"Against the cult of simplicity" - Craig Stern on how the indie clique hates complex games

[Tehdagah]

There was more care, thought, and dedication put into designing the gameplay in one section of Metal Gear Solid 3, a game frequently criticized for being a 'movie' by alot of people these days, than a majority of modern games out there.

I remember myself fighting a lot against MGS3's controls and camera. Konami should've put more care, thought and dedication into this.

 

[jcd]

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[Jick Magger]

There was more care, thought, and dedication put into designing the gameplay in one section of Metal Gear Solid 3, a game frequently criticized for being a 'movie' by alot of people these days, than a majority of modern games out there.

I remember myself fighting a lot against MGS3's controls and camera. Konami should've put more care, thought and dedication into this.

Didya play Subsistence? Never had a problem with that version's camera.

As for controls, eh, I never had too much of a problem with them, though the various crouching stances were admittedly a bit cumbersome.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

You should ignore people like jcd that don't understand what makes a game good. They have their limited scope of what's 'good', but lack the experience (and truthfully, exposure) when it comes to determining a game's actual merit. It's a bit like when gaming journalists proclaim Braid art when it's really a shit game. Or when the Codex RPG-veterans, so focused on one dimension of video games, callsDiablo 3 a bad game when it's actually a well-crafted experience.

Dark Souls is grindy and fairly repetitive. I know there are people who do not need to grind at all, but they are mostly players that know the game like the back of their hand, and can do whatever they want. New players, for example, have no chance against foes like the bridge wyvern, and must either resort to dumb, borderline glitchy tactics, like shooting the monster from some unreachable position, which turns the game into a tedious chore, or skip entire sections of the game in hopes of getting better gear/stats later.

In a typical first time playthrough, you will have to beat the same levels over and over again, and slay the same enemies that you've slain tens of times before, often in the same way as before. After a while it becomes a chore and not entertainment at all. Where is that merit you speak of? Is it in incredible repetitiveness? Is it in lack of valid tactical options (sure, there are lots to choose from, but anything that doesn't revolve around jumping and rolling all over the place or hiding behind your shield 95% of the time will get you killed in 3 seconds flat)?

There is literally no point in killing Bridge Wyvern. It's long, tedious and gives you weapon that just allows you to forget about itemization till Anor Londo, it was obviously meant to be a secret for dedicated players, not something everyone have to do on his first play-through. I finished the game and never killed it. The grinding is half-true. The game puts the same enemies but in different tactical positions so you usually have to be on your toes, on the other hand getting to the boss, getting killed and having to go through the same boring area to challenge him again. It was supposed to be 'hardcore' but it's just tedious busywork. It's even worse if you get nauseated from all the boringness and accidentally fall from some ledge, or if someone invades you with his powerful gear.

 

[jcd]

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[Gangrelrumbler]

They spawn in the exact same spots and you end up going through the same locations killing the same enemies by making the same motions with the analog sticks and pressing the same buttons at the exact same moment. After you figure out how to deal with a particular type of an enemy, the challenge vanishes.

I've meant new encounters, the ones you haven't seem. Yes getting to the place you've been after getting killed it bullshit, and the only challenge is figuring out the quickest way to deal with them.

 

[Karellen]

They spawn in the exact same spots and you end up going through the same locations killing the same enemies by making the same motions with the analog sticks and pressing the same buttons at the exact same moment. After you figure out how to deal with a particular type of an enemy, the challenge vanishes.

I've meant new encounters, the ones you haven't seem. Yes getting to the place you've been after getting killed it bullshit, and the only challenge is figuring out the quickest way to deal with them.

How fitting that in a thread decrying the simplification of games people decry basic elements of the RPG genre! The repetition in Dark Souls isn't perfectly implemented by any means, but that doesn't mean it's not there for a reason. First of all, in a strategic sense, attrition is important in Dark Souls. Even enemies you've faced before will eat up your precious Estus, spells and munitions the next time you meet them. Even if you can force your way through a particular encounter, it's no good if you have no juice left for the boss fight. Early in the game it may not matter so much, but later on the variety of tactical options makes a big difference in how safely and how consistently you get through encounters.

