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Twenty-five Years at the Heart of Gaming
Andrew Leonard writes "Salon has a loooong interview with Eugene Jarvis, the creator of legendary arcade video games Defender and Robotron, up today. Jarvis talks about why he is pro-emulators, anti-Grand Theft Auto, still focused on arcade games, and deeply worried about terrorism. It's a good read, even if you have to watch a ten second ad to get access."
Despite all the new games, I still have more fun playing Duke Nukem 3D and Commander Keen.. without having to quit because of motion sickness =)
Just because you disagree doesn't make it offtopic or flamebait.
That's 25 years of fixing leaky pipes. I sure as hell don't want to be around when Mario delivers the plumbing bill.
Its about time someone interviewed an important source about terrorism. Maybe now we can figure out what effect old-skool games had on the al-Qaida.
Codito, ergo sum.
...as it ever was.
So intense.
Even the best players could only stave off an inevitable death for a little while. Towards the end, finding a machine that didn't have the up/down lever worn out was almost impossible.
If only there was a decent MAME controller for it withh all the buttons and lever in the rigth place....
-------- In Soviet Russia, "Soviet Russia" sigs hate Slashdot.
I know plenty of people who play violent games and dont commit "crimes"... this means there is something else at work if it insprires people to kill people and steal cars. dont take away my freedoms because some kid has problems and cant handle the game... spend your energy to help the kids who grow up in poor homes and upbringings.
From the article:
DOS was boring and you had to kind of type and shit.
I can't wait until I have kids and they ask me, "Daddy, what was DOS like?"
This isn't meant to be a troll post, but hasn't every generation said this about the newest generation? I remember my parents being concerned at the violence in the video games I was playign in the early 80's.
My parents told me stories when their parents were concerned about the music that they were listening to.
I'm not a fan of GTA, nor any of the games that are similar. I'm not tring to defend GTA. I just think that we are too quick to say that it is because of the video games in our childrens lives that cause them to became so desensitized to the world.
Just my thoughts. Flame suit is on.
I remember the days when I was young, dumb(er) and had way too much time on my hands.
When I was bored I used to go to a local bar and kill 2-3 hours playing Pac-Man... on a single quarter.
It was great, because I could hustle beers from other patrons by betting whether I could get 100,000 or 200,000 (or whatever) points, all because I had the Holy Grail of Pac-mania: The Ninth-Key Pattern.
I guess I can understand why my wife won't let me get one of those oldie-but-goodie machines for our place.
But I still have some of those memories.
The problem with socialism is that they always run out of other people's money. - Margaret Thatcher
Nobody's ever done that before! How original! It's creativity like this that fuels the gaming industry.
REM Old programmers don't die. They just GOSUB without RETURN.
But it's NOT a young audience. The audience has grown up.
Links even a year or two old, I saw more recent demographics from neilson that had even more in the 18-25 category.
Anyhow, fact is, the big money is in that 18-25 year old male demographic. That's where the money is.
GTA has an M rating. Parents know what this means.
The old-school plots and family-friendly characters are still around in droves. Sonic, Mario, Spyro, Crash Bandicoot, Rayman, etc, etc..
But the simple fact is, that now there is a very large adult audience for video games. Those of us who grew up playing Adventure and Pitfall are still around, just older.
GTAs appeal was its immersive environment and sense of humor, btw, not simply over-the-top violence, titles of which are a dime a dozen.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Blasting invaders from space is one thing; a game that lets you steal a car and run over the owner or murder prostitutes is over the line.
This logic is kind of disappointing. The parent and the article take issue with violence in games; however, Pitfall Harry being eaten by an alligator in low resolution or the mass shootings taking place on the "show" 'Smash TV' somehow make it an acceptable form of violence?
Is not a killing or "murder" always violent and a death someone's "life" regardless of the quality level of the image?
I find it a tad hypocritical to suggest the violence in NARC was acceptable because your character was "justified"; while the violence in GTA is an affront to society because the lead character is a "villain".
Violence is violence regardless of the level or the one perpetrating the act. The real point is to remember that you are playing a game.
Does it stike anyone else what a hypocritical fuck this guy is? He's not against advocating massive, cruel forms of violence in his video games--he just wants a hollow, conservative, Reganesque (his words) justification for doing it, which apparently "Grand Theft Auto" doesn't neatly provide.
This is whitewashing morals to a disgusting degree--the games he's making aren't any less violent or graphic than Grand Theft Auto--it's just more ok if you say "you're defending your country!" at the beginning of the game before you start the slaughter. What bullshit.
Exactly. It's similar to that concept, where "NARC" was you're going after the drug dealers in a very Reagan-esque way. The motto was: "Say no, or die!" That was a lot of fun. Here, you're defending America. It's funny, the marketing guys were saying, "Well, you know, we can't put the White House in there. That's just not going to work." And I go: "You know what? Do you have a problem defending your country? Maybe you need a new country." It's almost like we don't realize how lucky we are and what an easy life we have here in America and all the great things we have. Yet, it seems like we're not even willing to defend our country.
