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[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

anarkex, thanks for the question, i'll try to be a bit more clear:

i don't believe there's any contradiction between notgames and games, no. as you mentioned, you can't get rid of goals and rules entirely, i agree with that. but as i mentioned, and as ueda implied, and as you disagreed with, you can still eliminate game-like rules and game-like goals. whether a rule or a goal is "game-like" or not is contextual and has to do with the history of the games industry. for instance, a game over screen and a life bar are game-like, whereas holding someone's hand and looking at a sunset are not game-like, even all of those things are technically goals or rules. so one could say that notgames are games which avoid many of the things that games traditionally do, and as a result often do not feel like video games, even though they are.

another way to put is that in most games, the goal is the primary objective, it's what you spend the most time doing. whereas in games/notgames like seiklus or grow or seasons or windosill, most of the time is just spent playing around / goofing off / exploring, rather than trying to get to the goal. this depends on a player's play style of course; some people can play them like games, others can play them like notgames.

also i'm sorry the article on non-linearity made you nauseous -- i don't really know why an article on thoughts about game design would make anyone nauseous, but i trust you're not lying. if you really do get that sick regarding opinions other than your own, i think that may be the basis of the problem you've had with this thread, namely that you're taking things too seriously. games are for fun, and they can be for many other things, but you're treating it like a life and death situation, as if it's the only thing that matters in the world. i've a friend who gets like that with halo: insult halo and she won't talk to you for days, and will yell in anger and all-caps. i always find that weird though, games are just games, game design ideas are just game design ideas, why should they have that strong of a physical affect on you that you'd feel nauseous and call people vile names in response? is anything really worth all that anger and hatred?

also, ashford, do you seriously consider anarkex your friend just because he agrees with you? is that all that matters to you, whether someone agrees or disagrees? if someone disagrees, then they aren't your friend anymore? i consider you a friend, too. but you seem to be treating this like a war zone, where you'll do anything in order to prove your point. that really isn't the purpose of these forums. the best friend is one who disagrees with you politely, not one who always agrees with you.

[AshfordPride]

Paul, I don't have many friends.  Not on this forum or in real life.  The truth is, I consider this sort of kinship with people on the internet the closest thing I have to genuinely friendship.  Mock me if you must, call me pathetic, but I guess I've just completely retreated into my shell and given up...  I can't respect people who disagree with me.  They're disgusting, worthless obstacles to the truth I'm trying to unveil to you all.  I need all the friends I can muster, all the people who will agree, even by chance, to assist me in this, because Anarkex is actually someone I've known since highschool lol.  

Anywaaaaaaaaaaay...

most of the time is just spent playing around / goofing off / exploring, rather than trying to get to the goal. this depends on a player's play style of course; some people can play them like games, others can play them like notgames.

This can apply to anything, Paul.  Any game that allows you to do this.  Hitman, Fallout, Stalker, GTA come to mind, but what games DONT have the potential to goof off.  Have you ever watched a younger sibling play a video game, where they completely ignore the objective and just sort of jump and move around the world without any concern for how to play the game?  Is that what we're striving for?  Is that something desirable? 

also i'm sorry the article on non-linearity made you nauseous -- i don't really know why an article on thoughts about game design would make anyone nauseous, but i trust you're not lying.

Paul, this shit is getting absolutely infuriating.  And it's not even directed at me!  I can only imagine how Anarkex feels.

[KM]

Paul, I don't have many friends.  Not on this forum or in real life.  The truth is, I consider this sort of kinship with people on the internet the closest thing I have to genuinely friendship.  Mock me if you must, call me pathetic, but I guess I've just completely retreated into my shell and given up...  I can't respect people who disagree with me.  They're disgusting, worthless obstacles to the truth I'm trying to unveil to you all.  I need all the friends I can muster, all the people who will agree, even by chance, to assist me in this, because Anarkex is actually someone I've known since highschool lol. 

Truth veiled in sarcasm and cynicism isn't exactly the best way to get people to empathize with you. Raw, honest truth has a better chance of success. Trust me on that one.

[Anarkex]

Paul what the hell, I haven't called anyone any "vile names". You're exaggerating and attacking a tone that I don't even have. I'm seriously not even mad. What is making you think I'm mad? Don't answer that. The article didn't really make me sick, it's a figure of speech, for crying out loud. And why would you try to turn Ashford on me, anyway? He's the one that made the thread, it's not like he's going to change his mind.

