If a gamer plays a game brainlessly, that's his/her fault, not the game's. Games are goal-oriented, and consciously trying to achieve a goal (especially when the goal is motivated by competition) is anything but brainless. If anything a game is exactly the opposite. Please, as an example, show me a game that doesn't require the player to engage in some sort of decision making. Next, try and show me a game where brainful playing loses to brainless playing. Any activity is brainless if you do it brainlessly - some activities just provide more oppurtunity for thinking than others. Gaming is definitely an activity that provides the oppurtunity for thinking.
Let's take pong for example, since it might just be the least brainful game there is. You might say the decision making necessary to excel at this game is minimal. You might instantly conclude that the best strategy is to just keep the paddle vertically aligned with the ball at all times. You then might think that the best way to learn this strategy is nothing more than a matter of rotely training your motor-muscle skills - practice. But if your a good gamer, you won't stop thinking there... you'll then think... well what's the best way to rotely train my muscles to do this? Maybe I can devise a better grip on the paddle - one that will give me faster, more accurate paddle movement? In fact, I would say the best gamers never stop asking themselves these kinds of questions.
Given that people still play basketball, baseball, football, soccer nearly a hundred years (or more) after their inception, something must be drawing people back to them year after year. Maybe people just like the elements of the sports (throwing a ball, tackling a person, etc...), but I bet more than anything, they come back for the competition.
I think the video game has already proven itself as a great forum for competition, and it will continue to be embraced until video games are as pervasive as every other sport. Obviously I'm not speaking for specific genres of video games (rpg's might have a tougher time surviving), but I say any game that lends itself to fun, fair competition will survive.
I agree. It would be very difficult to push the buttons down without changing the tilt of the mouse. If you've used a laser pointer before, or tried to aim a gun or anything else without something supporting your arm or wrist, then you'd think twice before using this mouse for gaming.
Yes, in fact you are naive. Actually, its really funny. I don't even know where to begin. I'm too lazy I suppose... I'll just point out one bit of irony, and then make my point.
But if you've got Einstein's genes, and you're born to a crack whore shitting out six kids and raising them in a memeset that considers its own ignorance as a mark of cultural pride ("Yo, dat skoolin's fo' whitey! Y'all don't wants ta be actin' white!"), you're doomed from the get-go.
Interesting - what if you're just a generic white male with slightly above average intelligence who takes pride in the fact that he's neither in jail nor in the bottom half of an arbitrary bell curve. If you ask me, you're similarly *doomed*. I mean, come on... neither of those traits you relish in are incredibly useful in terms of achieving *progress*... not to mention, if you have those traits, then you're NOTHING LIKE ME, and ME is the way to BE.
Your problem is you hold dear this notion of "progress". What exactly are you progressing towards, may I ask? And even if you did know, the likely-hood that you, 1 / 6 billionth of the system that you're trying to progress, would know how to get there is about... (1 / (6 billion ^ weight of your mom)) = 0.
Of course, I won't worry about you, because I realize that your opinion, albeit extreme, is just one of the billions of opinions out there that averaged together, actually guide our system. So think what you like honey - I fear not of you.
What I'm talking aboutis the careful use of resources...... In MAX, your anti-ground aircraft (good for killing tanks, turrets, etc) had only 4 ammo shots. So you had few of these planes, and few shots with each before they had to go back and re-supply. Heck, your towers had supply problems unless linked to a supply unit. It was half RTS and half turn.. bu sxcrap that.. I want an RTS where you can probe the enemy, then sit back a sec and think "how can I used" my "mixed arms" to get through that big well thought out defense? So I'll need a couple of these to square agains tthat, and a couple of these to get through over there.. some actual strategy.
First of all, this is a REAL TIME STRATEGY game. That's two parts... real time (speed) and strategy. You have to have both down to be a truly excellent player. You say you want just the Strategy part. That's fine. Why don't you play chess? or diplomacy? or civilization? Or any other turn based game. People constantly whine about people who emplore mass this and mass that strategies in RTS. The fact that they keep getting owned by them is because they want to sit back for a second and think of the best strategy. Think about it - if there is someone out there who can think of the best strategy instantly, how would you expect to beat him? It's not the games fault - he can just think of good strategies and execute them with ruthless efficiency. If you ever watch replays of top games, you'll see unbelievable things - micromanaged units of a disparate choosing that make those who love the game cry. There is a LOT of strategy that can go into a game - you just have to learn how to do it optimally fast. Don't whine about mass whateverers, just learn how to do those mass whatever strategies, and then learn how to beat them - yes, they can definitely be beaten with non-mass strategies.
