Aug
21

No Leg to Stand on

14 Comments

Scenario: You think your game is fun. You enjoy the world, the mechanics and everything about it makes you cream in your shorts every night. I don’t find your game as fun as you do, but I do find some other game more enjoyable.

What’s the outcome of this scenario:
a) You’re game has now become less fun.
b) You’re experience is now a dull, former shell of itself.
c) My game is now “better” than yours.
d) Nothing changes

I’ll leave that with you a sec…

…

/musac

…

If I do not have fun with a game, or as much fun as you do, you have no…ABSOLUTELY NO…leg to stand on to question that position. Why? Because none of us have the power to define what fun is to another person.

Now…don’t confuse my arguement with the whole “WAR is the same game we’ve been seeing with different bells and whisltes” thing we’ve all been debating. I’m sure some of you will. Correction, I know some of you will…but this is a subtle side-plot that has been going on here, i.e. that someone not finding your game as fun as you do is somehow an insult to your and the game’s very existence. That somehow, if someone finds another game more fun than the game you find fun, then they must obviously think that game is better than yours. For some reason, more fun = better….and…ummmm….no.

You find your game fun? Fine. Have fun with it. Good journey and all that jazz. But my gawd…it’s amazing the conclusions poeple draw when you say “I think X game is more fun than Y”.

D out.

Posted in Editorial
14 Comments Posted by Darren

14 Responses to "No Leg to Stand on"

  • Hudson says:
    August 21, 2008 at 9:03 am

    I dont think its really that as how Brent came out and attacked the game early on, but lets face it this circle has always been a tad Sony biased. Now that is not a bad thing, I dont hate Sony and I think that DC Universe will kick the crap out of Champions (even though it IS DC but still) and I still that UNTIL WAR I had more fun in EQ2 with its depth than WoW, I just didnt like the combat. I never had a grudge against Sony. But lord the way he came out with the weird stuff he posted.

    And I am sorry but AoC really sucked. However we are talking about video games and this whole argument is dumb and just goes to show how important we all think we really are as bloggers. Who cares.

  • Cyanbane says:
    August 21, 2008 at 9:14 am

    “Having taken part in the variety of game play modes that Warhammer Online offers, I can say with complete confidence that this game might as well have been released 4 years ago as it offers us nothing aside from one standout evolutionary concept, the public quest, that moves the genre forward. ”

    I think a lot of people are debating this with Brent ^^ not the “fun” as your post states. A lot of people are mentioning the fun they are having with it, but I think a lot of the core debates are because of the above.

  • Darren says:
    August 21, 2008 at 9:29 am

    “I dont think its really that as how Brent came out and attacked the game early on, but lets face it this circle has always been a tad Sony biased.”

    It might be…but that’s because SOE let’s us have a relationship with them. Does Blizzard? No. Does Mythic? No. SOE is accessable…the others are not, so of course we’re going to feel closer to them…but I still think they are full of shit sometimes.

    @ Cynbane: I don’t think he’s wrong on that point…honestly.

  • michael, St E says:
    August 21, 2008 at 9:43 am

    I think you’ll find Brent said things like…

    “It isn’t fun.”

    …an absolute statement. And then on and on with the second and third persons:

    “Repetition is decidedly not fun.”
    “Here are some of the un-fun things you’ll get to experience:”
    “It doesn’t really matter how much fun we’re having ”
    “Get that loot at any cost, you can have fun later when you’re playing your Wii.”

    Uses of “I” in the article:

    “I can say with complete confidence”
    “I have no doubt”
    “why am I so hard on [WAR]?”
    “what I mean”
    “I like to call”

    No uses of “me” in the whole article.

    Then then suddenly we’re in the AoC paragraph, and it’s first person pronoun central.

    Have fun hunting for the leg – I think the shark may have it.

  • Relmstein says:
    August 21, 2008 at 9:49 am

    I haven’t played Warhammer yet so I’m reserving my judgement. What makes me mad is that some burned out bloggers think that new MMORPGs should be radically different then previous ones so that it better appeals to the jaded gamer demographic. I made a similar arguement earlier, but should someone who has played FPS games since Doom be able to demand that new ones also include virtual pet raising?

    I don’t really care which game is better out of War, WoW, LOTR, or even classic EQ. The point is that they represent the baseline of what “most” people expect from a MMORPG. I don’t mind if a game tries something completely out of left field like Free Realms, but I don’t think the arguement can be made that these games are inherently better.

  • SmakenDahed says:
    August 21, 2008 at 9:58 am

    Yup, no one can question that you’re not having fun with something, but they can question why. If anything, it gives people insight on things they might not have seen. Of course, that isn’t really what is happening.. people are questioning the fact that you don’t find it fun. heh

    So what set you off WAR? With AoC it was timing or responsiveness, which was good feedback because I couldn’t really identify what turned me off of AoC but that was pretty much it. Aside from the sudden drop in immersion on leaving Tortage – voice overs, where are you?

  • sid67 says:
    August 21, 2008 at 10:25 am

    Your thoughts on the game are fairly reasonable, even if it was a bit of the ?nothing new to see here? variety. Brent offered similar thoughts, but takes it quite a bit further by seemingly attacking on the entire MMO genre. I think you got caught a bit in the Brent backlash. I don?t have an issue with someone calling for more innovation in games like you did, but Brent is commenting that ?we’re no longer grinding mobs, we’re grinding MMOs?. I mean, if the guy is finding MMOs in general that unfun, why is he playing them and why should I respect his opinion about a game that hasn?t even been released?

