Who keeps posting that shitty blog?

Reject_666_6 · Aug 6, 2011

This one: http://insomnia.ac/commentary/on_value_for_money/

I've seen it linked here a few times, mostly for the artfag article, and now I read a Wyrmlord post referencing it. What the fuck, people actually take this guy's opinions seriously? Why?

I've been reading it over the past few days, and the derp to good points ratio is way too high for me. He dedicated an article to pointing out why you should refer to Jap games by their Jap names, using the dumbest of faulty logic, as if the premise of the article wasn't enough to nominate him for the Darwin awards. In the article on game pricing, which the link itself was pointing to, I swear he's gotta be trolling. No sane man should use the argument "You can't say Horse Armour was an expensive piece of shit because for Bill Gates it's almost nothing!" and not get branded as a knuckle-dragging barbarian.

Worst of all, his articles on cRPGs would make mondblut cry. His stance is essentially PnP forever, emulate PnP or die! They'd probably make Holy Trinity™ fans rage a little as well. In fact, the ridiculousness reaches new heights when he lets slip that he thinks the best cRPG is Deus Ex, of all things (never mind that this contradicts pretty much everything he had been saying about what makes a cRPG good). It's actually obvious to me now how Wyrmlord, the biggest Deus Ex fanboy to ever grace this cesspool with his presence, would immediately take a liking to the guy.

The original reason this was even posted was the artfag article, which can be summarised with the sentence, "I think art refers to any creative work that is good.". There's nothing wrong with that opinion, it's common and somewhat relateable, but writing a long-ass article for it is pointless.

So, does a challenger appear?

Excidium · Aug 6, 2011

I doubt anyone read all that shit.

BLOBERT · Aug 6, 2011

BRO THAT GUY WOULD FIT IN RIGHT HERE

HE IS LIKE SKYWAY WITH A CLEVE SIZED EGO

SCO · Aug 7, 2011

He wrote cave story is shit.

He's shit.

Trash · Aug 7, 2011

No, he thought it was brilliant. He however couldn't say so out loud because he's too much of a self absorbed assburger. Therefore he wrote a lenghty thesis on why he cannot think it to be brilliant. Pathetic.

Wyrmlord · Aug 7, 2011

I...didn't even read that blog...save for one Sim City review...which I thought was tediously written.

I took a liking to this guy? I didn't like his bad writing style at all. I don't even think Deus Ex was a RPG, although it was a great game.

I think I just agreed with Drog, who agreed with him on a particular thing I don't remember.

Awkward enough that you flatter me and denigrate others by saying that I "grace this cesspool with [my] presence". RPGCodex is not a cesspool, and my presence does not grace it. Ugh.

Konjad · Aug 7, 2011

the only real cesspool i know is rpgwatch. avoid that terrible place

Reject_666_6 · Aug 7, 2011

Wyrmlord said:
I think I just agreed with Drog, who agreed with him on a particular thing I don't remember.

You quoted the "moviewatch, bookread, etc" strawman that appears in one of the articles. The grace thing was sarcastic. Nothing against you personally, but I do remember you being a DX fanboy.

SuicideBunny · Aug 7, 2011

Reject_666_6 said:
Who keeps posting that shitty blog?

you just did.

SoupNazi · Aug 7, 2011

it's basically a one-man Codex show.

Excommunicator · Aug 7, 2011

SoupNazi said:
it's basically a one-man Codex show.

Minus the entertainment value.

Icewater · Aug 7, 2011

I don't know OP, why are you posting that shitty blog?

Metro · Aug 7, 2011

SuicideBunny said:
Reject_666_6 said:

Who keeps posting that shitty blog?

Click to expand...

you just did.

Mangoose · Aug 7, 2011

Icewater said:
I don't know OP, why are you posting that shitty blog?

mr.doo · Aug 8, 2011

Some people go as far as claim it's a "art-games site that exhibits a high level of knowledge of gaming".

Wyrmlord · Aug 8, 2011

Reject_666_6 said:
Wyrmlord said:

I think I just agreed with Drog, who agreed with him on a particular thing I don't remember.

Click to expand...

You quoted the "moviewatch, bookread, etc" strawman that appears in one of the articles. The grace thing was sarcastic. Nothing against you personally, but I do remember you being a DX fanboy.

We both stole the moviewatch/bookread argument from somebody else, who probably stole it from someone else. It was from the personal site of some game journalist, for me. Not the Insomnia blog.