In addition, the game is intended to test the player's staying power, not peak performance. Some people dislike that, and that's a valid opinion, but the design of Dark Souls revolves around the player's ability to make consistently good decisions and options - it's not enough that you can get through an encounter once out of five or even once in two tries, but to get through entire levels you really want to get through encounters all the time. This is essential in building tension in the game - without it Dark Souls would be very different, much like Super Mario or something becomes ridiculous if you play with save states. It's also surprisingly difficult, because players are an impatient bunch, and impatient players make mistakes. Even after you've learned to fight a particular enemy type competently, you have to weigh getting through enemies safely versus getting through quickly and stylishly, and odds are you'll die hilariously every once in a while doing something stupid.

Of course, the game could be better about this, and I really wouldn't mind if the game had variant enemy placements each time you respawn or something to mix it up a bit. Still, taking out the repetition wouldn't just make the game worse, but basically break it in its entirety, and it would be foolish to deny this. In conclusion, git gud scrub.

 

[pakoito]

And then they went and threw most of that away in Dark Souls 2.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

They spawn in the exact same spots and you end up going through the same locations killing the same enemies by making the same motions with the analog sticks and pressing the same buttons at the exact same moment. After you figure out how to deal with a particular type of an enemy, the challenge vanishes.

I've meant new encounters, the ones you haven't seem. Yes getting to the place you've been after getting killed it bullshit, and the only challenge is figuring out the quickest way to deal with them.

How fitting that in a thread decrying the simplification of games people decry basic elements of the RPG genre! The repetition in Dark Souls isn't perfectly implemented by any means, but that doesn't mean it's not there for a reason. First of all, in a strategic sense, attrition is important in Dark Souls. Even enemies you've faced before will eat up your precious Estus, spells and munitions the next time you meet them. Even if you can force your way through a particular encounter, it's no good if you have no juice left for the boss fight. Early in the game it may not matter so much, but later on the variety of tactical options makes a big difference in how safely and how consistently you get through encounters.

In addition, the game is intended to test the player's staying power, not peak performance. Some people dislike that, and that's a valid opinion, but the design of Dark Souls revolves around the player's ability to make consistently good decisions and options - it's not enough that you can get through an encounter once out of five or even once in two tries, but to get through entire levels you really want to get through encounters all the time. This is essential in building tension in the game - without it Dark Souls would be very different, much like Super Mario or something becomes ridiculous if you play with save states. It's also surprisingly difficult, because players are an impatient bunch, and impatient players make mistakes. Even after you've learned to fight a particular enemy type competently, you have to weigh getting through enemies safely versus getting through quickly and stylishly, and odds are you'll die hilariously every once in a while doing something stupid.

Of course, the game could be better about this, and I really wouldn't mind if the game had variant enemy placements each time you respawn or something to mix it up a bit. Still, taking out the repetition wouldn't just make the game worse, but basically break it in its entirety, and it would be foolish to deny this. In conclusion, git gud scrub.

I'd understand if enemies were hard, if it was really difficult to go through them every time you go through them, like levels in Megaman. Usually it's just pointless grinding through trashmobs where you fail because you are bored, not because you were lucky the first few times. I remember failing many times at biggy and smalls and going through the mobs over and over again without wasting estus, or getting hit (unless someone decided to invade). I was well beyond the point of proving my "staying power" and it just became a boring grind.

 

