I think everyone is missing the point here. Jaffe is not talking specifically about just playing games with stories, but more so working on them.
There is a difference between working on a long story driven game like God of War which could take years (3 years) to develop and lots of energy spent on fit the game play around a plot line. It could be fun to dream up a complex storyline for a game, but grafting numerous scripted sequences and event driven mechanics can be a real chore.
Working on something more pure, more focused on game play can be quicker and the design, more spontaneous. Thus more fun for the developer.
Sort of the difference between developing Quake and Halflife.
Actually, Baldur's Gate does use 3D. Much of the artwork for the backgrounds and the characters was modelled in 3D and "pre-" rendered into sprites. Of course a lot of the programming requirements of writing a full and functional 3D engine are reduced by this technique, it doesn't necessarily make the artists lives much easier. To be clear Baldur's Gate as was its more arcady cousin Diablo were both very monumental efforts at their time as far as computer art is concerned.
But in those days 3D was more risky due to compatibility issues and hardware requirements.
But I think svid is right. In some cases 2D can be a lot more difficult than real-time 3D graphics.
Mel Brooks parodied a similar scam in his musical "The Producers". Where two guys created a scam by intentially coming up with the worst idea for a musical involving singing Nazis and other nonsense. The idea was to make the play so badly that it would quickly flop and get pulled after the first performance, the producers would then pocket the remaining investment money.
Of course the plan was foiled when the fictional show became a smash hit.
Yes and No. Although the developer and publisher must keep the end user in mind, often true innovation comes when someone, usually the developer says, "Hey I've never seen a game do [blank] before. I wonder how fun would that be." And the feature is implemented.
Ask the game players and they won't necessarily know if the designer has the right idea until given a chance to give the game a test run.
Of course Focus Groups may be a solution to this, but baring time and/or money often a developer's hunch and keen intuition is what should fuel the day to day decisions in game development.
I agree, that blacks are as much at fault with perpetuating these stereotypes as anyone else.
But watch "Hollywood Shuffle". It has a humorous take on this.
I don't like Martin Lawrence schtick either.
Sigh... This is getting tiresome. This is the same debate as in film and television and the rest of the entertainment media. I think it is a worse problem with games however.
The reason why its not as offensive to most to see a White guy play the thug in GTA is because, well, most video game characters are white or asian. Games coming from the west often have the lead character or hero of the game white. Duke Nukem, Lara Croft, James Bond, The Doom Guy, Sam from Splinter Cell, Gordon from Half-Life, the is list goes on and on.
In Japan, characters are either white or asian.
Black heroes are rare. Where they do play a role in most games is either street thugs or sports figures.
So when a prominent game like GTA casts a black hero, well he's just another thug.
Will we ever see something from Nintendo, Sony or Microsoft where the hero is smart, craft, uses their wits as well as brawn and isn't a thug or basketball star and they are black, hispanic.
The problem is that the character needs to sell the game. When you first look at game character, you need to instantly understand or recognize what the game is all about. Unfortunately game designers use stereotypes to achieve this.
This is why Gordon Freeman is a lanky, bispecled white guy, why, CJ is a brawny, black male youth, why.
A few games try to break the image mold a bit. Unreal Tournament has a prominent black hero named Malcolm. Sin is another shooter with a black lead and Fear has a Native America superhero lead. However each of these characters can still sort of fit old stereo types of ethic minorities being good fighters or good brawlers.
In my oppinion, one of the most offensive characters in game history is Barret from Final Fantasy VII. That guy nearly ruined the entire game for me.
Speaking as someone of African-American decent, I am always very wary of potential racial discrimination.
I also tend to agree that there is some basic inherent differences between the races. For example it might be proven that if measured performance of a given action such as say long-distance running or performing long division in your head may be on average better or higher with a single race or a group of people.
Note that our very notion of "race" is highly flawed. We tend to group people based on skin color or facial features. Which is possibly not the best way to group people genetically.
The bottom line is if you found out that there was a genetic trait allowing people of say... Japanese decent to perform better at mathematics; I believe people would abuse that knowledge. If I had the same credentials, same education etc. as the Japanese guy and we both were applying for accounting positions, would you higher the Japanese guy based on these studies? I know many people would. Some would and not on purpose, it might be at a very subconscious level that they would choose him.
