"Back in my day" . . . ? The original Super Mario Bros. even had small cheats available. Actually, come to think of it, they were rather large cheats.
Run out of lives and want to start over? Hold A and press Start when on the Game Over screen . . .
Don't feel like playing through all 32 stages? I mean, that's a lot of SMB, after all. Seriously, how many different level warps did you find? If you did it right you could warp from L1 to L4 to L8 and beat the game by playing about 1/4 of the game iirc.
Those aren't cheating?
What about the famous up, up, down, down, youknowtherest, start . . . ?
Do you truly not understand the point of homework? Do you really think that there should be no need to study? Sure, maybe at early ages it's slightly unnecessary, but even then it's getting students ready for the more intense workloads they will face in the future. The human brain can only absord so much information at a time, after all. So either you're suggesting that instead of 12-18 years of school (depending on the path you decide to take) we move to a system closer to 20-35 years of school, or you're suggesting that instead of a 6-7 hour school day we move to a 10-12 hour school day.
Learning academics is no different than learning anything else. It takes practice. Teachers aren't there to do it all for you, that's simply not possible. They're there to inspire you to want to learn, and to give you the tools you need to learn the material they teach. Unless you can come up with a way to make our school system (and every other one in the world, might I add) run more efficiently - which could probably only be accomplished by DRASTICALLY balancing the student:teacher ratio, which would require money that I'm sure YOU'RE not willing to fork over - then your argument really has very little basis. I doubt that anyone gets excited about homeword, and would be surprised to learn that anyone looks forward to cracking open a chemistry book and studying for hours on end - I sure didn't. But it's one of those necessary evils, if you will. We're trying to cram lifetimes of information into everyone over the span of 12 years...so until you devlop a way to transfer all that data virtually into someone's mind - a la The Matrix - just accept that it has to be done. And if you're imparting the notion that homework and studying is worthless and blaming your children's flaws on the education system, then you are a fool unfit to raise your child.
I really hope that was just a poor joke...
I bet that studies would find that children who playbasketball for 5 hours on school nights also perform worse than those who don't. Or kids that do puzzles. Or kids who practice music. This is a very unfair correlation, and any idiot with half a brain can see that. Seriously, why call out video games? Any activity that gets in the way of a child doing his homework and studying is going to negatively impact his grades. That's a no brainer. For some reason, though, video games are the culprit.
It's retarded. I played video games for easily 3-4 hours a day in high school and college, and also lost about 10 hours a week in high school and at LEAST (depending on the location of the football game that weekend) 20 a week in college due to marching band, and can say I finished with pretty good marks. Could they have been higher? Sure, slightly. Why weren't they? That's easy. Because the increase in workload to gain an incrimental increase in grades was more than I could justify. I studied as much as I felt I should, walked away with nearly a 3.4, and know that it wouldn't be any higher if it weren't for video games. Don't ban your kid from games during the week. They're good for relieving stress. Just make sure he does his homework and finishes his studying first. That's all it takes.
Ya know, I played that same game obsessively. In Grand Theft Auto, I religiously ran over pedistrians with my car, attacked police officers and the elderly with little discrimination, hired prostitutes and then killed them to get my money back after getting my full value from them, blew up masses of people with a rocket launcher from atop a parking garage, stole a tank, and stole an army helicopter. Yet amazingly, none of that has translated to real life. Perhaps because I have the ability to differentiate between real world and games...perhaps because my parents instilled within me good moral values. Who knows. In truth, the parents HAVE to be blamed. My 14 year old won't be playing GTA....well, when I have a 14 year old he won't be playing GTA. There's a reason the game is rated M. Mature. 14 is not Mature. Mature means that you understand the difference between reality and video games. If you don't qualify in that category, well, your parents should be aware of that, and not allow you play such games. Granted, I will say that retailers should be held more accountable for selling games such as GTA to minors....but parents should do their research before purchasing a game for their kids, as well. The rest of this family seems to paint a good picture, however. They are probably upholding the "blame corporate America" philosophy that was so advocated by their departed. I'm sure it'd be horrible if something like this happened within my family, but I'll never know, as we hold ourselves responsible for what we, as well as those we are accountable for, do. Parents need to do their damn jobs, I hope that the family loses this suit, and bad.