(It is possible that the Insomnia man did not steal it, but came up with it independently. I don't know)

However, it's a good argument. The word gameplay is devoid of meaning, but is thrown around needlessly. Just like the language of some Indian journalists, who never stop using the word neoliberal to describe everything ("This soup is too hot! Neoliberalism! I have to pay tolls at highways! Neoliberalism"), gameplay is just a word used because it is used.

Ultimately, gameplay probably means everything that involves the actual game and not the needless fluff. If that is so, the fact that you made a word for it means that you take the idea of a game that actually have to play for granted! It means you have paid so much attention to the needless fluff, that the part about playing the game is a whole new thing for you.

For me, there is only one criteria, a subjective one. Either I enjoy a game. Or I don't.

Serious_Business · Aug 8, 2011

I was about to read some of this and try to defend it just for the sake of defending the underdog agaisnt the mob mentality on this thread, but then this is the first thing that happened :

As some readers may have gathered, one of my goals with this website is to clear up a number of grave misunderstandings in the field of electronic games, so that we can then begin to build a body of criticism based on solid principles.

This guy must be English, right? Solid principles, how about that

Seymour · Aug 8, 2011

Wyrmlord said:
However, it's a good argument

It's really not. Don't literature critics constantly refer to the "writing" in a book? Yet I don't see Zirbas shrieking like a hysterical "fagot" that books are comprised solely of writing, which is certainly truer than saying games are comprised only of gameplay. His "bookread" strawman might sound amusing enough, but it is exactly the kind of distinction literary criticism makes.

While it might be a very broad term, basically encompassing all game mechanics, "gameplay" still separates them from other aspects of videogames, like graphics, sound, story (which could also be said to be useless terms by his logic, since "graphics" includes art style, resolution etc). The fact that gaming journalists misuse it, thinking it's enough to say some game has "good gameplay" instead of properly analizing its mechanics, makes no difference at all, especially since his alternative ("this is a good game/book/movie") makes for an even more useless blanket statement.

MetalCraze · Aug 8, 2011

So much butthurt over some bloggy by the elite gentlemen ITT.

Guess the blog really is doing what it was made for.

Reject_666_6 · Aug 8, 2011

Wyrmlord said:
However, it's a good argument.

I wouldn't say so. Games incorporate more elements from other types of media than films or books. When you watch a movie, that's all you do, pretty much. But when you play a game, you're not always playing it in the full sense of the word. You could be watching a cutscene, reading some exposition, listening to audio tapes like in SS2, or I guess you could be distracted by the scenery, in general these are things that you don't interact with. Words like moviewatch and stuff are unnecessary because those are more or less singular activities. You can discuss cinematography, ambience, acting, but those are all things you watch anyway.

When somebody mentions gameplay, I understand it to mean all of its mechanics and how they work together, as opposed to all of the non-game mechanics I mentioned above. It's an umbrella term, but umbrella terms have a purpose too. When you go into detail you wouldn't use the word gameplay, but when you want to discuss all of the game's mechanics as a whole, you wouldn't use the words level design either. When you refer to the game as a whole, you include all of the above frills, so saying gameplay isn't the same thing as saying game.

Wyrmlord · Aug 8, 2011

People always keep coming up with these abstract concepts, in order to keep giving an additional nuance to what they liked or did not like about a movie, a book, a game, or anything. Gamespot's reviews have had a Value category, which describes how many hours you can get out of a game per dollar price spent, as well as amount of replay value.

This is really just pulling your hair out to find new arbitrary categories on which to judge games. "We give the game 6 for its innovative but flawed Gameplay, but a 10 for Value, since it has ten very different possible playthroughs with a 100 hours each, just for a $10 pricetag."

I actually don't get the point. After admitting that there are game-breaking exploits and unbalanced mechanics (more or less what they mean by Gameplay), they say the game still has 1000 hours for just ten dollars, so it is highly Valued. Why would they spend 1000 hours on a game that they feel is broken? Did they mean that they still enjoyed the game? If so, does it matter that there are game-breaking exploits? Why won't they just get to the point? Did they or did they not like the game?

The truth is: these reviewers are too afraid to be honest and unwilling to simply summarise their impressions with a single statement: "I believe the reader will most likely enjoy/not enjoy the game." Instead, they beat about the bush with these arbitrary categories, arbitrary numerical systems, and arbitrary calculations. How much simpler it is to stick to a binary Like/Dislike?

