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Carmack on New id Game, Game Theory
An anonymous reader writes "CNN/Money interviewed id Software wizard John Carmack at the recently completed QuakeCon. Among the topics discussed is Nintendo's recent announcement that today's games are too complicated and hard for players. Carmack, surprisingly, agrees, saying 'I agree strongly with that point of view, but I'm in the minority in the PC space. I want a game you can sit down with, pick up and play. [Role playing games], for example, got to where they had to have a book ship with the game.'"
Pc games are better for things like complex role playing games, internet cames, and even action because the keyboard and mouse is alot more flexible then a controller pad. I can move staffe left and right quicker and create my own macro's. Try staffing left, firing a weapon, and then change to the next weapon on a controll pad at the same time? You can do it but it will take longer and your aim will not be as good when doing it.
Quake3 is pretty easy but it would suck on any other platform. For example even if it was an xbox lan enabled release, I could not download mods or new maps. Are there any and I mean any internet games for consoles?
I am sick of the arguement that pc's are for work only and a console is for real games. I consider the pc a rolls royce of gaming and I am fustrated that most game developers now only concentrate on consoles. This is why dukeNukem continues on the ps/2 and why it was killed on the pc. I think executives who only look at installed units per platform and tell the developers to use only x instead of seeing that a particular game is more suited for the pc platform.
http://saveie6.com/
I am in. Sometimes I just need to load up a quick game where I can blast anything that moves; and other times I want a game with a bit more depth. I think the industry defenitely has both genres right now...so I fail to see what he is really griping about.
The most popular computer game is, of course, Solitaire. It grates me to no end that so many games have come & gone, but people keep going back to Solitaire. It's a simple game.
I have given up on many games -- maybe because something didn't get me involved, but a good part of the reason was the game was too complicated. I didn't want to think that much, and left it for later. (still waiting, btw)
I agree it just needs a good learning curve. Or just an optional training program. Half life's was especially well done. Special extra's should be introduced after basics are mastered though.
Karma: -2^0.5 . Mainly due to the imbibing of dihydrogen monoxide
You might say "But that's the whole point with a city simulation; chaos. Maybe. But once you realize that no one player could possibly micromanage so many details it gets frustrating and boring. Simcity 4 should be played by a computer. I remember being a kid and picking up Simcity for the SNES and I got right into it. It was easy but that didn't mean it wasn't interesting.
Shite. Look at any game on the NES. When you were a kid you threw the manual and the box away. You didn't need a manual to figure out how to play Excitebike or Balloon Fight. Now I have to keep a library of game manuals and a separate library of strategy manuals just to play a game like Civilization III.
The only genre that hasn't been affected by this is the FPS. Once you've learned WASD you're all set. I love that feeling of loading a brand new game and just knowing how to play it. The last time I felt that way I was playing Medal of Honor.
Then of course there's the in game tutorial which has become standard. Except for the tutorial in Black and White (which doubled as an introduction) which was really well done I get so bored listening to and reading the instructions. I just want to play.
It's still not so bad on the consoles. I have a Cube and I love it. Games like Pikmin and Animal Cracker have short little manuals on the interface; the rest of the game is up to you. Miyamoto is a genius like that. One or two buttons and that's all you need to know to interface with the game. F-Zero is out Tuesday. Will I have to read the manual? No. I'll even bet I know what the manual will say: A: Accelerator. B: Boost. L/R: Hard Steer. Simple. Will I be hooked on it for months? Yes.
Support the First Amendment. Read at -1
Are you sure? Perhaps you want something more complicated than a pure shoot-em-up, but I'd wager there's a large number of gamers that do want something simple to get into, which is the whole point of the article.
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
but i always liked games where you were actually led through the game. obviously, there are games that offer virtually unlimited complexity like chess and go, but computer games are quite different. obviously, it is harder to guide a player instead of just creating a bunch of levels he has to get through (which isn't easy either), and arguing about controls is not the right way to go, here.
although a lot of games *do* include tuturials and training missions, etc, it can be difficult to pick up a game because of it. arguably, what a game needs is that each mission/level require a limited subset of skills, and as the game progresses, combine those learned skills, instead of just throwing more monsters at you.
probably my favorite computer game of all time was freespace 2. sure, i like simulations better than FPS and many other genres, but at the same time, it really gave you the feeling of being a part of a "war", mission by mission. the only thing it lacked was cooperative campaigns.
anywho, a lot of modern games lack fantasy: innovation in game play. RPGs have lots of spells, FPSs get you to shoot lots of people, etc. if someone has been playing FPSs or RPGs for a long time, they can get into a new game of the same genre easily. however, when i see a new FPS, i think of it as just that: a new FPS. i want something original!
look at it another way: you are marketting to tech geeks a lot of the time. tech geeks like to build things (like carmack and his rockets) why not translate this kind of interest into a game? mindrover was great for this reason. you actually had to think a little to be good at this new type of game.
BSD is for people who love UNIX. Linux is for those who hate Microsoft.
Carmack has traditionally taken the stance of environment and fast-paced action over character development and gameplay. This is nothing new.
id has long followed the idea that a game should be build around the technology and not the other way around which is simply not the way to create a game, it's the way you create a technology demo or benchmarking software. At one point in time games had plots, scripts, characters, and progression laid out before the engine was written (or incorporated in the case of licensed code). At that point in time it was simply unrealistic to try and write a game completely for the "wow" factor because graphics technology was simply to primitive to impress anyone enough in that regard to buy the game.
After years of reading Slashdot, I am always surprised that such a high-tech community seems to have such low end graphics accelerators.
Too busy staying alive... ~ R.A.
I totally agree with John in some of what he says. Games these days are too complex at times. The average MMORPG takes a few weeks, at the least, to really get the hang of. Some RPGs are even rather complex in terms of play mechanics, character advancement, UI manipulation, etc. However, while games may have a steep learning curve, they REALLY are lacking in the depth and difficulty of the games of yester-year.
I remember playing a game called Star Tropics back on my NES when I was 5-6. That game made me absolutely stretch the limits of my fresh-out-of-the-oven mind. Some of the puzzles in the game were so difficult that, at times, the game became a family affair, with both of my parents trying to help me figure out the puzzles necessary to advance in the game. Speed ahead a couple years to Land Stalker on the Genesis. A game in a very similar vein to the previously mentioned Star Tropics. Only 3 buttons were required to play, the menus were, at most, 1 level deep, and the gameplay was fueled by a sword, a jump button, and a special item. There were some puzzles in that game that, literally, took me WEEKS to figure out.
These games weren't difficult in the "cheap" sense that a lot of today's games are. Land Stalker and Star Tropics both presented the answer to a puzzle, but it really took some brainpower. Recent RPGs (final fantasy, Baldur's Gate, NWN, etc.) just don't give that complexity. THey give you hard enemies that take a high level to beat. Whoop-dee-fucking-doo. I don't want to spend hours leveling up in mind-numbingly simple battles! I WANT TO USE MY BRAIN!
Every now and then (maybe twice a year, if we're lucky), a game is released that really dwells in the roots of gaming. My recent favorite games that are hard in the sense that they require brainpower are Big Huge Games' Rise of Nations (which is complex in that it has a HELL of a lot of stuff to do) and the recently released Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (Bioware), both of which greatly surprised me with their depth and challenge. KOTOR really surprised me, in that it was an RPG... And it was based on the D&D ruleset... But the game was totally open-ended (left things up to the player), had some tough little puzzles, was action-packed while still staying true to RPG roots, didn't take weeks to get over the learning curve (it didn't even take a day, just a mere hour or two until you really knew what was going on) and didn't try to take up 100+ hours of the player's life.
