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[substance]

Dude, just link the goddamn icycalm article that makes your point instead of trying to make it yourself.

That would imply that icycalm has already written (or thought about, for that matter, but I don't doubt it) an essay about the topic I eventually intend to discuss.

printing them is safer and more valid than leaving them on the internet.

Safer is debatable but valid in this sentence is complete nonsense, I'm afraid.

[Zaratustra]

uh is icycalm trying to advise jonathan blow how to make a "masterpiece game that sells"

next he might try advising justin bieber on how to make popular youtube videos

[Hangedman]

Indeed, someone who has done nothing at all, but just sat there pondering the entire time that icycalm has spent reviewing the disgusting monstrosities some of you have been creating, would be the one who has closed the distance.

Aww, and you were doing so well. Oh well. Another body on the heap.

[PlayMeTape]

@Derek
All I heard was "SWOOOOSH". I get your points but at the same time I find it frustrating that he doesn't seem to realize that not every game will cater to his specific taste. I would hate Braid if you had to restore your "power" by killing enemies in impressive ways. He claims that Braid doesn't feature any signs of good game design but in my opinion his suggestions are some of the most simplistic and least clever ways a designer can improve his or her game. Sure, sometimes they fit but when I see those examples implemented in games I often feel they're just added because the developer can't come up with an interesting way to either increase the challenge or introduce more depth to the gameplay.

In one forum thread I saw him accusing someone of not being good at bullet hell games or whatever. He continued on to accuse that someone of not playing the game as the designer intended and that's when I (personally) felt like he does not understand design AT ALL. People might not agree with me on this but I would never suggest that players have to follow the developers "rules" or restrictions.

This became even more ironic once I remembered how some of those great additions (according to Icycalm) to various genres were invented by mistake when players learned to abuse faulty systems (like combos in fighting games).

[substance]

Another body on the heap.

[shig]

not everybody want uber macho anime, I like them but not there is only that.

And then you guys complain about icy putting words on people's mouths or going off on tangents or missing the point of what you said because he was too angry or whatever.

Also, I hate reading your posts, man. Are you not a native english speaker?

[Chris Whitman]

It's quite amusing how often this false assertion is repeated. It's derived from the typical "You don't like that game? Why don't you make a better one yourself!" mentality present in your typical gamespot/IGN/etc. banter.

I think you're misunderstanding that. In general, experience really is the best teacher. There're things that don't seem to be clear to this guy that even hobbyists seem pretty familiar with.

[Derek]

Dude, just link the goddamn icycalm article that makes your point instead of trying to make it yourself.

That would imply that icycalm has already written (or thought about, for that matter, but I don't doubt it) an essay about the topic I eventually intend to discuss.

Question: is this topic and the discussion thereof going to blow the lid off of the elaborate conspiracy put in place by the indie power monopoly to brainwash the public into buying screensavers? If so, please PM me because I will offer you an exorbitant amount of Nazi indie gold to keep quiet.

Uh, not because such a conspiracy exists, of course... but because I'm afraid you might make a fool of yourself and I care about you.

[substance]

I only wish it was as exciting as that. Then I would have already bothered writing about it instead of procrastinating here...

[Breadcultist]

@Paul

Each genre (in videogames, unlike movies) is defined by its mechanics.

Here's how I derive this. I'm starting with tradition, namely the fact that we traditionally recognise platformer, shooter, roguelike, etc. as genres. These examples are defined mechanically. 2D platformers are about controlling a character from side-view, jumping or clambering through obstacle courses. The skin the games wear is orthogonal to the genre. A platformer doesn't have to be full of bright colours and animals, for example. It could be about a middle-aged dude working on the Manhattan Project. As long as he's jumping/climbing and all that.

Now, some people come along and introduce supposedly new genres to our established collection. We can compare and contrast these to the old ones. What makes a 'social commentary' game? Easy, that it deliberately promulgates ideas about real world stuff. That doesn't depend on any specific mechanical constraints. I could use a text adventure to protest a war, or a match-three game to promote vegetarianism. Same for symbolism.

With exploration, well, that's a bit different. Exploration isn't new. It's always been part of games since they invented scrolling. Or before then, in text adventures? It's just a regular part of games. I'd call Knytt a puzzle-platformer; the world you explore is a maze, which is a type of puzzle.

Here's another modern-ish new fake genre: survival horror. Survival is just a theme, and so is horror. They're basically action-adventure games. But wait, you could group them together as a 3D action-adventure sub-genre, I suppose. One defined by the added mechanical constraints of fixed camera angles, bad controls, and miserly provision of ammunition.

"tower defense, hidden object game, rhythm game, stealth game"
Those are all proper genres or sub-genres. Because they're defined in terms of mechanics, what the player does, rules, y'know. Not by a commonality in story, theme, stylisation, etc.

tower defense: subgenre of real-time strategy that concentrates on defense rather than offense, with some other mechanical conventions like set waves of incoming attackers. Could be sci-fi, mediaeval, whatever.

hidden object game: simplified sub-genre of adventure games, I think. Not sure if I've played any.

rhythm game: a kind of (surprise!) action game. They most primitive kind. All action games are about pressing buttons at the precise time. Rhythm action games are action games where the correct sequence of button presses is more pre-fabricated, and directly communicated to the player. And they're played to a musical tempo, and the whole thing often simulates the playing of music. That'd be the common theme.

stealth game: a type of action game. But I think it could also apply to a few distinct sub-genres of FPS, 3D 3rd person action, 2D platform, turn-based (so, not action) strategy games.

