Editorial Felipe Pepe at Gamasutra: Why are we abandoning gaming history?

[felipepepe]

???

https://twitter.com/RichardGarriott

I have no idea why people translate names, but I'm not complaining. Me and my homie Ricardo retweet anyway. :3

 

[mindx2]

Just wait till they find out you're a Codex regular...

 

[Drakron]

I have no idea why people translate names,

'Mericans.

 

[felipepepe]

Just wait till they find out you're a Codex regular...

Yeah, I was a bit worried about that, but it seems that no one cares anymore. I even mentioned it on the article, with two links to fair Codexian articles no less. Hard to call me an evil doer when I'm doing all of this for free, I guess.

Also, there's a point where you must ask yourself; when your biggest hater is an "ex-nazi and banned corrupt reddit mod", is that an attack or an endorsement?

 

[Darth Slaughter]

I can't wait for tim schafer's involvement...

 

[dnf]

Just wait till they find out you're a Codex regular...

Yeah, I was a bit worried about that, but it seems that no one cares anymore. I even mentioned it on the article, with two links to fair Codexian articles no less. Hard to call me an evil doer when I'm doing all of this for free, I guess.

Also, there's a point where you must ask yourself; when your biggest hater is an "ex-nazi and banned corrupt reddit mod", is that an attack or an endorsement?

Unless they have something against you, or you badmouth them via social media, they won't bother you, but if you are not sucking their cocks, don't expect easy press. Things like racism, sexism or corruption by association is only used as a means to fight for status. That's why they don't bother with their whiteness and their "problematic" past between their ranks. It amazes me how people still call them hypocrites when it is a way of life for them.

 

[Irxy]

Speaking of gaming history and oldies it's not like nobody at all cares about it out there, there are still sites like http://www.mobygames.com/ (despite that their late inteface is rubbish, it has tons of info on many obscure games), and of course http://www.homeoftheunderdogs.net/ (which was resurrected a few times and has not been updated for ages, but I did find several marvels there).

 

[Zarniwoop]

Speaking of gaming history and oldies it's not like nobody at all cares about it out there, there are still sites like http://www.mobygames.com/ (despite that their late inteface is rubbish, it has tons of info on many obscure games), and of course http://www.homeoftheunderdogs.net/ (which was resurrected a few times and has not been updated for ages, but I did find several marvels there).

Did you even read the article?

That was Felipe's point. Sure, some guys are preserving records, but it's not in the public consciousness.

 

[JarlFrank]

Gaming history is a niche of a niche for now. A couple of websites care about it, that's it. There's that museum in Berlin, but I never visited so I have no idea about their philosophy behind it all.
If I ever have enough funds for such a thing, I'd try to establish a gaming history preservation initiative at some uni, with actual historian's methods being used and serious articles being written about it.

 

[Infinitron]

I have no idea why people translate names,

'Mericans.

Kenneth is Canadian (otherwise it would have been Phillip instead of Philipe? )

 

[pakoito]

Gaming history is a niche of a niche for now. A couple of websites care about it, that's it. There's that museum in Berlin, but I never visited so I have no idea about their philosophy behind it all.
If I ever have enough funds for such a thing, I'd try to establish a gaming history preservation initiative at some uni, with actual historian's methods being used and serious articles being written about it.

Felipepepe is persona non grata in most mainstream sites and blogs, and we know the policy is to 'silence hate speakers' even if it's to defend, deny or refute the accusation.

 

[mondblut]

The problem with something small like this is making it available for people everywhere at a decent price and keeping it in print.

Way to do it utterly wrong. Making it a strictly limited edition is what should be done. A luxury item for a luxury consumer. Ask Garriott for half a pint of his blood and urine to handnumber them with for a bonus trailing zero on ebay.

"People everywhere at a decent price" should be content with a pdf in their e-reader.

 

[pakoito]

No PDFs please, they look like crap on ereaders. Use the swag money to buy someone to format it into epub.

 

[felipepepe]

Felipepepe is persona non grata in most mainstream sites and blogs

I am? D:

And I'm using InDesign to make everything, I can probably export it to EPUB with just one or two weeks of pure frustration and rage.

 

[pakoito]

Felipepepe is persona non grata in most mainstream sites and blogs

I am? D:

Public codexer figure, front and center in DFs documentary and calling on their incompetence? Most probably. You're only a couple of hashtags away from being doxxed

And I'm using InDesign to make everything, I can export it to EPUB with just one or two weeks or pure frustration and rage.

Where was the tip brive donation account?

 

[JarlFrank]

PDF please, epub is shitty to read on a PC and it's confusing to see which page you're actually on

 

[pakoito]

PDF please, epub is shitty to read on a PC and it's confusing to see which page you're actually on

PDF export is trivial in InDesign.

