Players vs Spectators

What makes a game successful and popular? It is the players? Or the spectators? When the same question is applied to televised sports, the spectators generate the most revenue and the most interest. But video games have almost always had a larger player base than a spectator base. This hasn't been a problem for decades, but with the rapidly growing strive to reach televised esport status, the need for more spectators is clear.

Games like Quake 3, Starcraft, Counterstrike, Street Fighter, DOTA have all been televised before, and largely commentated and spectated, yet a controversial topic was brought forward by a Korean community member recently: Starcraft was the only sport to draw a significant number of spectators who have barely played the game, while all others have spectators who have at least played it at an amateur level. He believed that this characteristic distinguished Starcraft as a genuine 'sport'.

While his stance is still heavily contested, games striving to achieve tournament and esport recognition should place heavy consideration into making the game fun for spectators, and not just the players. Even in real sports, the respective associations consider and apply rule changes to make the game more exciting for fans to watch, even if it is as the expense of the players. Baseball had different bats approved to increase the rate of homeruns to entice more watchers. Hockey changed passing rules to quicken puck turnarounds and increase frequency of scoring. After all, for these games built primarily around competitive play, it is the fans that will bring in revenue, and the more people who are interested, the more pros will want to pick it up.

That isn't to say any casual drivel can be accepted as a tournament game as long as it is easy to watch. It must be largely recognized to be a deep game requiring mastery and training. But the gameplay should be easy to comprehend for new watchers, smooth to follow for cameramen, quick to tell who's winning and why, fast paced enough to stay interested, long enough to be satisfying, and short enough to not get bored.

If you make a game for tournaments, think about the spectators. I'm looking at you MOBA.

The small details should be missed.

Whenever I think back to previous immersive gaming experiences, the main factor that I find neglected are the small details. Perhaps it's something comedic that's happening in the background. Or a faint, passing sound in the distance. Or the tiny gouges in the wall that are omens for a greater nemesis. Or the hint dropping for a masterminded scheme in shadows. These elements, while small, synergize with primary gameplay and setting to accentuate a brilliant game.

Games in the 90's started to have the technology and capacity to harness and manifest these masterful details, and while not every game that did this were financially successful, they all became memorable experiences and left unforgettable legacies. The progression and modernization of gaming has not discarded these fine touches, and the resurgence of success of heavy-immersion games with significant atmosphere has only strengthened this philosophy.

Yet, something is lacking. Notably so. Almost to the extent of crippling the entire effort of the responsible developers. Only recently did I come to pinpoint what the problem was: the developers didn't want us to miss the details. They tried too hard to make sure players would notice and experience every fine detail. They would move to camera and zoom in on exactly what they wanted us to see. They would stop the gameplay so that players could hear that faint squeaking. They would make characters audibly or visually respond to the details. Protagonists would commentate on the fine detail he noticed, just in case the player missed it.

The producers find this reasonable, and I understand. If they paid a developer to add in content, this content better directly attribute to raising the game's score and quality. Leaving it to the chance of whether or not the player was perceptive enough to receive it is a bad gamble with an investment.

But when the extras are forced into the game, shoved into the players face, you don't feel in control. You don't feel the need to be perceptive. You don't feel frightened or intimidated. You don't feel like there's anything you may have missed, and you don't want to play again. Every time I reread a book or rewatch a movie, there are fine details that I glanced over at first, but then come to appreciate on subsequent views. If immersion is crucial, then part of that immersion is to be believable. And in a believable situation, you will miss some details, and you'll only be able to see everything you should if you let your imagination run away with it. The mind and imagination are the strongest weapons a developer can harness against us. With them, they can make us see what isn't there. Or believe things that were never true. Or shock us when we are the ones revealing the untold truth to ourselves. The only way to do that, is to let our minds be free, and stop guiding us with painfully exposed and over-elaborated details. We'll become more perceptive, allowing our minds to wander into the depths of the game.

"One new idea a year..."

So there's a game company out there that has been shamelessly and blatantly copying popular game concepts games for their own sale and distribution. Bet you can't guess what country this developer belongs to. China? South Korea? Russia?

It's France.
Wait what? Yep! A French company, Gameloft, has been replicating popular PC/console titles on mobile devices, such as Android and iPhone. It's copied Gran Turismo (GT), Midnight Club (Asphalt), World of Warcraft (Order and Chaos Online), Halo (NOVA), Assassins Creed (they ported AC, but they also released Backstab), Sunset Riders (Cowboys and Aliens), Uncharted (Shadow Guardian), God of War (Hero of Sparta), GTA4 (Gangsta: Miami Vindication), and Starcraft (Starfront). And that's just for Android!

Hard to believe that they've cloned some of these games on the phone... But just look: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.gameloft.android.ANMP.GloftMMHM

That's nearly 1:1 identical to WoW. How they don't have lawsuits crash onto their ass like a ton of bricks, I don't know. Of course, we've seen shameless game copying before, so why would I talk about it now?

Well, there have been many before me to call Gameloft a copycat, and their CEO has actually responded.

"The video game industry has always played around a limited number of themes. There is maybe one new idea a year. If a type of game is not available, then you should make it. The damaging thing is if you do a bad expression of a good idea."
- Michel Guillemot

Bold statement, buddy. Even if Guillemot's claim of a singular unique idea per year was true, that is not a flattering situation. Nor is it an excuse. It makes us wonder what is happening in the game industry that is causing this stagnation of ideas. Could it be in part that upper management like Guillemot himself is too focused on mimicking popular titles rather than reaching out with daring concepts, leading game designers to hesitate when proposing and promoting new game concepts like back in the gaming golden age of the late 80's and 90's? Could it be that Guillemot is right about the lack of ideas, but yet ironically he is the plague that is pervading it?