[jcd]

b42b6f3187c9673e928a2efc6dd455f177cdb97a50117bfbc032a40b1efe4fbbcf24bdcabc1c1e1bde2a2c23a0a9d118c423a853af799e617d339ff3bece469a1e9383c8027c7d4f30a695897cf89ab9ba19cdcbebc1d02f4455cd0c4e150559d80b3734d7537bab6a353d895ed9d1a85dc338abc45c2e44e30e9cde07bc3d55f975ac518a67cc0ee10c9af45b7dec3ff30b4547d148f6c252dc8f4ae76f209a6ec47f71609f258f7e08b2562d2f1e31632010be54502fa08c5f32f40163d30de70b692da9d705d43bf8b1aacd96c68a67b905d7ccce51822e67512eeb7b2c0c4e6d5148bd894a5e4be7b850abbd955bcddf8bf53cd5684a8c5c358b8760a617276f52a6626eb2536af144e513b20efec5021c5d7be468d019e3a5107a7ddde999c1eeed25e93147c41c8bacf7e77111d3b3a329369a155fa761f4c27744092d6ecbc475c01de23e2ed7440b5d1c0418045d2c27d578cf6592993e0afa07a679f5ea78fd95912eff97bf293710d7d272125337505827404a63422e6e3120c2e203a56cc057db9fed89f2cf81d2f0ba25fca66441a2b4d0964a0c33e7b7a0227d410c13784df8cbb767b32b6cb16a0bf5a7e762f2e53eb28fdbd732399aa2f5e99dc14f8347427ff48c08b86b6d7236eadf2341f7f9c82a53aa1c4071c38f7790e22b4ffa121408b67f84aecf5e6bfa9ccdaad573f767db8727676c17dc4718c2d143dc615c8c1ea1c8463a73b9d55367a00af2946070886aa496303f0c49c9edca4adc7b0fe5dadb7a924c0168ab72f3c8ecc66f7107a180f8b39d161e4a00d35e6669858a94be9492b4e5dae632b2b35ce97639ef0889ca281ef6bce10de0523d87ae883129db34d7456bc94f6e26305552d34d27d2bed8b3241ec0a0b9acd4331cc23fd39f7573eed17f6e18634e79e15e02ee0268d54465d0195760b27f9b3e2c2d1b7419a5d3983d50653a7e502ce739c7a3578cbdcf32355a3d6aaab15f1e13e96a3180af47f38e31026df7f6987521b05d73961458624e8713eeb1795a7c10b569917533552066f3611edc644777781c65aa1c3c2e2c3c5f6ec3959719b4df3814ff2ab034e5a7eec4d9b25244c2be575ae3b61ba4823963b89b286dfacb95ae4e1587ace4bf3c585f3fa3c9753ae068268376764d66627f8d6e423f511dbdb3e3bdda7db86ed08d519e0b2d56295151bc5006adf435dc515756a3c838b30836ea11566204c1103f36a19f4ea7b2053f52132326c8d88c783cbdbb2408e30baacf56a1416fb2e459d7138fb31378433e61c7ae82d07fb26f030743c5c27fc80607e37bdc10f37d3ddeb061d6330c51092e20f4dbfbed4d16489480bc83501cd40789367a6a75a56d4ab56a764372ecd601e468fe0a4ff786703584fedfe8b57652850a6c4736799a53d900e6c3e602ef59f5dc632490b34c668533745d9ef943e2cd42d9c2cab5b8553433ba8c22854afcaa26cca9734188f2d0b30e2ca6297558f47dcf58e0dfea64247156c6c846a089452ea0e7c6369764053ddf77c09faf4ca90e78c727a5450d97d11820947d485d897cd58a55d65e852551d230da4323022d4add4efc70d5e6b8ee107ddb5ebe39942ebd668711923102639dc08e3e08ed87e3ec59a51931f3459f18ec77381d5463dd2ed3059094129c1593863d21ebf2187e5977b7a592b0fb0e63ed6096841fc1bee9eb581d543f4e5d10dc67be75b913b480e0147ac7643896f9ff812f536ba1577bd099e131b02af8a057c707eb37bdfbdd584b8d77ac107022bf3