I'm not a fan of C&C - I've only played the original and Red Alert a few missions each. What I'm wondering is, what is offered in terms of online possibilities? Is there even a battle.net equivalent for C&C? I play Warcraft III obsessively (not as obsessively as a lot of other people), but I doubt I would if there weren't a battle.net. Campaigns/single player modes are BORING AS HELL (except for reminiscing with classic games). So anyway, someone please enlighten me as to the online prospective for Generals.
That's right, screw the rest of the country - and screw bush and people like him too! Because economics is only a game - you have a winner and a loser. The rich have won, and the poor have lost. Is there some reason why we're still playing?
So screw everyone - your all a bunch of mindless boobs with no greater purpose. Keep trying though... I'm sure for you billionaires out there, there's another billion waiting... and for you "poor" folk, another commercial holiday hopefully with twice as much cheap walmart crap as last time.
Rather than making us stoop to pokemonesque consumerism, why don't they take advantage of these new technologies, with acronyms CD and DVD, and just give us all the games at once. They could even release it for their own gamecube and charge probably as much as 100 dollars for it.
Oh wait a minute, those mediums would probably last too long - at least this way I'll be forced to buy another megaman 1 card when my first one no longer swipes.
Slashdot Mirror
If a gamer plays a game brainlessly, that's his/her fault, not the game's. Games are goal-oriented, and consciously trying to achieve a goal (especially when the goal is motivated by competition) is anything but brainless. If anything a game is exactly the opposite. Please, as an example, show me a game that doesn't require the player to engage in some sort of decision making. Next, try and show me a game where brainful playing loses to brainless playing. Any activity is brainless if you do it brainlessly - some activities just provide more oppurtunity for thinking than others. Gaming is definitely an activity that provides the oppurtunity for thinking.
Let's take pong for example, since it might just be the least brainful game there is. You might say the decision making necessary to excel at this game is minimal. You might instantly conclude that the best strategy is to just keep the paddle vertically aligned with the ball at all times. You then might think that the best way to learn this strategy is nothing more than a matter of rotely training your motor-muscle skills - practice. But if your a good gamer, you won't stop thinking there... you'll then think... well what's the best way to rotely train my muscles to do this? Maybe I can devise a better grip on the paddle - one that will give me faster, more accurate paddle movement? In fact, I would say the best gamers never stop asking themselves these kinds of questions.
People who don't use their minds are brainless.
Does it beat out AOL 9.0 Topspeed technology?
Given that people still play basketball, baseball, football, soccer nearly a hundred years (or more) after their inception, something must be drawing people back to them year after year. Maybe people just like the elements of the sports (throwing a ball, tackling a person, etc...), but I bet more than anything, they come back for the competition.
I think the video game has already proven itself as a great forum for competition, and it will continue to be embraced until video games are as pervasive as every other sport. Obviously I'm not speaking for specific genres of video games (rpg's might have a tougher time surviving), but I say any game that lends itself to fun, fair competition will survive.
Although I won't predict the death of the genre, I think one person can only play an MMORPG for so long before they're empowered to play real life.
Says the enemy haXors.
I agree. It would be very difficult to push the buttons down without changing the tilt of the mouse. If you've used a laser pointer before, or tried to aim a gun or anything else without something supporting your arm or wrist, then you'd think twice before using this mouse for gaming.
Yes, in fact you are naive. Actually, its really funny. I don't even know where to begin. I'm too lazy I suppose... I'll just point out one bit of irony, and then make my point.
But if you've got Einstein's genes, and you're born to a crack whore shitting out six kids and raising them in a memeset that considers its own ignorance as a mark of cultural pride ("Yo, dat skoolin's fo' whitey! Y'all don't wants ta be actin' white!"), you're doomed from the get-go.
