>>12579the things that make a fangame successful depends on the person experiencing it
let's look at the 2 most popular fangames, 2kki and flow
while someone who loved 2kki probably likes flow, their idea of an ideal fangame might be different from someone in the opposite viewpoint
Let's look at the main differences and trivia between them:
2kki
- The first(?) fangame to be ever created, spawned off 2chan and is worked on by a constantly changing small team
- Is a Yume Nikki "successor", with the Yume 2kki pun and the way most things are designed
- Polished as fuck in way of graphics and presentation, save for some worlds
- World is absolutely huge, the game is dead set on exploration
- Has its fair share of dark/light/neutral areas
- Mood of the game is slightly ligther than Yume Nikki and feels more recreational
- Gotta catch 'em all! Wallpapers, effects, menu themes and music!
- The game just rolls with Urotsuki's fucked up dreams as seen by the endings
- Urotsuki's dreamland doesn't feel coherent, owing to the multiple developers. For some this is a good thing (it IS a dream after all) and for some it's a negative
- Continued until everyone crashes and fucking dies
- Overall feels like a fun wonderland
.flow
- Also one of earliest fangames, made by a single person who is a huge westaboo
- Is a Yume Nikki fangame but derives more into its own territory (some have mixed opinions on it:
http://archive.uboachan.net/flow/res/701.xhtml)
- Not much in the way of polish for most of the early worlds and presentation/animations. lol's art is ZUN-tier so he can't use it like how 2kki used artwork. Some worlds (mostly those added on the last updates) do have an element of polish but it's nothing compared to Wataru.
- IIRC, world is actually slightly SMALLER than Yume Nikki. It also follows a very intertwined map design with shortcuts everywhere.
- The whole game is moody from the start to finish. The game does try to moderate the overall apathy with some bittersweet/calming areas to avoid the Crawling in my Skin factor (still affected by it)
- Not much in the way of collectible or goodies, has some randomized stuff there and there though
- The "plot" is a clusterfuck when you consider the endings (which questions the reality of everything seen before it). Without the endings, Sabitsuki is just this moody kid with fucked up tendencies (like 2kki, LCD and YN) but with the true ending stuff runs deeper. Most people say it's the FG with most "plot"
- .flow is cohesive as fuck since it's made by 1 guy. All the areas, BGM's and characters lead up to one another
- Updated until lol moved to new and better things
- Oddly has more memes
- Feels like more of a journey, most late areas are grounded in realism or industrial areas
See where i'm getting at? I know it seems like im describing the fangame-y parts that can differ but that's not what i mean. I bring you my opinion (more like a weird conspiracy theory) on why the western scene is the way it is. Have you ever wondered why .flow is the most popular FG in the west aside from the edgy horror game thing? Because it stands out on its own (for a variety of reasons, mainly whatever story it is trying to achieve and cohesion), that's why most western FG's (albeit most of them shitty) try to have something to "stand out" instead of being like 2kki and being inherently linked to the YN formula (which .flow applied to a lesser extent) while most jap FG's maintain the formula (2kki is the most favored FG there for obvious reasons)
I'm not saying 2kki is not it's own game or some cloudcuckooland Oreko did 9/11 stuff, but if you can link the dots there and there i'm sure you can reach a conclusion
I might continue this weird conspiracy post on the FG scene but i can't wrap my thoughts around it as 2 whole hours have passed with me thinking about pretty much everything that contributes to FGs and lurking while making this post
Also to all these fags arguing about fangames, look at Dream vs Dream and that weird platformer where you play as Poniko
there is also a thread specifically meant for FG ranting
>>12161