kamolahy

@icemael: The rhetorical flexing is half the fun.

When we did "Boss Fights are Dead" we found that one side tried to redefine a "Boss Fight" over and over. That tends to weaken an argument, however, as it appears to be a deflection of the most clear representation of the concept.

Often in high level debates, they leave the terms open for proper interpretation as it doesn't serve the debaters too much to try and flex and bend the wording in the long run.

So I run this Games Debate Club out in NYC (we're actually having a live debate this Wednesday for those of you NY'ers who might want to hang out) all based on an Oxford style debate format. For those of you not familiar, there is a motion and 2 panels that argue either for or against the motion. The simple point is to be the most persuasive. This is scored by taking audience votes before and after the debate on what their opinion is based on the arguments of the debaters. Last one we did was "Boss Fights are Dead" and, surprisingly, the argument for the motion won handily.

This week we're doing "Local Multiplayer is the Purest Form of Multiplayer Gaming". Every time I've presented the argument, it's already proven to be a divisive debate.

I figured these debates would be good to bring online and see where people go with it. So, what do you guys think?

Side note: The debate is all about the sport of persuasion. We've had debaters that argue a side of the motion that may not actually be their proper opinion, but they're able to present intelligent points that win them the debate.

I think about how Minecraft put you in the middle of an unknown landscape with a simple task and open palette. The result has been tremendous. What other games have played with the idea of "beginning" in a way that was innovative, inspired or memorable?

@believer258: Golden. Just realized there was a separate forum for that.

It's not lost on me how great this game is. I love so much about it, and have managed to get through a good deal of the game twice, but still have yet to beat it.

However, this game severely stresses me out for one reason. I can't quite figure out how frequently I should be going into the dungeon to fight. I feel all this pressure to build my social links and study, but I'm also nervous that I should be going around in the dungeons like every few days. I haven't figured out any way to gauge how frequently I'm supposed to spend time there knowing that there's a lot you miss if you don't handle things right outside...

Is there some kind of general guideline that I missed as far as choosing what to do with my time? I don't like using walkthroughs.

A few good analog rounds of Settlers of Catan are perfect for the holidays.

I love to see enthusiastic early adopters. Partially to give life to a system, and partially to make it easy for me to sit back and watch while the kinks get ironed out and I can jump on later.

I'd let it die and pour money into R&D on a HD handheld that could beam to TV... take down the Vita with rockin library. An HD Nintendo console that was built to be portable but could look great on your big screen via stream or something.

Play on PC, catch up on backlog.

Look on the bright side... no one you know will know just how much time you're blowing on yer vidya games.