c181130565a073a6a19557ab084e432f7d3012e7870e77655fb4e1f918ca54eb49bc4652fda5226253b96c68f5c357ba1ff5913ab623cf5c417edcbd3551a560b8a65e47f37251385387dd65087e7f10e3eb3e985174c170f3555065c4b1871719e79a9fd01c8f9751a9671623e44ca0d1b7f79baeb295fe1e7ef4639a7539f52f2acb0425e51bb136583221458d29acb50e322e6f63febb0404bcbbc6ca718315edc7f74d5b2868df1cdc0cd401e0edb83a27864084fee59a59aa3ac481031993d171565e1462d991e1416ea781b16e1e0f4439f261077a59b2211811f6c65786a7f2f39704e175d1167320e9656e61e3afd6dbab019b65a31826772384874d0027928c00593ff9a0461e7853a02e3e079ba0f4dc0954a8c94afc8f3de20cfb134d9e786e85e54427feb9babebc20c642a5ff8f0c7cb380ee29109e2bab0c12487242dcb1673ae253197ad5791725b3572099a62ffc1f239a28c3bc78973f23f85a3b91d1a9f1f775d78baa833db3a6b38641d48c7b106754f9c6c9f44940329e0a09150115429ce62e7e05f535e0fc5df849a3a421da01247b83ac28368884302996de14d9c553d861f849820f0ff56f2b6d28bd6868aade3c63e7cc29ecfabc7c55a068d4bca2391f93a7ea06f1774f5ffa15eabe983b944bd3603631893d86dcbd1270fcca00339eb6ad131e0010dc9872c26e422457284e7eafaad592863cfd77e6f5af19e38b1c8c0e8c858b3c13a4b030ea83f1645d39e84cfeb2e0fc9e3492e0553f3f83c5e7c39afce2701c294dbc9df37d61e7bf5c857f22ebaaaa347610a8546df48a4345a054d63c0b76cf4446adc856c80f0bc28ae50d7232c954b0ee6c20ef8a8cc1854b3fd3b0c7a2e9e755912d733496902c077bf13288cb72b538a6a0d9acf46aa3fecca579741c5744ab929f2336eaa43a5ef07be61d4432aaac96e4e43a6ab7f55220cb223b62a972a34cdfedba5b28ebc99d705b543433560f5b0f6203f0c15b760d877c3f7de5e330e783c3b41bc9032f4ca25c328831fd0697ebc84b7f22a510a520b9486760e1ea3357ddda60db0fdc401313d294b3782229a9259f6a17d31a2a1fc96b6cc4118f57e0d8e7369d0f0a3aab20a219ad132608954e50e894e458678d4970a4974a823df82ddd5e508a59cf7d88e1668c82f799113ff00bd6e2f40d1535fcec17800d2462d8451fe3b49baefd775de4ed6606be2469be715150ce0d8a36816851eadee188a80de8bd9836745795d0e64dbaf1bfde4ce646420cb7a6c447a6d5f40a60f5a62c55a7ccaa3a51d41ca507068086be882fed8c395e1d90dc7782006b52e01085e306285d7b7b3c511f24c9404a966bc560ca28ebcdeef575a3b78b520a81ef57569e9c5fd265e5215645fec64ed9f3baff66b34beb35e97ee5284bb712a6581e2c097e433da692bd5094369619734bfe77c81b1502936e31d81c67296c30f68d0be38e2e10c9487a23168526f69eec012854962863875a85590facbf52e8616977c66ac7ebc7e367fb19c21dffd751874f84c0176d0e74260bfd0c0faa98031f3273835bfc56560faaae368c544ebbb54925467c49aa026eec3c519f195b1492060f3218509baf4df84ee115212b5895f1381326f3d1ae6adc8ba898c93a0bcfc97b4d1703165808c1757a1463c93d8b0bd76408c8e4e04f003e2e52e1f8fe3894c54d8935b837569ceb1ade1e5add0ac33acf8393a1b661aa0d245d2d5d7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[pakoito]

