saisymbolic You are being very kind to Konami. Kudos to you. They destroyed all of my goodwills towards them after turning Silent Hill into a pachinko machine, firing Kojima and calling it a planned vacation. Let's not even get into what they did to the gem that was Suikoden. And then there is the horrid treatment of their employees. Pretty inexcusable.

Yeah, it's really hard. Like, I really hate the things they've done currently and can't excuse or condone those decisions. But I also can't forget the good things that they have done and what they used to be.

Edited June 10, 2018 by saisymbolic
clarification

[henrymidfields]

Atlus: Atlus is starting to become my favorite with Persona 4. While I merely heard good things about the other Persona stories, playing P4G proves that you don't need a dark story for a deep one, and it really highlighted the value of friendship, which is comparatively underrated to romantic relationships or family - something I heard from church service just yesterday. I'm excited to play P3P, P5, and Radiant Historia eventually, and with some of the spin-offs, as I heard that Atlus similarly gave good consideration to the story and characters. I've already decided to ditch Nintendo games that are not the main Pokemon/FE/big-ticket Zelda games in favour of Atlus (and maybe Square-Enix), and maybe even ditch Pokemon/FE too as I'm not quite enjoying Pokemon Sun as much, and Fates/Awakening's (and depending on info from some of the members here, Echoes too) story has been subpar as of late.

Even TMSFE arguably qualifies; even though the end result may not have been as successful, it still shows an interesting interpretation of the FE lore with J-Pop, and it was certainly an ambitious attempt on Atlus's part. 

Edited June 11, 2018 by henrymidfields

[Rapier]

Nihon Falcom, mostly for Trails.

Intelligent Systems, as FE is one of my favorite game series. Advance Wars and Paper Mario were also cool.

CDK Projekt Red, because The Witcher 3 is brilliant and I like their DLC policies.

Paradox Interactive, because their grand strategy games are brilliant (but I dislike their DLC policies).

Bethesda, because I really enjoy The Elder Scrolls despite its flaws.

Inti Creates, because they're pretty good with platformer 2D games.

Square-Enix for their RPGs, especially Nier Automata.

Rockstar Games, because yeah, I like GTA (including the early PS1 ones).

I'd say Capcom because most of their games more than compensate for their modern failures, but I'm not sure. Konami also applies.

Edited June 11, 2018 by Rapier

[Zera]

Nintendo, Retro Studios, and Treasure make Fun Games, and that makes me smile.

Other developers I respect are -
Choice Provisions Inc. (Bit.Trip Presents... Runner 2, Future Legend of Rhythm Alien)
ChunSoft (Mystery Dungeon: Shiren the Wanderer)
Ganbarion (Pandora's Tower)
Image & Form (SteamWorld Heist)
Namco (Klonoa series)
Platinum (Bayonetta 1 & 2, Okami as Clover Studios)
Prope (Rodea the Sky Soldier)
Shin'en (FAST Racing NEO, Art of Balance)
Ubisoft (Rayman series, Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes)
WayForward (Shantae series, Mighty Flip Champs)