Seriously, what was the point of that? I'm upset because I'm grown up, too. I miss the days that I was home by 3 and, if I was so inclined, I could play games all night long. Things change, yeah, but I still don't understand the argument. So the game is 60 hours, you can play for an hour a day, you're saving tons of money on video games. So maybe you don't get to experience as many of the games, but I don't see where the real problem is that he's complaining about. What's the proposed alternative? It's not like there aren't plenty of games that you can put in 20-30 minutes and have some fun. Yeah, sure, for most of these longer games, you don't get in the "zone," so maybe it takes you longer. But basically, what I derived from this is that some guy is mad that the rest of us, who can find time for gaming still, will never be out of a worthwhile game to play....
Clinical tests on human beings....
You're brother is in a tight financial situation and he's offered 5 grand to be a test subject for this. He accepts because he's broke, and dies during the procedure. They decide it's not safe for humans yet, and you have one less brother.
That sticky ethical issue.
But this may not be the worst idea. A lot of people seem to be laughing at this, and I can understand why, but let's at least make sure we have a few things clear. The fact that there is now a detox center for gaming addicts suggests that at least some people accept that a person can become addicted to video games. A lot of you seem to disagree with that. People can become addicted to gambling, why not games? It's the same kind of thing, a purely psychological addiction, but those can be nearly as bad as chemical addictions. Sure, it may remind all of us of that famous scene in Half Baked, where Dave Chappell goes to the rehab center and proclaims that he's addicted to marijuana, only to be laughed at and informed by Bob Sagat that unless he's sucked a dick for some weed, it's not a real addiction. Sure. And no one in his right mind would put this at the level of heroin or cocaine. But it's hard to listen to people who just brush off the notion that there is a possibility that people could become addicted to a game. You have to be able to distinguish, however, between the people who play for 12 hours a day because it's fun, and because they have nothing better to do and don't feel much like going out and searching for something to do and the people who couldn't bring themselves to leave their consoles if the house was burning down around them. I wouldn't say I was 'addicted' to World of Warcraft, though I certainly played a lot. But when the time came to decide between, say, a job interview or herb farming, the choice was clear. So, sure, you may think the people who have lost their job because of an 'addiction' to a game are really just idiots, sure, and that does seem reasonable to a degree. Same with the people who's families have left them (and yes, it has happened). But you have to understand one thing. Many of the super nerds in games like WoW and FFXI and EQ find a different kind of acceptance in these games. It does feel good to run around in shinies and have everyone checking you out. It does feel good when people you've never interacted with whisper you and ask what makes you a great healer, and it's nice to know that there is a group of people in your online gaming community that actually care whether you show up or not. Sadly, there are some people that need this degree of fulfillment, and crave it to the extent that they waste away from reality. These are the kind of people a place like this is for. Not for the college kid that fails a test because killing the Twin Emperors is more interesting than studying weather patterns. For the guy whose wife leaves him, and he doesn't even notice for three days.
Trying to take the fun out of games...
on
Just Let Me Play!
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· Score: 1
I just spent 5 minutes reading an article that was apparently written for the sole purpose of boldly proclaiming laziness and idiocy to the world. I suppose that maybe, on another day, I would find this funny. Perhaps I even do today. However, sitting at my desk at work reading over this article, I quickly realize that I have no one to vent my frustrations to, and thus I decided to finally post here. A minor issue I'd like to hilight is the blatant contradiction that he presents when comparing video games to books - oh, yes, he tries to avoid contradicting himself by stating:
"When I buy a book, the only thing that stands in the way of completing it is the page count. And I know the page count going in. I can read the last chapter standing in the bookstore. If I find Chapter 56 too cumbersome, I can skip it entirely and move on to the better parts of Moby Dick (there are better parts, trust me)."