He's kidding here, right? He's just joking? He's not actually saying "gosh, the best way to defend America in the 80's was to randomly shoot drug dealers?" I loved NARC. It was an amazing game. But how can he criticize GTA for violence and depravity? Even if you think drugs should be illegal, what you did to them in NARC wasn't exactly "due process."
I'm mis-reading this somehow, right?
Raw Thrills' first volley is the upcoming counterterrorism two-player shooter "Target: Terror." "Target: Terror" asks players to save the Golden Gate Bridge, defend the Los Alamos Laboratory, and, somewhat controversially, prevent a hijacked airliner from crashing into the White House.
I used to be an avid arcade fan. 'Bout six years ago in my high-school prime, I'd always frequent the arcade. Stopped going for a couple reasons:
1) Pay per play was the shits...that was right around the time where they were coming out with the bloody "snowboarding" and "surfing" games that involved you standing on a board and moving it with your feet. Only cost $1.50 a play, and for a beginner to get 15 seconds of play on it not knowing how to get to the first checkpoint fast enough was enough to say bye-bye to those games. So many of them became 15 seconds of failure for too much freakin' money.
2) Games were no longer inventive. I'm sorry, but you can only make too many Street Fighters (I believe Capcom's cranked out 24 to date in the US alone) before it's no longer has flare. Speaking of which...
3) No more flare. There's no game now where you just have people surrounding the thing just begging for a glimpse of the wizard at play, wanting a glimpse at the levels which no human has ever touched before. When I was a kid, my gosh, there'd be 20 people crowded around the TMNT arcade machine just wanting a glimpse of what happened after you defeated Shreddar. There's none of that flare now.
The last game I remember that I loved playing and really got into was Area 51. I could get five minutes minimum of play for 33 cents (3 plays for a buck at my local arcade). I mean, the type of play was simple...but I really felt the desire to get further and further into it...that's what so many games are missing. Everybody thinks its about the big-fat graphics. It's not. You can get graphics now on a home console. It's about gameplay. Why did so many people throw gobs of quarters into Smash T.V. (a game that to this day refuses to let me get past the fifth arena)...it's because there's that inner desire to push deeper into the game, because the gameplay starts you off simple and then just becomes more and more and more challenging, so the point where your nerves themselves actually pulse with the game.
That's why I think his ideas might work. You want a game to be successful, the players want and need to get into it, and I'm sure there's plenty of Americans who would love to defend their country against terrorist badasses, just like before when everybody wanted to defend the world against alien badasses!
There's a few things that send both of those games over the top. First of all they have some of the best sounds of any game. You can hear the "lander picks up a colonist" sound in like 100+ hip-hop songs these days.
Then there was the, literally, non-stop action of these games. When you are playing Robotron, the longest break in the action is approximately one second, and that's between levels. It's not even long enough to take a sip of your drink! Defender is pretty much the same but you might be able to sneak a quick chug in at the end of a wave if you don't mind spilling beer down the front of your shirt.
Where I play there's that "Big Buck Hunter" game right next to Robotron. That game not only costs twice as much, it's mostly waiting around and pretty scenery. I prefer the immersive experience of Robotron over the eye candy of those games any day. And Robotron has some pretty good eye candy, it's just the eye candy of 23 years ago.
For those of you that think Robotron is too hard, it's not. Sure, when it came out, I couldn't handle the two joysticks. But I went back to it and I've gotten pretty good. Defender had the same "controls are too hard" problem for lots of people.
You know what's really hot? Chicks who play Robotron. I've met one or two. But I've never seen a woman on Defender. Hmmm maybe it's time for an OSDN peronals ad:
Ok it's a but off topic, but still related. This reminded me of a site that has some old school games you can play on the web. Enjoy some classic '80s games.
-Valiss
If you lack the ability to monitor and care for your children in a manner that you see fit, then don't have kids.
... there are no excuses to not have kids anymore. If you don't want to quit your job to care for your own offspring, then don't! We've got daycare, live-in-nannies, gangs, and community programs. Now, parents need not sacrifice their freedoms and professional lives just to get bogged down with the boring, menial task of raising one's own children. Heck, with all the video games and TV channels we have available now, kids practically raise themselves!
<TONGUE-IN-CHEEK>
Nonsense! This is the 21st century, for crying out loud. We have government programs, daycare, surrogacy, artificial insemination, adoption, gene therapy, genetic counseling, selective fetal termination,
When I think back of how my family had to give up caviar and luxury cars and only live off one salary so my Mom could stay home and raise me, I'm filled with sadness. Think of all the fun times with shallow fellow corporate slaves that she missed out on to sit around and watch me grow up. If only we'd had MTV and Nintendo when I were young.
Parents today shouldn't have to trade in their Mercedes SUV and GSM cellphone and downsize from their 4-bedroom mansion and live off of one salary! BOTH parents can continue working as long as they want, and need only interact with their kids for a couple hours a day! I mean, after a long day at work, who has the energy to quiz a kid over the basic algebra they're studying for tomorrow's test? Can't someone else do it?
Can't someone else raise our kids? In this day and age - yes!
<TONGUE-IN-CHEEK>
Like woodworking? Build your own picture frames.
Exactly, the problem isn't video games. Its parents who dont belive they should have to have any form of interaction with their kids. I grew up with D&D, quake, duke nukem, and tons of war games. I am fine. My parents made a point of explaining the difference between fantasy and reality. Fantasy was me ninja kicking down the small tree outside. Reality was me doing hard labor in the yard for 6 straight weekends to pay for that tree.
No, Keen is NOT abandonware. If you download the full version, you are participating in illegal warez, and this is one of my hugest pet-peeves with the gaming industry.
Does anyone actually pay $20 freaking dollars for Commander Keen these days? There are so many good games out there that stupidly can't be distributed as abandonware because of paranoid companies. They're not making money on these old games any more, so why the fuss?!
I just don't understand why more companies can't realize that by demanding hard cash for >15-year-old games, they're only shunning the people who love them the most. That, and they'll probably go elsewhere & find a warez copy for free.
Oh we got trouble, right here in River City. They'll be listening to ragtime, talkin' about horse race gamblin'. Not a wholesome old trottin' race, no! But a race where they sit right down on the horse! Like to see some stuck up jockey boy sittin' on Dan Patch, make your blood boil.
Mass hysteria!
Yeah, we've been here and done this before. Strauss's waltzes, now virtually the epitome of staid music for old people, was once considered the ultimate in youthful depravity. The violin and the pennywhistle were banned by the church at one time as being depraved instruments because women were unable to resist their allure and might be prone to wiggle to their tunes.
On the other hand beating up a temple whore would have been considered a holy act in the right time and place. Thou shalt not suffer the witch to live.
Depravity depends a good deal on the mind viewing the act. In the words of Tom Lehrer, "When correctly viewed, everything is lewd."
Worrying about virtual depravity is silly. If anything it acts, on the whole, as an outlet and thus prevents more meatspace depravity then it could ever cause.
But you can't point to events that didn't happen so the one nutcase who does something becomes a big deal.
KFG
Yes, yes, and yes.
No matter what Jon Katz and Michael Moore would like you to believe, your chance of getting brutally killed in or around an American school is far lower today than any of those three periods you just mentioned.
If nothing else, it's a radically safer time to be a minority in America now compared to back when lynchings were commonplace.
Seeing violence every day in the games they play can't possibly be good, can it? Seeing women objectified without realizing the consquences and effects it has on the women can't be good, can it?
Good point. Those dime novels of the 1910s, B movies of the 1940s, and exploitation movies of the 1970s were... oh, you were talking about entertainment of today? Yes, shocking. Very shocking. Almost, but not quite, as violent and sexest as entertainment from previous generations.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
"Dude, people are the same. Always."
That is actually a falacy. The people that lived a hundred years ago would not understand a lot of the issues we are faced with simply becuase they were not issues. It was a matter of common sense. The classic examples are sexuality and violence. If you asked Horace (around 10 BC or so) or Ovid (around the same), they would not have understood the differences in sexuality that we now classify as being different. The same with violence. The average ancient greek did things on a daily basis taht would shock and horrify even the most hardened inner city gang member today. The ancients greeks had a festival were women had tgo throw a dead pig in a well and three days later climb down there and fish it back up. The ancients greeks when they went back to nature, really went back to nature. They would go out in the woods and literally rip apart small animals with their bare hands and eat them raw. In fact there is actually a greek word for the science of eating raw flesh and several manuscripts were supposedly written on the subject. The ancient greeks had a connection with nature and the animals we have long since lost. The same with people 100 years ago, they had conections and attitudes that we don't have. If we ahd grown up then we would have the same asttitudes but we wouldn't be like we are now - we wouldn't be us. So you are partly correct - if any person lived and grew in any era, they woudl grow to fit into that era. But if we were to take say an adult ancient greek out of the past and transport him here, no matter how much education or social interaction he had he would never ever fit in cause he is not the same as us.
As to the attitudes towards women, you are somewhat correct and somewhat wrong. men of the times often kept women out of politics, not becuase they thought women were inferior (though some if not many obviously did) but to a large extent becuase they wanted to protect women. Politics is a messy business and it wasn't something most men wanted women to dirty their hands with. It was one of the side effects of the victorian era - before it, women were as much a part of everyday siociety as men were. They worked at the home and in the fields, helped to support the family, etc. But as they were no longer needed becuase the husband could support the family alone, a lot of guys thought their wives should be above dirtying their hands with work. Women were thought to be above that. On the other hand, there was no reason to hold back women that did want to dirty their hands. If a woman wanted to vote, she should have been allowed to. Its the pedestal problem - once you put something on top of a pedestal it harms that things interaction with everything else. That was what happened with the victorian era - if women were above it then they were restricted from it as well. A similiar thing occured in France during the early middle ages with the Marovingians. They were set on such a high pedestal (of holiness this time) that they became useless to reality becuase they were so restricted in their interactions with it. In the end the price of freedom is that you have to get your hands dirty. Women eventually fought their way off the pedestal and are now a part of our culture in a real way again. Unfortunately some feminists are so sexist that they are trying to fight their way back up onto the pedestal.
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy