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There are too many video games

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Re: There are too many video games

#111

Post by mitchdoogle »

trixie_ wrote: post #8

People say all the time, "why spend all that money on space when there's so many problems on Earth?" Why do people never say the same thing about all the money spent on video games and Starbucks? Which is arguably a lot more money.

People do say similar things about video games and Starbucks. "A cup of coffee per day" is often used as a barometer when charities want you to donate to them.

It's not a bad question though. Someone who wants space exploration should think about that question and be able to answer it in a meaningful way.

Re: There are too many video games

#112

Post by WaxProlix »

mrighele wrote: post #106
WaxProlix wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we aren't allowed to blame Democrats for running Seattle into the ground in tech circles I exist almost exclusively in tech circles in and around Seattle, and we blame existing leadership for tons of problems. This seems so weirdly divorced from reality that it smacks of ideologue speak.

> and we blame existing leadership for tons of problems and then vote again for Democrats when elections come. I'm not picking on you in particular, or on the Democrats, in other places it may be the Republicans, but it seems to me that the American society is so much split that when it comes the time to vote, most people will vote for the party that ostensibly is more aligned with their values, irrespectively of the…

Totally agree, for the most part. With the exception of Ann Davidson, western WA generally won't elect anyone with an R by their name. Polarization is a part of this (I won't get into the weeds here, but The Last Guy was popular in part due to the perception that he was "owning the libs", and as high-minded as coastal liberals consider themselves, there's a sneer not too far off for any southern accent or 'unenlightened' viewpoint).

> maybe the position of the two main parties were closer so it was not much of an issue

I think the parties were further apart, actually. They almost completely overlap in terms of policy outlook and - tellingly - donor class. Maybe the flames of culture and race war are being stoked by the Tuckers of the world in part because there is no major meat-and-potatoes differentiator anymore.

Re: There are too many video games

#113

Post by danShumway »

erulabs wrote: post #76
a_t48 wrote: post #54

Let's say for the sake of argument that there is too much art out there, that we need less people writing novels and more people fixing potholes and whatnot - fine. How does the author propose deciding _who_ gets to make art? Even if you have an oracle who can assign some sort of quality number to an art project before it's made...how are people supposed to get better at it? It's going to take thousands of cruddy Uni…

> How does the author propose deciding _who_ gets to make art? I feel like the author makes it fairly clear: those with enough privilege. If the cost of living goes to zero, we'll have near-infinite art. If the cost of living goes to maximum we all starve to death. At very least, I was very much in love with a free-living artist who inspired me greatly in my 20s. I moved to San Francisco to hangout with her and her a…

> When you find out that most free-living artists have financial backing - well, the rose-tinted glasses come off quick.

Maybe the issue there is taxation, not art? If we're going to get into a debate about people owing stuff to society, I think looking at estate taxes, property taxes, etc... is probably a lot more reasonable than getting mad at them for doing things they enjoy with their time.

I think it's a very easy trap to fall into where we sometimes look at opulence/privilege and get mad at the good things that come out of that (life/job security, freedom to experiment, etc), rather than the consolidation of resources and wealth that enable those outcomes very selectively and that deny other people access to the same conditions.

And there's lots of different life philosophies about how to deal with millionaires/billionaires from lots of different political perspectives, but in all of them from the most Capitalistic to the most Socialist, guilting people over not being passionate about charity blue-collar work is probably less helpful and less reasonable than guilting them over not paying back money (either through charity or taxes) into the systems and common social resources that are currently supporting them and their lifestyles.

"I'm a millionaire, but I got a normal job so therefore I don't need to feel guilty", feels weird to me. That's not really practically changing anything about other people's conditions.

Re: There are too many video games

#114

Post by kiba »

erulabs wrote: post #76
a_t48 wrote: post #54

Let's say for the sake of argument that there is too much art out there, that we need less people writing novels and more people fixing potholes and whatnot - fine. How does the author propose deciding _who_ gets to make art? Even if you have an oracle who can assign some sort of quality number to an art project before it's made...how are people supposed to get better at it? It's going to take thousands of cruddy Uni…

> How does the author propose deciding _who_ gets to make art? I feel like the author makes it fairly clear: those with enough privilege. If the cost of living goes to zero, we'll have near-infinite art. If the cost of living goes to maximum we all starve to death. At very least, I was very much in love with a free-living artist who inspired me greatly in my 20s. I moved to San Francisco to hangout with her and her a…

Charles Darwin accomplished building a theory in comparatively luxury. Clearly, wealth can, if not always, enable great things.

Re: There are too many video games

#115

Post by sharkjacobs »

I think that Jeff Vogel is a genius, an original thinker with a tremendous amount of creative energy and drive, like Steve Jobs, or John Carmack, or Terry Davis. But geniuses can be wrong, a lot, and this particular article reads like his own intrusive thoughts of anxiety and self loathing spiralling out of control and being given voice and broadcast to the world.

For 10+ years Vogel has written blog posts about stubbornly making it in an increasingly hostile indie game market, and he's always sounded a little bit proud and a little bit scared. Now the pride has turned to shame and the fear has turned to dread.

Western society is in decline, and the fault and symptom is that so many people are making and playing video games, the work to which he has dedicated his life.

Re: There are too many video games

#116

Post by vsareto »

This article misses it.

Video game tooling got good enough that the velocity increased massively from 20 years ago where companies were writing their own engines. There might be more folks working in games, but it's probably not the sole reason for the increased output. The team size for indie games shrunk dramatically while quality simultaneously went up due to tooling improvements.

There's lots of supporting work for assets and logic that can be plugged in to game engines. Even when you need your own stuff, there's other forums to get that work as needed. This is distributed and shared work now instead of being under one studio roof. Plus the tools for producing that stuff probably got better too. The efficiencies are compounding.

There's also been success with much simpler visual styles (Stardew), meaning not as much work needs to go into 3D modeling and advanced stuff like that. The worlds you play in now didn't necessarily have to get bigger either. Again, Stardew switches screens like old RPGs. It didn't seek to render a bigger world than games that came before it.

Same for the distribution platforms. You no longer need a slow corporate entity to handle making physical disks and shipping them worldwide. This lowers the barrier of entry by a lot when combined with the previous gains.

This author got used to the incremental graphics and technical improvements being marketed by game companies and thought that's how it always would be. That part still exists, but it's just in a much more crowded space these days.

Re: There are too many video games

#117

Post by flutetornado »

kiba wrote: post #14
trixie_ wrote: post #8

People say all the time, "why spend all that money on space when there's so many problems on Earth?" Why do people never say the same thing about all the money spent on video games and Starbucks? Which is arguably a lot more money.

Space colonization is simply jumping third or fourth steps removed from the dream of making our Earth more livable and more ecologically diverse, or learning how to build and make an acrology. From that perspective, it's no wonder why people think it's a waste of space, because they saw no meaningful purpose. Meanwhile, we're doing the opposite of terraforming Earth, by making it more unlivable everyday.

If space colonization leads to mining resources from asteroids and offloading the environmental costs of such mining from earth or get us building materials strong enough to give us a space elevator or space factories sending their waste into the sun, you wouldn’t be saying this perhaps.

Re: There are too many video games

#118

Post by happytoexplain »

dvt wrote: post #53
WaxProlix wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we aren't allowed to blame Democrats for running Seattle into the ground in tech circles I exist almost exclusively in tech circles in and around Seattle, and we blame existing leadership for tons of problems. This seems so weirdly divorced from reality that it smacks of ideologue speak.

I work exclusively in tech circles around L.A. and even being remotely sympathetic to Republican views is anathema. San Francisco is ideologically way more entrenched even though, ironically, their city is a mess, much like Seattle.

Many of the people I know consider many Republican views anathema, and blame Democrats for running Seattle into the ground (in the way the phrase is being used here). What you're expressing sounds more black and white than reality.

Re: There are too many video games

#119

Post by [deleted] »

ModernMech wrote: post #39
smashem wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like an interesting theory. Who will be the ones that do the productive work that pays for UBI?

I presume the same people doing productive work today. I think it would be a great net positive if all the people who want to sit around and do nothing all day would just go and finally do that, rather than getting in my way all the time at work.

[deleted]

Re: There are too many video games

#120

Post by fxtentacle »

Oh wow, that's a depressing read but the guy might be right.

We as society highly value art and artists and celebrities. But we don't value helping random fellow citizens that we've never met. The result is that people are eager to make art, but you won't find a similar level of motivation for repairing infrastructure or playing taxes to enable repairs.

But if our infrastructure gets bad enough, life becomes frustrating for everyone. And genuinely helping others might be more fulfilling than making art that nobody cares about. So I'd support the conclusion that we need less people making art alone and more people helping others.

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