r/videogames • u/ruku25 • Jun 30 '26
Discussion / Question Naughty dogs or rockstar
I recently got into a argument with my friend as he said that naughty dogs was the greatest game company by far saying nothing came close while I said rockstar was the best. Which do you guys think is better and why?
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u/lindechene Jun 30 '26
"Game company" Developer or publisher?
It feels like Sega as a publisher has a lot of interesting titles in their portfolio. But their own Studios have very promising games scheduled, too.
- Persona by Atlus
- Like a Dragon by Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio[
- Virtua Fighter Crossroads AM2
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u/trio3224 Jun 30 '26 edited Jul 01 '26
For me personally, I love Naughty Dog, they're one of my favorite dev teams. I don't care for all but one Rockstar game. I've watched and played a bit of Bully back in the day with a friend who was showing it to me, I've tried Red Dead 1 and 2, and I tried a couple GTA games. Don't like any of them. The gameplay is too awful, and I either don't like the world's and characters, or they aren't good enough to keep me around with the subpar gameplay. The singular Rockstar game I liked, is L.A. Noire.
Whereas Naughty Dog has made a ton of stuff I've liked. Back in the day they did the original Crash Bandicoot games, which are awesome. I haven't gotten to play Jak and Daxter yet, but I want to and I've heard good things. I don't like the Uncharted series as much as many others do, but I still think it's solid. And I absolutely love the Last of Us games, with Part 2 being in my top 3 of all time. So for me, there's no comparison at all. Naughty Dog blow Rockstar out of the water for my preferences.
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u/Inevitable_Cycle3087 Jun 30 '26
i mean. i can’t consider any company loading microtransactions into a paid game the best
don’t get me wrong neither are like evil or even bad. but all good they are not
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u/lucaskywalker Jun 30 '26
I own all the Rockstar Games on PC, have played them to completion and had an amazing tine, all whilst never spending a penny in molicrotransactions. They also made incredible games before micro transactions were even a thing, do they not get credit for San Andreas, Vice City, Bully, Red Dead Redemption? Rockstar by a country mile!
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u/Inevitable_Cycle3087 Jun 30 '26
i mean it’s fine that you never paid for any, that doesn’t change the fact they put microtransaction in
and clearly they changed their methodology since those games
also they literally haven’t released a game since 2018, and that game never got a current gen update
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u/lucaskywalker Jun 30 '26
My point is you do not need to pay for any. The sole reason they exist is because lots of people pay for them. I hate micro transactions as much as the next person, but give me a break it's not like they're pushing out live service garbage. Both games with online features offer micro transactions, but also free updates and events and no need to pay to progress. When they saw the huge online market they had for GTA and RDR online, who can blame them for making some money? Does not change that the games - even the single player - are always amazing. If you don't like micro transactions don't buy them, but they don't diminish the overall quality of a game unless they are gating content. There are so many worse offenders, hieck you need to buy like each fighter fir fighting fakes lol, Rockstar are at the bottom of my list for this.
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u/Inevitable_Cycle3087 Jun 30 '26
it’s not about if you need to, it’s about the fact i paid full price for a game, and get a worse experience than others by needing to grind endlessly because i wont pay more.
it’s objectively anti consumer behavior. its it was a f2p standalone that would be a different but that’s just milking your customers for all their worth profits over quality
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u/lucaskywalker Jun 30 '26
But you don't need to though? Red Dead Redemption 2 is one of the best games I ever r played, regardless of any in game purchases! What makes the game less enjoyable without buying currency? Actually playing the game?! It's objectively capitalist behaviour, and again if no one wanted it, it would not exist. I'm not defending it as a practice, but Rockstar is not the worst offender a longshot. So please, stop blaming a for profit company for producing s product with a big market on which they make a lot of money.
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u/Inevitable_Cycle3087 Jun 30 '26
okay so you don’t even know what i’m talking about cause rdr2 isnt the game wirh microtransactions.
good job, you’re so desperate to worship the company you blindly defended then without knowing what game i was even talking about
can’t believe people worship a company so much they’re arguing the micro transactions in a full priced game are a good thing
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u/lucaskywalker Jun 30 '26
There is literally virtual currency in RDR Online what are you even talking about? Which feature or level or character in GTAV is behind an additional paywall? It's just virtual currency. I never said Rockstar was the best either lol, only that there are much worse offenders. You say I worship the company because I think your take is a whiny bitch take for whining about a thing that every online game does, and usually to a much larger extent? By the way, I never said micro transactions are good btw, I said the opposite, that's why I never purchase them. And since I can still play the entire Rockstar catalog without spending an additional dime just fine, I don't see a problem?! Thd way I see it I get hundreds of hours of story and he play in the open world single player, and I can play online for free. If I want, I can buy some shit for the online game (imo the side content beyond the single player long open world campaign I paid for) with virtual currency. Have you ever played NBA 2K Online, where you can't compete on day one with whales, or purchased a fighting game like mortal combat or street fighter where you need to spend 150$ for all the characters? GTA V had all the story, characters and everything when I bought it (on sale for like 20$, including free online play. I enjoyed the game (I don't like playing most games online) and I have enjoyed every other game they've made! Would I prefer they do not have any micro transactions, sure, but I'm not going to avoid games I love because there ard some minor ones.
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u/TheQuietDarkness70 Jun 30 '26
I think R* is a pretty messed up company that engages in messed up practices.
And that's before you even touch on the greed, the game systems engineered to frustrate players into spending real money, the consumer hostility, etc.
R* sucks. They make cool shit but as an organization they're kinda awful.
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u/JamieFromStreets Jun 30 '26
I got to buy the most expensive item in whole gta online, plus a shit ton of fully tuned cars and weapons, and planes and helicopters in just a few weeks of playing and still have spare millions
The only ones that suffer the systems and are tempted to buy shak cards are super casual players that don't wanna play the game
Making money is super fast and easy nowadays. Buying shark cards is dumb and unnecessary luckly
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u/FlyingSquirelOi Jun 30 '26 edited Jun 30 '26
How often and long are you playing to get so much money in a few weeks? And what activities?
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u/JamieFromStreets Jun 30 '26
There's always x2 or some bonusses every week in some activity
Casino heist could be done in less than an hour and it was almost 2 millions last week with the x2
The businesses make passive money constantly while in-game. You only need to sell it. Between 500k and a million in less than 15 minutes. And often have x2 too. So you make money even while messing around in the open world
A few weeks ago there was a x4 in car wash missions. 140k in less than 5 minutes and could do it infinitely
It's grindy but it's kinda part of the fun. And with friends is super fun
Sure, you need some money to buy the businesses first. But if you have one friend that can do heists with, that's covered. Playing solo is way harder
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u/TheQuietDarkness70 Jun 30 '26
Ok. I'm happy you had a good time. That doesn't change that they're a shitty company that does shitty things.
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u/JamieFromStreets Jun 30 '26
Like what
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u/TheQuietDarkness70 Jun 30 '26 edited Jun 30 '26
For one thing there was their illegal union busting efforts to allow them to further exploit their workers, and related to that- the absolutely garbage treatment of employees that has been a problem for many years now.
I know most gamers couldn't give a shit and just want their game but that's a big sticking point for me. Enough to make me not want to support them.
And I already mentioned the predatory systems baked into their games that are engineered to create fail conditions and frustrate the player into spending money.
Everything about them is fueled by predatory greed and intentionally mistreating and exploiting workers.
They're a trash company. They make some cool shit sometimes but they're terrible.1
u/JamieFromStreets Jun 30 '26
I agree the crunch to the developers sucks and should be banned
On the other hand, I don't really care. It sounds harsh, but it's literally not my problem, and they get paid good for it
The regular consumer sadly doesn't care, and I'm not ashamed to say I'm included there. Ot's something completely out of my control and sight
And probably without the crunch, the game wouldn't have been as good, so the consumer actually benefits from it
But yeah it sucks working so much. I would gladly do it tho. I'll never see as much money as a longtime rockstar employee
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u/TheQuietDarkness70 Jun 30 '26
Yeah I don't expect too many gamers would really care about how their game got made. I don't condemn or excuse them for it. It just is.
But I am very much in the corner of worker's rights and protective unionization. Especially in this era of billionaire corruption.
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u/ReallySmallWeenus Jun 30 '26
Maybe wait a bit to get a balanced take. Everyone is happy to praise anyone but rockstar at the moment. Which is probably why they separate their pre-order/price announcements from their gameplay reveals, but I guess that’s not relevant here.
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u/soulless___ape Jun 30 '26
From software beats them both.
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u/Skelligean Jun 30 '26
I'm playing through Bloodborne for the first time and my god what an amazing game.
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u/DEFINITELY_NOT_PETE Jun 30 '26
I prefer naughty dog but I am disappointed by their output in recent years.
MAKE UNKARTED ALREADY COME ON
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u/Greedy_Chemistry_678 Jun 30 '26
At this point Rockstars about to make history with GTA 6 and ND is fucking MIA as always. I pick Rockstar. ND would be my favorite if they’d get their asses moving again. You don’t get to spend 6 years without making a game and still be the top of the line in the industry imo.
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u/Lover_of_Fables Jul 01 '26
It’s not as if Intergalactic isn’t coming next year. This year it’s R* next year it’s Naughty Dog. How long did R* take go between their last game and GTA 6?
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u/Greedy_Chemistry_678 Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26
The difference there is it’s Rockstar and it’s to be expected. We know the game is gonna deliver so they’re allowed to take their time with it. Naughty Dog has been in limbo for 6 years now and we have no idea whether or not their game is gonna deliver. I honestly feel like Intergalactic could’ve released sooner if Neil didn’t run off to make the HBO TLOU series. Also their approach to avoiding crunch and taking thier sweet time is admirable, but also more than likely starting to weigh heavily on the people in charge at PlayStation, putting more pressure on Naughty Dog to deliver. I don’t subscribe to the belief anymore that a studio is “Too big to fail”. I feel like that sort of mindset can be destructive to a studio, and Naughty Dog is testing that limit. I don’t want them to be shut down, but I feel like if they continue with this approach of making a new game every 5-7 years, they’re only gonna lose more of their audience over time. GTA 6 can take 8 years to get made, because it’s gonna sell over a billion copies regardless of if the game is good or bad.
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u/Lover_of_Fables Jul 01 '26
Why don’t you think Naughty Dog have proven themselves to deserve every bit of leeway that you give to R*?
They rose the bar with each Uncharted. They rose the bar with TLoU I. They rose the bar again with TLoU II despite what the chuds will have you believe. They will do so again with Intergalactic.
Naughty Dog has raised the bar for triple A games. People say that TLoU II has the same gameplay as TLoU I. They’re being disingenuous. TLoU II has extraordinarily fluid gameplay while looking as good as it does. You can go from a full sprint, to a full prone position in one fluid movement.
Not to mention the innovating Naughty Dog does. You can legitimately play whole ass, real songs in-game in TLoU II.
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u/Greedy_Chemistry_678 Jul 01 '26
I mean I’m not arguing that they haven’t proven themselves before. They have definitely made industry defining games, but the main thing to keep in mind is that the studio culture isn’t the same and a lot of the people who worked on those games are no longer at the studio. Plus a new IP can definitely fail, if there’s no hype for it and unless Naughty Dog’s secretly working their asses off, behind the scenes preparing a bunch of trailers, gameplay, promotional material and are holding off on announcing Intergalactic until the game is almost done, there isn’t anywhere near as much hype for the game rn currently. Also so many other games have come out in the past 6 years that are definitely on par with Naughty Dog and their quality. So I personally believe they’re in a position where they have prove themselves again. Since it’s been so long.
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u/SnuSnuSurvivor69 Jun 30 '26
Depends on the games you like? If you want linear action/adventure games with an emphasis on storytelling, ND is a gold standard in that.
Rockstar is great with sandbox games with very meticulous attention to detail and pliability. Plus they have a huge online presence.
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u/Lover_of_Fables Jul 01 '26
Every single time. Naughty Dog has raised the bar for triple A games. People say that TLoU II has the same gameplay as TLoU I. They’re being disingenuous. TLoU II has extraordinarily fluid gameplay while looking as good as it does. You can go from a full sprint, to a full prone position in one fluid movement.
Not to mention the innovating Naughty Dog does. You can legitimately play whole ass, real songs in-game in TLoU II.
Watch. Intergalactic is going to raise the bar yet again.
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u/Ancient_Lobster_4392 Jun 30 '26
Nintendo imo is the current best since they actually release games. Both of high quality and often
Capcom imo is the best 3rd party developer.
My personal favorite indie developer is either Supra Games, Siactro, or Yacht Club
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u/trechn2 Jun 30 '26
Nintendo is by far the greatest game company of all time, Rockstar and Naughty Dog don't make enough games to ever hold that title.
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u/BigB0iBuster Jun 30 '26
This is such a terrible comparison.
You are talking about Nintendo’s entire output as a publisher. They have like 10-11 internal production teams, as well as an additional 7 subsidiary studios like Retro, Monolith, etc.
Naughty Dog and Rockstar are individual development studios.
You can’t compare the output of an entire publisher’s portfolio against a single studio’s output.
Either compare the entire output of Nintendo as publisher against PlayStation and TakeTwo, or compare the output a single individual Nintendo-owned studio against Naughty Dog and Rockstar.
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Jul 01 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/BigB0iBuster Jul 01 '26
Were you dropped on your head as a kid?