Interesting - what if you're just a generic white male with slightly above average intelligence who takes pride in the fact that he's neither in jail nor in the bottom half of an arbitrary bell curve. If you ask me, you're similarly *doomed*. I mean, come on... neither of those traits you relish in are incredibly useful in terms of achieving *progress*... not to mention, if you have those traits, then you're NOTHING LIKE ME, and ME is the way to BE.
Your problem is you hold dear this notion of "progress". What exactly are you progressing towards, may I ask? And even if you did know, the likely-hood that you, 1 / 6 billionth of the system that you're trying to progress, would know how to get there is about... (1 / (6 billion ^ weight of your mom)) = 0.
Of course, I won't worry about you, because I realize that your opinion, albeit extreme, is just one of the billions of opinions out there that averaged together, actually guide our system. So think what you like honey - I fear not of you.
Please tell me more about the crap you find in swg.
I couldn't agree more. The thought of being declassed as part of the professional hoi polloi is offensive.
Just because programmers work for a system built by and permeated with chumps (policy wonks?), doesn't mean they themselves are chumps.
And if you don't know what I'm talking about, then you're not a programmer, you're a chump.
Sysadmins... always protecting their bandwidth. We just need more bandwidth, damn it! Problem solved!
What I'm talking aboutis the careful use of resources...... In MAX, your anti-ground aircraft (good for killing tanks, turrets, etc) had only 4 ammo shots. So you had few of these planes, and few shots with each before they had to go back and re-supply. Heck, your towers had supply problems unless linked to a supply unit. It was half RTS and half turn.. bu sxcrap that.. I want an RTS where you can probe the enemy, then sit back a sec and think "how can I used" my "mixed arms" to get through that big well thought out defense? So I'll need a couple of these to square agains tthat, and a couple of these to get through over there.. some actual strategy.
First of all, this is a REAL TIME STRATEGY game. That's two parts... real time (speed) and strategy. You have to have both down to be a truly excellent player. You say you want just the Strategy part. That's fine. Why don't you play chess? or diplomacy? or civilization? Or any other turn based game. People constantly whine about people who emplore mass this and mass that strategies in RTS. The fact that they keep getting owned by them is because they want to sit back for a second and think of the best strategy. Think about it - if there is someone out there who can think of the best strategy instantly, how would you expect to beat him? It's not the games fault - he can just think of good strategies and execute them with ruthless efficiency. If you ever watch replays of top games, you'll see unbelievable things - micromanaged units of a disparate choosing that make those who love the game cry. There is a LOT of strategy that can go into a game - you just have to learn how to do it optimally fast. Don't whine about mass whateverers, just learn how to do those mass whatever strategies, and then learn how to beat them - yes, they can definitely be beaten with non-mass strategies.
I'm not a fan of C&C - I've only played the original and Red Alert a few missions each. What I'm wondering is, what is offered in terms of online possibilities? Is there even a battle.net equivalent for C&C? I play Warcraft III obsessively (not as obsessively as a lot of other people), but I doubt I would if there weren't a battle.net. Campaigns/single player modes are BORING AS HELL (except for reminiscing with classic games). So anyway, someone please enlighten me as to the online prospective for Generals.
screw the rest of the country
That's right, screw the rest of the country - and screw bush and people like him too! Because economics is only a game - you have a winner and a loser. The rich have won, and the poor have lost. Is there some reason why we're still playing?
So screw everyone - your all a bunch of mindless boobs with no greater purpose. Keep trying though... I'm sure for you billionaires out there, there's another billion waiting... and for you "poor" folk, another commercial holiday hopefully with twice as much cheap walmart crap as last time.
If our space shuttles could bomb Iraq we would be getting new ones all the time.
You've hit the nail right on the head - except the part about seeing them.
Well right now privacy is liberty and that is a right.
I'm sorry, you're going to have to make a better argument than that. How exactly is privacy a form of liberty?
You sound like a working artist, not a working pro.
Rather than making us stoop to pokemonesque consumerism, why don't they take advantage of these new technologies, with acronyms CD and DVD, and just give us all the games at once. They could even release it for their own gamecube and charge probably as much as 100 dollars for it.
Oh wait a minute, those mediums would probably last too long - at least this way I'll be forced to buy another megaman 1 card when my first one no longer swipes.
f******