So you are forced to play through the levels that you've beaten and know how to beat for no particular reason other than to artificially lengthen your total playtime.


If I want to just rush through a level because I'm bored to tears with the same encounter that I've beaten tens of times that's a problem with the game's design, not my preferences or skill.

It's the fast travel/quest arrows dichotomy. I liked Nehrim more than Oblivion or Skyrim because it forced me to walk everywhere and put encounters on the way. Dark Souls encounters were quite different done backwards too.

I like Original Sin and Dark Souls because quests or general directions are suggested, not straightly pointed out. Getting lost is a possibility, I spent more than 20h in DaS1 crawling through a lategame are I wasn't supposed to visit at level potato.

 

[TheGreatOne]

New players, for example, have no chance against foes like the bridge wyvern, and must either resort to dumb, borderline glitchy tactics, like shooting the monster from some unreachable position, which turns the game into a tedious chore, or skip entire sections of the game in hopes of getting better gear/stats later.

Turn based master race. I accidentally killed a boss and some hard enemies in Dark Souls before they even could react to me by fumbling around unintentionally. That never happened to me in Wizardry, X Com, Shin Megami Tensei or Jagged Alliance.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

So you are forced to play through the levels that you've beaten and know how to beat for no particular reason other than to artificially lengthen your total playtime.


If I want to just rush through a level because I'm bored to tears with the same encounter that I've beaten tens of times that's a problem with the game's design, not my preferences or skill.

It's the fast travel/quest arrows dichotomy. I liked Nehrim more than Oblivion or Skyrim because it forced me to walk everywhere and put encounters on the way. Dark Souls encounters were quite different done backwards too.

I like Original Sin and Dark Souls because quests or general directions are suggested, not straightly pointed out. Getting lost is a possibility, I spent more than 20h in DaS1 crawling through a lategame are I wasn't supposed to visit at level potato.

If you mean the Catacombs then you did well. Going there when you are supposed to fight Nito makes the entire area a snorefest (and the boss fight even more pathetic), and kindling ritual is actually very useuful. The area is actually doable at low levels, just not the very first ones.

 

[pakoito]

So you are forced to play through the levels that you've beaten and know how to beat for no particular reason other than to artificially lengthen your total playtime.


If I want to just rush through a level because I'm bored to tears with the same encounter that I've beaten tens of times that's a problem with the game's design, not my preferences or skill.

It's the fast travel/quest arrows dichotomy. I liked Nehrim more than Oblivion or Skyrim because it forced me to walk everywhere and put encounters on the way. Dark Souls encounters were quite different done backwards too.

I like Original Sin and Dark Souls because quests or general directions are suggested, not straightly pointed out. Getting lost is a possibility, I spent more than 20h in DaS1 crawling through a lategame are I wasn't supposed to visit at level potato.

If you mean the Catacombs then you did well. Going there when you are supposed to fight Nito makes the entire area a snorefest (and the boss fight even more pathetic), and kindling ritual is actually very useuful. The area is actually doable at low levels, just not the very first ones.

First bell then all the way through the Tomb of Giants being unable to kill any monsters until reaching the yellow door. Got the Kindling Ritual which didn't use for a while plus the high level sacred gem for my Zweihanders (sacrificed to the balance gods in DaS2). Sadly I broke a couple of NPC storylines in the way.

 

[Destroid]

Diablo 3 ... a well-crafted experience.

Maybe he was talking about its level of polish.

This is the Quake 3 vs System Shock 2 argument all over again. It seems people who vouch for Japanese games seem to care more about the type of game design that goes into making a game like Quake 3, where as strict PC gamers are more concerned on how stimulating a game is on a purely conceptual level, whether it pushes certain boundaries (in a real, non-pretentious sense), and so forth. Diablo 3, at least when i tried it, before its expansion, was very poor in terms of what it did to the original Diablo formula, particularly compared to games like Path of Exile, but there's no denying it was a well polished game, even though that is hardly sufficient to redeem the game, for me anyway.

Stuff like Diablo 3 isn't very exciting for people who were playing games in the 90s and have dropped a ton of hours in Diablo 1+2, but would you recommend either of the former over Diablo 3 to a newcomer in the genre?

 

[Lyric Suite]

I would if Diablo 3 was any good. I had to learn to play those games like any scrub when they first came out, why can't modern kids do the same?

 

[TheGreatOne]

Because they're taught from an early age by publishers and Josh Sawyer types that it's not fun.