Games designers really need to quit trying to make "sure bets", and try to innovate genres (like KOTOR and Rise of Nations)! I've had my fill of games like Unreal 2k3, Tomb Raider, Final Fantasy, and other cookie-cutter games. Let's see some INNOVATION AND CHALLENGE! Challenge and depth can, very easily in fact, be presented in a simple and easy-to-pick up manner. If an 8-bit NES game, that had a two-button controller, can make a game that stretches the minds of its players, then why can't a PC or an XBox game?!
Trent Polack
www.polycat.net
There are several games that allow you play online. The PS2 with the network addon, and the XBox all have sports games (Madden, et.al) and FPS games (SOCOM) that allow multiplay online. You can even replace the control pad with a keyboard and mouse. The graphics resolution on the PC is still better than the on the TV
Like pi? Try 10,000 digits.
I really miss the days of side scrolling games such as Super Mario Bros, Sonic, EWJ, etc. That's the main reason why I bought a Gameboy Advance, because it's the only real source of those games left.
I like playing games, but I do have a life. I can't spend too much time getting into it. Just point, shoot, kill. Let me find new stuff to kill for 15-20 hours and I will feel I've had my money's worth.
Then I go online and play the same game I just learned against others and it doesn't matter that it doens't stay new. If it is a good game, live people as opponents will keep it interesting.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
The parent is an example of the cynical self-aware post, in which nihilistic criticism is preferred over subjective reasoning. In such a mindset, there are no ideals or beliefs, because all is exposed as a neverending pattern.
"Sufferin' succotash."
Any good game designer knows however that anytime that you have the player flip over to the in-game reference, it jolts you back to reality. Having a printed manual let's you study away from the game (like in the bathroom, the best place for study) and nothing beats paper for quick reference.
I mean, is Carmack going to start bashing tech-trees in strategy games next? Hey, he's good at making game engines, but I'm taking the word (and work) of masters like Brian Reynolds, Sid Meier and Bruce Shelley. Never mind that Warcraft and Starcraft use them as well. There's something to be said for simplicity, but there is something else called depth in game design, something that has been lacking in id Software releases of late. (Sorry guys! We're still on for lunch right?)
One last thing that I didn't cover but mentioned above. It's just cool to have the books. I shelled out the extra money to get the Ultima IX Dragon edition. Yes, I wanted to smell the cheap fake plastic leather covers of the spell books. I remember pouring over the details of all my 2nd Edition AD&D manuals. It added to the history of the game. There was a whole world to conquer and these books showed the way. The wealth of the material made me realize that the world was my burrito. So what if some games have a lot of controls. Does it prohibit the average gamer from playing an RPG? Not really because he/she is more apt to not play because it isn't their type of game. It does add to the experience though. It's okay to innovate, but not at the expense of gameplay.
Note: Major props for usage of tiltowait. Werdna forever.
If you're after arcade shooters, there are some good ones in shareware-land. Some are even worth the $5-10 contribution asked for, and have received mine.
There are also the occasional simplified arcade-style shooters like MDK2 or Tsunami 2265 that come out. Unfortunately, they get roasted royally in the reviews for their simplistic play style, plummet down the sales charts, and are lucky to break even on the development costs. (OTOH, some like Tsunami 2265 deserve a good roasting for stupid things like not allowing mouse inversion. Idiots!)
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
The fact that people tend to stay in a certain gaming ghetto is probably the main problem. FPS people end up reinventing RPGs, RPG people end up reinventing TBSes, and TBS people end up reinventing FPS.
That's probably not the best way to crosspolinate ideas between the genres.;)
Is this a sigs-optional kind of place? 'Cause I am totally down with that if you know what I mean.
Many Return to Castle Wolfenstein players have been trying to turn on many people to RTCW but no one wants to seem to learn.
They see the 40 second respawn time and want to quit immeditaly. They just can't learn *NOT* to hit the space bar and instantly go into limbo. They don't realize there is a good chance of a medic picking them up. You need to learn the in's and out's.