Come on already. I found 90% of Moby Dick too boring and cumbersome to comprehend, but I can assure you that had I taken his suggestion and just skipped to the final chapter, I would have no idea what the hell was going on, and it would make an already boring book even more so. So maybe Moby Dick is too complex a book to use this theory on. Except that if you tried the same idea with Harry Potter, you'd have no understanding of why Voldemordt wanted Harry dead, much less why the book ended the way it did. Or with Lord of the Rings, why did Frodo sail off on the ship instead of staying with his friends? Most games today keep people involved not only through the gameplay, but also through the storyline. The more interesting and deep the story, the longer I'm willing to sit in front of the TV with a box of Triscuits and play. If I skipped to the end of Final Fantasy VII, what would I gain from it? The way I see it, for $49.99, I'm buying at least 40 hours of gaming. How that can possibly be viewed as a rip-off is beyond me. It's not like the developers are cutting corners, and that's why the game is longer. They're spending more money to make a more in-depth and exciting game. And you're complaining about that.
There's also a reason that there is "bonus content" in games. It's for the people that want to put in that extra time. "Side quests" are not part of the main game you paid for. Unlockables aren't, either. Those things are there for the people that want to go back through. Clearly, they aren't for you. So just buy the game and play the part of the game you paid for. I don't understand why anyone would expect a game to be tailored to his explicit laziness.
All said, I've been an avid World of Warcraft player for about 18 months now, and was a major player in an end-game guild since last August or so. About 3 weeks ago I started a new job, and, as a result have had to nearly quit the game entirely, because I don't find nearly the same degree of enjoyment in the non-"end-game" content. However, that's just how life goes. I would much rather be stuck trying to dig out the last morsels of fun in other aspects of the game then somehow be allowed to just acquire whatever super-fantastic weapon or armor I wanted. That would ruin the game for everyone. Why would you wish that? The most appealing part about WoW and other games like it is that, if you desire, you can play that one game, and it alone, for over a year. I have a STACK of other games I haven't really even touched because of that. If I could have everything I wanted from WoW within a week, I'd get totally sick of it within a week, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.
I understand the "plight" of the working gamer as well as anyone. I leave my house at 7am and return home at almost 7pm. Being single, there's not even the most remote chance that food is sitting on the table when I get home, so I have to cook dinner, eat dinner, then clean up after dinner. There's always something else that must be done, as well, and by the time I settle down to p
Slashdot Mirror
"Back in my day" . . . ? The original Super Mario Bros. even had small cheats available. Actually, come to think of it, they were rather large cheats.
Run out of lives and want to start over? Hold A and press Start when on the Game Over screen . . .
Don't feel like playing through all 32 stages? I mean, that's a lot of SMB, after all. Seriously, how many different level warps did you find? If you did it right you could warp from L1 to L4 to L8 and beat the game by playing about 1/4 of the game iirc.
Those aren't cheating?
What about the famous up, up, down, down, youknowtherest, start . . . ?
Do you truly not understand the point of homework? Do you really think that there should be no need to study? Sure, maybe at early ages it's slightly unnecessary, but even then it's getting students ready for the more intense workloads they will face in the future. The human brain can only absord so much information at a time, after all. So either you're suggesting that instead of 12-18 years of school (depending on the path you decide to take) we move to a system closer to 20-35 years of school, or you're suggesting that instead of a 6-7 hour school day we move to a 10-12 hour school day. Learning academics is no different than learning anything else. It takes practice. Teachers aren't there to do it all for you, that's simply not possible. They're there to inspire you to want to learn, and to give you the tools you need to learn the material they teach. Unless you can come up with a way to make our school system (and every other one in the world, might I add) run more efficiently - which could probably only be accomplished by DRASTICALLY balancing the student:teacher ratio, which would require money that I'm sure YOU'RE not willing to fork over - then your argument really has very little basis. I doubt that anyone gets excited about homeword, and would be surprised to learn that anyone looks forward to cracking open a chemistry book and studying for hours on end - I sure didn't. But it's one of those necessary evils, if you will. We're trying to cram lifetimes of information into everyone over the span of 12 years...so until you devlop a way to transfer all that data virtually into someone's mind - a la The Matrix - just accept that it has to be done. And if you're imparting the notion that homework and studying is worthless and blaming your children's flaws on the education system, then you are a fool unfit to raise your child. I really hope that was just a poor joke...