I didn't hear that many casuals whining how the game took too much time back in vanilla World of Warcraft (which was more casual than other MMOs to begin with). I was a noob and I was eager to learn and become a good player. Within a few years that all changed and we started hearing the mantra how doing things the hard way back then wasn't fun and how the game was broken back then. I don't think it's casuals themselves who demanded the change, casuals by very definition aren't the kind of people who get up and arms about things like that. Most of them were happy doing their own thing and progressing at their own pace. They didn't whine at forums or demand to have the same gear as hardcore players.

 

[Chateaubryan]

I'll be a bit off-topic there, but sometimes there is something interesting in those posturing indie games. For example : Dear Esther's randomized narration. Even if nothing justifies the titanic amount of praise it got, it nevertheless did something right, something that could be exploited. Granted, it is a game based on a gimmick, but it did bring something to the table.

For those who were inspired enough not to play it - and most of all - not to play it a SECOND time, Dear Esther's gimmick is to actually randomizes its narration. Something that hasn't been said the first time you played the game may be in the next play-through, or the reverse. How something is told, presented, or not told at all is randomized and may brings different interpretation of the story.

Why would anyone bother with this? Because it's a new technique in the medium. A technique that might be re-used in RPGs, for example, where a quest-giver (yet unreliable narrator) truncates the story he's telling you because you chose to talk to him when he's somehow intoxicated, or in a bad mood. Maybe some information given to the player could be omitted in a play-through and added in another, whatever the reason. Maybe one quest's premises could be completely different. Could be useful for replayability matters. Could be useful to challenge the player's adaptability.

AFAIK, Dear Esther is the only game to have done that, and even if the artsy phapping tradition is irritating, it may be useful to recognize and exploit one of the game's contribution.

 

[Destroid]

I'll be a bit off-topic there, but sometimes there is something interesting in those posturing indie games. For example : Dear Esther's randomized narration. Even if nothing justifies the titanic amount of praise it got, it nevertheless did something right, something that could be exploited. Granted, it is a game based on a gimmick, but it did bring something to the table.

For those who were inspired enough not to play it - and most of all - not to play it a SECOND time, Dear Esther's gimmick is to actually randomizes its narration. Something that hasn't been said the first time you played the game may be in the next play-through, or the reverse. How something is told, presented, or not told at all is randomized and may brings different interpretation of the story.

Why would anyone bother with this? Because it's a new technique in the medium. A technique that might be re-used in RPGs, for example, where a quest-giver (yet unreliable narrator) truncates the story he's telling you because you chose to talk to him when he's somehow intoxicated, or in a bad mood. Maybe some information given to the player could be omitted in a play-through and added in another, whatever the reason. Maybe one quest's premises could be completely different. Could be useful for replayability matters. Could be useful to challenge the player's adaptability.

AFAIK, Dear Esther is the only game to have done that, and even if the artsy phapping tradition is irritating, it may be useful to recognize and exploit one of the game's contribution.

I haven't played the game but if you didn't know about this what are the odds you would replay a game like that?

 

[SuicideBunny]

AFAIK, Dear Esther is the only game to have done that, and even if the artsy phapping tradition is irritating, it may be useful to recognize and exploit one of the game's contribution.

narrative randomization is what pnp rpgs have been doing for, like, heck, i don't remember.. what was the first pnp rpg to have dice roll skills? empire of the petal throne? classic traveller? that would still make it 40ish years.

 

[Karellen]

So you are forced to play through the levels that you've beaten and know how to beat for no particular reason other than to artificially lengthen your total playtime.

I don't think that's true. There's a great deal of variance in how much time it takes people to get through Dark Souls - I clocked almost two hundred hours by the time I finished, though admittedly probably over half of that was various types of online stuff. Some people get through the first time in thirty or forty hours. Dark Souls is as long as it takes you to get through, no more and no less.

If I want to just rush through a level because I'm bored to tears with the same encounter that I've beaten tens of times that's a problem with the game's design, not my preferences or skill.

Sure, but I'm not really seeing a solution. You could make the encounters vary a bit between each respawn - only even that would actually make things worse, in a way, since it wouldn't be much more difficult, but the changes in the enemy placement would mean you couldn't quickly run through areas you've already explored, which would inflate the length of the game even more. Ultimately, there's no way to make content that you've mastered and played through "tens of times" exciting.