    As I wrote on my blog, ?I think that?s where Brent is at ? he just watched his eighth hour of Seinfeld and doesn?t really care to watch another sitcom like Friends. Maybe he would enjoy a drama, or maybe he would just rather not watch TV at all. Either way, the last thing he wants to do is watch Friends. [..] So while it?s OK for Brent to describe the burnout he is experiencing, it?s more than a bit unfair to call a game unfun just because he?s tired of playing.? (Serial Ganker)

  • Openedge1 says:
    August 21, 2008 at 12:01 pm

    I tried to like LOTRO – And now I question why everyone likes it
    I tried to like EQ2 – And now I question everyone…

    I love Guild Wars and question why people have not tried it

    I think DDO has potential, and I question why does it not sell well.

    WoW is old hat, WAR looks like WoW, just a few innovations have been added in. Why do people care so much how someone feels?

    I guess I just do not understand what the fuss is.

    I think people get bent out of shape if THEY like something and someone else does not. Like I said, how can anyone like WoW, LOTRO or EQ2 over GW…yet they do.
    But, I guess I am not worried if they don’t…ah well…life goes on.

    Brent seems to have an opinion, and uses his forum to state it. Good for him.
    It is up to everyone else though to get over the idea that opinions are bad.
    Brent may have stated them badly, but hey I know they are an opinion..

    I guess the WAR call should not be WAUGGHHH!!!

    It should be

    WAHHHH!!!!

  • Hudson says:
    August 21, 2008 at 12:28 pm

    @Openedge1

    Well said.

    @Darren

    I think Mythic has been open, I mean in the lastest Chaos Cast look how Paul walked around with Keen and they perused the games on display there. You mean open in terms of game data? I’ll give you the other points, but then again you know a lot of people that have ties with Sony, Keen has some ties with Mythic now. Mythic has always been helpful on the beta boards also.

  • brent says:
    August 21, 2008 at 12:32 pm

    ?Having taken part in the variety of game play modes that Warhammer Online offers, I can say with complete confidence that this game might as well have been released 4 years ago as it offers us nothing aside from one standout evolutionary concept, the public quest, that moves the genre forward. ?

    This is actually the thing that stings the most… and it’s a big part of why I didn’t have fun. If WAR had come out on the same day as WoW, I’d have said, “Damn, we got a battle on out hands here. There’s going to be a lot of blood in the water.” But when it comes out 4 years after EQ2, WoW, Ryzom, EVE – all I could do was stand there staring at the KTR-quest-text and the shoddy PC models saying, “really? this is what we waited for?”

    I shouldn’t have to apologize for not liking a game, but it looks like those of you who are about to (to quote Darren) “cream in your shorts every night” – dudes, cream away, I mean you should feel LUCKY that you have this huge expanse of gaming ahead of you that you will enjoy while I sit here playing SWG and eyeballing the Lineage 2 box thinking “I wish The Agency would release already”.

  • Cyanbane says:
    August 21, 2008 at 1:41 pm

    @B and D, I think the conversation moved to criticizing you for not finding it “fun” where as all I thought was that your above statement was wrong. I look over at that thread now and it has dripped into people calling you carebare which is pretty lame (hence I came over here to Darren’ blog). I don’t think it is wrong for you guys not to have fun with the game, but to say it doesn’t bring anything new to the table after X years of development isn’t correct. There are tons of new aspects to the game that are great (and work for large numbers of people all at the same time!), are the ‘evolutionary’? well probably not. I don’t really know what evolutionary is to be honest, it is pretty much right up there in subjectivity (a word?) as “fun” is.

  • brent says:
    August 21, 2008 at 2:11 pm

    @ Cyanbane
    /agreed, but still thinking there’s not that much new there, sorry.

  • Oakstout says:
    August 21, 2008 at 9:52 pm

    This has got to be the craziest debate I have ever seen.

    THEY DON’T LIKE THE GAME. So what?

    People here have said they don’t like SoE, but you don’t see Brent or Darren getting bent out of shape. I’m sure that at some point, they may give WAR a second chance, but till they sense a change in the force, they’ll probably wait for something else to hit them like a brick. Till then, I think they’ve stated why they don’t see it our way, which are reasonable explainations. They don’t see the Great OZ behind the curtain and honestly that should be ok. We should respect that. They aren’t trying to cram EQ2 down our throats or tell us repeatedly how silly they think we are for liking a game they don’t. Actually I think I’ve read that they respect the fact that we see something they don’t. Lets get this bus moving to the next stop on the MMO line.

  • Snafzg says:
    August 22, 2008 at 2:22 pm

    Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but when they feel the need to prop it up with “evidence” on an open forum, like your blog, they’re pretty much putting theirself out their to be contradicted. That’s the rule of the Internet, folks…

    I look at this whole situation in the same way I look at homosexuality… *silence*

    No seriously, two people of the same sex being together has absolutely no effect no me, so I don’t really care. Have at ‘er boys. But if they come out into a public forum to create a debate about it, they should expect people will come in and speak their mind on the issue.

    Curiously, I haven’t had much experience with SOE, but I find Mythic to be extremely open and accessible to their community. The GM regularly posts on forums for cripes sake. We sent a few emails and were able to interview the creator of the Tome of Knowledge in our podcast without ANY question prepping. Keen got to walk around with Paul Barnett and shoot the shit about various E3 exhibits… and then he got a 1 on 1 with Mark Jacobs. We have another interview lined up for ChaosCast with a famous WAR dev in the near future. The entire Mythic staff has been immeasurably responsive to beta feedback throughout the entire process.

    How much more accessible can you get?

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