Guillemot is a disgusting worm. He's not just copying to make a quick buck like some Asian game developers do... But he doesn't even think it's copying or setting back the development of the industry and propagating more development studios with FEWER original ideas. In fact, his narcissism allows him to believe that he's doing us a favor by paying homage to leading titles. You have to be pretty twisted to say that.

There will always be fools who guide the blind.

There are many trends in gaming in the new decade: the resurgence of the console era, albeit somewhat different than in the late 80's; developers becoming more conservative and restrictive; the catering and spoonfeeding to a more casual crowd; the over-saturation of worthless DLC; the lack of real support and updates in an effort to perfect released games. But for now, I'll elaborate on a trend, nay, an illness that pervades the industry to the point of becoming commonplace and acceptable. Oh wait, that goes for everything above... What about bringing inevitable oblivion? Nope, that too. Forget it, let's move on and talk about the downfall of FORUM SUPPORT.

It used to be that online forums were a great place to ask others for help on similar software or hardware. It was a communal place to share ideas, solutions and experiences. Even the most eccentric of users could post their strange setups and discuss their troubleshooting methods. Even if lost in a sea of other more popular posts, one day, his journal will become the foundation of established how-to-guide sticky thread.

But alas, those days are no more. The modern forum consists of relentless torrents of needlessly defensive fanboys, overeager to defend their latest possession of novelty, despite their believed attacker having never spoken a word of negative criticism. Asking if others have tried to resolution-hack, modify game files, remove headbob or mouse acceleration, or adjust field of vision or depth of field results in your first five responses ranging from "I don't hav dis problem. Why r u complaining about it?" to "Why would you want to change that?" Welcome to the counteractive gaming generation. Instead of trying to search for a solution, people instead pretend that there was no problem to start with, and try to convince others the same. Unfortunately, this method, because of it's overwhelming popularity successfully converts more and more gamers. Ultimately, due to peer pressure, we'll all be suckered into believing that games are perfect and any problems are inherent to ourselves.

I recall having sought advice from the internet for almost every game I've played, but it has been almost entirely the past few years when the internet stopped helping me with my problems. When I queried the mouse acceleration problems in Dead Space 2, I found only a few posts of gamers still grasping for hope of online help. They were barraged by comments of others who BELIEVED they never experienced the issue, and then told to suck it up and deal with it. Or when I looked up how awkward the combat and cover was in Mass Effect 1, a game based on the normally-smooth and easily modifiable UT engine, I also received no help. Just 5 years ago, I'd have gotten a set of console commands in a flash to modify whatever I wanted. If not that, then at least a consolidated community voice asking for a standard of quality to be delivered.

What's appalling is the level that this self-degrading stupidity has developed. Case in point: a reply to a thread created to address FOV and motion sickness issues with Minecraft.

I don't understand why people get motion sickness from games.

I don't understand why people get motion sickness.

Come to think of it, I don't know what people mean by vertigo.

Crazy heights and movement have never bothered me... Well, you know, unless there weren't something to keep me from falling.

Source

Wow. Well I don't understand why people don't understand things. I guess that means it is nonsensical and thus, impossible for people not to understand, right? Fucking retard. How does his lack of understanding contribute ANYTHING to the thread, other than to derail another man's plight and curb common interest into attacking the original poster's vulnerabilities? Worse, Minecraft is an independently developed game, and supports many mods, so the game is quite customizable, even as an understatement. For this sort of narrow-minded egocentricism to even be not immediate grounds for disbarment is insulting. Here's a Dead Space 2 thread, where I criticized some of these dumbasses for their misinformation. Same sort of deal. Only a minority realise the problem, while others blindly tout their false beliefs.

This sort of limited perspective cripples the industry, causing the developers to cut corners, knowing that the lobotomized fanbase will serve as a self-defensive mechanism to defend the games from any shortcomings of the developers. Thus, they become even more careless, leading to further infection of gamers with this false belief. Imagine if I walked into a wine-enthusiasts fair and told them that everything there was amazing and without even the slightest flaw or possibility of improvement. I'd be wrong, but if there were enough voices like mine, we'd be able to pressure everyone else into succumbing to this new lowered standard. We'd set back development and progress for decades with terribly flawed opinions.

Alas, these people are fools, and in the perfect world, they'd be obliterated, but unfortunately, we'll have to settle with ignoring their short-sighted pacification while we are consciously dragged into the ruin of gaming.

Item customization makes everything better.

A while ago, I played the latest Red Faction game, Armageddon, but found it to not be as fun as its predecessor, RF: Guerrilla. At first, I couldn't quite understand why. It was changed from an open world, quest/exploration/mini-challenge experience to a linear path one, yet I wasn't really too disappointed in that. I've had a lot of fun playing games in that category as well, such as Dead Space. The plot was rather plain, but not unexpected. The characters were thin, but generally had little representation anyway. The mechanics and weapons were neat enough and thoroughly utilized... So it took me a while to realise why I couldn't come to love the game.

RFA lacks customization. It only lets you have 4 weapons at a time like RFG, which was fine, but you can't customize your guns and upgrade them like you could before. I think for me, an easy seller in games is the ability to customize your guns like a talent tree. I agree that not every game has to be like an RPG with stats and skills, but I think weapon customization makes a lot of sense. It means you can put your upgrades and money towards an immediate and visibly effective cause, and you can easily define how your character plays without locking yourself in to a permanent character, as you can just swap weapons.

Meaningful customization (non aesthetic) over your items is great since it puts you in control, and any game where you maximize your control and are rewarded by utilizing it against your enemies becomes great. Perhaps it triggers the release of endomorphins or some shit, but it is goddamn sacred as an aspect of gaming.