Likewise if it were proven that blacks (people of African decent) were genetically better at say long-distance running and the Japanese guy and I both tried out for that long-distance running team... We both had the same track record if you will. Both trained at the same school with the same instructor... whatever. Would I the, African-American get put on the team. I probably would. But that is very wrong in my opinion.
Worse, two kids are both struggling on learning some complicated math problem in junior-high. Would the teacher work harder on the student whose apparent genetic ancestry is proven to perform better in math? Possibly.
I believe this is what the ACLU and many other groups are most opposed to this type of research. The damage and potential abuses seem to outweigh a possible benefit to the knowledge gained from this research.
I disagree to an extent though. But I feel that this train of thought requires careful consideration of its affects on society as a whole. Are we as human beings wise enough or responsible enough to fully understand our own genetic make up?
Oh, no. The things I heard they did to this Jar Jar character were much too horrific to put in print. In fact I was told they had to film Jar Jar's death scene in parts as no one suffered bouts of nausea or became faint of heart during the shoot.
I play some piano too and if I have a song to memory I only have to occationally glance at my fingers. When typing on a keyboard, I never have to look at my fingers unless I need the top row of symbols above the number keys.
I find that blind piano playing can become a bit more tricky when your hands have to shift one or two octives at a time. Once your hands leave its position, the fingers no longer have a frame of reference. So you simply have to memorize the distance your hand needs to move to reach a certain note of a different octive.
However, I believe that if you avoid looking at your hands when playing the piano, it actually helps you become more proficient. Having to visually verify a note before letting your finger muscles go slows you down and can mess-up you rythm. Likewise relying more on your sense of touch and your ears, not your eyes makes for better musicianship.
But besides playing Blindfolded, this kid is remarkable. Just watch him play the more "rag-time" sounding Mario music really fast and you will start to appreciate his talent.
Slashdot Mirror
In addition: Robert Shaw bites first...
I think everyone is missing the point here. Jaffe is not talking specifically about just playing games with stories, but more so working on them. There is a difference between working on a long story driven game like God of War which could take years (3 years) to develop and lots of energy spent on fit the game play around a plot line. It could be fun to dream up a complex storyline for a game, but grafting numerous scripted sequences and event driven mechanics can be a real chore. Working on something more pure, more focused on game play can be quicker and the design, more spontaneous. Thus more fun for the developer. Sort of the difference between developing Quake and Halflife.
Actually, Baldur's Gate does use 3D. Much of the artwork for the backgrounds and the characters was modelled in 3D and "pre-" rendered into sprites. Of course a lot of the programming requirements of writing a full and functional 3D engine are reduced by this technique, it doesn't necessarily make the artists lives much easier. To be clear Baldur's Gate as was its more arcady cousin Diablo were both very monumental efforts at their time as far as computer art is concerned. But in those days 3D was more risky due to compatibility issues and hardware requirements. But I think svid is right. In some cases 2D can be a lot more difficult than real-time 3D graphics.
Sounds more like fucking your sister.
I say let the players elect/promote rank in the game. Make it democratic. Like clans or guilds.
Mel Brooks parodied a similar scam in his musical "The Producers". Where two guys created a scam by intentially coming up with the worst idea for a musical involving singing Nazis and other nonsense. The idea was to make the play so badly that it would quickly flop and get pulled after the first performance, the producers would then pocket the remaining investment money. Of course the plan was foiled when the fictional show became a smash hit.
Yes and No. Although the developer and publisher must keep the end user in mind, often true innovation comes when someone, usually the developer says, "Hey I've never seen a game do [blank] before. I wonder how fun would that be." And the feature is implemented. Ask the game players and they won't necessarily know if the designer has the right idea until given a chance to give the game a test run. Of course Focus Groups may be a solution to this, but baring time and/or money often a developer's hunch and keen intuition is what should fuel the day to day decisions in game development.
Actually XEROX invented the GUI, though Jobs claimed Apple bought the rights to the design.
