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Awesome By Proxy: Addicted to Fake Achievement

pixelpoppers.com

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Re: Awesome By Proxy: Addicted to Fake Achievement

#21

Post by derefr »

I don't believe my enjoyment of CRPGs with slim-to-nil skill requirement comes from any sort of achievement-orientation; instead, it's just a simple variable-schedule addiction mechanism—I pull the lever long enough, lights flash. I don't enjoy the kind of lights slot machines have, but lights that tell a story I enjoy quite a bit. In its effect it's quite like a parent telling their child they'll have to wait for the next night to hear the end of their bedtime story.

When I was young I would invite my friends over, and they would play the games—I would simply watch them, and offer strategic advice when I could (which I gleaned from reading the included instruction manuals that they usually ignored.) Thinking back, I got just as much out of this experience as actually playing them[1] myself, if not more, due to the pair-programming-like social interaction of pilot and navigator. The variable enforcement schedule was still there, as there would be times that they were stuck, and, by empathy, I would feel stuck too. I was two levels removed from the game-world, only able to direct my friend to direct the character, but it was still just as fun.

I still play these games, already knowing their plots, just because I can immerse myself in the game-world's atmosphere by deviating in any direction from the "move the plot forward" one. It's a bit like taking a guided tour through a sandbox game; when someone points out a lion, you can stop the bus and ride it, then get back on toward the next stop. Even then, though, I know it's really just a movie, and none of the "scenes" I'm creating for myself would make it past editing.

If you find a lot of yourself in that description, by the way, I'd recommend checking out the Let's Play Archive[2] from SomethingAwful. Basically just people being your buddy and playing games with you, sometimes doing MST3K-like additions to the narrative to make the presented stories even more compelling.

[1] "Them" as in CRPGs. I would not compare for a moment the fun of watching someone play a skill-based game to actually playing it; the feelings are orthogonal.

[2] http://lparchive.org/LetsPlay/

Re: Awesome By Proxy: Addicted to Fake Achievement

#23

Post by derefr »

jerf wrote: post #15
amalcon wrote: post #10

Some types of RPGs do have another attraction, that appeals to the "Master" style: they give you a single system, and steadily tack options onto it. While your character does improve as a result of this, if the game is well-designed, the difficulty remains roughly constant or increases over the course of the game. This gives you the opportunity to master aspects of the system in more manageable chunks. That is, it ta…

There are also other options. I've come to enjoy playing RPGs with the deliberate goal of underleveling. Where a performance-oriented player's idea of an ultimate fight is walking up to the end boss and smacking them down in one hit with damage to spare, my ideal battle is every member of my party down but the mage, every expendable expended, with the only option left for the mage to attack with their staff... and th…

Indeed, the (early) Final Fantasy series actually becomes quite tactically complex if you limit yourself such that you'll never take an unneeded step except to move toward the plot, use various amenities (inn/shop/etc) or take treasure. Doing so also means you don't end up with a glut of money, disabling you from getting better equipment at every opportunity (but usually often enough that it never becomes a serious problem in-and-of-itself.) Most bosses can be "brute-forced", but they usually also have a strategic weakness that most players might have never even discovered due to their higher-than-required level upon reaching them.

Re: Awesome By Proxy: Addicted to Fake Achievement

#24

Post by ewjordan »

zephjc wrote: post #13

Here is an article from a few years back that addresses this: http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20060222/sirlin_01.shtml It's main points are is games like WoW teach the wrong lessons, like "investing a lot of time in something is worth more than actual skill". This addresses MMOs more specifically, but relates to the larger point raised by the pixelpoppers article.

It's main points are is games like WoW teach the wrong lessons, like "investing a lot of time in something is worth more than actual skill".

For the vast majority of our fellow humans, this is exactly the lesson they should learn to prepare for whatever they are likely to do for the rest of their lives. It's a vanishingly small proportion of the population that cares about cultivating a skill beyond "good enough", and that includes a greater majority than you'd probably expect of programmers, academics, and people in other "thinking" professions as well. Plenty of people need little more than a stable income and a few loved ones around them to be happy.

And it's not necessarily a bad thing: shoot for mastery if that's what you feel compelled to do, but if you don't feel you have what it takes, carve out a comfortable niche and try to be happy in other ways. Everyone evaluates their success against a different metric, and we should never be so arrogant to assume that our personal metrics are valid when we measure others.

Re: Awesome By Proxy: Addicted to Fake Achievement

#25

Post by mynameishere »

allenp wrote: post #3

A related (but from a developer point of view) blog post by Jeff Vogel: http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2009/11/make-your-game-easy-t... It is really interesting to see these posts come out just days apart - I wonder if there is any cross pollination there.

topgear always bugs the hell out of me. To see a real racing film:

http://www.hulu.com/watch/79438/on-any-sunday

Re: Awesome By Proxy: Addicted to Fake Achievement

#26

Post by liquidcool »

After 6 months of playing WOW, I finally got bored. I looked back at that time and thought, "What could I have accomplished with 6 months of free time?" Learned an instrument? Written an application? Dragged my fat carcass to the gym and lost some weight?

That was early 2005, and I haven't played a video game since (other than some GNUbg and a few hours of Street Fighter IV). I'm not entirely sure I've used my free time as wisely as I could have, but I know I didn't waste it killing boars.

Re: Awesome By Proxy: Addicted to Fake Achievement

#27

Post by jasongullickson »

manvsmachine wrote: post #11

This is what I need to tell people when I try to explain my love for racing games (and motorsports in general). To me, it really is the epitome of a mastery-based genre, especially when dealing with time attacks. Multiple failures with incremental improvements is absolutely required - "I need to do that lap in 1:30 and I did it in 1:36; if I brake later on the second turn, maybe I can bring it down to 1:34.4". Check…

I have a friend who is working on breaking a motorcycle land-speed-record (http://bonnevilleproject.wordpress.com/) who was the first person to explain this to me. It's easy to dismiss drag racing as "build a big engine and step on it" but as he demonstrated (through examples like you have provided) any one thing can be broken down into millions of variables, and to compete you have to be willing and able to tweak at this level to rise above the obvious improvements (which quickly become commodity).

Re: Awesome By Proxy: Addicted to Fake Achievement

#28

Post by srn »

sofal wrote: post #18

Quake has taught me more about how to confront pressure and competition than my entire academic career.

Quake gave me a sense of direction when I was a teenager. Before that I had either walked very short distances or been driven everywhere. My sense of direction meant I could figure out that this street was parallel to that street etc. but it was not based on cardinal directions. When I started using a map during college was when my sense of north aligned with north.

In silicon valley it's interesting because people sometimes define north/south as parallel to the freeway north/south 101. It actually runs ~east/west where I am.

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