Ravey

A definition of agency would be useful... here's mine:Agency is when someone is trying to make something happen.A longer definition:The player/designer/character has control over their own decisions a...

@cyberbloke: The issues you raise about difficulty and unpredictability seem like the result of bad game design to me—players should have frequent opportunities to fail as well as frequent chances to ...

@nutter: Yeah, most players loved Doom; it was an astonishing guilty pleasure. I just mean that Doom wasn't exactly a satisfying or complete image of the future of games. It wasn't what people wanted ...

I think a game is no longer underrated once it develops an audience in the current market, and its unique qualities and genius matches fan's reverence for it.The original Doom was underrated for a tim...

I hear you, Clint.It's hard for me to play a game unless I'm already convinced that I'll get something out of it. And when a game isn't meeting you halfway, it can be very frustrating.I think pacing i...

@onemanarmyy: That's fair. I think the feminist humour is a bit on the nose, but I can appreciate the contrast between the stupidity and rashness of a lot of the henchmen, and the occasional shrewdnes...

I don't think the NOLF games are good. Good concept, poor execution.But I love that 2000 was a year of first-person, action-adventure games with female protagonists. I liked the subtlety of Medal of H...

@arbitrarywater: Very sad and unfortunate; I would love to play a decent Underworld-style game!Wishing them all the best in this troubling time.

Appologies if I don't address your questions directly and the arguments below are unclear, you raised a lot of good questions.I agree that fun isn't about making players feel good; at least not entire...

Didn't get around to GoldenEye until 2000 and I was already playing shooters on PC. The singleplayer still has a special place in my heart :-) That game made me realise that tactical shooters didn't h...

@thebalch: You're welcome :-) I hope you find games that work for you.Incidentally, GoldenEye would've been perfect: left hand was used for aiming, shooting and moving, and you could get through 99% o...

+1 for the original Doom, +1 for mouse & keyboard if possible.Half-Life 2 is a great teaching game.You'll need to find a group to play with, but you might like Sub Rosa (you can download it here)....

@flashflood_29: @retris: That was pretty much the vibe of early "shooters" like Wolfenstein 3D, Doom and SEAL Team. For a while there after, it seemed like a lot of violent games were designed to be n...