My opinion is that 'Gameplay' was concocted precisely for such bush-beating.

Icewater · Aug 8, 2011

Wyrmlord said:
How much simpler it is to stick to a binary Like/Dislike?

Not everyone is going to like everything you like. Reviewers are supposed to be objective, not just give their opinion.

Wyrmlord · Aug 8, 2011

It's just a videogame, there is no objectivity involved here.

Why do some people act like videogame reviews are some scientific analysis? Games are just a light hobby to pass your time, not a serious pursuit. And game reviews are just promotional activity for new products released for this easygoing, uncerebral activity.

Awor Szurkrarz · Aug 8, 2011

I think the main problem with review scores is that they are a replacement of proper description.
When I used to read a review in a gaming magazine, after reading I had no idea what the game would be like, thus I'd have to risk spending a very high amount of money blindly, unless there was a demo.

Excommunicator · Aug 8, 2011

Wyrmlord, you seem quite intelligent on some things and yet very dull on other things. This is one of the latter things.

You sound afraid and offended that there could be something more than a completely arbitrary 'like/dislike' in a product like a game. Why is that? Does your own taste in games continually disappoint your more intellectual self?

The truth of the matter is, not all opinions are born equal. That is an undeniable fact, and it follows from that, that more would be expected from professionals who make their living from trying to inform people about the qualities of a game. The moment you trying to disqualify every attempt at analysis is the moment you lose all means to maintain a standard for it.

As for this whole "Gameplay" thing, he is right in the sense that most of the time, the word can be substituted for another, but that is quite beside the point. That is like saying there should be no words that have similar meanings in order to avoid redundancy. I use the term occasionally as a kind of umbrella term for mechanics and the sequence of play together, and I think it does fine for that use. If two people can use that term and have enough of a shared understanding to still be able to communicate, then that's all that matters. Not all words need to be technical constructions, and this is one of those words that really isn't, which you, Wyrmlord, have already acknowledged when you say it was concocted as a term of journalistic criticism. I mean, otherwise it would be very hypocritical of you to argue that reviews should be entirely about like/dislike whilst trying to assert your opinion that 'gameplay' isn't a technical enough term, wouldn't it?

And that last bundle of snide self-important remarks at the end just cover up any validity of opinion you might have on reviewers, when you are here on an internet forum trying to have a serious discussion about how non-serious the topic is.

PorkaMorka · Aug 8, 2011

Wyrmlord said:
The truth is: these reviewers are too afraid to be honest and unwilling to simply summarise their impressions with a single statement: "I believe the reader will most likely enjoy/not enjoy the game." Instead, they beat about the bush with these arbitrary categories, arbitrary numerical systems, and arbitrary calculations. How much simpler it is to stick to a binary Like/Dislike?

The point of all that added detail is to help the reader figure out whether he will like the game or not. Take the example you mentioned: Some people can tolerate systems with a few broken mechanics while others will find that the existence of broken mechanics ruins the fun for them.

It's pretty much useless to hear if the reviewer enjoyed the game or not. For any piece of media there are some people who will enjoy it and some people who will not. Even if the game is high quality by most standards, that is by no means a guarantee that an individual reader will enjoy it.

The reviewer can't say "You will enjoy Starcraft", some people just don't like that kind of game. Instead he needs to provide you with information and impressions to help you decide for yourself if you will enjoy it.

Wyrmlord said:
My opinion is that 'Gameplay' was concocted precisely for such bush-beating.

What alternative pre-existing term would you use in order to discuss the way that the player interacts with the game system and interacts with the challenges the game provides?

"Game mechanics" doesn't mean the same thing as "gameplay", they're similar concepts but by no means identical.

If anything, the relevance of the term "gameplay" has increased as video games rely more and more on non game elements for their success.

IE: You can have a 30 million dollar "game" with "gameplay" that is simpler and shallower than stuff from 10 years ago.

Who keeps posting that shitty blog?

Arcane

P. banal

FUCKING SLAYINGN IT BROS

Arcane

Pointing and laughing.

Arcane

⛏

Arcane

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SoupNazi

Guest

Arcane

Artisanal Shitposting™

Arcane

Arcane

Educated

Arcane

Best Poster on the Codex

Liturgist

Arcane

Arcane

Arcane

Artisanal Shitposting™

Arcane

Arcane

Arcane

Arcane

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