 

[DwarvenFood]

Can't wait to be able to buy the physical book, I hope you can get some kind of deal going, and preferably not Amazon. Somewhere around $20-25 would be great. A bit more would not be a drama, but at $35 + shipping, with Amazon getting all profits, I'd rather PDF it.

 

[Severian Silk]

I totally borrowed Matt Barton's book from my public library, and I will totally borrow this one too!

 

[Malignant Manor]

Why can't you do a Kickstarter or something so you can try to see if you can get enough to print 500 or more copies? You will definitely want to do it when the book will be ready by completion of the Kickstarter. Unfortunately, the publisher could drastically change rates unless you get something in writing beforehand. $20 before shipping sounds like a good price if it is $13 at the start of the Kickstarter. That is still much better for people than $35.

Edit: Maybe add a dollar or two more because of the 8-10% fee. You certainly don't want to lose money, but you could probably cancel if that happened.

 

[octavius]

I've played a lot of mobile games and have never encountered one with anything like as abominable an interface as Wasteland had. Or Ultima Underworld.

Try playing UU with a mouse next time.

 

[Neckbeard Shitlord]

HDRI crap takes good film and makes it look like garbage. I would not call that progress.

 

[octavius]

Unfortunately there is no uniform interface for games across their time of inception (as there are with books, films, etc.). People know how to read a book, they know how to watch a film, but they have to learn how to interact with each and every new game they attempt to play. Some are very easy (pong), some are very difficult (NetHack, Dwarf Fortress, System Shock, Gothic). So difficult in fact that most modern gamers will be so frustrated by the interface that they quit after 5 minutes and turn to something else. The game may be a classic, but if the interface renders it inaccessible, it may as well not exist (for 99% of gamers).

Very good point.
As much a I like older games (and I've been playing old pre-1997 games exclusively for the past 4-5 years), the greatest obstacle in enjoying those I haven't played before is learning them; first how to install them properly and then learn the interface. You don't need manuals to enjoy books or movies.

Incidentally, it's very telling how even most of the commenters on GamaSutra can't bring themselves to play ancient games from the '80s.

 

[Zeriel]

Unfortunately there is no uniform interface for games across their time of inception (as there are with books, films, etc.). People know how to read a book, they know how to watch a film, but they have to learn how to interact with each and every new game they attempt to play. Some are very easy (pong), some are very difficult (NetHack, Dwarf Fortress, System Shock, Gothic). So difficult in fact that most modern gamers will be so frustrated by the interface that they quit after 5 minutes and turn to something else. The game may be a classic, but if the interface renders it inaccessible, it may as well not exist (for 99% of gamers).

Very good point.
As much a I like older games (and I've been playing old pre-1997 games exclusively for the past 4-5 years), the greatest obstacle in enjoying those I haven't played before is learning them; first how to install them properly and then learn the interface. You don't need manuals to enjoy books or movies.

Incidentally, it's very telling how even most of the commenters on GamaSutra can't bring themselves to play ancient games from the '80s.

I think the tech problem is much more important than the interface one. While a lot of games can be run on Dosbox, some take quite a bit of configuring to get to that point, and even when they do run like a charm in Dosbox, there's the visual factor. Most 2D games from years ago look like garbage on non-CRT monitors. Your average cheapo LCD just doesn't look very good rendering non-3D stuff that has a lot of movement.

 

[TheGreatOne]

There is a huge effort to restore movie classics that are found in some backwater archive (e.g. Metropolis), and the certain loss of many defining movies from the early era is widely mourned, yet the same thing is happening to games, and (except for some enthusiasts), nothing is done about it. In fact it is getting much worse, with games working only as long as the company server exists. Yet nobody cares.

GOG
PSN+XBLA+Wii U virtual console
Compilation discs of arcade games and publisher/developers' previous work (like collections of old Sega games being sold for modern consoles)
Dedicated retro game stores, conventions and sites like eBay for purchasing old games globally
Fan made reproductions of games that are rare and expensive. Enthusiasts have also started building and selling flash carts for old computers and consoles as well as making new clone consoles and arcade cabs for playing old games (Retron 5 etc)

On top of that there are all the ROM sites which are the most crucial since they often have almost all/all games released for each platform + dosbox, mame and all the free emulators floating around. Though certain things can't be properly emulated (so far) and in the case old computer games some times you have to fiddle around with settings alot before you get the games to actually play.

In other words:

In all history, it has never been this easy for us to access quality content, and for cheap or even for free thanks to the public domain, yet, given the choice, most people willfully chose to consume crap