From: carleton@tecsun1.etl.army.mil (Daniel Carleton)
Newsgroups: rec.games.video.arcade
Subject: Re: Super PlayChoice
Date: 15 Sep 92 00:13:37 GMT
Organization: U.S. Army Topographic Engineering Center, Ft. Belvoir, VA.

exuhag@exu.ericsson.se (James Hague) writes:

>Ari Glaizel writes:
>>
>>   In Nintendo's defense though (in my opinion) how much room is there
>>left for originality in the marketplace???? Everyone talks about how
>>ORIGINAL the first video games were (early 80's). Well OF COURSE they
>>were original, there was nothing to compare them against. Right now
>>we're in a market where all the basic genres of video games have been
>>defined. Now, the game developers are operating within these
>>boundaries.

>When people talk about the early '80s games being better, it is because
>those games were _playable_ in the traditional gaming sense.  They required
>skill.  They created a universe which operated according to consistent
>rules, not just pre-determined patterns and tricks.  When you were a kid
>did you ever just make up games?  I mean stuff like weird variations of
>tag, sending Matchbox cars down the local playground slide to see how
>far they would go, or making up a simulated baseball league based around
>you hitting balls Fungo-style?  Simple, yes, but enough variation and
>unpredictability to keep kids entertained for a long while.

>Now constrast this with word searches or jigsaw puzzles or pen and paper
>mazes or one of those "you choose what to do next" books with various
>endings.  Both are valid forms of entertainment, but I think most people
>can see the difference.  If basketball were simply a matter of learning
>tricks and finding the preset way of winning, then I don't think that
>sport would hold my interest any more.  I don't like having my entertainment
>spoon-fed to me.

>Now the originality thing:  you are completely bonkers if you think that
>the three current video game genres are IT.  Sure, and all movies are about
>scantily clad teenage girls getting hacked up at a slumber party, angst
>ridden young men who study martial arts in a secluded mountain retreat so they
>can avenge their fathers' death, and evil scientists with facial deformities
>who have concoted brilliant plans to rule the world.  An ad I saw for the
>home Addam's Family game shows how hilarously stagnant things have become.
>The plot description started with "Morticia has been kidnapped and it is
>up to you to rescue her..."   AAARRRRGGGGHHHHH!!!!!!

	Part of the issue is that many video games fuse elements of literature
and gaming.  Side-view games of human charachters have the qualities of changing
'sets' and a profile view of the main charachter.  This has more cinematic
appeal than top-view games like 'Robotron' or 'Smash TV'.  With the addtion
of movie-like intermission like "Ninja Gaiden" you get a hybrid of passive
and active entertainment.  Bosses, I believe, have become prevalent because
all stories need their climactic moments.  Golden Axe even shows the charachters
aall running out of a theater at the end of the arcade game, and in the home
version shows all charachters as the 'Cast'.  This doesn't appeal to everyone,
but I suppose it appeals to enough people to work.  There are still pure games
that trade on gameplay rather than drama,  and some that have drama without
making gameplay mundane.  Street Fighter II has plot elements, but the gameplay
is definitely the main thing.  As for 'Drama' videogames, they do need more
original plots...
Newsgroups: rec.games.video.arcade