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Games We've Never Seen Before

Posted by Zonk on from the go-for-the-gusto dept.

anaesthetica writes "The Christian Science Monitor is carrying a story on new directions in game design. The article notes that big gaming companies are not pushing innovation beyond taking advantage of newer hardware. New areas of innovation are coming from education, training, and online communities." From the article: "Online games have the potential to transform entertainment into a global-community exercise, breaking down borders, cultural and language barriers, and even political prejudices...I doubt any other form of entertainment holds out that promise...We have only scratched the surface of what [interactive entertainment] can be."

8 of 404 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Make Something New by ThePuD · · Score: 3, Informative

    errr, doom used bsp trees for its level format.

  2. The Christian Science Monitor is NOT Christian by meatflower · · Score: 5, Informative

    from Wikipedia.org:
    The Christian Science Monitor is an international newspaper published daily, Monday through Friday. Started in 1908 by Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of the Church of Christ, Scientist, the paper does not use wire services and instead relies largely on its own reporters in bureaus in eleven countries around the world. Reporters at one time were drawn largely from church members but this no longer holds true.
    Despite its name, the Monitor was not established to be a religious-themed paper, nor does it directly promote the doctrine of its patron church. However, at its founder Eddy's request, a daily religious article has appeared in every issue of the Monitor. Eddy also required the inclusion of "Christian Science" in the paper's name, over initial opposition by some of her advisors who thought the religious reference might repel a secular audience.

    1. Re:The Christian Science Monitor is NOT Christian by damsa · · Score: 3, Informative

      On the other hand, the Washington Times is owned by the Moonies.

  3. Re:Christian Science Monitor? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    Surprisingly, despite being founded by one of the most retarded sects of Christianity, the Christian Science Monitor is actually a reliable news source.

  4. Descent by rufusdufus · · Score: 3, Informative

    Quake was not the first true 3D game. Descent was fully 3d 2 years before Quake.

    1. Re:Descent by lnjasdpppun · · Score: 5, Informative

      Descent was an awesome game and it highlights a problem I see with the game industry, or maybe the game audience.

      Because it was *full* 3D in that you could move in any direction no restrictions at all, people had trouble learning to play it. I could easily beat semi-new players 50-0 if I cared to because they couldn't move properly in a 3D space (and my mentor could easily beat me 50-10 if he wanted). I have a demo of me flying rings around someone killing them with flares... Because it was hard to learn how to play people didn't spend time on it and it wasn't as sucessful as other games such as Doom/Quake.

      I see this problem in other games too, like Natural Selection, it's a great game but it's very complicated and people don't spend the time learning how to play it. Complicated games will never become as popular as the flavour of the month straight FPS.

      Counter-Strike is the most popular game on the internet because it's easy to figure out what to do and it has a low "skill-multiplier" ie its fucked up hitboxes (and spray weapons) add a large amount of randomnes to the game which replaces part of the skill required with pure random luck. Quake3 is pretty easy to figure out, but it has a high skill-multiplier so the newbies hardly get kills. Since they can't get kills they leave and play something like CS because not getting kills isn't much fun.

  5. Re:Make Something New by compass46 · · Score: 5, Informative

    As someone who actually reads the newspaper regularly, no I wouldn't expect such a simplistic idea from them...

    The Christian Science Monitor tends to be one of the more liberal newspapers in the US. I wouldn't classify them ideologically with papers like the Washington Times. The CSM is also not about spreading the the Christian Science church's doctrine. It was started by Mary Baker Eddy to provide fair and accurate reporting. This was a response to attacks on her from a Joseph Pulitzer newspaper.

    For a more indepth explnation:
    http://www.csmonitor.com/aboutus/about_the_monitor .html

  6. Re:all i want to know by apoc.famine · · Score: 3, Informative

    One word: KOL. Free.

    http://www3.kingdomofloathing.com/login.php

    Think NetHack with stick figures and a lot more humor merged with something like Zork. It's amazing, once you get the hang of it. Try it for 2 days. You'll be hooked forever.

    --
    Velociraptor = Distiraptor / Timeraptor