Kieran_ES

Games are at a transitional point, one that will go on for a while, from copying film for narrative to using the game as narrative (yes, I realise that games have previously done this, but I mean as a conscious, holistic movement). The problem with this is that, in regards to issues like rape, race, misogyny, etc, game writers/designers have to think a lot more about how their medium is best suited to talking about the issue. If they're stuck in the mindset of copying film, then the dissonance of placing that in the context of a game almost always causes problems. Similarly, even if you're thinking of narrative in terms of a game's inherent rules (as Journey does for instance) then you still have to essentially start with no reference point of how to do that - since you're working in a very new medium. Evoking emotion in a player is, I would argue, much easier in a game than in comparative mediums. It's how you do that, and how you approach that sensitively, that determines whether the designer is successful in trying to engage with one of these 'mature' concepts.

It's absolutely possible, it's just very hard at the moment. No-one who just tries to take something they saw in a film or a book and place it in a game is going to be successful, so the work needed to be successful is entirely new ground. What we're seeing at the moment is the very early experimentation in that. Yeah, people will screw up but that is part of the process. Plenty of great work is being done on the edges of mainstream industry games, a lot of which is more and more being picked up by big sites and really put on display.

(Edit: oh and I think that tapping into much broader, rawer emotions is where mechanics driven narrative should be going. Big strokes of emotion, immediacy, direct placement alongside those feelings, are the current strengths of the medium. See Journey, Day Z, XCOM, Cart Life, Gone Home)

http://steamcommunity.com/id/kieran_es/

1. Mark of the Ninja
2. Hotline Miami
3. Superbrothers: Sword and Sworcery EP
4. THQ Humble Indie Bundle
5. Torchlight 2
6. Elder Scrolls IV
7. Civilization V
8. Home
9. Broken Sword Trilogy
10. The Tiny Bang Story

Thanks for doing this. We have an amazing community.

I'd love to see you write about what playing, and reviewing, hundreds of terrible games does to your perception of games in general - especially in comparison to the average player. This has been superficially discussed, but it would interesting to really go into it.

Day 1. Take a chicken. Rub in olive oil, salt and pepper. Stuff some rosemary and thyme in the cavity. Put it in an oven. Cook for 1h 20. Halfway through, baste. (depending on size).

Day 2. Take rice. Put in pan. Cover in water. Bring to a boil, then simmer (covered) until done. Use spare chicken and veg.

Day 3. Take chicken carcass. Put in pot, cover in water. Bring to boil, simmer for 2 hours. Throw in veg, blah blah and you have stock. Use stock to make soup.

Seriously though, cheap cooking is easy if you're economical about what you buy and how you use it. Make full use of everything (as above), plan your week out in advance if you can.

From the list, it seems like they get it. At least superficially.

Everyone interested in games should be listening to Idle Thumbs. Some of the best criticism in the industry happens there.

Oh and My Brother, My Brother and Me.

So Julian Gollop is remaking his 1985 ZX Spectrum classic Chaos.

https://twitter.com/julian_gollop/status/264373422216314880

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/11/02/x-com-co-creator-julian-gollop-making-chaos-sequel/

This is pretty exciting. For those who don't know, Julian Gollop is one of the Gollop siblings who made the original X-COM and Laser Squad.

Chaos was a turn based strategy game which is now considered to be the genesis of some of what we saw in X-COM, as well as a really fun game in its own right. Gollop has been low key since the 90s, so this is pretty interesting stuff.

Pathologic.

Edit: From Quintin Smith's 'Butchering Pathologic' series.

The point is that Pathologic fearlessly wields desperation, brutality, hopelessness, exhaustion, cruelty, even ignorance and pain, and, if you can stomach it, the result is phenomenal.

Pathologic could not ever be described as fun. Tramping back and forth across town, trying to stem the torrent of deaths while aching to know what’s going on /is not fun./ This is not a game. There isn’t a word for it really, which is probably why the developers, Ice-pick Lodge, call Pathologic “an exercise in decision making” on their translated English website.

and

But this happened all the time. My favourite was on day 9, some 20 hours into the game, when the same friend started talking about how he couldn’t play on for much longer. He said that if things didn’t resolve themselves soon he’d give up. He was so tired, he said.

The next day my character went to see the Bachelor to discuss some findings, and I found a man overcome with exhaustion. The Bachelor said that if we couldn’t discover the truth about this disease soon he was going to shoot himself rather than let the illness kill him.

This is what Pathologic does. It creates an interesting, desperate situation and brooks no compromise in letting you experience it. And in unflinchingly making you suffer, you identify with these characters you control to the point of becoming them.

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/tag/butchering-pathologic/

I somewhat agree. Not most important, but very important for a number of reasons. Not just the approach to violence either.

HLM is a game that holds two distinct, competing ideas in its mind. The indictment of violence's pervasive place in the medium, and the gleeful concession that violence is fun. It lets those two ideas go at it.

But the game is mostly about flow. What it's brilliant at is in that flow. Violence plays a large role in that as well.

@SexVicar: I hear otherwise about requirements. The 2:1 Journalism and ethics module seem necessary for straight news reporters, but features and anything outside of news is far looser at this point. That's just what I hear as a student, so obviously I cede to you. The point is that what most of these people do isn't news, it's more of an equivalent to features, editorials etc. I would be happy if those in the industry just doing critical work and features had common sense and some sort of basic understanding of media ethics. They don't need a full degree, but what they're displaying here just isn't enough.

An industry wide, certified course on ethics offered by every site or mag that wanted to be reputable would be great. Impossible to set that up at this point though.

Anyone in a dedicated news position (not reposting from press releases, which is a related problem, but actual news and reporting) should have formal education in journalism though, ideally.