Wolfenstein:ET is like the beginner class to RTCW. ET is starting to show its problems, experinced RTCW players saw its problems from the start and now they are starting to come out for clan play. Its only a matter of time before it leaks to average public games.
I play with many many gamers here in Grand Rapids, that would do nothing but deathmatch all day. I try explaining to them deathmatch is like masturbation without orgasm. You do a whole lot to get to an end, and at the end its dissapointing. Whoopdie freaking do.
With objective based games, you could be pounding away at a defense for 28 minutes to finally get a dynamite planted, only to have an enemy attempt to diffuse it, them get blown away by a rocket, and his friend comes over to diffuse it sucessfully with less then a hundreth of a second till detonation. It is so much more exciting then just pointing and clicking. Don't get me wrong, there is plenty of pointing and clicking, but it is far more important to know WHEN AND WHY to point and click.
With an objective based game, you have to actually think and stratagize as a team. In Counter Strike, a "tactical" shooter, stratagy is as complex as: "everyone follow me". That doesn't work in RTCW. You need to juggle classes, positions, ammo, airstrikes, etc...
Best part of playing ET for me is that since the game is so complex I know it all and people who don't know it all call me a cheater :)
Something I wish FPS games would do more of is allow you to start playing the game at the hardest level. Often, they expect you to beat the game at 'easy' before letting you play it through (again) at 'medium' and then 'hard', where there are more goals, more monsters, etc. But I usually don't like to play the game again--once I've played the basic idea of every level, I don't want to go back again (in single-player mode) and beat them again.
I would much rather play the game at 'medium' or 'hard' to begin with, so that beating the levels the FIRST time takes a lot of work. That way, the game lasts a lot longer. Quake2 was the last FPS game which I played where I could do this (though admittedly recently I haven't played many).
Typical for Carmack to agree; it's not as if depth of experience is something in which id has ever excelled. Just point and shoot, people.
System Shock 2, Thief, Deus Ex-- these are the games that are consistently lauded as the masterpieces of the genre, and are as consistently re-played as id's mindless mousekillers. Yes, they were complex. Heretic? Please-- when did you last launch that dog?
And yes, I do *still* play System Shock 2 and Thief.
Game complexity, when done right, enriches and intensifies the experience without making you feel guilty for playing. id never really figured that out, even when handed to them (witness their internal schism over Doom 3 -vs- their first complex RPG). They'd rather someone else do it with their tools. id isn't gunning for the literate gamer. They're looking for the quick buck: they're the Spielberg of game design.
Whatever makes you money, John.
If you're needing a gaming fix with scalable difficulty levels from the get-go, allow me to suggest Unreal Tournament 2003. If you crank the difficulty to the point where the very first match is close, you can expect pretty routine butt-whooping throughout the first couple of times in a level, and a big sigh of relief when you do win.
:) Of course, online is a totally different story. The folks still playing UT2003 tend to be pretty amazing, and what some of them lack in "twitch factor" compared to bots at Godlike skill, they make up for in cunning and good timing.
I can play it through on Masterful, losing the first few (well, OK, in the case of the final deathmatch, the first 20 or so) matches before finally winning one and moving up the ladder. I've tried turning it up to Inhuman difficulty, but after the first three matches it's down to sheer good luck if I win or not, so at least I know where I rate on the "can't-beat-the-bot" scale
There are plenty of modern games with scalable difficulty levels -- you just have to find them, and be willing to crank up the challenge from the start. A kid over whom we had guardianship for a while insisted on playing through UT2003 in "Easy" mode so that he could win every time. Well, duh, within about an hour of play he complained how "boring" the game was and never played it again. Yet I can revisit it every few months and have a ton of fun for quite a while...
Matthew P. Barnson
I learn what I think when I read what I write
Enter the Matrix has fixed save points, and they aren't particularly well chosen. Too often you have to walk through meaninglessly easy -- but time-consuming -- parts of the game to get to the more challenging stuff. Then, if you fail at the challenging stuff, you die and have to walk through the boring stuff again. I personally believe that games should allow you to save whenever you want.