I bet that studies would find that children who playbasketball for 5 hours on school nights also perform worse than those who don't. Or kids that do puzzles. Or kids who practice music. This is a very unfair correlation, and any idiot with half a brain can see that. Seriously, why call out video games? Any activity that gets in the way of a child doing his homework and studying is going to negatively impact his grades. That's a no brainer. For some reason, though, video games are the culprit. It's retarded. I played video games for easily 3-4 hours a day in high school and college, and also lost about 10 hours a week in high school and at LEAST (depending on the location of the football game that weekend) 20 a week in college due to marching band, and can say I finished with pretty good marks. Could they have been higher? Sure, slightly. Why weren't they? That's easy. Because the increase in workload to gain an incrimental increase in grades was more than I could justify. I studied as much as I felt I should, walked away with nearly a 3.4, and know that it wouldn't be any higher if it weren't for video games. Don't ban your kid from games during the week. They're good for relieving stress. Just make sure he does his homework and finishes his studying first. That's all it takes.
Ya know, I played that same game obsessively. In Grand Theft Auto, I religiously ran over pedistrians with my car, attacked police officers and the elderly with little discrimination, hired prostitutes and then killed them to get my money back after getting my full value from them, blew up masses of people with a rocket launcher from atop a parking garage, stole a tank, and stole an army helicopter. Yet amazingly, none of that has translated to real life. Perhaps because I have the ability to differentiate between real world and games...perhaps because my parents instilled within me good moral values. Who knows. In truth, the parents HAVE to be blamed. My 14 year old won't be playing GTA....well, when I have a 14 year old he won't be playing GTA. There's a reason the game is rated M. Mature. 14 is not Mature. Mature means that you understand the difference between reality and video games. If you don't qualify in that category, well, your parents should be aware of that, and not allow you play such games. Granted, I will say that retailers should be held more accountable for selling games such as GTA to minors....but parents should do their research before purchasing a game for their kids, as well. The rest of this family seems to paint a good picture, however. They are probably upholding the "blame corporate America" philosophy that was so advocated by their departed. I'm sure it'd be horrible if something like this happened within my family, but I'll never know, as we hold ourselves responsible for what we, as well as those we are accountable for, do. Parents need to do their damn jobs, I hope that the family loses this suit, and bad.
Or...because the parents of the child were killed by the child....
Seriously, what was the point of that? I'm upset because I'm grown up, too. I miss the days that I was home by 3 and, if I was so inclined, I could play games all night long. Things change, yeah, but I still don't understand the argument. So the game is 60 hours, you can play for an hour a day, you're saving tons of money on video games. So maybe you don't get to experience as many of the games, but I don't see where the real problem is that he's complaining about. What's the proposed alternative? It's not like there aren't plenty of games that you can put in 20-30 minutes and have some fun. Yeah, sure, for most of these longer games, you don't get in the "zone," so maybe it takes you longer. But basically, what I derived from this is that some guy is mad that the rest of us, who can find time for gaming still, will never be out of a worthwhile game to play....
Clinical tests on human beings.... You're brother is in a tight financial situation and he's offered 5 grand to be a test subject for this. He accepts because he's broke, and dies during the procedure. They decide it's not safe for humans yet, and you have one less brother. That sticky ethical issue.