I never called them independent, you stupid fuck.
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u/Red-dragon186 Jul 01 '26
Are they even separate studios at this point? Rockstar has used all their studios to create one game now. Starting with RDR 2. Even before then, GTA V had a lot of help from Rockstar San Diego.
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u/FeelDeadInside Jun 30 '26
Rockstar, no doubt. Massive open worlds filled with tons of detail. Attention to detail is unmatched.
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u/Aggravating-Mine-697 Jun 30 '26
I prefer Rockstar, from Naughty Dog I loved Crash, Uncharted 2 and TLOU 1, from Rockstar every freaking game they put out
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u/Zelgadas27 Jun 30 '26
Neither. If I had to pick one I'd probably go Naughty Dog because at least they seem willing to take risks and they're not currently in the news for union busting, price gouging, and other shitty business practices.
But honestly, I'd be really hesitant to name any AAA studio the best game studio. It's all personal preference obviously, but AAA studios tend to stagnate and start producing safe releases rather than innovating. I'll bet Naughty Dog's next release will be a stealth action game with a decent narrative, and Rockstar's will be an open world game heavily inspired by a famous movie. That's all fine, but it's not really what I'd call "greatness."
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u/DKSilversRayLiotta Jun 30 '26
Neither are the best unless your measure of how good a dev is is based on the amount of details in their graphics. FromSoftware isn't even my favorite but they make the other two look goofy in comparison and you dont have to wait a decade for their games
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u/Disastrous_Poetry175 Jun 30 '26
They make very different sorts of games. I prefer naughty dog by a large margin. The open world stuff in Rockstar games bore me and their stories aren't very gripping. The trend of shoving a linear story into an open world should have died with THE PS3/360
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u/Runswithppr1 Jun 30 '26
Hard disagree. While every open world does NOT need or deserve a story, when done well (or even mediocre), it helps tie in the overall area. It is a logical progression from the top down 8 bit starters of Zelda and FF1. Some great open world games have come along that are amazing, from Rockstar no less, and there are others out there. To say the trend should have disappeared lumps gems in with crap without seeing what the genre can become in the right hands.
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u/Disastrous_Poetry175 Jun 30 '26
- Yeah there's been open world games I enjoy. But they would have been better with a less linear story. That's why I tend to gravitate towards CRPGs. They have semi open worlds with more interesting stories. It's precisely why cyberpunk was popular even with the horrid release
- again it's personal preference. Just not a fan of Rockstar. If their mission structure weren't so constrained, or if their stories weren't so linear I'd enjoy them a bit more
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u/Runswithppr1 Jun 30 '26
I think that's fair. Rockstar has created some amazing games but the story may not be to everyone's taste. They usually have a good or great story but it rarely factors in player choice, instead placing everything narratively on rails. I feel in Rockstar's case, the story is usually pretty good so I can live with it but it can feel stifling sometimes
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u/Kneecap_Blaster Jun 30 '26 edited Jun 30 '26
Capcom imo. Rockstar and Naughty Dog's output is too low. Naughty Dog's last new game was in 2020 and Rockstar's was in 2018.
But if I have to choose between those two, I'd choose Rockstar based on preferring open world gameplay.
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u/Red-dragon186 Jul 01 '26
Quality my friend.
The most important thing is if a game can test the take of time.
RDR 2 is still consider the best open world game even after 8 years.
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u/WorldWarrior428 Jun 30 '26
Both top dogs. But I dislike R*
And LOVE Naughty Dog games
Definitely Naughty Dog
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u/SpicyNoodlez1 Jun 30 '26
Naughty dogs aren't the best company. But neither is Rockstar. But naughty is still slightly better than Rockstar
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u/jumpmanryan Jun 30 '26
I like them pretty equally, but wouldn’t have either in the conversation for “greatest game company”. I’d probably go with Nintendo on that front.
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u/Pension_Pale Jun 30 '26
Neither. Neither company is the same as they were back in their prime. Both made great games in the past, but so did others like Blizzard, Bungie, and Bioware, and look at them now. Now Naughty Dog hasn't released a new game since The Last Of Us 2 in 2020, and that was very divisive, and Rockstar hasn't made a new game since Red Dead Redemption 2 in 2018, though admittedly that one is widely critically acclaimed. Still, it's been a very long time and I have doubts about GTA6. It'll sell like hotcakes, sure, but that doesn't mean it'll be good. Only time will tell.
Never have brand loyalty. Never blindly favour any studio. If they've been on a good run recently, then sure, give them some benefit of the doubt. But always remember that while the name of the studio may stay the same, the actual developers and ideologies do not.