A racing game called "HSX: Hypersonic Extreme". It is a so-so racing game but comes with (what looks like) a nifty Track Editor so that you can build your own physics-defying tracks. Unfortunately all of the cool track features begin "locked" and must be unlocked by playing the standard tracks and coming in third or higher. I think the game designers erred tremendously, as the editor is not linearly connected to your prowess on the standard tracks and should not have been tied to it. It's just a case of the designers insisting I pay homage to their creativity, rather than allowing me free rein to explore my own.
Anyway, that's my two millisovereigns and I'm sticking by 'em.
The Mongrel Dogs Who Teach
Neither Japanese (Final Fantasy) nor Western (Baldur's Gate) RPGs are true RPGs. In a true RPG, you could generate a character, write your own background, description, etc, and the plot of the game would integrate and work with the character. Unfortunately, we don't have any AIs capable of doing this.
Japanese and Western RPGs have taken different routes, and neither is inherently better or worse. In Icewind Dale, I loved writing really long, descriptive histories for the characters. The thing that annoyed me was that, in the end, these histories meant bugger all throughout the game. Even if I made my character a morose, introspective type, the game would still popup conversation options totally counter to the characters personality. Even though my little fighter was raised by orcs from childhood, he is still forced to react to an encounter with orcs the same way any other character would.
In the opposite way, Japanese-style RPGs weave the character's background into the story very tightly. Because they do this, they limit the gamers choice. It means in Final Fantasy VI, I can't make the protagonist a 6-foot, muscled black guy. I'm stuck with Terra. On the other hand, it means that at all times, Terra acts like Terra, reacts in ways Terra would, and is generally consistent with her own character.
Personally, I prefer the tightly woven character-plots of the Final Fantasy series. But all of these type of games offer this trade off. Consider Baldur's Gate; All your NPCs were pre-generated, your own character had much of his background specified, and, as a result, the story of the Baldur's Gate series can be more tightly woven around the protagonist.
Until someone in AI solves the natural language problem, we're going to be stuck with this tradeoff.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
"Story in a game, is like a story in a porn movie; it's expected to be there, but it's not that important."
yes, from <Masters of DOOM>
To me, even Quake series is too complicated.
the weapon system is OK, that's where the fun is
but why armor? why can't just increase the health limit to 300, or 400.
and I hate items which can be hold and used later. I always forgot that I have such things...
Hmm, I believe that the population has dumbed down in a sense. Actually a more accurate descriptor I think might be that the population is moving away from the traditional inturpretation of an educated person.
For example, hundreds of years ago a person's demeanor and attitudes would constitute their intelligence. This is why artisians such as playwrites were often considered buffoons. However modern society seems to place more importance on a person's actual abilities (which is why my colleagues consider me very intelligent because of my programming skills even though I find amusement in blowing bugs of the walls of my house with firecrackers).
I think all that gamers of today are lacking is patience. I happen to like a game that I can pick up and master in 15 minutes then play to my heart's content, while others might rather read that book that came with their RPG...
I'm probably going to get flamed for this, but I think that game designers lost the plot years ago. Somewhere in the chase for ever better graphics, they forgot that gameplay, and story are the true keys to entertainment. Instead of developing novel game concepts, degsigners are now chasing reality, with blood curdling graphics, and horific images. If people want to be entertained by stuff like that, they will usually watch the nightly news, or the latest blockbuster release from Hollywood.
I only need to look at my own children as a way of highlighting this point. My eldest is child is 14, and the youngest is 8. The kids have a PlayStation, and their own PC's, which they play games on occasionally. I have built a MAME cabinet, which has a good cross section of games in it. The kids actually enjoy playing the older MAME games, more than the newer PS games, and are forever asking me to pull out my old Atari 2600. The key to the older games was that they focused more on game-play than whizz-bang realisim. In a way the chunky graphics are more realistic though, because they exist where the sun doesn't shine, the colours are always bright, and the perspective is perfect; inside your head.
Another trend I have noticed over the years, is that the machine ends up playing more than you do. I have often watch people playing what I call the newer style games, as on the Playstation, and X-Box. If you watch them, the character always seems to do more than the input from the player would seem to warrant. With many games, it seems that once you set a sequence in motion, the game takes over and completes the move, or sequence. There is nothing entertaining about that. In a similar way, a lot of games seem to be over sensitive in the area of user-input, and take ages to get a feel for the controls. This becomes very frustrating, very quickly.
Hmmm...
Everything is relative I guess.
He claims space flight to be simple plumbing,
whereas doom with a crouch key is too difficult?
Bram Stolk http://stolk.org/tlctc/
Let me guess... you were educated 25+ years ago? Seriously though, if you are going to make that kind of statement, at least back it up with some facts. If people educated 25 years ago are smarter or better educated, then why? Is it in comparison to those who are educated now, or in the relative quality of education between the U.S. (which I assume you are speaking of) and other countries? If what you say is true, then why hasn't technological inovation slowed down?
Since when did RPGs not have manuals?
I mean, any good RPG has at least a little system to drive it. Text Adventure games are quite complex, you can't guess how to play one of them but you can guess how to play point-n-click rpgs.
The best games have a small set of simple rules from which complex behavior emerges. I think the most classic example of this is Boulder Dash which in it's original form features only a handful different blocks yet the variation between the levels was astounding. I've always thought that the best way to create a game is to start with the basic laws of physics which may or may not be modelled after our universe, then add a few different entities with some clearly defined rules of behavior including the interaction with other entities.
The beauty of this is that the game becomes predictable of the player. He/she will not be frustrated by seemingly arbitrary rules, like in the old Sierra On-Line adventure games where standing on the wrong pixel would get you killed, but instead will understand the action and reaction that lead to the players demise and will learn to avoid it. You want the gamer to go "aah, of course!" instead of "what the fsck?!".
Also, since the game's complexity springs forth from the interactions between the rules rather than the rules themselves, you get what's called "emergent gaming", where the game mechanics appear between the lines through the complex interactions of those rules. This means that although the rules are simple and predictable, you have created a breeding ground for complex behavior goes beyond what the game designer himself may have envisioned.
It's a sad fact that games were more like this before the 3D-card revolution.
I understand why the industry want simpler games as they are trying to expand their customer base which today consist of mostly hard core gamers. Especially on the PC. There are plenty of examples of mainstream hits, but a hardcore gamer will often spend 10 times or more on games than a "causal gamer".
Since games are usually created by gamers who invariably create games that they would like to play themselves I remain confident that there will still be games I'll want to play in 10 years from now.
Simple, instantly playable games is the domain of handheld devices. Complex games fit better on the PC-platform. Consoles are somewhere in the middle. This is linked not only to how we use handhelds/consoles/PCs differently, but also to the technical limitations of the device.
A witty
Keyboards were designed many many years ago as very low bandwidth devices. To save bandwith, many keys reuse the same codes, so that only one key signal can be sent to the computer at one time. The special keys (CTRL, ALT, SHIFT) are given special codes so they can be used in combination with the regular keys.
You can think of it as having 7 bits (allowing 128 keys) plus 3 bits for the special keys. So each time a key is pressed or released, a 10 bit signal is sent to the computer. The computer remembers the last signal, and assumes that if no signal is received, then the keys from the last signal are being held down.
This was important to game writers, because some combinations would not work. If "P" is "move left", and "O" is "shoot", then moving left and shooting would not be possible.
1. Hold "O". Computer sees that "O" was pressed.
2. Hit "P". Computer sees "P" was pressed. It assumes that the "O" must be released.
The special keys did not have this "feature", so they were used for actions, such as shooting, that might be done simultaneously with another action. Moving "shoot" to "CTRL":
1. Hold "O". Computer sees that "O" was pressed.
2. Hit "CTRL". Computer sees "CTRL+O" was pressed.
Keyboard technology may have advanced since the 80s, so these issues may have been solved.
