The "General Games Chat" forum, which includes Retro Game Reviews, has been archived and is now read-only. You cannot post here or create a new thread or review on this forum.
Right, my thought for the day is this: for a game to be truly brilliant it has to tweak your emotions. I don't just mean the cheesy RPG device of killing off your entire family in the first cut-scene, because frankly I could care less. But a game that makes you FEEL without telling you to do so is something else.
Obviously there is a whole spectrum of emotions that video-gaming can cause. There's the pedestrian ones: being scared of Silent Hill; the thirst for revenge of Max Payne; curiosity as to what your next secret costume will be in Tekken. But I'm interested in the big ones: love and hate.
Only the best - and worst - designed videogames manage to inspire hatred of your opponents. Two examples of this are enough:
(1) The brilliant MarioKart. Playing this game on 150cc can seriously up your blood pressure. And when you're pipped at the post in the deciding race, a volley of heartfelt curses gets directed at that damnable monkey. It's always the monkey: I hate him
(2) The flawed Streetfighter 2 on Super Nintendo. This otherwise fantastic game was marred by serious imbalances in character strengths. I don't mind admitting that being defeated by the outrageously powerful Vega for the millionth billionth time almost led to the old SNES commiting what we might call 'assisted suicide' out of my bedroom window. The anguish that game caused me...
I'll post my experiences of love and computer games tomorrow. In the meantime what highs and lows of emotion has gaming pushed others to?
Obviously there is a whole spectrum of emotions that video-gaming can cause. There's the pedestrian ones: being scared of Silent Hill; the thirst for revenge of Max Payne; curiosity as to what your next secret costume will be in Tekken. But I'm interested in the big ones: love and hate.
Only the best - and worst - designed videogames manage to inspire hatred of your opponents. Two examples of this are enough:
(1) The brilliant MarioKart. Playing this game on 150cc can seriously up your blood pressure. And when you're pipped at the post in the deciding race, a volley of heartfelt curses gets directed at that damnable monkey. It's always the monkey: I hate him
(2) The flawed Streetfighter 2 on Super Nintendo. This otherwise fantastic game was marred by serious imbalances in character strengths. I don't mind admitting that being defeated by the outrageously powerful Vega for the millionth billionth time almost led to the old SNES commiting what we might call 'assisted suicide' out of my bedroom window. The anguish that game caused me...
I'll post my experiences of love and computer games tomorrow. In the meantime what highs and lows of emotion has gaming pushed others to?
Page:
Generally, for a short post to win GAD, it has to be really really funny i.e. Happy's Rock crashing one.
Sorry mate, I wasn't saying "Oi! No!", I was just surprised is all, but I have a habit of not wording things too well.
Well done and I certainly don't begrudge anyone anything, life's too short.
Just....y'know....
Well done and I certainly don't begrudge anyone anything, life's too short.
Just....y'know....
Goatboy wrote:
>What did it say? "I like games to have emotion. Mario >Kart and Streetfighter caused emotion in me. That's all >folks!" It was a nice read, bit short and didn't say >anything at all about what constitutes emotion etc and it
>wins?
To be fair I was shocked that this won as well. I only looked at the winner's list out of curiousity, not expectation. Whenever I've written reviews I've thought they had GAD potential and so I've always looked at the list with my fingers crossed. But I was really just interested to know what sort of stuff WAS winning when I logged on today. Nice surprise all the same.
The real reason I wrote it was because I've only just registered and wanted to make my own contribution. I actually think I've written better stuff on other people's threads (your's included); some topics I wrote on were started by new arrivals, which I think have a tendency to get overlooked by established members. It wouldn't be fair if I won for discussing something someone else brought up, so maybe this was just a recognition that I've made a decent start in the forum. Nice surprise, anyway.
I'm not taking offence, but I think your specific criticisms were a bit harsh. I don't think there is a post in the forum that couldn't be reduced to a single sentence and made to sound frivolous. And do I really have to explain what emotions are? We're not robots: emotions are what make us human and we all know what they feel like.
Still, maybe I didn't make the post clear. I specifically wasn't talking about empathising with other characters or sobbing away at some hackneyed plot. I was talking about strong emotions being called up external to the game: something that doesn't happen very often. If an average game keeps killing you off, you'll probably think 'sod it, I'll go to bed.' If it happens with a brilliant game, then you'll keep plugging away but become gradually more enraged at what/whoever is shooting or beating you - in other words you're totally immersed. If you're losing because of some design flaw then your anger will eventually get transferred to something else (usually the joypad, I find) and you end up un-immersed but still raging.
If you didn't think it was up to much at the time, then maybe you should have contributed something yourself - telling us what emotion is or whatever.
Anyway, I'm glad and surprised to have won, and I certainly hope I won't begrudge anyone their victories in the future.
>What did it say? "I like games to have emotion. Mario >Kart and Streetfighter caused emotion in me. That's all >folks!" It was a nice read, bit short and didn't say >anything at all about what constitutes emotion etc and it
>wins?
To be fair I was shocked that this won as well. I only looked at the winner's list out of curiousity, not expectation. Whenever I've written reviews I've thought they had GAD potential and so I've always looked at the list with my fingers crossed. But I was really just interested to know what sort of stuff WAS winning when I logged on today. Nice surprise all the same.
The real reason I wrote it was because I've only just registered and wanted to make my own contribution. I actually think I've written better stuff on other people's threads (your's included); some topics I wrote on were started by new arrivals, which I think have a tendency to get overlooked by established members. It wouldn't be fair if I won for discussing something someone else brought up, so maybe this was just a recognition that I've made a decent start in the forum. Nice surprise, anyway.
I'm not taking offence, but I think your specific criticisms were a bit harsh. I don't think there is a post in the forum that couldn't be reduced to a single sentence and made to sound frivolous. And do I really have to explain what emotions are? We're not robots: emotions are what make us human and we all know what they feel like.
Still, maybe I didn't make the post clear. I specifically wasn't talking about empathising with other characters or sobbing away at some hackneyed plot. I was talking about strong emotions being called up external to the game: something that doesn't happen very often. If an average game keeps killing you off, you'll probably think 'sod it, I'll go to bed.' If it happens with a brilliant game, then you'll keep plugging away but become gradually more enraged at what/whoever is shooting or beating you - in other words you're totally immersed. If you're losing because of some design flaw then your anger will eventually get transferred to something else (usually the joypad, I find) and you end up un-immersed but still raging.
If you didn't think it was up to much at the time, then maybe you should have contributed something yourself - telling us what emotion is or whatever.
Anyway, I'm glad and surprised to have won, and I certainly hope I won't begrudge anyone their victories in the future.
Yeah, It does seem odd that this post wins GAD, fair enough it was a good post but not really up with the standards of the usual winners. To me there were other posts that deserved it more. No offence unknown kernel but i am being honest, you do write good stuff but In my vies this isn't the best of that day.
Hmmm...i thought my emotional gaming post in prime a few weeks ago was better (at least i actually talked about emotion i.e empathising with characters and enjoyment of good immersive stories etc.
Well, never mind you can't always win i guess.
Well, never mind you can't always win i guess.
Oh I'm aware of that.
And I expect to get some hassle for saying what I think, but come on.....
And I expect to get some hassle for saying what I think, but come on.....
I agree with you a little there goatboy. I'm not sure if the staff got mixed up with his other post as I think it was better than this one. Who knows?
It ain't up to us anyway.
It ain't up to us anyway.
Um, someone has to say it so it might as well be me.
No offence to be taken here:
But how the hell did this win GAD?
And I'm not for 1 second suggesting "Oh it should have been me", but come on, read it.
What did it say?
"I like games to have emotion. Mario Kart and Streetfighter caused emotion in me. That's all folks!"
It was a nice read, bit short and didn't say anything at all about what constitutes emotion etc and it wins?
Ooookay, something's missing in my head, because to me, this was a decidely....well...dull post.
Don't take unknown kernel, this isn't me saying "You suck!", this is me saying "What the hell is going on here?"
Still, congrats.
*shakes head amusedly*
No offence to be taken here:
But how the hell did this win GAD?
And I'm not for 1 second suggesting "Oh it should have been me", but come on, read it.
What did it say?
"I like games to have emotion. Mario Kart and Streetfighter caused emotion in me. That's all folks!"
It was a nice read, bit short and didn't say anything at all about what constitutes emotion etc and it wins?
Ooookay, something's missing in my head, because to me, this was a decidely....well...dull post.
Don't take unknown kernel, this isn't me saying "You suck!", this is me saying "What the hell is going on here?"
Still, congrats.
*shakes head amusedly*
That's 2 GADs in 2 days for you I think, and 2 in 8 overall.
Well done!
Well done!
Thank you, thank you, thank you. Well it's been a tough trip but an enjoyable one, and here I stand with two GADs to show for it. What a shame the competition isn't called Console-a-Day and then I could get a Gamecube and...another Gamecube. Special Reserve: what cheapskates ; )
Just my little joke lads - don't bar me from the competition.
I said at the end of that post I'd talk about love and videogames. Basically it was all about how much I fancied Nel from Advance Wars. Now that lots more people have read the post, I'm kind of glad I didn't say anything.
Still, if there was any justice in the world then this post wouldn't have won: my post-modern classic 'shortest future of gaming thread' would have got the prize instead. Ah well, shouldn't complain I suppose...
Just my little joke lads - don't bar me from the competition.
I said at the end of that post I'd talk about love and videogames. Basically it was all about how much I fancied Nel from Advance Wars. Now that lots more people have read the post, I'm kind of glad I didn't say anything.
Still, if there was any justice in the world then this post wouldn't have won: my post-modern classic 'shortest future of gaming thread' would have got the prize instead. Ah well, shouldn't complain I suppose...
Page: