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[mirosurabu]

Regarding objectivity:

I read somewhere that Tony is strictly against expressing personal taste in criticism. Or something along these lines, but generally that he is strictly for writing objective criticism. That coupled with his followers claiming the same is why I expect his statements to be objective.

But they are clearly not.

There are ways to be objective with criticism but they restrict reviews to what's in the game, such as how many levels are there, how many environments, weapons and stuff like that, something that you can easily enumerate and agree with everyone else easily. That's why many critics aren't objective and are instead subjective. Still, it's possible to appear subjective but be objective. That's when you try to cater to your audience and when you actually have some sort of knowledge of what they like and what they hate.

And what's this "relative complexity" shit anyways? It looks like desperate attempt to make subjective measurement look like it's objective somehow. That's impossible. Something is either subjective or objective. You can either teach people to use your methodology or not.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை]

as i mentioned, i believe there are some things which are objective but unknown or unmeasurable. just because something is objective doesn't mean it's measurable. for instance, neutrinos were unmeasurable until the 20th century, and unknown before that as well. does that mean they weren't objective until the 20th century? no, they were still objective, it's just that humans had no idea they existed and had no idea how to measure them.

similarly, it's possible that icycalm's complexity exists in such a state: that it's something which can be measured, potentially, but which cannot currently be measured.

[mirosurabu]

I'm not sure where you getting at with this. I'm talking about one's methodology. Methodology one is using cannot be unknown or undiscovered. It's there and it's either subjective or objective. You can either teach someone else to do the same or not.

[Incision]

I read somewhere that Tony is strictly against expressing personal taste in criticism.

You made me laugh out loud, so thanks for that at least.

Look, it's one thing if you don't want to follow the links and read the articles, but you're not even reading the excerpts in this thread.  I suspect that to clear up your misconceptions I would just end up quoting the entire site, but you already refuse to digest what little I'm spoonfeeding you.  Maybe it's a language barrier, in which case it is not your fault for misunderstanding, but it is your fault for continuing to post.

[mirosurabu]

No, you posted hilarious excerpt, I thank you for that. Good job cherry-picking what I'm saying too.

[Dragonmaw]

I go to sleep for 5 hours and look at what happens. Yeesh.

@Incision: Regarding inductive reasoning, I did not say he should "try to avoid it." I don't know where you are reading that in my post. Unless of course you mean Hume's "try not to" in regards to it, in which case I think you are missing the point. The problem is not so much induction, but induction that refuses to correct itself.

Regarding "it made me feel warm" being unmeasurable, that's partially true. You can measure authorial intent easily enough, as you simply need to read an artist's statement or interviews with the developer. Easy peasy. Emotional responses obviously can't get measured by any known metric (although there's promising work on neurons and shit, blah blah), but you can explain why you feel a certain way, which is good enough. If it simply was "it makes me feel fuzzy because I like it," that's fucking stupid. However, if it's "I feel warm because it made me reflect upon my childhood with my grandparents," that's a bit more valid. There is a clear reason for said feeling.

I think all this argument about methodology to measure complexity is idiotic. One can readily admit that there are games such as The Graveyard of Desktop Tower Defense that are vastly more simple than games like Supreme Commander or Far Cry 2. The argument should not be how to measure complexity, but why complexity is necessarily a better or higher goal for developers/artists to reach. There are countless sayings from countless luminaries that reflect this ideology, with the most prominent being Occam's Razor or the famous "It seems that perfection is reached not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away."

Yes, virtual reality is an important goal in the road to gaming improvement. But so is variety. I don't think having a wide variety of games makes the developers that make them or the players that play them "subhuman" or as animals.

[mirosurabu]

Subjectivity, which is an error of style in German literature, is, through the deteriorated condition of literature and neglect of old languages, becoming more common. By subjectivity I mean when a writer thinks it sufficient for himself to know what he means and wants to say, and it is left to the reader to discover what is meant. Without troubling himself about his reader, he writes as if he were holding a monologue; whereas it should be a dialogue, and, moreover, a dialogue in which he must express himself all the more clearly as the questions of the reader cannot be heard. And it is for this very reason that style should not be subjective but objective, and for it to be objective the words must be written in such a way as to directly compel the reader to think precisely the same as the author thought. This will only be the case when the author has borne in mind that thoughts, inasmuch as they follow the law of gravity, pass more easily from head to paper than from paper to head. Therefore the journey from paper to head must be helped by every means at his command. When he does this his words have a purely objective effect, like that of a completed oil painting; while the subjective style is not much more certain in its effect than spots on the wall, and it is only the man whose fantasy is accidentally aroused by them that sees figures; other people only see blurs. The difference referred to applies to every style of writing as a whole, and it is also often met with in particular instances.