I spend my life entertaining my brain.
This is all about controls. A good, fun racing game has an acceleration button, a brake button, and left-right steering (ex: Rad Racer from the NES). Maybe one button to shoot something if guns are involved. But nowadays companies compete not by the quality of the games, but by having more active buttons in the game than the competition. It's quite stupid and it really ruins the games. Ever notice that each new generation video game system's controller has about 2-4 more buttons on it than the last generation system? Is it because technology allows for more buttons to be crammed on the joypad? No. A racing game that has one button for shift-up, one button for shift-down, one button for windshield wipers, one button for emergency brake, one button for regular brake, one button to change the brake pads, one button... well you get the idea, it's not fun. It ruins the fun. The inner workings of a video game should be complex (40,000,000 polygons per second) but the controls should be as simple as possible. Just because the controller has 12 buttons on it doesn't mean all of them have to be used for the game to be "realistic" or "have good play control" (quite the opposite). Games on the PC are even worse than console games... stuff like Wing Commander, Mech Warrior, all use practically every button on the qwerty keyboard to do something different during gameplay, and each sequel uses even more buttons. Sorry but I agree with nintendo, when I have to memorize an entire keyboard layout, the programmers have done a shitty job at making this game. It's not that i'm not smart enough to memorize what 40+ buttons do. I don't have the time and I don't care. up down left right a, b. That's all I feel like learning to play a fucking video game. No game should need more than 6 buttons, EVER (and Street Fighter 2 is the ONLY one).
Stupid people make stupid things profitable.
"Jokes aside, I like complex games because they make you think." I like challenging games too. But when game interfaces themselves become major obstacles with which the player has to contend, I think that's just sloppy, and it takes something away from feeling fully immersed in the game. And that's what I think Nintendo and Carmack are
talking about.
All I know is, when I saw those Japanese PS2 gamepads with integrated mini-keyboards, I shrugged my shoulders and sighed, thinking about how gamers are expected to LOOK at them, since you can't touch type on the damn things. That's pretty sad, since FFXI (the game for which they were made) is just so pretty.
Do you understand "past tense?"
[Role playing games], for example, got to where they had to have a book ship with the game.
Where does he mention modern games there, at all? It is true that RPGs got to where they had to have a book ship with the game. Is that true anymore? I don't know, it's not relevant.
Now, you may have a point, but the quote you chose doesn't help prove it.
As it is immediate playabillity, or "hookability" (i.e. the ability of the game to get somebody to pick up a controller, play, and not toss it away in disgust immediately).
Now, in this aspect games have been getting both more complex and more simple. Instruction manuals have often been replaced by increasingly fancy "walkthrough" or "tutorial" modes. At one point we had training missions, now you have a training mission wherein it pretty much points out (and often even dictates audibly) what you are supposed to do.
In games like Starcraft, Warcraft, etc each level was was not only often a ramp-up of skill, but of what you could do. By not overwhelming the player with too many things at once, you allow them to advance along and learn things level-by-level.
This isn't quite the same for FPS games, although it could be. Start with basic pistol shooting, add later levels with neato weapons, items etc, until the player gets used to the controls and past the babysitting stage. In RPG's, it runs both ways: FFX as an examplew with its "Sphere Grid" being a bit complicated, but giving you a step-through example at first that can be onerous to the experienced gamer.
Really, back in the day you'd get kids who player "Street Fighter" and just knew how to jump, punch, and kick. Eventually they graduated to special moves, maybe combos. Quite often people would read the manual looking up moves. How many people do read the manual nowadays? Perhaps the whole idea of just playing a game out-of-the-box is because of a laziness that has perpetrated on the part of the player, or is it because gaming has been infiltrated by a different crowd than the geeks that used to dominate it?