[posting without reading 19 other replies, go me]

[Paul Eres]

there seems to be a nietzsche quote for everything

"You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist." - nietzsche, about icycalm

"We often refuse to accept an idea merely because the tone of voice in which it has been expressed is unsympathetic to us." - nietzsche, about tigsource

*

@breadcultist

how would you explain the mechanics of

a) puzzle games

b) text adventure games

because to me those seem to be not defined by their core mechanics, but by other factors. for instance, puzzle games often have vastly different mechanics, but all share the idea of solving puzzles in some form. tetris's mechanics are utterly unlike the mechanics of minesweeper, or brain training, or lemmings, or the adventures of lolo, yet all are considered 'puzzle games'.

[substance]

In general, experience really is the best teacher.

Experience can indeed be one of the best teachers but even then, the student must have the capacity to learn from it. Quite often, they will be misled by their previous experiences and poor intuition.

As an example, consider the use of @username on this forum. Experience from twitter would teach certain people that this is an acceptable method of directing attention at specific people, rather than using the quote facility which creates a logical progression of the discussion. For the wise however, they would avoid using twitter at all, let alone this convention which is hard to spot on forum software not designed to highlight it and makes it difficult to follow what is being said.

[Udderdude]

HOLY FUCKING SHIT POSTING IN AN ICYCALM THREAD

I think this is a good time to remind everyone that Icycalm is pretty much batshit insane, as demonstrated by the following :

http://rydia.net/udder/!crap/lolMax/lolMax4.txt
http://rydia.net/udder/!crap/lolMax/lolMax5.txt

With that being said, there is still some of derp-worthy stuff being posted here.

People might not agree with me on this but I would never suggest that players have to follow the developers "rules" or restrictions.

By playing a game you are implictly agreeing to follow the rules of that game.  To do anything otherwise is cheating.  If the game can be played "The wrong way", then the developer just didn't design the rules well enough.

I will poke at some more stuff here later.  Hi. :3

[jwk5]

IcyCalm's greatest feat is where others struggle to make a name for themselves with creative games, artwork, music, financial success, etc., etc. he succeeds merely by talking out his ass. IcyCalm plays on people's anger strings like he's playing on a violin and he's got a 42 page forum thread full of people dancing to his tune. So on that end I have to give him credit, he's pretty good at what he does. It is a shame he doesn't seem to be much good at anything else...

People might not agree with me on this but I would never suggest that players have to follow the developers "rules" or restrictions.

By playing a game you are implictly agreeing to follow the rules of that game.  To do anything otherwise is cheating.  If the game can be played "The wrong way", then the developer just didn't design the rules well enough.

That would be assuming video games were meant to be played exactly like board games or other games, which they are not (and in fact many games have built in "cheat" codes). Video games are a whole other beast and the "rules" aren't so much actual rules as they are guidelines. If you can find ways to bypass or subvert the rules the designers have built in you are not really cheating so much as finding new ways to play. In multi-player games it is pretty annoying but still not necessarily cheating (take Mavel vs Capcom 2 for instance, several characters have infinite attack or combo loops but anyone can learn to pull them off so they are not considered cheating they have become a legitimate game play tactic). The developers will often patch out things they consider "cheating" (which is usually something that is destructive to the game play, such as "aim bots" in FPS). I don't think it is necessarily a bad thing to leave room for the player to find creative ways to work around your designs, sometimes it can make the game even funner (so long as it doesn't outright cripple the game play).

[Dragonmaw]

all bullshit aside, jhonatan mak's picture and quote are hilarious

isn't the wisest man supposed to be the one who is aware of the limits of their knowledge?

Yes, but that doesn't matter. The wisest man would also be capable of seeing how much everyone else is below him. A man so wise would definitely be aware that he is a genius.

icy's attitude is definitely fitting for someone as intelligent as he claims to be. But IS he a genius? Fucked if I know.

There is actually a direct correlation between intelligence/modesty. The more intelligent and/or skilled you are at a task, the more modest and/or self-conscious you tend to be about it. The less skilled or intelligent, the more confident you are. There was actually a scientific study on it that I'm looking for the link to. There's also the factoid that creative and intelligent people (which, IMO, are one and the same once you reach a certain point) have a much, much higher incidence of certain mental illnesses: bipolar disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, borderline personality disorder, etc.

Intelligent people are usually the ones not running around screaming at people how smart they are. They are usually the people sitting quietly in the background, living their life outside of your notice until they say/do something profound.

Each genre (in videogames, unlike movies) is defined by its mechanics.

This is both true and not true. In the same sense that genres of music can be defined by content (chord progression, instrumentation, etc) as well as theme (topics covered, general feel), so can videogames.

For example, space rock (my fav, mm mm) is a genre with a nebulous definition that straddles the line between content (psychedelic) and theme (SPACE!!!).

Game genres can generally be defined according to their mechanics, yes, but there are exceptions to this rule where theme must be incorporated as well. You mention survival horror, and there are games that are part of that genre which do not adhere to the classic "rules" (fixed camera angles, limited ammunition, high risk of death, complex puzzles). For example, Resident Evil 4 and Dead Space (same game amirite [lawl]) are both over-the-shoulder, give you plenty of ammunition, have a low risk of death, and far less complex puzzles. But thematically they are identical to your average survival horror game.