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Is 'SimCity' Homelessness a Bug or a Feature?
51–60 of 107 posts
Re: Is 'SimCity' Homelessness a Bug or a Feature?
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
Let's rewrite it. Say it's some conservative commentator like Bill O'Reilly: "To me video games are the so-called 'real France,'" he said. "The real France operates according to a video game logic, and that game logic is socialism" That doesn't strike you as overtly and primarily political in nature? Beyond that, it's simply inane.
There is a tendancy to treat real world problems in an overly abstract way. That you pursue an argument because of a particular dogma rather than actual empathy for the victims of a problem. For example people love to debate funding of healthcare (which we can all disagree on) whilst loosing site of its actual purpose (which we mostly agree about). The same is true of homelessness where it is easy to discuss it in br…
You got it. I have relatives who work with the homeless, and one of the striking things is the population that is growing now: veterans.
Politicians love waving flags and "supporting the troops". But when some if these men come home and can't adjust, the flags get out away. Many turn to alcohol and start a spiral the ends on a street somewhere.
Re: Is 'SimCity' Homelessness a Bug or a Feature?
#53It's an amusing thought, but I imagine that most of these people realise homelessness isn't really a problem you can simply fix by following some set of procedures. Ultimately it's a game to be played for entertainment, and if you can get some people to think about social issues as they play it that's wonderful, but it's still supposed to be enjoyable. Clearly homeless people in the game are impeding some peoples enj…
To paraphrase from around 19:10 of [0] - readings of games throughout the ages have flip flopped between two moralistic binaries; between a wholesome pastime for young children, and a depraved and immoral one suited for soldiers, gamblers, or angry youth. In saying the game is "supposed to be" something one elides the nature of play: As players interact with the game's systems, they reify what the systems allow and e…
None of that requires "psychology, anthropology, philosophy", as the book author claims, since (as you noted), it tells us the sensibilities of its makers.
Bittani could build a city simulation with blackjack an...erm psychology, anthropology, philosophy, and see if who is interested in that - and if it's not just another reflection of the maker's opinions (just one that Bittani happens to prefer).
Re: Is 'SimCity' Homelessness a Bug or a Feature?
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
I actually flag all politics here, even the articles that agree with my political views, which are not at all what you seem to think they are, either. It helps to get rid of these articles and keep the site a good one for startups/hacking/interesting articles, so for me it's worthwhile. The article doesn't hurt my feelings: I think it's genuinely silly and low-quality.
An important part of flagging - and it is mentioned in the guidelines - is to avoid commenting that you've flagged the article. Look at the low quality sub-thread that your comment spawned.
If no one explains that something is off-topic, how are we supposed to propagate that information, and the culture of what is on-topic to new users of this site?
That's an honest question, by the way. Since there is no barrier to entry to joining this site, there's nothing preventing masses of people arriving and crowding out the good content, which is of interest to far fewer people than politics are.
I'm more than happy to sacrifice otherwise useless karma in order to call stuff out, as the karma points serve no other purpose.
Re: Is 'SimCity' Homelessness a Bug or a Feature?
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
The 'final solution' option? It's been done in real life of course many times in many countries, but I don't think adding an option to Sim City to round them all up and shoot/gas/incinerate them, or build a 'killing fields' facility is really what people are looking for in that game. In DF we can get some distance from it because it's explicitly a fantasy world, but Sim City is a bit too close to emulating real life…
It would be more interesting if they had that option just too see how often players would resort to something like that.
In FallOut 3 I was given a choice between blowing up a town and saving it. I went with the evil option, as that seemed to offer a greater reward. Later I went back to the town, and I saw the used-to-be-good-looking NPCs now disfigured, but some still alive. That made me feel really bad about what I did. Also, later I also heard about it on the in-game radio multiple times, which really felt weird, and made me feel bad about what I did even more. At that point I felt that my actions in this game have consequences, and after that I made my choices more carefully. But the game did not let up, it kept me remembering what I did by putting some of these disfigured NPCs into quests later on.
(It might have been only one NPC that survived, details are fuzzy.)
Re: Is 'SimCity' Homelessness a Bug or a Feature?
#56It is amusing what happens when you make games that are "realistic" in a way which isn't fun for players but is like real life, and get to see how the player base reacts. Depression Quest springs to mind. Or way the book the protagonist of The Fault In Our Stars loves cuts off abruptly once the main character dies, which upsets her to no end.
In the original Civilization, if your political system was Democracy, there was no Corruption :))
My main strategy for quite a while was to race toward Statue of Liberty, then use it to immediately switch to communism; I'm pretty heavily on the side of 'be careful about using games as a metaphor for life' re the OP.
Re: Is 'SimCity' Homelessness a Bug or a Feature?
#57It's an amusing thought, but I imagine that most of these people realise homelessness isn't really a problem you can simply fix by following some set of procedures. Ultimately it's a game to be played for entertainment, and if you can get some people to think about social issues as they play it that's wonderful, but it's still supposed to be enjoyable. Clearly homeless people in the game are impeding some peoples enj…
IMHO, the biggest benefit from playing games like SimCity is the practical introduction to systems thinking: the obvious solution may not be the obvious solution. I often wonder if these games are giving this generation an intuitive grasp of systems dynamics that older generations simply don't get.
The meta-game of effective systems design is fascinating in its own right, because the skills learned apply to real-world systems as well.
I wonder if anyone has tried modeling the problem specific to the game using something like trueworld? http://www.true-world.com/htm/en/index.html
Re: Is 'SimCity' Homelessness a Bug or a Feature?
#58It is amusing what happens when you make games that are "realistic" in a way which isn't fun for players but is like real life, and get to see how the player base reacts. Depression Quest springs to mind. Or way the book the protagonist of The Fault In Our Stars loves cuts off abruptly once the main character dies, which upsets her to no end.
Older Simcities actually already had this to an extent, with the traffic mechanics, which tended to be more stressful than fun.
Re: Is 'SimCity' Homelessness a Bug or a Feature?
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, I haven't played SimCity (or any games, for that matter) for a while now, but if I recall, this type of games was always more akin to central planning model than laissez-faire; or else they wouldn't be that playable.
From my European perspective SimCity actually misses several city planning tools to reduce homelessness. The most important being the ability to build public housing and set up social services.
Simcity 2000 used to have subsidised housing and homeless shelter ordinances, which reduced crime, though you never actually _saw_ anything. It is weird that they've never tried adding a public housing mechanic; it could be quite interesting.
Re: Is 'SimCity' Homelessness a Bug or a Feature?
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the original Civilization, if your political system was Democracy, there was no Corruption :))
My main strategy for quite a while was to race toward Statue of Liberty, then use it to immediately switch to communism; I'm pretty heavily on the side of 'be careful about using games as a metaphor for life' re the OP.
Yeah, on the other hand they do indoctrinate, whether this is intended or not. Everybody talks about brutal games and how a twelve year may go on a shooting spree having played too much of Call of Duty or whatever. Causation never proven, given the number of players vs. rampage killers.
Now isn't planting an idea such as that Democracy is inherently Coruption-free (or something equally nonsensical) much worse brainwashing in broader scheme of things?