Re:You do realize the other hobbies are the same?
on
How Do Games Grow Up?
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· Score: 1
It seems to me that keeping trying even if you fail, is a valuable RL lesson. Most cultures have some saying along the lines of "if at first you don't succeed, try and try again," so it must have been useful before computer games too.
Oh, absolutely and without a doubt that is a valuable lesson, however the other hobbies listed don't have a built-in form of encouragement to keep trying (e.g. glowing when you level up, finally equipping that new but ultimately only numerical piece of equipment). Those encouragements have to come with from within after building a skill incrementally and teach far more about resolve and patience than chasing after the next carrot held in front of you, in my opinion.
Also, there is some discipline to be learned from games too, especially in multiplayer ones. Whether it's a WoW raid in the endgame grind, or just playing Counter-Strike with your "clan" mates, there is a lot of point in acting disciplined, as team. And it can mean utter defeat if you act like an anarchistic yahoo.
I honestly had not even considered the team-building facets of multi-player games, but that is an excellent point.
Delayed rewards? Well, those two words would describe a MMO's endgame grind the best.
But even at lower levels, if you're say, the healer (but the same applies to any other role), for the next couple of hours you must do your role to the letter or the team will wipe out. No matter how much you'd like to blast a little instead, or compare dick sizes by killing another mob than the tank to see who does his faster, or whatever, you must stick to the plan and do your role. And you'll get your reward at the end of that couple of hours. Or not at all, if there were too many screw ups and the team split up in frustration.
Heck, for some people even the whole weeks or months of the levels 1 to 69 (used to be more like months before patch 2.4 in WoW) is essentially one big exercise in working for a delayed reward. They don't play the game for the road, but for the destination. They don't stop to appreciate those small immediate rewards along the game, they want that big final achievement already. I can't say I understand them, but they probably don't understand me either, and probably neither is right or wrong. But it _is_ an example of an exercise in working for weeks or months for the delayed final reward. And it probably takes some discipline to keep going.
There are lots of kinds of games out there, and not all can be painted with the same brush. Not all are single player games, for example. Not all teach discipline, and not all foster or require confidence in your skills, that much is clear. But some do.
The caveat I would add to that is that the grind in an RPG in fact does not build upon your skill grinding in an RPG, it is purely repetitive and driven by ephemeral rewards that are to be snatched away and replaced by another, more distant reward with only the time spent leading up to it lost as a result. I spent hours and hours when I was younger grinding in RPGs, and ultimately as I've gotten older I decided, it doesn't matter what's the next floor down in wizardry, or saving the next crystal in Final Fantasy, the grind is meaningless. The time spent perfecting technique in playing an instrument, however, builds upon what you knew before.
You can have something which is completely utilitarian, which is not a game. These programs exist: Iraqi culture simulations, reflex training programs, etc.
You can also have something which has a sense of whimsy and fun. This is a game, and some of them have the potential to make you think or to awe you with their beauty.
Hey, or you can not rudely condescend to everyone else and inflict your lack of imagination and vision on everyone else.
How about this: You can have something that tells an engaging and meaningful story in a branching, linear, or emergent interactive environment. You can have something that something that makes a satirical or philosophical statement through its mechanics. You can have a game that elegantly tells a science-fiction story, simply and unpretentiously.
I don't know what the author is bitching about. He wants games without the fun, it would seem; games which take themselves as seriously as he does. Those just aren't games.
He thinks games are a medium on the level of television. This is wrong. The computer is the medium. Games are merely a flavor of program, much as game-shows are flavor of television. Do you expect your game-shows to "progress intellectually" as you age?
So games are a genre (I think that would be incorrect? Are you saying the medium is inherently inflexible and vapid? Or are you saying that fun precludes maturity? Just what are you saying? Why are you so rabidly attacking a search beyond the status quo?
Fucking games journalists. Enough pretentious, bullshit opinion pieces. Get back to your fucking jobs.
And what thought out rhetoric! Truly you've won me over with your emphasis and shocking command of ideas. You know, like telling games journalists to get back to their jobs and... criticize and evaluate games? Perhaps you meant to imply that the jobs of games journalists are to parrot praise for every standard barely deviating example of the genre shoveled out by obliging companies.
Re:You do realize the other hobbies are the same?
on
How Do Games Grow Up?
