Live 12-Hour Oblivion Marathon

HarvardFrankenstein writes "Gamespot's Greg Kasavin will be playing The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion for 12 straight hours tonight (Monday, March 20th) and the entire marathon session will be broadcast live. Kasavin will be 'offering commentary about the experience as it transpires. Subscribers will see a picture-in-picture view of Kasavin as he spends an increasing number of successive hours playing the game, and they will be able to chat with each other over the course of the event.'" The event starts tonight at 6pm PST, if they get started on time.

Comments

What has the world come to?

[Sp00nMan]

It's a sad, sad world when people will pay to watch someone else play a game over the internet.. ...unless of course it involves porn :)

Re:What has the world come to?

[MortimerV]

No, it's more like watching a 12 hour D&D session. With one player and one DM. Not terribly exciting, unless you're the one playing.

Really?

[ArkonChakravanti]

12 WHOLE hours? Wow what a hardcore gamer...

But seriously, making this sound like an achievement is an achievement...

Hmm...

[Opportunist]

We've been watching sports for ages. It's only logical that the same happens with games.

Today it might seem strange. Watching someone play a game, I mean duuuuh? Can't do it yourself?

This might change. Let's go into the realm of sports, let's go to American Football. Sure, you can play it yourself. But will you ever catch a 80 yards pass? Will you ever kick a 50 yards field goal? Or baseball, will you ever throw a ball in curves like the pros? Or hit for a killer homerun?

Today's computer games don't really lend themselves well for "pro-gaming". They're too easy. Everyone can play them at a decent level. After all, that's what they're made for: For the general audience. They have to be playable for everyone, at a more or less decent level.

This might change, we might see the advent of "pro games". Games with a difficulty that scales up with the skill of the player, where the game doesn't "level off" at a certain point where more skill does not automatically mean better playing.

And a more interesting game. Watching a game can be more interesting when you actually get to see something you won't see at home, because the pro player can do stunts you won't ever be able to copy. Current games don't offer this kind of experience.

Re:Hmm...

[Opportunist]

Well, don't get me wrong but just because your friend ate you all at Descent doesn't mean that he's a one of a kind unique super pro player. I pretty much left my friends behind me at Grand Prix Legends on a regular base, with default settings and a full tank against tuned cars. No problem.

Then I went online. Then I saw that I really, really suck and can't even remotely hold a candle to some others.

But at some level, current games limit you. There is such a thing as a "perfect game" in today's games, where the outcome of a match between two players playing "perfect games" is a matter of (very rare) mistakes or (more often) sheer luck. This is actually more true in RTS games than shooters, but still, the game puts both players on equal grounds, when it comes to physics and their avatar's abilities.

Both run at equal speed, jump equally far, both guns shoot equally accurately, both avatars get exhausted equally quickly, or in RTS games, both builder units build equally fast and both units have equal HPs. The game is in balance. Simply because it has to be.

Sports are rarely in balance, if ever. One player has more stamina. Or more strength. Or he can run faster. Sports is not only a game of tactics and strategy, it's also a matter of your physical condition. That part has been eliminated in computer games.

If you can bring this element back into games, if you manage to put more emphasis on the player's abilities and shortcomings instead of artificial, equalizing advantages and limitations the game imposes, the game has the qualities of being played on a professional level.

If you have to invest considerable time to play an interesting game, especially a game that's interesting to watch because you simply cannot duplicate what the person playing does, the game has what it takes to be taken serious in professional gaming. Until then, if you can pretty much do everything a professional could do at home, nobody will seriously consider watching.

Re:Well, remember, this *is* Greg Kasavin.

[metrunecs]

I don't see how using a comfortable wireless controller that fits nicely in your hands while relaxing on the couch is less comfortable than hunched over a keyboard and mouse, less than 2 feet from the screen. Especially for 12 hours.

Re:erm..

[Babbster]

Wow, you and others are really bitter about this for some reason.

I don't think the point is that playing for 12 hours is an achievement of note. I think the interest comes from the fact that a game reviewer is playing a game and, essentially, demoing it for folks for 12 hours live on the Internet. I can see where people might find that interesting, especially if they're one of the people - the many people if online talk means anything - who are considering buying an Xbox 360 or new PC components specifically for this game. For those people, the cost of a month's subscription to the site in order to watch the proceedings (perhaps not all 12 hours) might be well worth the money. It could also provide some insight into the thinking of a professional game reviewer while he's actually playing a game.

Again, playing for 12 hours is no achievement at all. Like many, I've done 24+ hours stopping only to let caffeinated liquid out of my body. But that doesn't mean that this event isn't worthwhile or interesting.

Stupid idea

[Sathias]

I want to discover the first 12 hours of the game myself, not let some game media bozo do it for me.