Having said that, I think there's a great deal of value in the "walk of shame" back to the fog gate that you have to endure after getting squashed in a boss fight - it's part of what makes losing hurt, and part of what makes boss fights like Ornstein and Smough compelling, psychologically speaking. I mean, if a player just wants to get through, nothing's stopping them from summoning a couple of Sunbros to speed them through - and yet, a lot of people keep running through Anor Londo dozens of times, hour after hour, just to get butchered by Ornstein and Smough time after time. It's entirely self-inflicted. At some point, they actually start to play worse due to sheer frustration and tedium. Some people actually get to the point where they literally break apart their gamepads in rage. At that point, the issue isn't so much skill - Dark Souls is only a moderately difficult game, in terms of execution - as self-control and (admittedly misplaced) willpower. People play gamepad-crushers like this largely for the same reason some people do endurance sports; it's not really about beating the game as it is about beating yourself. That, or masochism. Take your pick, but I wouldn't have it any other way.

 

[Chateaubryan]

I haven't played the game but if you didn't know about this what are the odds you would replay a game like that?

Pretty slim, I suspect. For me, it was purely accidental. I misclicked somewhere and began a new game. Before I went to reload, I was "Hey, fucker didn't say that the first time around."

The reviewers probably got some kind of press kit explaining that jazz before they wrote their article : even if they often mention it, I can't imagine anyone replaying the game in such a short span of time that they would remember what the narrator said the first time around.

narrative randomization is what pnp rpgs have been doing for, like, heck, i don't remember.. what was the first pnp rpg to have dice roll skills? empire of the petal throne? classic traveller? that would still make it 40ish years.

You're right. I should've stressed that the Dear Esther contribution is somehow valuable precisely because it is a video game. As for the rest, DE's kind of randomized narration influence the player decision process, because of changing perspective, interpretation and exposition to the information. In the PNP example, it is (mostly?) a mechanical way of determining the success of an action. In their narrative nature, those are two different kinds of randomization.

 

[SuicideBunny]

You're right. I should've stressed that the Dear Esther contribution is somehow valuable precisely because it is a video game.

it's kinda sad how little from actual pnp has made the move to computer rpgs...

DE's kind of randomized narration influence the player decision process, because of changing perspective, interpretation and exposition to the information. In the PNP example, it is (mostly?) a mechanical way of determining the success of an action. In their narrative nature, those are two different kinds of randomization.

the specifics differ, but the flavor is the same ('cept pnp randomization being way more extensive and its specifics being shaped by the actual distribution of abilities on the player's character, while DE's randomization always follows the same distribution, even if the specific variates in two different playthroughs differ). ability checks in pnp are used to determine success/failure of actions, but those actions usually have more than binary outcomes, and also control access to information, the same way dear esther does via showing a bit of narration or not.
noticing small details about npcs, noticing details about npcs that aren't there when you fail a check, wrongly remembering some ingame knowledge when you fuck up a check and thus thinking some npc is lying and so on.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Games like Trine 2, Super Meatboy, Castle crashers, Trials HD, Hotline Miami and mediocre indy platformers&euroshmups that are PSN/XBLA+PC aren't really that bad, so I don't really consider them to be in the same category as cancer like Papers, Please, Gone Home, Stanley Parable and Dear Esther that has flooded Steam over the last few years.

Explain this.

 

[pakoito]

Games like Trine 2, Super Meatboy, Castle crashers, Trials HD, Hotline Miami and mediocre indy platformers&euroshmups that are PSN/XBLA+PC aren't really that bad, so I don't really consider them to be in the same category as cancer like Papers, Please, Gone Home, Stanley Parable and Dear Esther that has flooded Steam over the last few years.

Explain this.

Arcade games are not story-driven. All story centric games are bad. Hence, arcade games are not bad.

More truth table exercises coming up next.

EDIT: I wouldn't bundle Papers Please with the others, but that's me.