I agree, that blacks are as much at fault with perpetuating these stereotypes as anyone else. But watch "Hollywood Shuffle". It has a humorous take on this. I don't like Martin Lawrence schtick either.
Sigh...
This is getting tiresome. This is the same debate as in film and television and the rest of the entertainment media. I think it is a worse problem with games however.
The reason why its not as offensive to most to see a White guy play the thug in GTA is because, well, most video game characters are white or asian. Games coming from the west often have the lead character or hero of the game white. Duke Nukem, Lara Croft, James Bond, The Doom Guy, Sam from Splinter Cell, Gordon from Half-Life, the is list goes on and on.
In Japan, characters are either white or asian.
Black heroes are rare. Where they do play a role in most games is either street thugs or sports figures.
So when a prominent game like GTA casts a black hero, well he's just another thug.
Will we ever see something from Nintendo, Sony or Microsoft where the hero is smart, craft, uses their wits as well as brawn and isn't a thug or basketball star and they are black, hispanic.
The problem is that the character needs to sell the game. When you first look at game character, you need to instantly understand or recognize what the game is all about. Unfortunately game designers use stereotypes to achieve this.
This is why Gordon Freeman is a lanky, bispecled white guy, why, CJ is a brawny, black male youth, why.
A few games try to break the image mold a bit. Unreal Tournament has a prominent black hero named Malcolm. Sin is another shooter with a black lead and Fear has a Native America superhero lead. However each of these characters can still sort of fit old stereo types of ethic minorities being good fighters or good brawlers.
In my oppinion, one of the most offensive characters in game history is Barret from Final Fantasy VII. That guy nearly ruined the entire game for me.
Speaking as someone of African-American decent, I am always very wary of potential racial discrimination. I also tend to agree that there is some basic inherent differences between the races. For example it might be proven that if measured performance of a given action such as say long-distance running or performing long division in your head may be on average better or higher with a single race or a group of people. Note that our very notion of "race" is highly flawed. We tend to group people based on skin color or facial features. Which is possibly not the best way to group people genetically. The bottom line is if you found out that there was a genetic trait allowing people of say... Japanese decent to perform better at mathematics; I believe people would abuse that knowledge. If I had the same credentials, same education etc. as the Japanese guy and we both were applying for accounting positions, would you higher the Japanese guy based on these studies? I know many people would. Some would and not on purpose, it might be at a very subconscious level that they would choose him. Likewise if it were proven that blacks (people of African decent) were genetically better at say long-distance running and the Japanese guy and I both tried out for that long-distance running team... We both had the same track record if you will. Both trained at the same school with the same instructor... whatever. Would I the, African-American get put on the team. I probably would. But that is very wrong in my opinion. Worse, two kids are both struggling on learning some complicated math problem in junior-high. Would the teacher work harder on the student whose apparent genetic ancestry is proven to perform better in math? Possibly. I believe this is what the ACLU and many other groups are most opposed to this type of research. The damage and potential abuses seem to outweigh a possible benefit to the knowledge gained from this research. I disagree to an extent though. But I feel that this train of thought requires careful consideration of its affects on society as a whole. Are we as human beings wise enough or responsible enough to fully understand our own genetic make up?
Oh, no. The things I heard they did to this Jar Jar character were much too horrific to put in print. In fact I was told they had to film Jar Jar's death scene in parts as no one suffered bouts of nausea or became faint of heart during the shoot.
I play some piano too and if I have a song to memory I only have to occationally glance at my fingers. When typing on a keyboard, I never have to look at my fingers unless I need the top row of symbols above the number keys. I find that blind piano playing can become a bit more tricky when your hands have to shift one or two octives at a time. Once your hands leave its position, the fingers no longer have a frame of reference. So you simply have to memorize the distance your hand needs to move to reach a certain note of a different octive. However, I believe that if you avoid looking at your hands when playing the piano, it actually helps you become more proficient. Having to visually verify a note before letting your finger muscles go slows you down and can mess-up you rythm. Likewise relying more on your sense of touch and your ears, not your eyes makes for better musicianship. But besides playing Blindfolded, this kid is remarkable. Just watch him play the more "rag-time" sounding Mario music really fast and you will start to appreciate his talent.