This is not directly related, but interesting anyways.

[Incision]

Regarding inductive reasoning, I did not say he should "try to avoid it." I don't know where you are reading that in my post.

Bad use of quotation marks on my part--that was my best guess.  I wasn't sure what you were trying to say or why you were bringing up Hume.

The problem is not so much induction, but induction that refuses to correct itself.

If you simply mean that critics should be aware that their criteria might change in response to new data, just like scientists have to change their models, then I of course agree.

[mirosurabu]

Yup, Occam's Razor is totally not idiotic argument and showing their inconsistencies is. What's with people not understanding what Occam's Razor is?

[P Diddy]

Then again, "aesthetics" deeply affects our enjoyment of the "mechanics," doesn't it? Would, let's say, R-Type still be half as exciting and enjoyable if you replaced the ships with abstract rectangles and single-color silhouettes on a pure white background, and enemies just faded out instead of exploded? Or if there were no intense music tracks playing to get you pumped up? These things are technically completely irrelevant to the game's ruleset and complexity, yet they still impact our enjoyment of the game a hell of a lot, don't they? If they stand out enough, they can even make a bad game enjoyable to play - at least, in the short run. So I think the "mechanics" (the ruleset and the complexity of those rules) and the "aesthetics" (the presentation - story, graphics, sound) really blend together, to the point that you can't really say one is more important than the other.

You've just made Icycalm's point for him with that phrase.

To be more specific, he's saying that he can easily judge when he's being tricked, and his website is an explanation of these tricks so that other people can be more aware of them next time they play these inherently bad games.

For instance, I just played Cactus' new game about a crazy naked guy who thinks he's a car. During the first 2 minutes, I was laughing my ass off, but I stopped playing very quickly (like you stated above: fun in the short run), the game was inherently bad. But it was worth 2-3 minutes of my life.

In other words, Cactus' product had things about it that were good, but those things had nothing to do with the game itself, and is using the videogame community to trojan-horse itself into our lives (because as a short movie, it wouldn't get as much attention, better to be a big fish in a small pond then a small fish in a big pond).

Basically what I'm trying to say is that Cactus should be a filmmaker/animator, not a game-maker, and that the game was a missed opportunity at being a game.

It's all presentation / no game.

edit: I should add: I don't dislike the product, I dislike the game.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை]

p diddy, have you played some of cactus's more gamelike games? like clean asia, for instance. or burn the trash. you'll probably enjoy those

vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzvURmXlTaE

clean asia in particular is notable in that it's probably the game that made cactus "famous" in the indie scene

[PleasingFungus]

Well, pretty much in the same way that icycalm moves there. For you to recommend games from a genre, you need to know what the good ones are. In order to do that, you need to rank them.
However, I'm probably thinking about 'genre' in a somewhat different way to icycalm. Maybe it would be better if I said 'set of criteria'. So if you wanted to recommend a game to someone who likes complexity/depth, that would be one set of criteria. (Icycalm agrees that you can do this - it's what he means when talks about 'ranking genres', since he is ranking all genres and thus all games according to their depth.)
However, you could also rank games according to other sets of criteria, so long as you can measure them. Things like "authorial intent" or "it made me feel warm inside" can't be quantified, so even though they might make for a good game, they have no place in criticism.

Here's the thing. None of this can be quantified - not practically. You might be able to come up with a strong, quantifiable definition of complexity - there have been several in this very thread! - but they're impractical to apply to actual games, growing more impractical the more closely you define them to "meaningful complexity", which smells suspiciously like "a number identifying how good your game is".

Which is of course what you're looking for, but I'd be shocked if this is a holy grail you uncovered.

So if we don't have any fundamental, objective basis for criticism, where do we go? Embrace subjectivity - write about how much you enjoy a game, or don't enjoy a game, and why. Act as a conduit for the experience of the game, if that doesn't sound too pretentious. (It does, but I'm leaving it in so you can mock me for it.) It's the role of the critic to clearly express what they enjoyed and didn't while playing, and it's the role of the reader to find critics whose tastes closely match their own, whose recommendations they can trust.

Certainly this isn't an "ideal" scheme - some kind of metric that would allow any critic to rate any game "objectively", in such a way that any reader could get advantage out of their criticism - that'd be more useful, because then any reader could read a review from any critic and need worry only about their writing skills, not their taste. But as I've said earlier, no such thing exists - there is no universal metric for game quality. Complexity in particular ranges from irrelevant (for the more mathematical definitions - decision trees...) to circular ("meaningful complexity" - which, again, is very very close to "how good is the game?" Trying to find game quality by trying to find game quality...)

None of what I'm saying here is revolutionary - that's the funny thing. Basically all of this is common knowledge. But re-examining basic assumptions is good from time to time, even if you don't end up altering them...

...Incision, your post is quite a bit longer, and I'm very tired, so I hope you don't mind if I reply to it tomorrow. For now, this should give you something to dissect.

[P Diddy]

p diddy, have you played some of cactus's more gamelike games? like clean asia, for instance. or burn the trash. you'll probably enjoy those

vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzvURmXlTaE

clean asia in particular is notable in that it's probably the game that made cactus "famous" in the indie scene

Cactus has an amazing style; it's very unique to him. Kind of like how Tim Burton's style is easily recognizable (we don't need to see the credits to know who directed the work), and I think that's a true testament to how talented Cactus is as an artist.

But as a game-maker? I don't really know. I only played a few of his games. I never played Clean Asia, but it does look like it's all form and no function. Like for instance, I noticed that the avatar passes through the walls, I'm sure there's a reason for that, but it looks like it was done that way because it looks cool and not because it adds to the challenge.

But I can't go further until I play the game. It's definitely more serious as a game then the example I mentioned above.

[Dragonmaw]

Clean Asia is one of the better shmups around.

[William Broom]

Here's the thing. None of this can be quantified - not practically. You might be able to come up with a strong, quantifiable definition of complexity - there have been several in this very thread! - but they're impractical to apply to actual games, growing more impractical the more closely you define them to "meaningful complexity", which smells suspiciously like "a number identifying how good your game is".

Which is of course what you're looking for, but I'd be shocked if this is a holy grail you uncovered.

So if we don't have any fundamental, objective basis for criticism, where do we go? Embrace subjectivity - write about how much you enjoy a game, or don't enjoy a game, and why. Act as a conduit for the experience of the game, if that doesn't sound too pretentious. (It does, but I'm leaving it in so you can mock me for it.) It's the role of the critic to clearly express what they enjoyed and didn't while playing, and it's the role of the reader to find critics whose tastes closely match their own, whose recommendations they can trust.

Yeah, I pretty much agree with all of this and I think it's great.

The other stuff I was saying was just me trying to better understand icycalm's position and digest it into a form that doesn't sound quite so batshit insane.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை]

the "walls" are just background imagery i believe, you can pass through anything in the background (much like you can pass through cloud backgrounds in other shmups) -- the enemy borders you do die from

[Gimym JIMBERT]

I believe if you lose all the bullshit non sense, it's possible (and desirable) to measure complexity in a game on an objective, purposeful scale. I do that to control my design, so I think it's possible.

@eva
You can tell if a fighting game is more complex than another? This seems reasonable, then I want you to comment on sf4 compare to smash bros melee. Take your time and develop why one is more complex than the other.

[C.A. Silbereisen]

The last couple pages have made me realize several things (and also answered my question to Incision). If videogame criticism is all we're talking about, Icycalm's views become a lot more understandable. Basically what he says (and I hope I'm getting this right) is that a critic needs definite criteria to judge works by (well, duh). That he thinks his criteria are the best is only logical, otherwise there'd be no point in even using them. So what remains? A critic who loves complexity, hates art games and gave Spelunky a negative review- big fucking deal.

[Gimym JIMBERT]

Is Pierre Bourdieu Hot to quote or it's bullshit within the standard of this thread?

[Triplefox]

The last couple pages have made me realize several things (and also answered my question to Incision). If videogame criticism is all we're talking about, Icycalm's views become a lot more understandable. Basically what he says (and I hope I'm getting this right) is that a critic needs definite criteria to judge works by (well, duh). That he thinks his criteria are the best is only logical, otherwise there'd be no point in even using them. So what remains? A critic who loves complexity, hates art games and gave Spelunky a negative review- big fucking deal.

Which is why I advocate for inclusive art criticism. If you put interactivity on a pedestal you end up with strange metrics, as icycalm has. If the best game is the most complex game, then "life" is the best game, but it really isn't.