But this may not be the worst idea. A lot of people seem to be laughing at this, and I can understand why, but let's at least make sure we have a few things clear. The fact that there is now a detox center for gaming addicts suggests that at least some people accept that a person can become addicted to video games. A lot of you seem to disagree with that. People can become addicted to gambling, why not games? It's the same kind of thing, a purely psychological addiction, but those can be nearly as bad as chemical addictions. Sure, it may remind all of us of that famous scene in Half Baked, where Dave Chappell goes to the rehab center and proclaims that he's addicted to marijuana, only to be laughed at and informed by Bob Sagat that unless he's sucked a dick for some weed, it's not a real addiction. Sure. And no one in his right mind would put this at the level of heroin or cocaine. But it's hard to listen to people who just brush off the notion that there is a possibility that people could become addicted to a game. You have to be able to distinguish, however, between the people who play for 12 hours a day because it's fun, and because they have nothing better to do and don't feel much like going out and searching for something to do and the people who couldn't bring themselves to leave their consoles if the house was burning down around them. I wouldn't say I was 'addicted' to World of Warcraft, though I certainly played a lot. But when the time came to decide between, say, a job interview or herb farming, the choice was clear. So, sure, you may think the people who have lost their job because of an 'addiction' to a game are really just idiots, sure, and that does seem reasonable to a degree. Same with the people who's families have left them (and yes, it has happened). But you have to understand one thing. Many of the super nerds in games like WoW and FFXI and EQ find a different kind of acceptance in these games. It does feel good to run around in shinies and have everyone checking you out. It does feel good when people you've never interacted with whisper you and ask what makes you a great healer, and it's nice to know that there is a group of people in your online gaming community that actually care whether you show up or not. Sadly, there are some people that need this degree of fulfillment, and crave it to the extent that they waste away from reality. These are the kind of people a place like this is for. Not for the college kid that fails a test because killing the Twin Emperors is more interesting than studying weather patterns. For the guy whose wife leaves him, and he doesn't even notice for three days.
Come on already. I found 90% of Moby Dick too boring and cumbersome to comprehend, but I can assure you that had I taken his suggestion and just skipped to the final chapter, I would have no idea what the hell was going on, and it would make an already boring book even more so. So maybe Moby Dick is too complex a book to use this theory on. Except that if you tried the same idea with Harry Potter, you'd have no understanding of why Voldemordt wanted Harry dead, much less why the book ended the way it did. Or with Lord of the Rings, why did Frodo sail off on the ship instead of staying with his friends? Most games today keep people involved not only through the gameplay, but also through the storyline. The more interesting and deep the story, the longer I'm willing to sit in front of the TV with a box of Triscuits and play. If I skipped to the end of Final Fantasy VII, what would I gain from it? The way I see it, for $49.99, I'm buying at least 40 hours of gaming. How that can possibly be viewed as a rip-off is beyond me. It's not like the developers are cutting corners, and that's why the game is longer. They're spending more money to make a more in-depth and exciting game. And you're complaining about that.
There's also a reason that there is "bonus content" in games. It's for the people that want to put in that extra time. "Side quests" are not part of the main game you paid for. Unlockables aren't, either. Those things are there for the people that want to go back through. Clearly, they aren't for you. So just buy the game and play the part of the game you paid for. I don't understand why anyone would expect a game to be tailored to his explicit laziness.
All said, I've been an avid World of Warcraft player for about 18 months now, and was a major player in an end-game guild since last August or so. About 3 weeks ago I started a new job, and, as a result have had to nearly quit the game entirely, because I don't find nearly the same degree of enjoyment in the non-"end-game" content. However, that's just how life goes. I would much rather be stuck trying to dig out the last morsels of fun in other aspects of the game then somehow be allowed to just acquire whatever super-fantastic weapon or armor I wanted. That would ruin the game for everyone. Why would you wish that? The most appealing part about WoW and other games like it is that, if you desire, you can play that one game, and it alone, for over a year. I have a STACK of other games I haven't really even touched because of that. If I could have everything I wanted from WoW within a week, I'd get totally sick of it within a week, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.
I understand the "plight" of the working gamer as well as anyone. I leave my house at 7am and return home at almost 7pm. Being single, there's not even the most remote chance that food is sitting on the table when I get home, so I have to cook dinner, eat dinner, then clean up after dinner. There's always something else that must be done, as well, and by the time I settle down to p