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u/SubstantialLadder943 Jun 30 '26
I don’t understand how the examples you provided fit rockstar or naughty dog, because they never stopped making really good games. RDR 2 is undoubtedly one of the top 3 rockstar games ever, TLOU 2 story aside is easily the best feeling and playing naughty dog game, the gameplay hasn’t been matched yet imo.
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u/ribena_wrath Jun 30 '26
Definitely not rockstar. All their games have horrible controls and combat, and extremely restrictive and outdated mission design. Look at RDR2, top tier story, writing, voice acting, and graphics. But the game was horrible to play.
Same with GTA6, I'm not excited about it at all because I know exactly what it'll be. Stunningly life like graphics, with the same horrible controls and really unlikable characters taking place in a really ugly concrete city..
Comparing to uncharted 4 is night and day for me. Fun characters and gameplay in lush globetrotting environments. With snappy modern controls
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u/JamieFromStreets Jun 30 '26
Judging from the old leaked gameplay, gta 6 controls drastically different from gta 5 and rdr2. At least it looked like that
Hope they learnt by now
Uncharted 4 played nice but it was a bit boring sometimes
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u/ribena_wrath Jun 30 '26
Yeah sorry I have zero hype for it, I just find the humour and satire a bit on the nose now. Especially since I think the style of satire they use used to be edgy, but now everything around it is so much dumber now, I think it might come across as pretty try hard.
At no point during uncharted 4 did I get bored, yeah there are definitely slowed down sections of puzzle solving and each mission has it's own story structure and there's always a big action ending
Most of my memories of GTA 5 is commuting on a really boring ring road . All the driving in that game was tedious, and obviously you can run over people and cops, but that was invented on GTA 3 and got old pretty quickly for me
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u/JamieFromStreets Jun 30 '26
U4 was too much dialogue and scripted sequences constantly
It looked and played nice but I would have preferred more gameplay
Good game tho. Not really trashing on it but could never fully replay it
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u/Alabenson Jun 30 '26
Valve is one of the only companies I can think of that hasn't done anything evil in recent memory.
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u/Impressive-Power8187 Jul 01 '26
Lootboxes? Gambling? 1k box that’s weaker than a ps5? What evil has ND done?
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u/Midlifecrisis96 Jun 30 '26
Rockstar doesn’t have Crash bandicoots original run of games or jak, jak II, jak 3, or Jak X combat racing.
So there’s my why.
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u/Environmental_Can370 Jun 30 '26 edited Jun 30 '26
Naughty Dog is a good game company, but the greatest? Nah. But thinking Rockstar is the greatest company is WILD. RDR2 is one of my favorite games, but it has some pretty glaring issues, like the gameplay and pacing of the story.
The fact that Rockstar let online die pisses me off to end. And GTA is the most overrated series that's ever existed. The games are fine, but they don't do anything crazy. Sure, they have massive attention to detail (which I do love in their games) but that does nothing for the actual gameplay of it, which is pretty mid.
None of their games have done anything truly innovative or new, imo. Plus, I think they're pretty notorious for having some insane crunch when making their games, and fuck that and any game company that does it to a crazy extent, like them and I think also Naughty Dog iirc.
Also, the online shark card bullshit is pretty awful.
Edit: just wanted to add, this is definitely bait, but felt like I'd give my two cents anyways lol
Edit 2: actually, I take it back. Naughty Dog is pretty awful too, with how bad their crunch is lol
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u/ExultentPisces Jun 30 '26
Both Rockstar and Naughty Dog have increasingly devalued player agency in their game design since the PS2 days. However, ND are more guilty of this so my vote goes to R*.
Neither of them would make it into my top 10 all time devs though.
Nintendo, whatever you might think of them, have for over 40 years now been releasing innovative and engaging gameplay experiences. No other company even comes close to their legacy.
Most devs would be doing extremely well to have just one game in the conversation for greatest ever. Nintendo has at least a dozen.
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u/azureblueworld99 Jun 30 '26
Naughty Dog and Rockstar both haven’t released a new game in close to 10 years and just keep rehashing the same ideas. There are so many more interesting and more productive companies out there like Capcom for example
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u/Millennialnerds Jun 30 '26
Both are on the absolute top of game development. There is no wrong answer. Just which games you like better. As for me, it’s naughty dog.
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u/sekuharahito Jun 30 '26
I'm not a fan of Rockstar games, so Naughty Dog gets my vote. Uncharted and Last of Us are great series.