·
· Score: 1
Except that games tend to have bright flashing lights and other "feel-good" techniques that make you feel immediate reward and pleasure just by interacting with it, even when you don't win. They encourage you by virtue of design to keep trying when you fail (by necessity, otherwise they wouldn't sell), whereas all the hobbies you've listed take a kind of self-discipline that in fact is useful in other contexts.
I'm not down-playing the validity of games as hobby or entertainment, I'm hugely interested in Interactive Fiction (and also toying with IF-authoring languages), and I also read books watch movies, and listen music to which, excepting specifically educational ones have few ancillary benefits (though, as mentioned by a poster further-down, like games, also give you further insights into those domains).
But my point still stands that something by virtue more active, playing an instrument, car repair, computer repair, rock climbing, have delayed rewards and teach a great deal about fostering skill and having confidence in your abilities that have a much deeper and more lasting positive impact than passive forms of entertainment.
And then he went ahead and ended with the deus ex machina:
Wbua Ynebpur jnf xvyyrq ol gur nyyvtngbe ng cerpvfryl gur zbzrag ur jnf tbvat gb xvyy Xnhsznaa'f punenpgre.
Which was kind of the point of the film, the first half spent mocking movie and story-telling conventions, the second half giving into and indulging them ironically.
Wish I could tell you, but I'm in the wrong profession. I can however tell you that the tech support calls have not changed in number and that I would like to be admitted somewhere.
It makes me wonder about how the study defines gamers. Hopefully gamers are defined as "people who play games" and not "people who play with the most expensive technology." Why the assumption on the part of slashdotters that gamers must fall into the latter group?
Horror is foreboding, knowing that something bad is going to happen, just not knowing exactly how or when.
I'll make a reference to H.P.Lovecraft. Arguably the most famous horror author, and basically all his stories starts with telling you how awful everything went in the end. Then he starts describing exactly how it happened and why it couldn't be avoided.
Mostly agreed, except that I don't think you're giving enough latitude for what horror is and how it can be portrayed, and I think you're conflating horror and terror a bit.
Horror is based on knowledge and revulsion, usually after or during the fact and can be quite powerful, almost real (and also very difficult to effect convincingly with any medium). Horror is very existential and usually long-lasting, and also very subjective. Horror is how one might feel about telling an atrocious lie.
Terror is the actual dread before the fact, the adrenaline inducing paranoia leading up to something bad or while trying to avoid something bad, and this is easier to achieve in Interactive Media. Terror is very temporary, effervescent. Terror is what you might feel in the act of telling a lie.
The best, darkest works start with Terror that leads to Horror, though I have seen effective examples of terror contrasted with and/or leading to hope; horror without knowledge or understanding (this is usually achieved by surrealism, some of the best of which is by Robert Aickman); horror through comedy (don't think Army of Darkness, think Perfume, at some scenes, usually something very Sardonic, but earnestly dark and dreadful); and Horror through Mystery or mysteriousness (effectively done by Ray Bradbury, or more so. Edgar Allen Poe).
Lovecraft IS a great example of horror based on knowledge after the fact, but I find his works fall flat in the actual reading precisely because his works read like a tedious recounting, almost journalistic at times, of said events. He had great horrifying ideas, but was usually lacking in presentation ("The Music of Eric Zahn" and "The Rats in the Walls" being notable exceptions). Games, however have had great success playing off of Lovecraft's ideas, often better than the source material.
Since everyone is making horror game recommendations, and we're talking about Lovecraft, I want to recommend Anchorhead by Michael Gentry as an example of first-class interactive Lovecraftian horror. It's all text, but it is the most succesful and artful example of Interactive Horror that I have come across.
I use it regularly for discussions about Interactive Fiction Development. The annual IFComp is largely discussed in rec.arts.int-fiction as well. rec.games.int-fiction is a common place for developers to announce that they have made new games.
Newsgroups are treasure troves for various programming languages. Niche hobbies are still widely discussed there from tea to literature discussions too.
It would be foolish to assume that because YOU personally do not ever use it that no one does.
My apologies. There is a strict character limit for headlines, so perhaps I could've gone with town instead of Municipality and spelled out TDS Telecom. Still, I thought telco was pretty common shorthand for "telecommunication company". Am I wrong?
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It seems to me that keeping trying even if you fail, is a valuable RL lesson. Most cultures have some saying along the lines of "if at first you don't succeed, try and try again," so it must have been useful before computer games too.
Oh, absolutely and without a doubt that is a valuable lesson, however the other hobbies listed don't have a built-in form of encouragement to keep trying (e.g. glowing when you level up, finally equipping that new but ultimately only numerical piece of equipment). Those encouragements have to come with from within after building a skill incrementally and teach far more about resolve and patience than chasing after the next carrot held in front of you, in my opinion.
Also, there is some discipline to be learned from games too, especially in multiplayer ones. Whether it's a WoW raid in the endgame grind, or just playing Counter-Strike with your "clan" mates, there is a lot of point in acting disciplined, as team. And it can mean utter defeat if you act like an anarchistic yahoo.
I honestly had not even considered the team-building facets of multi-player games, but that is an excellent point.
Delayed rewards? Well, those two words would describe a MMO's endgame grind the best.
But even at lower levels, if you're say, the healer (but the same applies to any other role), for the next couple of hours you must do your role to the letter or the team will wipe out. No matter how much you'd like to blast a little instead, or compare dick sizes by killing another mob than the tank to see who does his faster, or whatever, you must stick to the plan and do your role. And you'll get your reward at the end of that couple of hours. Or not at all, if there were too many screw ups and the team split up in frustration.
Heck, for some people even the whole weeks or months of the levels 1 to 69 (used to be more like months before patch 2.4 in WoW) is essentially one big exercise in working for a delayed reward. They don't play the game for the road, but for the destination. They don't stop to appreciate those small immediate rewards along the game, they want that big final achievement already. I can't say I understand them, but they probably don't understand me either, and probably neither is right or wrong. But it _is_ an example of an exercise in working for weeks or months for the delayed final reward. And it probably takes some discipline to keep going.
There are lots of kinds of games out there, and not all can be painted with the same brush. Not all are single player games, for example. Not all teach discipline, and not all foster or require confidence in your skills, that much is clear. But some do.
The caveat I would add to that is that the grind in an RPG in fact does not build upon your skill grinding in an RPG, it is purely repetitive and driven by ephemeral rewards that are to be snatched away and replaced by another, more distant reward with only the time spent leading up to it lost as a result. I spent hours and hours when I was younger grinding in RPGs, and ultimately as I've gotten older I decided, it doesn't matter what's the next floor down in wizardry, or saving the next crystal in Final Fantasy, the grind is meaningless. The time spent perfecting technique in playing an instrument, however, builds upon what you knew before.
You can have something which is completely utilitarian, which is not a game. These programs exist: Iraqi culture simulations, reflex training programs, etc. You can also have something which has a sense of whimsy and fun. This is a game, and some of them have the potential to make you think or to awe you with their beauty.
Hey, or you can not rudely condescend to everyone else and inflict your lack of imagination and vision on everyone else.
How about this: You can have something that tells an engaging and meaningful story in a branching, linear, or emergent interactive environment. You can have something that something that makes a satirical or philosophical statement through its mechanics. You can have a game that elegantly tells a science-fiction story, simply and unpretentiously.
I don't know what the author is bitching about. He wants games without the fun, it would seem; games which take themselves as seriously as he does. Those just aren't games. He thinks games are a medium on the level of television. This is wrong. The computer is the medium. Games are merely a flavor of program, much as game-shows are flavor of television. Do you expect your game-shows to "progress intellectually" as you age?
So games are a genre (I think that would be incorrect? Are you saying the medium is inherently inflexible and vapid? Or are you saying that fun precludes maturity? Just what are you saying? Why are you so rabidly attacking a search beyond the status quo?
Fucking games journalists. Enough pretentious, bullshit opinion pieces. Get back to your fucking jobs.
And what thought out rhetoric! Truly you've won me over with your emphasis and shocking command of ideas. You know, like telling games journalists to get back to their jobs and... criticize and evaluate games? Perhaps you meant to imply that the jobs of games journalists are to parrot praise for every standard barely deviating example of the genre shoveled out by obliging companies.
Except that games tend to have bright flashing lights and other "feel-good" techniques that make you feel immediate reward and pleasure just by interacting with it, even when you don't win. They encourage you by virtue of design to keep trying when you fail (by necessity, otherwise they wouldn't sell), whereas all the hobbies you've listed take a kind of self-discipline that in fact is useful in other contexts.
I'm not down-playing the validity of games as hobby or entertainment, I'm hugely interested in Interactive Fiction (and also toying with IF-authoring languages), and I also read books watch movies, and listen music to which, excepting specifically educational ones have few ancillary benefits (though, as mentioned by a poster further-down, like games, also give you further insights into those domains).
But my point still stands that something by virtue more active, playing an instrument, car repair, computer repair, rock climbing, have delayed rewards and teach a great deal about fostering skill and having confidence in your abilities that have a much deeper and more lasting positive impact than passive forms of entertainment.
And then he went ahead and ended with the deus ex machina:
Wbua Ynebpur jnf xvyyrq ol gur nyyvtngbe ng cerpvfryl gur zbzrag ur jnf tbvat gb xvyy Xnhsznaa'f punenpgre.
Which was kind of the point of the film, the first half spent mocking movie and story-telling conventions, the second half giving into and indulging them ironically.
Wish I could tell you, but I'm in the wrong profession. I can however tell you that the tech support calls have not changed in number and that I would like to be admitted somewhere.
It makes me wonder about how the study defines gamers. Hopefully gamers are defined as "people who play games" and not "people who play with the most expensive technology." Why the assumption on the part of slashdotters that gamers must fall into the latter group?
Indiana resident here: since 2005 all of Indiana observes DST, including Lafayette.
Horror is foreboding, knowing that something bad is going to happen, just not knowing exactly how or when.
I'll make a reference to H.P.Lovecraft. Arguably the most famous horror author, and basically all his stories starts with telling you how awful everything went in the end. Then he starts describing exactly how it happened and why it couldn't be avoided.
Mostly agreed, except that I don't think you're giving enough latitude for what horror is and how it can be portrayed, and I think you're conflating horror and terror a bit.
Horror is based on knowledge and revulsion, usually after or during the fact and can be quite powerful, almost real (and also very difficult to effect convincingly with any medium). Horror is very existential and usually long-lasting, and also very subjective. Horror is how one might feel about telling an atrocious lie.
Terror is the actual dread before the fact, the adrenaline inducing paranoia leading up to something bad or while trying to avoid something bad, and this is easier to achieve in Interactive Media. Terror is very temporary, effervescent. Terror is what you might feel in the act of telling a lie.
The best, darkest works start with Terror that leads to Horror, though I have seen effective examples of terror contrasted with and/or leading to hope; horror without knowledge or understanding (this is usually achieved by surrealism, some of the best of which is by Robert Aickman); horror through comedy (don't think Army of Darkness, think Perfume, at some scenes, usually something very Sardonic, but earnestly dark and dreadful); and Horror through Mystery or mysteriousness (effectively done by Ray Bradbury, or more so. Edgar Allen Poe).
Lovecraft IS a great example of horror based on knowledge after the fact, but I find his works fall flat in the actual reading precisely because his works read like a tedious recounting, almost journalistic at times, of said events. He had great horrifying ideas, but was usually lacking in presentation ("The Music of Eric Zahn" and "The Rats in the Walls" being notable exceptions). Games, however have had great success playing off of Lovecraft's ideas, often better than the source material.
Since everyone is making horror game recommendations, and we're talking about Lovecraft, I want to recommend Anchorhead by Michael Gentry as an example of first-class interactive Lovecraftian horror. It's all text, but it is the most succesful and artful example of Interactive Horror that I have come across.
I use it regularly for discussions about Interactive Fiction Development. The annual IFComp is largely discussed in rec.arts.int-fiction as well. rec.games.int-fiction is a common place for developers to announce that they have made new games. Newsgroups are treasure troves for various programming languages. Niche hobbies are still widely discussed there from tea to literature discussions too. It would be foolish to assume that because YOU personally do not ever use it that no one does.
My apologies. There is a strict character limit for headlines, so perhaps I could've gone with town instead of Municipality and spelled out TDS Telecom. Still, I thought telco was pretty common shorthand for "telecommunication company". Am I wrong?
http://xkcd.com/16/ I typically dislike it when people respond with an xkcd comic, but this one seems pretty relevant.
He flew without hassles? Maybe I should start carrying guns to the airport.