So okay, if the goal is to shoot a person, then it's a game. But if it's to hug a person, it's not a game? What if both actions are accomplished by pulling the right trigger? What if it's not a hug but more of a piledriver? What if the game makes you talk to a person to find out where the dungeon is by pressing A? What if pressing A instead makes you kiss them? What if it makes you rape them?

What if it's not a life bar, but a love bar, and you run out of it by getting turned down by girls? Are H-games notgames? Is Okami a notgame because you paint sometimes? Is it only a notgame when you paint? What if the screen was nothing but icons and life bars? Dude all I'm getting out of this is that games are notgames when they do things that you think that games don't generally do. So was Spacewar!, the first video game, in fact, a notgame? At that time, there were no game conventions, so the first video game was indeed "not a game". So I guess it wasn't the first game then! Where does this start? When does it end?

You've created a word with no definition, that you can stretch and spin to fit everything you want it to be. I guess this is what we've all been waiting for, huh. Some dumb word to claim superiority over the games you don't like, for great justice. You're so sophisticated.

Truth veiled in sarcasm and cynicism isn't exactly the best way to get people to empathize with you. Raw, honest truth has a better chance of success. Trust me on that one.

KM, he's not rallying for empathy, we really are friends from high school. We just talk about games on the internet a lot, jeez, and we happened to go in on this one. Did anyone bother to check my email address in my profile when he was quoting those chatrooms earlier in the thread? Who do you think "punkomix" is, lol.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

didn't you say ueda is full of sh*t, though? that's about as vile as it got in this thread.

i'm not trying to turn ashford on you, again i think you're seeing this as some type of war, with sides, rather than a mutual and cooperative attempt to understand how to better make games. i'm working together with you towards that goal, we don't have opposing goals.

your questions in your second & third paragraphs, it depend on context of course (and as i mentioned). there's a border area of things which can be considered both game-like or notgame-like, depending on context. for instance, grass which primarily serves to hide goodies under it (like in zelda 3) is game-like, grass which primarily serves as something to play in (perhaps to draw patterns in) is notgame-like, but grass in a game can do both purposes at once.

it also largely depends on how the player plays the game rather than the game itself. any game can be played like a notgame, and any notgame can be played like a game, if you try hard enough. it's just that some are easier to play as games, and others easier to play as notgames. for instance, you can speedrun ocarina of time, attempt to maximize efficiency and to beat the game as fast as possible. or you can go through it slowly, watch the sunsets, enjoy how link walks, ride your horse around, etc. -- it's a game that lends itself to both styles of play.

but most games are focused on one style or the other style, and encourage either accomplishment or playful behavior. it's often still possible to go against what the developers intended and play the game in the opposite way. for instance, portal is about as game-like as you can get (very specific set of levels with predefined puzzles) but you can also just play around with the portals and jump through them for fun. when played like that, portal is a notgame, when played "normally", portal is a game.

[AshfordPride]

i'm not trying to turn ashford on you,

Paul, I'm not losing any sleep over it.  Just stop acknowledging tones, and cusses, and all that nonsense.  

your questions in your second & third paragraphs, it depend on context of course (and as i mentioned). there's a border area of things which can be considered both game-like or notgame-like, depending on context. for instance, grass which primarily serves to hide goodies under it (like in zelda 3) is game-like, grass which primarily serves as something to play in (perhaps to draw patterns in) is notgame-like,

Well, okay that's...

but grass in a game can do both purposes at once.

The...  What?  They CAN, I suppose, but it's pretty obvious that any game-like-ish-ion quality overides any sort of nongame-ish-ion-like-ness.  You cut grass, you get a reward which helps in the context of the game.  You make a pattern, this changes nothing in the game but the grass itself.

it also largely depends on how the player plays the game rather than the game itself. any game can be played like a notgame, and any notgame can be played like a game,

http://vectorpark.com/thomas/seasons.html

Just managed to 1CC this, gonna throw up a replay on Youtube later.  I'm pretty satisfied with my final score, although I feel that my use of bombs was overall kind of sloppy.  

it's a game that lends itself to both styles of play.

It does because you say it does.  It's like discussing the rewards of staring at a tool and then valuing them as highly as the actual service the tool provides.  Paul, you're creating mechanics, rules, and overall GAMES that don't exist.

portal is about as game-like as you can get (very specific set of levels with predefined puzzles) but you can also just play around with the portals and jump through them for fun. when played like that, portal is a notgame, when played "normally", portal is a game.

Is there really anything you can do with the portals that wasn't required of you in the main game?

[Anarkex]

This distinction has always existed, Paul. I mean, we've always played games like this. It's the old "playing to win" argument that goes back to like the dawn of the fighting game community. Someone plays as the good character, someone else plays as the cool character who's like mid tier, and they bitch together for hours about who's doing it right. It's kind of beautiful. Also terrible. Ruined Smash Bros for everyone. But I digress.

I guess it goes back to what we agreed on before about aesthetics and mechanics, but you're taking it in a really unnecessary direction. Remember when I said aesthetics and mechanics have an effect on each other? You can't separate the two. There's always going to be some degree of appreciating aesthetics in playing to win, and there's always going to be some learning of mechanics in jerking around and smelling the flowers. Usually I don't really do either, I'm just kind of playing. My point is that there's no such things as notgames. There's games you like, and games you don't. Games I like, and games I don't. Games Michael Samyn doesn't like, and games Michael Samyn made. All of them are just video games, just computer simulations with goals we make up as we go along.

The end result is, as before, that Michael Samyn just made up a word to describe his glitchy, artsy games to make it seem like we shouldn't be comparing them to games WE like. And I really think you're just taking it out of context to dick around with me.

And yeah, yeah I did say Ueda was full of shit, because he said something that was straight up idiotic to make his game seem like something better than what it was. Just like Michael Samyn did. I mean no disrespect to Ueda, though, I'm absolutely sure he's totally cool with some jerk on some message board calling him out on the blatant lie he told Wired in an interview. He also is not here right now and probably can't read this thread. So, seriously, who the crap cares. Nobody is losing sleep here.

[deathtotheweird]

The end result is, as before, that Michael Samyn just made up a word to describe his glitchy, artsy games to make it seem like we shouldn't be comparing them to games WE like. And I really think you're just taking it out of context to dick around with me.

so what? get the fuck over it. move on with your life, please.

[Anarkex]

Go back to bed, Allen.

[Carrie Nation]

It seems like these notgame things might not be so good after all.

Look what they're doing to our happy indie family!

If mommy Anarkex and daddy Allen divorce I get to live with Allen right?

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

@keyser: they aren't really part of the tigsource family yet -- note the number of their posts (both level 0). they just joined the forums

@anarkex: i'm not sure why you believe that the function of something always is more important than the experience of something? could you elaborate? if that were true, there wouldn't be so many people buying macs, since functionally they're overpriced, with the only real advantage in aesthetics and usability rather than power/cost ratio.

another comparison is clothes: as tools, most clothes are the same, but most people when shopping don't tend to go for the most functional clothes, the ones that keep them the most warm or the clothes that are the most durable, but rather the most aesthetically pleasing clothes, the ones they like the style of the most.

so i think there are plenty of realms where people value the sensory experience of something more than its function, and i don't see why games can't work that way too. *especially* considering that the primary purpose of games is entertainment, as things to be experienced, not to function as a useful tool for anything. i'd expect that people would care about the experience more than the function for things which are just done for entertainment.

[Derek]

I feel like ToT's ideas would translate a lot better if they had more resources or if you could play their games with a Kinect... or better yet, a Holodeck. A lot of their games have pretty clunky controls and I can't imagine that that's purposeful.

Anyone remember Strange Days? That part where the businessman is wearing a headset and gets to feel what it's like to be a teenage girl in the shower?

Okay, weird analogy. But you know, I think it would be quite compelling to be an old lady in a cemetary if the interface allowed me to really feel like I was one. But just holding the up arrow doesn't convey that very well.

I suspect when the technology is good enough we'll see many simulations like that and it'll be really cool. Who knows what we'll call them. But in the meantime, keyboards and standard controllers seem best suited to regular old games.

"Time you enjoy wasting was not wasted."

[Ixis]

*walks in wanting to say something about games as art and non-games*

 

 

*walks out awkwardly*

[Jonas Kyratzes]

But the term "notgames" is not meant to imply a different type of gameplay, or at least not only: it's also meant to imply

• for adults
• everything else is for children
• serious
• everything else is not serious
• artistic
• everything else is "just games"

And that's where it gets offensive, and utterly destructive. So I repeat: if TotT were talking only about the games they would like to create, or how we can all expand our horizons, no-one would mind. That they feel the necessity to use their logically flawed ideology to declare everyone else worthless is less than acceptable.

[Derek]

Honestly, even within the niche areas of gaming that these guys inhabit they are marginalized, so it's not really worth getting too upset about it.

It's funny, though... ToT, Auntie Pixelante, icycalm... each of them represents a polar point of view about what makes games worthwhile, and they ridicule and put down one another (directly and indirectly) all the time. They're so different and yet similar in that regard.

It's pretty hard not to find at least one of those three disagreeable at some point, just because their personalities are so strong, but really, if you can just not be offended when they bash something you like, I've found that you can learn a lot about games from 'em. I have a lot of respect for the passion and energy they put into thinking about games.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

But the term "notgames" is not meant to imply a different type of gameplay, or at least not only: it's also meant to imply

• for adults
• everything else is for children
• serious
• everything else is not serious
• artistic
• everything else is "just games"

And that's where it gets offensive, and utterly destructive. So I repeat: if TotT were talking only about the games they would like to create, or how we can all expand our horizons, no-one would mind. That they feel the necessity to use their logically flawed ideology to declare everyone else worthless is less than acceptable.

i still feel as if this is a far-fetched overstatement of their position, almost a caricature of them; e.g. they've repeatedly pointed out games they've liked and what they like about those games, so they don't hate all games or all parts of games.

it just strikes me as too defensive to get upset about what they actually have said (rather than what people are claiming they have said).

here's an analogy: let's say someone says 'comics are for kids, they're mostly about superheroes'. that's a largely true statement, even though there are comics that aren't for kids and aren't about superheroes. but someone who was really into comics would go ballistic if he sees statements like that, due to defensiveness.

gamers are the same way when you say something that, to non-gamers, is an obvious truth: that games are mostly for kids and mostly about adolescent male power fantasies. they get terribly defensive about things like that, even though it's true about most games.

i think you're right that it's a good idea to qualify such statements as saying that they apply to most games rather than all games, and ToT often doesn't do that: they say 'games are x' rather than 'most games are x', but if you mentally replace 'games' with 'most games', what they are saying isn't anything worth getting offended by. they aren't talking about the exceptions, or saying there are no exceptions.

[Gnarf]

I feel like ToT's ideas would translate a lot better if they had more resources or if you could play their games with a Kinect... or better yet, a Holodeck. A lot of their games have pretty clunky controls and I can't imagine that that's purposeful.

I too would blame the tools of their trade. But that's really just because of the implication you get when you couple it with that saying about who it is that blames his tools. Bam and zing. Oh-ho-ho.

Okay, weird analogy. But you know, I think it would be quite compelling to be an old lady in a cemetary if the interface allowed me to really feel like I was one. But just holding the up arrow doesn't convey that very well.

More compelling than being a WWII soldier, if the interface allowed you to really feel like you was one? That's pretty compelling even now.

Oh, I dunno. Maybe pretending to do mundane and everyday things is less compelling, not because the current technology just cannot do mundane and everyday things justice, but because mundane and everyday things are less compelling.

Plus it's not just competing with pretend warfare and such, but also with slowly walking through a graveyard for real.

[Nate Kling]

Okay, weird analogy. But you know, I think it would be quite compelling to be an old lady in a cemetary if the interface allowed me to really feel like I was one. But just holding the up arrow doesn't convey that very well.

More compelling than being a WWII soldier, if the interface allowed you to really feel like you was one? That's pretty compelling even now.

Oh, I dunno. Maybe pretending to do mundane and everyday things is less compelling, not because the current technology just cannot do mundane and everyday things justice, but because mundane and everyday things are less compelling.

Plus it's not just competing with pretend warfare and such, but also with slowly walking through a graveyard for real.

Okay so you have no interest in experiencing things that maybe slower or more contemplative than being a WWII soldier. That's fine but that's why you will never like any ToT game.  It's obvious that you think their games are boring.  They might think the games you like are boring, what is there to be mad about?

  Also, having the experience of actually being a soldier at war is ABSOLUTELY different than playing one in a video game fantasy world.  Video games about war are pretty much a constructed lie in the way they let you experience them.  I  think having a more accurate experience of a soldier would not be "fun" in the way you seem to like your video games to be.

[gunmaggot]

Ok, I just read the presentation and it was awful so I guess I agree with AshfordPride or something?

[Christian Knudsen]

You know who ToT should team up with to engineer/examine the interfaces that will allow players to truly experience their games? The porn industry. Seriously. The idea behind virtual reality seemed to die in the late 90's with regards to mainstream video games, but they appear to be pretty much alive and kicking in the laboratories of the porn industry. Kinect and Move and the other gesture based interfaces in development for the mainstream gaming industry don't provide the physical feedback that you need to have a truly convincing virtual experience within a game (as far as I know!).